Showering In Ideas

Kyle trudged through the hills, wiping his brow with a grin. “Here we are.”

It had been a beautiful day to go take a hike – the sun wasn’t too harsh, the weather perfect. He’d asked Fiona about if something like what he’d needed was nearby, and she’d been right.

Abagail, Kari, and Fiona weren’t far behind. Or rather, Fiona wasn’t far behind, with the others riding on her shoulders.

“Just because I can carry you up the hill doesn’t mean you can’t walk,” Fiona grunted as the two slid off

Abagail grinned. “You looked real eager to do it when you thought Kyle rolled his ankle.”

It was hard to see Fiona’s blush through her red skin, but it was there all the same.

The four had come upon a large lake in the hills near the tall mountain, surrounded on all sides by taller hills and rockfaces.

“My dad liked coming here to swim,” Fiona explained. “Explain what we’re trying to do again?”

Kyle grinned. “We’re going to build an aqueduct,” he said. “It’s going to take water from this lake and bring it downhill to the village.”

Aqueducts were designed to bring water from one place to another. In ancient times, gravity would pull the water from its elevated source down to its destination at a lower point.

“We let it slow down and settle in a reservoir or a tank close to the village. We use the water as it’s coming down to move a wheel that will help charge a battery – the thing I put in the tractor that uses magical energy. The battery powers a pump where the water is settled, where it is then sent through this.”

Kyle held up a copper pipe.

The three women looked at it, curious. Abagail flicked the metal with a gloved hand. “Copper’s a bit expensive. Couldn’t you use something cheaper? Like lead.”

“Not a chance,” explained Kyle. “It might not be so bad if the water’s high in calcium, it would coat the inside of the pipe. But if it isn’t, then the water being pumped will be high in lead – we’d be poisoning people.”

The benefits to running water would be huge. Easier access to water for drinking and cooking and bathing, he could finally take an actual shower…

Indoor plumbing. He could finally have a modern toilet. That would create its own problems when it came to treatment and waste disposal, though.

Abagail had made a point of enchanting the bathroom that had appeared when she moved in to always clean itself – to the point of wiping a person’s business on the throne out of existence. Something that had shocked Fiona when she first arrived.

“Then the water will be pumped back through another pipe, where we’ll treat it, and put it back into the lake.” Kyle smiled. “It’s genius.”

“Perhaps, but that could take quite a while,” Kari pointed out. “A project of this nature could take months, even years.”

Kyle pointed to his ring of power. Abagail pointed to her wand. Fiona pulled out her large hammer.

Kari looked to her own staff, sighing. “Point well taken.”

-----

Having two magic users, an oni, and a princess versed in healing magic weren’t the only resources their project had.

The village had finished working the field for the moment, and with the tractor letting preparing other fields be a less labor-intensive task the men appreciated having something else to do.

Explaining why this was a good idea took a few tries. But with all of the meat they’d gotten to eat recently and the tractor making life easier, they were willing to nod their heads and accept that Kyle just had a good idea worth doing.

----

After a week of work, the familiar sound of water spraying from a shower being turned could be heard in Kyle’s cottage.

Kyle felt the water heat up moments after twisting the knob and grinned. Sometimes it was the smallest of pleasures from his old life he missed. The warmth of a hot shower, the feeling of pressurized water hitting his skin. In a world where he couldn’t have coffee, this was going to help him loads.

He stepped outside and pulled a linen towel off of a clothesline. This was going to be great. Abagail was off doing magic whatever, Fiona was having a second helping of rabbit leg, and he didn’t even know where Kari had gone.

Kyle finally had a moment to himself.

“All that philosophical discussion,” Office Kyle pointed out, “and we still ended up reinventing indoor plumbing and modern water distribution.”

Well, a moment to himselves.

“It’s not like we invented guns,” Real Kyle replied. “These are creature comforts. Things to make people’s lives better.”

Office Kyle rolled his eyes.

Real Kyle shrugged. “Our lives are hard enough. As long as we’re careful with what we introduce, we shouldn’t have to worry about upsetting things.”

“Or upsetting people.” Peasant Kyle rounded on him as Real Kyle started going back inside. “We’ve got a witch whose house we burned down and a childhood friend who thinks we’re going to marry her.”

“Not to mention a Princess to return to a morally questionable Prince,” added Office Kyle.

The cottage was filled with a familiar steam coming from the bathroom. It put a smile on his face. He disrobed and wrapped a towel around his waist. Between all of the weird stuff with his shirts going missing when the amulet of wisdom activated, he was running out of brown tunics.

He’d have to start wearing whatever it was the ladies had bought him soon. And he’d put off looking at it because frankly, he’d never been much of a fashion person. Kyle was a little scared of what might’ve been considered ‘fashionable’ in this world.

Kyle hummed as he went into the bathroom, not noticing that someone else was in there humming as well. He opened the shower door and was shocked to see someone else in there.

Kari was already inside, taking a shower. Thankfully, the steam was so thick all he could see was her face, but –

“GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!”

Kyle rushed out of the bathroom and ended up running headfirst into the front door, knocking himself unconscious.

Kari peeked out from the bathroom, completely embarrassed but staring at the prone and barely decent form of Kyle.

“…That was just like chapter eleven of my book.” She felt herself develop a slight nosebleed.

----

Kyle ended up taking a very cold, very long shower. So long that when he was done and getting dressed in his last brown tunic, Abagail and Fiona had returned.

“You look a bit shook up,” said Abagail. “Everything alright.”

“Mmmmm.”

Fiona tilted her head. “That a yes ‘mmmmm’ or a no ‘mmmm’.”

“Mmmmm.” He walked outside to get some fresh air.

With the door closing behind him, Abagail and Fiona gave each other a look before going back to what they’d been talking about.

“You sure you want to go along with this escort?” Abagail gestured to the silent Kyle outside. “Not going to try to do anything to the Prince?”

Fiona shook her head. “No point. I’m still mad about what happened. But I just got Kyle back in my life. I don’t want to lose him. What about you? That whole thing with your mom?”

Abagail hemmed and hawed on her answer. “He pays well enough. As long as he keeps his word, I’ll have all the money I need to pay for a new house.”

“And then you’ll be on your way?”

“…” Abagail didn’t answer, watching Kyle shuffle off into the middle distance. Even staying around to make sure the peasant didn’t welch on paying her back, she’d been having a lot of fun teasing him. And now that the prospect of getting paid laid on the horizon, she thought she’d be happier.

So why wasn’t she?