“Fine, fine,” Jötz muttered. “Hy go clean up da deck, ja? De best bits I stack in the da middle of da boat so chou can take a looks later.” With that, he head back towards the stern and up the ladder that would bring him near the remains of the pilot house.
Her words left a buzzing in his furry, tufted ears for some reason. Motorhum had been a pretty backwater place, even for a village in the middle of the Wastes. How had she heard about the pirate captain there? It wasn’t like the Jaegers. Everyone knew about Jaegers, he thought with a certain amount of pride. Then again… was Motorhum really that far from whatever ruin they had fallen into? The trip had taken a bit, but then again he and Ivy had to circumnavigate trees, bogs, ponds, boulders, and mutated blue toads along the way. Maybe there was a connection between the two that he was missing?
Jötz put it out of his mind for now. Instead, he tossed what was obviously debris overboard while scourging about for anything that might look remotely useful. He had a pretty good idea for what a Spark might want. Not to mention that he could use some of the panelling from below to cover the more treacherous holes in the deck’s surface. There seemed to be enough material to ensure a bit of safety while leaving her with some to work with. Jötz grinned. “Vell, so long as she don’t blow a hole in da-“
This time it was his own words he froze at. Not so much from the power of them but for how they linked up to words that the Mad Girl had just recently spoken.
"I bet I can get it open… I think you get in the way of my exploding things a lot.”
“Oh she vouldn’t,” he breathed. The monster looked down at the deck beneath his boots and realized that he was standing more or less right above her. If Ivy blew the door open…
Closing his eyes, Jötz realized that yes, yes should would use explosives to open the door… and possibly the whole of the bow in the process and thereby sinking the ship. Did she know enough to curtail the explosion? Did she have the experience to know exactly how far to go and no further? He feared that she didn’t and that soon they would be swimming. So far, Ivy had made some great demonstrations that she knew how to make things go boom. Then again, she hadn’t blown up the engine… yet.
With a heavy sigh he turned and trudged back towards the stairs. Jötz was starting to feel a bit conflicted about all of this. Ivy needed a keeper and he had volunteered for whatever reason. He wanted to trust her, which was an incredibly foolish thing to do with a young Spark regardless of gender! He still wasn’t sure if any of what he had said about not experimenting on him had sunken into her brain, and even as one of the Jaegerkin he was finding her propensity to make things explode just a tad alarming. Yet if he stopped her… it was like scolding a child for wanting a sweet… or a pet seeking attention… or the victim of grisly human experimentation begging for mercy… or a lover expecting a-
He clamped down on that last thought as he reached the bottom of the stairs. Looking down the long hallway to the bow where she working upon the heavy door, he called out to her. “Oy, Ivy! Is you alright? Too big a bang und ve’ll be swimming mit da fishes, chou know!”
Justric Member
STATUS: No longer here. youtube.com/watch?v=RLBo1HJK.. 9 yrs ago- Last Seen: 4 yrs ago
- Old Guild Username: Justric
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James gave Branna a bright smile, part shy and part rueful as he offered, “I’ve never minded looking like a fool. If I am one, I would dearly like to think I’m an honest one.” Another taste of the delightful stew, and the gentleman sighed wistfully. “It is a bit sad though, for in all honesty I doubt I’ll ever see the beast again. How often can something like that happen in a lifetime, I ask you. And if it does appear, I fear I’ll have no recourse but to chase it because I shall not be able to help myself. The sight of that cuny, darting here and there beneath the brush, leading the trail back on itself, jumping right over… Seeing it, I wouldn’t d be able to do ought but try my best to catch it.”
He looked up at his hostess with a queer look in his eye. “And yet, what if I did catch it? What then? The hounds will have killed one of the most… beautiful creatures I have ever laid eyes on, at my command no less… and that thrill would be gone. The game would be over for good. Where is the fun in that, I wonder. I doubt I should ever hunt again, after that.”
“Still,” he offered with smirk, his gloom dispelled, “Be it a faerie, a witch, or a dream, I should thank her! You speak of hope, laughter, and friendship? And sure enough, what is it she had led me to but you?” James laughed loudly then as he thought more about it. “How does one thank a hare, though? It’s an exasperating notion! Somehow a bouquet of flowers would seem more a meal for her than an expression of gratitude, and I doubt any trinket of silver or gold would easily adore her paw! Feh. I tell you, it’s worse than trying to shop for my sainted mother!”
The meal finished, James pushed the bowl a tad away from himself as he waited patiently for Branna to finish. He would gladly clear the table as he had helped set it. Whatever the extend of her injury, James found he would not have her exasperate on it on his accounting. Yet as she ate, James regarded her by the hearth light. How daring was this woman? Not only was he loathe to think of leaving her company, this person with whom he had felt the closet connection in ages, but she might appreciate helping him with a bit of a joke. There was a nagging sensation that it really wasn’t a joke as per se, but James could not quite nail down the source of that feeling. He decided to table it for now.
As the storm continued to rage and blow overhead, he eventually helped to clear the table to her direction and satisfaction. Quickly enough, he joined her at the table once more to sit a bit closer so that they might share the remains of his brandy. Passing the silver flash to her first, he coughed delicately into his other hand. “It’s getting late enough that I fear I should ask. There is but one bed. I would not drive you from it with your leg as it is. Do you have a spare blanket and pillow, then? I can stretch out upon the hearth.”
He looked up at his hostess with a queer look in his eye. “And yet, what if I did catch it? What then? The hounds will have killed one of the most… beautiful creatures I have ever laid eyes on, at my command no less… and that thrill would be gone. The game would be over for good. Where is the fun in that, I wonder. I doubt I should ever hunt again, after that.”
“Still,” he offered with smirk, his gloom dispelled, “Be it a faerie, a witch, or a dream, I should thank her! You speak of hope, laughter, and friendship? And sure enough, what is it she had led me to but you?” James laughed loudly then as he thought more about it. “How does one thank a hare, though? It’s an exasperating notion! Somehow a bouquet of flowers would seem more a meal for her than an expression of gratitude, and I doubt any trinket of silver or gold would easily adore her paw! Feh. I tell you, it’s worse than trying to shop for my sainted mother!”
The meal finished, James pushed the bowl a tad away from himself as he waited patiently for Branna to finish. He would gladly clear the table as he had helped set it. Whatever the extend of her injury, James found he would not have her exasperate on it on his accounting. Yet as she ate, James regarded her by the hearth light. How daring was this woman? Not only was he loathe to think of leaving her company, this person with whom he had felt the closet connection in ages, but she might appreciate helping him with a bit of a joke. There was a nagging sensation that it really wasn’t a joke as per se, but James could not quite nail down the source of that feeling. He decided to table it for now.
As the storm continued to rage and blow overhead, he eventually helped to clear the table to her direction and satisfaction. Quickly enough, he joined her at the table once more to sit a bit closer so that they might share the remains of his brandy. Passing the silver flash to her first, he coughed delicately into his other hand. “It’s getting late enough that I fear I should ask. There is but one bed. I would not drive you from it with your leg as it is. Do you have a spare blanket and pillow, then? I can stretch out upon the hearth.”
Hob sighed as he watched the Briefing from their place within the net. He felt sorry for Sergeant Larson as she had to stand up there and announce at large that there had been a murderer among them, one who had not felt compelled to leave his past behind him. Nor could he envy her as she fielded the questions from the masses. Not that they weren't good questions, but most of them simply did not have answers! And those that did? Well, they hardly mattered now. The victims were dead, their murderer was dead, and paranoia was going to be on the menu for the next several months. While Hob had little doubt that a great deal of this would fade in time, he knew that everyone's fears would resurface come next Shift Change. "And good luck getting these folks back into their coffins," he muttered into the aether.
He noticed the frizzy haired girl vomiting into one of the holo projector panels and winced. Thankfully Yuriko was already on top of it, re-routing the hologram image to different projectors to help cover the gap that started to appear even as the panel short-circuited. It wouldn't total cover the lost image, but at this stage Hob doubted anyone in that room was paying too much attention. Death had a way of taking top priority in the human mind. Efficient as alway, she followed up with a maintenance request to engineering.
As the meet and greet continued, Hob reflected that far worse for everyone would be the time in-between. There would be those who would now be looking at their fellow workers throughout all of the next three years, wondering who among them might be a thief... a rapist... a murder...
"Oh, fuck," Hob swore vehemently as he composed another message to the Sergeant. Annette and Charlie looked up in surprise at his cursing. Not so much Singh or Yuriko, as they tended to be quicker on the uptake. Tyson just didn't care. But having the rest of Third Shift suspecting one another could easily lead to feuding and witch hunts that would jeopardize the mission. Hob wasn't big on military protocol or discipline. He was big, however, on making sure the medicos and engineers who maintained the NI tubes were kept alive! Another message was sent off to the First Sergeant's command tablet.
You might want to specify that not everyone who was moved is a suspected or known criminal? Maybe before they all leave? Otherwise anyone assigned to a new shift is gonna be the odd man out pretty damn quick. Just my two cents.
Singh caught his attention, the Indian businessman dressed in golden brocade suit straight out a Bolliwood movie. "You and Annette should introduce yourselves, Robert. After all, on paper you are the watch leads for this Shift."
The curly haired grandmother, dressed in a 1950's housecoat with curlers, looked towards Hob. As if on cue, they burst out laughing to send a flock of butterflies soaring throughout the 'net. Gasping for breath, Hob wiped away a virtual tear. "What am I going to tell them?!" 'Hi there! This is Eddie, your shipboard computer, and I'm feeling just great, guys, and I know I'm just going to get a bundle of kicks out of any program you care to run through me!'" He called the sound file up from his own memory. Annette sniggered while Tyson whooped it up in laughter. Hob, still laughing, sputtered out, "No, no, wait! I got a better one, I got a better one!"
He took a moment to compose himself, straightening his bow tie before before saying, "We are controlling transmission.. We will control the horizontal... We will control the vertical..." Hob couldn't even get the whole thing out, and even Singh was laughing by the time he finished his recalled memory of The Outer Limit's opening. Even as they started to recover, Hob decided he'd need to go bug OLGA to review and recapture the mental image and audio of that show. "Oh, man, I wish there was someone named David leading one of the teams!"
Tyson, the youngest of them, looked confused even as he grinned. "Why?"
Hob grinned even wider. "So I can ask him, 'Just what do you think you're doing, Dave?'" True, it wasn't as funny given the theme of that particular movie, but it helped. The artistic Hob in his plaid suit knew he had to keep them all distracted, otherwise their own fears could popular the system with Ghosts based on murder and death. Just because the trauma they endured as NI Techs made them a bit more callous than the rest of the ship's passengers and crew didn't make them inhuman. Or any less concerned about their own well being.
"No, we'll skip the whole introduction thing." Hob finally snorted. "Anyone who needs to know who we are either already knows or will find out soon enough. Besides, we all agreed, right? No leaders. Maybe out there in the real world, but we can't function like that in here, not even in theory. We work together."
Hob looked at the screen he had summoned and shrugged. "I'll leave this up if you guys want to keep watching. I want to go see what OLGA's been up to."
Yuriko rolled her eyes. "You know she's not real, Hob! Besides, she has no access to anything outside of her own programming. All she can do is watch us run around the system and run her own, separate routines."
Pursing his lips, he nodded sagely. What Yuriko said wasn't strictly true, but Hob saw no reason to contradict her. "I known, I know. But she's got a cute avatar. And more importantly, she's been awake all this time, guys. The other shifts don't tend to pay much attention to her, and there's probably stuff that went on that the other teams might have missed or didn't think was important to leave in their reports-"
"Which we really should read," opined Annette. Hob ignored her.
"Not to mention that as an AI, she has a different point of view. One that we might want to pay attention to from time to time?" He also left out that he found the concept fascinating! As a human living and interacting in a virtual world, Hob saw OLGA as the only 'native' inhabitant who interact with the NI-Techs in turn. Departing for the Core, he left the teams behind him even as he sent a message to Dr. Brock with signature.
Yo, Doc! Gonna go ask your daughter out on a date. Rollerskating and malted shakes before we go make out at the drive-thru movies. What time you want her home by?
He noticed the frizzy haired girl vomiting into one of the holo projector panels and winced. Thankfully Yuriko was already on top of it, re-routing the hologram image to different projectors to help cover the gap that started to appear even as the panel short-circuited. It wouldn't total cover the lost image, but at this stage Hob doubted anyone in that room was paying too much attention. Death had a way of taking top priority in the human mind. Efficient as alway, she followed up with a maintenance request to engineering.
As the meet and greet continued, Hob reflected that far worse for everyone would be the time in-between. There would be those who would now be looking at their fellow workers throughout all of the next three years, wondering who among them might be a thief... a rapist... a murder...
"Oh, fuck," Hob swore vehemently as he composed another message to the Sergeant. Annette and Charlie looked up in surprise at his cursing. Not so much Singh or Yuriko, as they tended to be quicker on the uptake. Tyson just didn't care. But having the rest of Third Shift suspecting one another could easily lead to feuding and witch hunts that would jeopardize the mission. Hob wasn't big on military protocol or discipline. He was big, however, on making sure the medicos and engineers who maintained the NI tubes were kept alive! Another message was sent off to the First Sergeant's command tablet.
You might want to specify that not everyone who was moved is a suspected or known criminal? Maybe before they all leave? Otherwise anyone assigned to a new shift is gonna be the odd man out pretty damn quick. Just my two cents.
Singh caught his attention, the Indian businessman dressed in golden brocade suit straight out a Bolliwood movie. "You and Annette should introduce yourselves, Robert. After all, on paper you are the watch leads for this Shift."
The curly haired grandmother, dressed in a 1950's housecoat with curlers, looked towards Hob. As if on cue, they burst out laughing to send a flock of butterflies soaring throughout the 'net. Gasping for breath, Hob wiped away a virtual tear. "What am I going to tell them?!" 'Hi there! This is Eddie, your shipboard computer, and I'm feeling just great, guys, and I know I'm just going to get a bundle of kicks out of any program you care to run through me!'" He called the sound file up from his own memory. Annette sniggered while Tyson whooped it up in laughter. Hob, still laughing, sputtered out, "No, no, wait! I got a better one, I got a better one!"
He took a moment to compose himself, straightening his bow tie before before saying, "We are controlling transmission.. We will control the horizontal... We will control the vertical..." Hob couldn't even get the whole thing out, and even Singh was laughing by the time he finished his recalled memory of The Outer Limit's opening. Even as they started to recover, Hob decided he'd need to go bug OLGA to review and recapture the mental image and audio of that show. "Oh, man, I wish there was someone named David leading one of the teams!"
Tyson, the youngest of them, looked confused even as he grinned. "Why?"
Hob grinned even wider. "So I can ask him, 'Just what do you think you're doing, Dave?'" True, it wasn't as funny given the theme of that particular movie, but it helped. The artistic Hob in his plaid suit knew he had to keep them all distracted, otherwise their own fears could popular the system with Ghosts based on murder and death. Just because the trauma they endured as NI Techs made them a bit more callous than the rest of the ship's passengers and crew didn't make them inhuman. Or any less concerned about their own well being.
"No, we'll skip the whole introduction thing." Hob finally snorted. "Anyone who needs to know who we are either already knows or will find out soon enough. Besides, we all agreed, right? No leaders. Maybe out there in the real world, but we can't function like that in here, not even in theory. We work together."
Hob looked at the screen he had summoned and shrugged. "I'll leave this up if you guys want to keep watching. I want to go see what OLGA's been up to."
Yuriko rolled her eyes. "You know she's not real, Hob! Besides, she has no access to anything outside of her own programming. All she can do is watch us run around the system and run her own, separate routines."
Pursing his lips, he nodded sagely. What Yuriko said wasn't strictly true, but Hob saw no reason to contradict her. "I known, I know. But she's got a cute avatar. And more importantly, she's been awake all this time, guys. The other shifts don't tend to pay much attention to her, and there's probably stuff that went on that the other teams might have missed or didn't think was important to leave in their reports-"
"Which we really should read," opined Annette. Hob ignored her.
"Not to mention that as an AI, she has a different point of view. One that we might want to pay attention to from time to time?" He also left out that he found the concept fascinating! As a human living and interacting in a virtual world, Hob saw OLGA as the only 'native' inhabitant who interact with the NI-Techs in turn. Departing for the Core, he left the teams behind him even as he sent a message to Dr. Brock with signature.
Yo, Doc! Gonna go ask your daughter out on a date. Rollerskating and malted shakes before we go make out at the drive-thru movies. What time you want her home by?
RoadRash - Love the sig, although first thing that comes to mind is, "Dad...?" But thanks for the trip down memory lane! If you have trouble kicking the dip, try mint. It's how I got off it back in college, and I heard Jake's Mint is pretty good these days. Don't recommend my way of quitting cigs though (five days with the flu).
Will try posting later tonight.
Will try posting later tonight.
Lillian - I've seen both the original Storyteller (and have the DVD and book), and the Greek. I did not like the Greek nearly as much. My favorite is still "The Soldier and Death".
Dot - Loved that last post on "Never Lose Your Hat"!! Will get reply out in the next couple of days.
All- I'll be away for a day, things got hectic.
Dot - Loved that last post on "Never Lose Your Hat"!! Will get reply out in the next couple of days.
All- I'll be away for a day, things got hectic.
In
Oktyabr'skaya Revolyutsiya (October Revolution) - Modern Fantasy/Revolt among Magic Users
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10 yrs ago
Forum: Advanced Interest Checks
What races are we looking at other than human? Or is sky the limit?
No, no. Just wondering.
Wouldn't that get blood in the coffee?
That... is an excellent point!
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