Private Roleplay~ IOD

asi • 5 September 2017 at 8:55 PM

Teij took to a nervous, awkward boy attending on her like a filthy rich but well-disciplined princess took to presents- like she expected them, accepted them, but wasn't particularly interested unless they turned out to be actually useful to her in some practical way.
She just nodded and kindly began to explain to the guy what they were there for when this very lackluster interaction suffered from a rather welcome interruption from a strangely familiar figure across the room.
Teija recognized the other girl as soon as she called out her name, and the blonde's little pointy face instantly broke out into an extra wide grin at the sight of her friend. She didn't hesitate to pull Tina into to a bone-crushing hug the minute the girl got within grabbing range. "Heeeeeyy, Ti-na!!" she greeted her with an enthusiastic cheer before letting go. "I'm fiiine, I got a first-class rush order so I was in and out of the ward in a flash! But you, it feels like forever since you were on the team," Teij complained, even though it was far from it. "I still can't believe you got shot off to Eighth," she smiled in aside to Tina as Mikey joined in.
And then she grinned widely at Tina's timely and dramatic reveal, seizing the opportunity to give a cheeky hi-five in congratulations and just general mutual teleporter fellowship and support.
Four's assistant made a noise at that display, like a little puffy 'hmph' that drew some attention back his way before he spoke. "Teija, need I remind you that you're here to meet Eight, not these..." His gaze lingered momentarily on Mikey before he finished with, "Nice people. You're going to have to remind me just how Two ended up hiring you," Buick smiled in a rather provoking fashion before going back to reading over the papers he'd been carrying-
The other assistant noticed this and took alarm immediately. "Hey, those are from Two, they might be for my eyes only!" she proclaimed, reaching over to snatch them back.
Buick pushed them into her chest before Teij could grab them. "Then you carry them, how about that," he retorted with a barbed smile. "And they're not, by the way, just the most recent general Area briefings."
Clutching at the papers to keep them from falling, Teija gave him a barely tolerant smile in return, and shuffled the sheets into a more manageable deck before moving on-
"Also, this has literally nothing to do with me, and I have things to do, so I'm leaving now. Bye," Buick left through the door without a backwards glance, while a dissatisfied Teij just managed to repeated his farewell right before the close.
"Man, what a jerk. I should have known he was going to duck out of meeting Eight with me at the last minute," Teij sighed to Tina, giving one of those universally infamous, defamatory 'boys' looks, accompanied by a knowing roll of the eyes. Which then alighted on the remaining boy in the room, Mikey, and then a sly, contriving guise overtook her. "But you seem to be doing all right, don't you have a brave one over there?" Teij suggested with an overtly suggestive look between the two Eighth workers, plus a vigorous nudge to her neighbor's side.
Then she looked back in the direction of the table, Eight's way, and stalled slightly.

taffy789 • 6 September 2017 at 1:24 PM

“I shouldn’t be in the Eighth division for much longer,” Tina had told Teija after recovering from the squeezing bear hug the other girl had pulled her into. Then Buick had spoken up, and Tina had pulled a face at the Fourth assistant’s unpleasant tone of voice. When he’d mentioned Teija’s new job, however, Tina’s eyes widened.
“…So the rumors were true,” she’d muttered to herself, not aiming the statement at anyone in particular.
Buick then left, and Tina felt grateful for that. Although she immediately felt less grateful when Teij made the sly comment about Mikey, gave her that smug look, and overall was being a total dummy.
Tina opened her mouth to say something, but Mikey had already responded.
“Uh. Considering who was coloring right next to Eight. It’s kinda clear who’s the braver one here.” Mikey shoved his hands in the pockets of the hoodie he wore, and, despite the sunglasses covering most of his face, it was easy to tell that all of Teija’s nudging had made him slightly uncomfortable.
“Anyway,” he said, coolly changing the subject. He sent a grin towards the two teleporters.
“Can I point out the elephant in the room here?” His grin widened. “Tina? Teij? The teleporters?”
“Ha ha ha.” Tina frowned. “Laugh it up. Just don’t try to make that joke around Tippy. Last person that did that lost two teeth.” She gave Teija a conspiratorial wink and nudge. “Remember that?”
“Ha ha ha you’re joking, right?” Mikey deadpanned, looking genuinely conflicted by this information.
Tina smirked and waved away Mikey’s concern. “That’s not important. What's important is that Teija is here on some serious second division business. She needs to talk to Eight-” As she spoke, Tina turned her head away from their conversation at back towards where Eight had been sitting and coloring.
She froze.
“Crap.” She uttered, for Eight was no longer there.
Tina immediately rushed over to where Eight had been sitting and frantically begun glancing around, as if Eight had shrunk and was hiding under the coffee table or had fallen between the sofa cushions.
Slowly, Mikey pulled an extra pair of sunglasses from his hoodie pocket, and he passed them to Teija, adding a forceful, “You might want to wear these.”

asi • 6 September 2017 at 7:29 PM

With the distraction departed Karen diligently turned her full attention back onto Jane, waiting, with a perfectly stationary calm while the other fretted and fidgeted, for the assistant to disclose whatever it was she had to say.
When Jane revealed her own worries and reservations about the Second assistant, Nine did begin to grow a little nervous. Should she have refused the girl, not let her in? Surely if it made Eight (and herself) uncomfortable, Nine could always decide to turn the blonde away. But then it was Two's assistant, belonging to a much higher rank than her own, and Karen wasn't familiar enough with the protocol and policy surrounding the authority an assistant could hold. If this Teija had reason to believe she was acting in accordance with the Second leader's wishes, or better yet, proof, then perhaps Nine really couldn't do anything about it.
Still, Karen kept the option in mind that she could ask, as Jane proceeded to lead her into a more confidential space for this briefing of apparent importance. She followed, and internally her brain was abuzz with interest at the preface Jane had given.
Once inside, Jane took the stage in the otherwise abandoned room, and Karen took a moment to appreciate that while the assistant was fraught with nerves and the constant stress of what Nine understood to be an extremely trying job, she remained determined to carry out her will. In respect for this perseverance, even before Jane said anything specific and of interest, she already had Karen committed to listening intently to every bit of it.
Although there was more than the one time she wished to cut in with a prompt or a question, Karen held her tongue and allowed Jane's own explanation of the subject to run its natural course, since there would be time for her response later.
Despite her concentration, Karen was initially distracted for a moment when Jane mentioned her time in First division, and a brief recollection flashed unbidden to the forefront of the paralysis user's mind. A vision of Lily, herself and Dani, all together again in First... Well, Lily had gotten that promotion to assistant pretty early on, but she had still been with them, hung out all the time... Karen quickly tucked this memory back into the darkened corners of her mind where it belonged, irrelevant to the task at hand.
Karen then made a short mental note that she had no idea what Jane's power was, and ought to fill that hole in her knowledge at some convenient opportunity.
Eight's name, on the other hand, was something Nine knew no such easy investigation would solve. Prior to this interview, she had looked up what she could on the leader, and no such record seemed to exist. Still, Jane's apparent lapse of memory didn't fail to unnerve her, putting Karen further on guard for what was to come.
From then on, Nine was surprised by how increasingly unleaderly Eight was described by her assistant, who logically had to know best. It seemed Karen had seriously underestimated the Eighth leader's personality... And the ensuing tale of how Eight obtained the uniquely secure position she held today truly chilled Nine to the bone.
She hadn't even imagined that that kind of strategy was possible.
Well, it wasn't for Nine anyway, the plot was tailor made for Eight's ability, and so skillfully woven, it seemed, that even the likes of the old One and the other higher-ups couldn't find a way out of the sticky, foolproof web. To think that Eight's survival and continued reign of terror depended entirely on that of a distant enemy leader, it was a strange thing indeed...
After that, the fact that Nine was now standing in a room with the de facto Eighth leader came as something of a belated shock, registering slowly but at the same time making perfect sense even as Karen's brain reeled with the revelation. This girl may technically be her superior, while the one in the other room was... a wildcard for the Falchions at best.
Jane continued in her account of the Eight situation, and when she finished, Karen didn't move except to add to Jane's challenging little closing statement; "Except maybe Two," she said, pressing her ramrod straight back up against the equally vertical backrest, a fit of perfect harmony. Nothing else about Nine's job or Karen's life was so simple.
She proceeded to elaborate her thoughts carefully. "It's something he just might care about. The arrival of his assistant... it's timely, isn't it? Maybe it's a coincidence, but still. I don't like any chances for keeping this 'meeting' from him."
Realizing then how dissuasive that sounded, Nine set about correcting any false impressions her pessimistic thoughts may have beget by sternly asserting; "Not that I would back down so easily. But if he does protest my actions I don't know what I could do..." she trailed off, looking troubled, before shaking her head. "I wouldn't let that stop me, either, but I like to be aware of the possible setbacks. Anyway..."
Two on his own was a serious, serious problem- if things turned out the way Karen feared they might, he was one she wasn't sure the Falchions would be able to handle. Eight by herself was a constant handful and thorn in their side, and Karen didn't doubt that the girl could make things much worse if she put her mind to it. But if they were working together... Not just coincidentally, but if they had truly formed a coordinated effort against the Falchions...
Karen needed to find out.
The fact that both Eight and Two had secured the former's safety by abstaining from eliminating the intelligence threat struck a resounding chord for Nine, and she pointed this out aloud to Jane in so many words. Perhaps they'd struck some kind of deal then.
"But I suppose I can't fault anyone for failing to assassinate a foreign leader, having never accomplished such a feat myself," Karen twitched a little at her own words, internally acknowledging that something like that was practically unheard of, and when a leader did die outside of intra-factional politics or accident, it was without exception a super big deal. Especially outside the lower three or four- she couldn't exactly imagine a huge hullabaloo over her own death in battle, should it come to pass.
Though she was rather secure as the resident torturer, she was there, after all, at Two's pleasure, something she assumed he could withdraw at any moment. She refused to let him hold that over her head, however, and would willingly be deployed if that was the wish of her superiors.
"I would greatly appreciate it if you could tell me what you know and think of relations between the... de jure Eighth leader, and Two and his... people." This was what Karen asked of Jane, spoken with a small twitch of her dark eyebrows on the last word, but otherwise unfalteringly stoic poise.
In return, she made the following offer. "As for Eight personally, I should be able to ask what questions you'd like to hear. It's hard to see what harm an innocent question could do, after all." Though she gathered extracting the answers from Eight may be somewhat more difficult that that, Jane was the one with experience in this matter, so she should know the best way to approach it.
Of course, Karen still had to wonder if this Jane could be trusted. If this was some great manipulative plot... Karen would stay her course and not be taken in. "For the most part, you've convinced me," she told the assistant, crossing her legs where she sat in the basic break room chair, before considering the girl in front of her further. "If what you say is true, that is. It could instead be that you're simply a deluded and confused assistant, from all the stress your job involves... No offence," she added in a very collected way, simply intending to see Jane's reaction, though she didn't expect anything noteworthy from it. Karen needed to consider all possibilities, and she wanted the Eighth assistant to know it.
Given the sorry state of her, chewed nails, nicotine habit and all, Nine wasn't totally sure she could in good conscience blame Jane if she was actually conspiring to get rid of her boss... Scratch that, she certainly could, if it turned out things were not how that seemed.
But Karen didn't think that would be the case.

taffy789 • 7 September 2017 at 1:50 AM

Jane twittered with anxiety when Nine brought up the potential of Two “having to care”.
She may have muttered a quiet protest of, “But he’d be the only one to.” under her breath at that, or she may had said something else entirely, as it was terribly hard to tell with how softly Jane had been reduced to speaking.
Eight’s assistant kept mute as Nine mused through the possibilities, took each issue into consideration, examined the problem from every angle.
When Nine eventually brought up the idea that Jane could be lying to Nine due to some grand delusion she held, the assistant found that notion so unhumorously incorrect that she snorted out a laugh despite herself.
“Nine,” Jane said, meaning to assuage the leader’s fears, “I understand that this is a leap of faith on your part, but however. I implore you to be confident that this history I give you is the solid truth.” She gave a bitter smile. “I suppose you can take solace in this fact as well. This truth means that my appointment to Eighth was not a happy accident, and also signifies that our previous One at least cared enough to not allow the Eighth division to be without…” She faltered here, catching herself on a word. Then, slowly, she seemed to remember the context of the situation, what Nine knew…
“…without a competent leader.” Jane finished, and there was a visible relief in her expression- a gratefulness to finally be able to express her true opinion about her “boss” without needing to watch her words.
With some renewed life at that, Jane lifted her head up high and positively beamed up at the Ninth leader. “While that is the only solace I have to offer you, please understand the weight you’ve lifted from my shoulders by agreeing with me!” Her whole being seemed to buzz with joy.
“And of course,” she added, “I’ll be happy to offer you whatever I know about Eight, or Two, or about that entire situation! Although… as I’ve said before, two days ago, I did not know… much about Eight’s personal life other than her habit of declaring people to be her ‘best friends’ on a whim. Whether or not Eight declared Two as her best friend out of camaraderie for some insidious, furtive pact between them both… I cannot say. However.”
Jane pursued her lips together, growing again tense and choosey about her exact words.
“Two and… his ‘people’, that.” She paused. “…That is another story.”
Shifting in her seat, she pressed her hand against both cheeks twice, as if trying to cool down her heated face.
“I… enjoy keeping a certain… perspective on the goings on of the base and the other sections, as someone in charge of the information division is ought to do. And I can recognize events as they happen and,” Jane spared a glance at Nine, and she bit her lip before venturing, “…I am deeply sorry to hear what had occurred to your assistant. And you certainly have questions, as you have every right to have.”
The assistant took a moment to smooth the creases in her pant legs before explaining.
“As far as my knowledge goes, Two ran the old second division as a tight ship. It was impeccable. A model of clean efficiency with a heavy emphasis on micromanagement down to the smallest person with the least important job. It was militaristic in precision. No other leader achieved such results in their own divisions. Not even I, as I am well-aware of my own worker’s tendencies to play card games instead of sorting files, despite them not believing me to have full knowledge of what that ‘secret warning knock’ of theirs means…” Jane trailed off at that, frowning and seemingly getting distracted by what she perceived as unwanted behavior among her own ranks. Then, she remembered what she’d been talking about, and she winced.
“But. I would never, never stoop to the behavior that Two showed during his reign over the interrogation wing.” Jane closed her eyes.
Without opening them back up, she remarked, quietly. “There is something to be said about the psychological effects of authoritarian rule in harsh environments. People react to such behavior differently. But often. When faced with a strong and unyielding authority figure, when given a set of rules and structure to obey unflinchingly, when made a part of a larger social circle accepting these things as well… People… grow attached to authority.” Jane sighed, and her eyes opened. She looked tired.
“Deindividuation kicks in. Mob mentality, or whatever you wish to call it. And every mob needs a strong leader, correct?” Jane seemed to grow years older. “And children, teens, always want their role models, and they crave… structure. And some teens, when given a strong authority figure that they can look up to, especially when in times of strife? …They cling.”
Jane shook her head.
“If it makes you feel any better, Nine. I can honestly say that, while yes. A number of those working under you still may be…. Clinging to old figures of authority, there are many, many others who are breathing easier now that the old rules are gone. They may not want to admit it out loud, for out fear of rebuke by their peers… but they are ultimately happier. Hopeful but perhaps fearful, as in authoritarian structures like this, a “lax” in rules is generally viewed as a frightful thing, as some kind of test or a false promise. As you continue to rule with a kinder hand, some of your workers may start to test the waters, cautiously move around between the old boundaries and the new, may overstep your line of authority and cause trouble. But most will, with hope, come to respect you as a strong authority figure in your own right. And you can lead your people more fairly and justly than anyone leading them before.” Jane smiled, but her face dropped, and her expression wavered into something a tad darker, more frustrated.
“…You’ll prove to be a better leader than your peers. You can use your tangible strength, power, and influence for those around you, and not to do whatever you want without a regard to others merely because you are stronger than them or could hurt them. You’ll be better than-” Jane caught herself again, right before she said it. Gulping down the word, the number, she loudly cleared her throat. Then, she amended, ever so politely in regards to those above her and could very well hurt her, “…better than those that came before you.” Since it was just between them, her and Nine, Jane allowed herself the luxury of being clear of who exactly she was talking about.
Jane sat in silence for a second after that, allowing the words to soak in, and reflecting upon her own words herself. After a while of this, she suddenly remembered herself, and grew quickly sheepish upon realizing the full extent of that impassioned speech she’d given.
“Ah! But don’t mind me!” Jane quickly amended, “I tend to read too many books about people in my spare time! Psychology, sociology, human relations-” Again her hands hurriedly worked to pat her face, to cool it down. “Sometimes I think I have a bit of an obsession with observing and understanding people too much? Erhm! Not to make that sound creepy! I mean it from a purely professional, management and coordinating standpoint, okay… Effective logistics always takes in account the human element, of course!”
She flapped anxiously about again, eventually calming herself down and tugging lightly on her ponytail, as if tightening it.
“As for the interrogation of Eight is concerned, however…” She finally spoke up again, “I had something, um, particular in mind about that?”
She absentmindedly tugged her ponytail too tight, and she winced before continuing on,
“I am less worried about… exact questions as I am about you being able to get a straight answer out of Eight! Or even worse, her managing to run off, or avoid the question entirely. There’s no doubt in my mind that, if we don’t go about this correctly, that Eight may take the opportunity to run off and disappear for another week again! So that is why…” Jane faltered. “Why I want to be there with you. But!” She yelped, “Not… in person…. I’m not sure if Eight would respond… kindly to me?” She winced. “She seems to be most difficult with me, at times. But. There is a solution to this.”
The assistant managed a tight smile at this reveal. “Since this is before your time here, you most likely do not know of this. But. When we used to have a lie-sensing user, we had an earbud our interrogators would wear that would hook-up to a small wireless headset which the lie-sensing user would speak into. Think a one-way radio with a very short transmitting distance. The lie-sensing user would watch and listen to interrogation from an observation room, and would feed the interrogator information. The interrogator would listen and would use this information against the captured enemy, as to seem all-knowing to the enemy and employ that slight psychological warfare. We still have these systems in stock in case another such lie-sensing user arrives again. And I feel that, if you’re okay with me providing you directions to handle Eight or questions to ask…. I feel that this system would be extremely beneficial to our shared goal.”

asi • 8 September 2017 at 6:52 AM

Hearing that from Tina, the other teleporter actually looked a little saddened for a moment. "It's too bad," she said, still looking up at the other girl with a smile, "that I won't be able to work on that team with you again..." In this way, Teij herself confirmed the conclusion Tina had quietly reached through Buick's brusque and thoughtless words.
She then had a good laugh about Tina's reference to their mutual teleporting acquaintance and former teammate, remembering how that violently over-reactive old sod had made a necklace charm out of the two teeth they'd knocked out... and the reaction Tippy had received in return, on trying to give it to the person they dropped a filing cabinet on (non-accidentally). Those had been good times, good times.
Then Tina was the second person to remind Teija about the serious business she'd come here to do, and she started to feel a bit guilty about not making sure to pay her respects to Eight before anyone else, when-
"Crap," Tina said and, much to Teija's bemusement, began searching the sofa and coffee table set-up. The former piece of furniture looked like it could barely hide anything bigger than a sizable woodchuck or similarly beefy rodent within its stocky form, forget concealing the hyperactive Eighth leader herself, and the latter object was actually transparent. Eight was nowhere to be seen.
Teij put on the sunglasses offered and narrowed her eyes behind them, adjusting to the dark, protective visor as her body readied for any surprise attack that might come her way.

demon • 8 September 2017 at 7:20 PM

While doing her best to keep an impeccably impassive outward expression, Nine's innards were secretly squirming in sheer distaste for the phrase 'leap of faith', and the idea that she ought to simply trust in someone's word for an accurate account of the truth. Nevertheless Karen persevered through the girl's somewhat hazy reasoning, accepting that while she couldn't simply believe the words spoken to be absolutely correct, it was currently the most likely possibility at the current time, and that was about all the certainty that Nine could ever afford.
Anyway, it was nice that Jane seemed happy. While Karen offered no such expression in return, she did give a promising nod, and hopefully the girl would remain content with that much.
As Jane continued, it occurred to Nine that since this was the real Eight she was talking to now, and someone who was almost definitely more helpful and informative than the other girl was going to be, it might well be the real interview that she was having now. Not that Nine didn't think the official Eighth leader wouldn't be capable of providing her with much more personal and intimate knowledge of her coworker in the Second division, but whether Karen would be able to coerce her technical superior into confessing it without things getting too out of hand was another question. In comparison, Jane had a far more distant perspective, but given the detailed and reflective insight she offered into workings in the old Second- Karen's Ninth now- Karen wondered if she wouldn't prove every bit as useful, if not more to the investigation. Especially since she was offering her own help in questioning Eight. The difference might be that between a willing informant, and an uncooperative... child, probably.
Moving on, the assistant comment was hard to hear, but she swallowed it down, acknowledging with the bob of her head, listening.
Nine adjusted her cap subtly during the description of how her people had been treated by Two, simply as an excuse to pass a hand over her troubled face. It bothered her deeply that while she could see the appeal and logic behind running the division as he did, surely anyone had to know that it wasn't right. It wasn't good for the people involved. And she had seen evidence of that kind of high level awareness in Two's decree for torturers' psych evaluations and careful continuous monitoring of those individuals. It went to show that he had to have a thorough understanding of social mores, morals and environments, right? It seemed he really cared so little for the actual people involved that they were now Karen's twisted mess to untangle. Efficient and effective workers though they may be, Karen wouldn't take that at such a high personal cost. She felt severely disappointed that someone else would.
Still, when Jane went on to praise Nine's model of authority so highly, she definitely felt that was too much. Karen's expression gradually grew less and less composed and she ducked her head to hide it behind the bill of her cap until such a time as she could properly collect her rebelling facial features. When a rather more flustered Jane went on to explain her personal fascination with the subject, Karen allowed herself to relax again slowly, no longer feeling at great risk of blush-worthy embarrassment.
And on hearing Jane's particular suggestion for the imminent interrogation, Karen perked right up at the idea, taking to it immediately. A situation where Nine had complete control over the proceedings but also the best supply of information available on the matter responsive and at hand, sounded ideal.
Karen eventually stood, intending to shake hands now with her coworker. "That sounds like a plan to me. Consider yourself hired," she said to Jane with the slightest of smiles.

taffy789 • 10 September 2017 at 6:27 PM

Jane returned Karen’s smile as the girl stuck out her hand. Rising to meet her, Jane gave Karen a firm, confident handshake of agreement.
“I didn’t know this had turned into a job interview,” Jane ventured a joke at that word choice, “But I understand, and I looking forward to helping you with your investigation endeavors.”
Dropping Karen’s hand, Jane started walking for the door.
“I can go acquire headsets and set-up the interrogation room if you would like. Considering the… uncertain state of your worker’s… dedication to their old superior, I will try not to involve anyone in the specific details of why.” Jane mused on this before remembering herself and glancing back at Karen. “If that all sounds right to you, of course.”



“Crap. Crap.”
Tina kept repeating that as she, more frantically now, pulled the cushions off the couch in a desperation attempt to locate the missing Eighth leader.
From his spot guarding the door, Mikey uneasily shuffled side to side.
After watching Tina’s useless attempts a while longer, the boy finally had to say it.
“Tina, hey. Hate to be devil’s advocate here but. Uh. Eight’s like, very obviously not in this room.”
Hearing this, the girl froze. Then, slowly, she pressed the cushion she was holding up to her face in defeat. Her muffled voice groaned into it, “We’re in so much trouble.”
“But maybe not?” Mikey offered, not wanting to be the one to destroy whatever little amount of hope his coworker had in her tired, grumpy teleporter body. “I mean like, how far could have Eight had gotten anyway? She might still be in the interrogation wing. We just need to go out and find her before Jane knocks on that door and-”
As if the scene were being written by the gods of cliché comedic timing themselves, a series of loud knocks rang out from the door.
Mikey deflated where he stood.
Tina, still groaning, threw her body onto the cushionless couch and suffered on the hard springs.
Wincing, Mikey flipped around, steeled himself, and pulled open the door.
He was met with the sounds of a cacophonous slurping sound.
Standing in the doorway, Eight rocked back and forth on her heels as she polished off the rest of a Caprisun Pacific Cooler.
Mikey gawked at her.
Eight’s loud slurps grew more insistent as she struggled to drain the bottom of the juice pouch and not waste on drop.
Mikey still had no words to say.
Finally, Eight stopped slurping on the straw, choosing to instead bite on it and yank it out of the pouch with her teeth. She held that thin yellow straw in her mouth like some 60’s punk with slicked back hair would do with a toothpick.
Lifting her chin up to resolutely challenge Mikey, Eight chided, loudly, “Hey! Don’t staaarrrreeeee, that’s so rude!!! Go get your own juice thingy!!!” Then with that, she pushed past the astounded Mikey and bounced right back into the room, her ill-kept blue-green colored bob of hair swaying as she did so.
Tina had sat up on the couch, and she was too gawking at the re-entrance of the thought long-gone leader. “Eight?” she questioned as soon as she found the words, “You came back?”
Eight blinked and looked over at the staring Tina, and she pulled the straw from her mouth as she processed this question. While the leader did pout slightly at Tina's continued gawking at her, she eventually responded, “Yeah I came back! But I didn’t bring back a juice thingy for you so don’t ask!!!”
“Okay???” Tina responded, her voice reaching a higher pitch in confusion.
Eight seemed pleased with that response. Nodding curtly yet contented with the promise of not being assaulted for any Caprisuns, Eight slightly lifted up the side of her large shirt, revealing both the waistband of her skirt and the hidden Caprisun pouch she’d stored between it and her hipbone.
“Hmm~ Coolo!” Eight hummed. “ ‘Cuz there wasn’t a lot left in the room where they kept them all for me!!! So I brought back this one for later! …Or…” She trailed off, her fuzzy and far away eyes focusing on the brightly colored juice pouch in her hands. She squeezed at it, softly.
“OoooOOooooooOOOooor~” She spoke, thinking out loud, with emphasis on the loud part of it. “Spike-y might want it! That’s something people do, right? Give presents n’ junk to friends when they come back and visit???”
“Uhhhh.” Mikey replied as he slowly, cautiously shut the door again and leaned against it to prevent another Eight escape. He then anxiously shifted eyes on both Tina and Teija in hopes one of them knew what the heck the leader was chattering on about.
A flash of recognition lit Tina’s face. “Spike….y? As in. Spike? Two?”
“Spike-y!” Eight agreed with a sparkling smile.
Tina frowned. “Eight. We said we brought you over here to meet with Nine.”
“Nu-uh!” Eight clicked her tongue at the girl. “Then why are we in the interrogation place then??? Nine doesn’t live here!!!”
“Well.” Tina’s eye twitched. “Nobody “lives” here Eight, technically. But Nine works here now while Two is on the front lines.”
Eight’s eyebrows furrowed together in an adorable but highly befuddled manner. “B-but NINE works on the front lines!”
“Yes,” Tina explained, patiently, “Usually. But Nine and Two switched jobs, so Two’s working the front lines and Nine is here.”
After a second of scowling at those words, trying to make sense of them, a look of realization and horror came upon Eight. Upset, she exclaimed, “WAIT! Then who’s job did I switch with???”
Tina choked. “N-no one??? It was just Nine and Two switching??”
Eight seemed to calm down at this answer. She returned to staring at the Caprisun still held in her hands. Looking at that again, it seemed to spark another question inside of her, and she asked, “Soooooo~ Because Two-y ain’t here…. I should give my juice thingy to Nine, cuz’…. Spike-y is now…. Nine?” She ventured.
“No.” Tina sighed. “They didn’t change leader titles.”
Eight gasped, horrified. “So I gotta give my juice to WOLVERINE?”
“Not if you don’t want to?” Tina spluttered. “…And wait, Wolverine?”
“Yeah! Wolverine! The girl with the mean bone claws and the meaner face!!! She never liked me!!!”
“…Eight, the Ninth leader is Karen. It’s not Evie anymore.”
“When did Karebear and Wolverine switch jobs?” Eight exclaimed, upset. “Where’s Spike-y if they are the leaders now???”
“Evie died during the Truce.” Tina was gripping her forehead in frustration, now, but marched forward with the explanation anyway. “Spike is Two and Karen is Nine.”
“And Spike-y is Nine.”
“No.”
“Aaaand Karebear is Nine.”
“Yes.”
“And Wolverine is…”
“…”
“…”
“…”
“….Wolverine is…. Karebear?”
“… Very incorrect.”
As Tina buried her face in a couch cushion again, Eight’s expression had twisted up into one of immense concentration. The leader sat on the edge of the coffee table, her face adorably screwed up in concentration, and she seemed to be counting on her fingers, as if simple math could help her figure this out.
Finally, a brightness overtook and relaxed her expression as she came to a shining clarity.
“Oh YEAH! Now I remember! Wolverine died because of a cute giant clay bunny or, or a fire chicken, something! And Shortcake died too, that Genie girl who gave me a hard candy that one time tots killed him and made his blood go everywhere, which made me like her a lot more!!! Oh. And then Genie died too, I guess, she was killed by that guy with a cool dead sister and all those sucky, really scary and bad memories!” She paused for a moment there, getting all hazy for a second before continuing on, completely nonsensical.
“Oh! And after Genie died, Spike-y went over to her and started talking about a cult! …Oh wait, never mind, that didn’t happen! Spike-y kicked her all the way across base!!! Or. Oh, wait, that didn’t…”
She looked confused there, before continuing on, completely setting aside those jumbled thoughts, “Oh well! Anyway yeah!!! Wolverine’s tots dead and Mr. Flaming Chicken boy is all sad n’ stuff, and now also Karebear is NOT dead yet and Spike-y dear hasn’t been eaten to death by the mean dogs of that big island place either called like, New Zealand or something! And Karebear is Nine but is also Two, and Spike-y is also Two but is also Nine!”
She grinned, brilliantly.
“I got it! So Karebear lives where Two was now!”
Pulling the couch cushion away from mouth, Tina sucked in a pained yet thankful breath of fresh, non-flitered-through-dirty-cushion air.
“Yes.” She exhaled, allowing herself to become calm, for the worst was now over.
Eight’s grinned dropped at that, fast. She grew very upset.
“But… if Karebear lives where Two is…. Is Spike-y…. homeless?”
Her expression flat, Tina slowly lifted the couch cushion back up to her face. She covered it, and then she proceeded to attempt to smother herself.
Eight grew more distressed.
“And if everyone is living different places now, where do I live??? I like my room!!! It has a lotta nice n’ pretty colors!!! I don’t want anyone else to have it!!!”
Back at the door, Mikey sweated as he watched as the crazy girl spiraled deeper into a pit of confusion and endless back-and-forth. Helplessly, he glanced over at Teija, hoping the pretty and capable-seeming Second Assistant could possibly reel the girl’s mind back to reality where Tina had so horribly failed.

awesomeness • 14 September 2017 at 2:34 AM

Tabs chased the Fifth leader all the way back to the Eighth division’s main office.
Her superior, in his flighty agitation, did not bother to stop despite the clearly tailgating admin following close behind him. He did not even acknowledge her in the moments before he disappeared into the Eighth division’s office when she called out to him, a singular word of “Five.”
He seemed determined to avoid her, and Tabs felt equally resolute to meet that challenge, head-on.
Placing the heavier files down and holding only the paper for the leader’s eyes, Tabs leaned against the hallway wall and tried to relax as she listened to the leader’s agitated voice demand the Eighth worker that some files or another get processed “as fast as possible”, or something or another. Silently, the admin listened to the griping back and forth while picking at some dirt under her fingernails.
Fifteen minutes passed before the door opened again.
As the Fifth leader exited the office, Tabs pushed her body off the wall, and she stepped forward.
The leader immediately turned a sharp left and tried to escape down the hallway.
“Hey.” Tabs said, her voice as loud and brisk as it could have sounded without her outright snapping at him.
Five paused in his swift exit.
His shoulders and back had gone ridged, tight and wound up as he appeared to consider the girl’s word. Slowly, he came to a decision. Wearing an expression like he was getting teeth pulled, Zach turned around to face the admin. His shoulders had gone hunched over and wearied. A bushy eyebrow rose at Tabs as the Fifth leader demanded, “What do you want?” Some hesitation, followed by a scathing, “Didn’t get enough of an interrogation in yesterday, and now you’re back to drag me back in there and pull out my nails with pliers this time?”
Tabs didn’t waver from her steady, neutral expression upon being assaulted by the leader’s venom. How effective her strategy was to building personal rapport remained up to debate, as Tabs’ lack of comment on the idea of dragging him in for another interrogation made the leader grow warier of her. He stepped back, eyeballing the girl cautiously. He repeated. “What do you want.” It was no longer a question.
Tabs held out a piece of paper.
The Fifth leader’s eyes momentarily flickered to it before locking right back on to the girl in front of him.
“Paperwork is a type of torture.” He remarked. “I’m not reading that.”
Tabs extended her arm even further towards him.
Growing clearly agitated, Five drummed his fingers against the pocket of his pants. “What’s so important about that?” He snapped.
“You might find out if you look at it.” Tabs responded evenly.
Scowling, the leader jammed his hand into his pocket, producing out a small package of cigarettes. His boot tapped anxiously against the concrete floor of the bunker and sent echoes of sound bouncing around the tight, cramped space. He wrestled a cigarette from the package, and then he began patting his pockets again, in a clear search of a lighter.
Thirty seconds passed and his hands came up empty. The unlit cigarette fumbled uselessly between his fingers before his shaky hand jittered and dropped the thing to the floor. Five grimaced, an ugly thing, before the heel of his boot made direct, vengeful contact with the fallen cigarette, squashing it into the floor.
Tabs watched this go on for a full minute, wordlessly.
After the leader’s carnage was over, the girl slowly, deliberately, pushed her free hand into her own pocket and withdrew a small object that she held purposefully out to the leader.
“Lighter?” She offered, innocently.
The scowl Five gave her could kill.
He snatched the paper out from her hand, not even gracing the lighter she held out to him with a look in its direction. Tabs shrugged and returned the lighter to her pocket as the leader held the paper up to his mean mug.
She then watched the leader as he uselessly stared at a piece of paper for a solid seven minutes.
Hearing the tap tap tap of Five’s boot and growing overly anxious herself, Tabs finally relented with a, “Do you need a quick summary?”
Looking up from the paper, Five glared. “You were the one who wanted me know. So if you want me to know so bad, then tell me.”
“Yesterday there was a patrol in A-A.” Tabs began, curtly. “A normal occurrence, right up to the point that the Glaeroes attacked.” She paused. “We lost three. A fourth was disfigured pretty badly. Apparently the skin on half his face had… cracked and separated down the middle? Something gruesome. Despite this he managed to escape and survive. He later returned to the scene of the battle to scavenge for some medical supplies and found something… interesting. Some sort of map.”
She motioned to the paper the leader still held. “The details are vague, and are vague for a reason. The veteran in charge of our A-A base was said to very excited about the possible implications of what was brought back. Information concerning the Glaeroes that could give us the upper hand in that area. There’s talk of an attack happening incredibly soon, which may escalate battles in that region and start to force the Glaeroes back.” Tabs mused over this last part. “We very well may be asked to provide support and troops.”
The Fifth leader looked like he was considering this information with some thought, and Tabs, momentarily, had hope.
Then he spoke.
“So. Why should I care about this?”
Tabs sighed.
“Fiver. I don’t have a clue. Why should you care, the fifth leader of the Falchions?”
“Glad to see we can agree on something.”
“If you don’t care about your leadership duties,” Tabs retorted, “I am seriously curious as to what you actually DO bother caring about.”
Five shrugged.
“This development in A-A affects the people directly under you, the people working here that may be sent out to go fight somewhere else.” Tabs asked, “Do you not care about them?”
The leader snorted. “I’m not the one fighting.”
“And if you were?” Tabs challenged.
Five’s eyes narrowed, possibly sensing the trap her words, like breadcrumbs, were leading him to. He responded, anyway. “Then that would be my problem.”
Tabs was a creature of evidence and fact; thus she had to confirm those suspicions of hers, one more time…
“And if your assistant was sent out?”
“That wouldn’t happen,” the leader snapped back, stiffening, growing defensive. “Now stop, I said this isn’t going to be a second interrogation.”
“It’s not.” Tabs said, and her own foot was now the one tapping impatiently. “I’m just getting a second feel for things.”
“For what?”
“For you,” she responded, and Five grimaced at that. “And,” she continued, “I’ve come to the conclusion that you, Fiver, are a terrible person to have be a leader.”
Five rolled his eyes. “Listen. The management worker with the messy hair already beat you to that conclusion.”
“You could be better.” Tabs offered, an edge of desperation creeping in. “Get involved. Care more. Be better. Nobody’s going to hold your hand and wait for you to be less crappy, Fiver, I’m tellin’ you this right now, not as some enemy, not as a friend, but as somebody who wants what’s best for the base and everyone in it.” The girl’s eyes were intense, dark. “You can do some serious good with your influence and position. God knows what I would do with that kind of power. So for the love of God, do something with it. Something other than being selfish.”
The leader considered the girl, for a moment. All was silent except for that ever-present agitated tapping of some appendage of the leader’s body- be it a jittering foot or drumming fingertip.
Finally, he responded.
“…That all sounds fine and good,” he shrugged, “if there was even a point in doing that. Have you forgotten where we are? An island of death, where we’ve all been sent to die by the powers that be, or whatever. Any good I, or you, or anyone tries to do for anyone here is pointless. We’re all going to die here, eventually, some faster than others.” He stared at Tabs, solidly. “And the faster you accept that you were born just to wind up dead here, the faster you’ll stop trying to act like whatever ‘good’ you think you’re doing is actually doing crap for anyone.”
With that, the leader turned on his heel, and he began to walk away.
Tabs stared.
She watched her leave.
She felt her blood boil; her cool and calm melt, slow and steady like a chunk of ice under a magnifying glass.
And, eventually, she defrosted fully and found the words to call out, after the leader, the sentence she thought would trap him, catch him, trump him and his apathetic little ideology.
So she spoke them, a red gritting anger straining the question,
“If that’s your mindset, then why even care about living, then?”
And she thought she had him with that one.
When Five stopped, and turned halfway around to face her, Tabs really thought she’d stumped him.
Then Tabs saw his expression. She saw that utter apathy, dull in his eyes.
He shrugged. “Might as well."
He put his back towards Tabs, and shrugged again, not really caring, not caring at all. "I mean, really. What’s there left for me to do?”
And with that, the Fifth leader walked away.

asi • 17 September 2017 at 6:52 AM

Karen nodded in return after Jane let their hands drop, pleased with the resolution they'd reached. Personally, she wasn't greatly worried about the possibility of any Ninth workers trying to interfere with this- it didn't seem like Two's style, and if they were acting alone they couldn't be too smart- but a little extra care wouldn't hurt. The stakes in this particular case weren't too high anyway.
"Wait, one last thing," Karen said before Jane reached the door. The Ninth leader actually fidgeted a little in the subsequent pause before she could proceed, her toes rubbing anxiously together under the table and inside her shoes. She couldn't help but wear a somewhat self-conscious expression as she asked of the in-name-only assistant; "... Should I ask open-ended questions, or closed?"
It sounded dumb, and Karen was sure Jane would recommend the latter, given the subject's apparently scatterbrained nature, but she had to be certain. She would sound even dumber in that interrogation room if she couldn't do her job properly for lack of asking questions.

demon • 25 September 2017 at 2:42 AM

While some long moments were spent simply staring along with everyone else, Teija's hackles had settled long before the Eighth divisioners' conversation picked up, garbled exclamations of confusion now out of the way. Her hand twisted the curled ends of a pigtail in a relaxed, roundabout motion as Teija couldn't help but grin her appreciation of Eight's unexpected and unusual appearance. While she had somewhat dreaded meeting the girl because of the importance of the encounter, she'd failed to factor into account her own enjoyment of the strange character's whimsical antics...
And if she thought that was fun, she only had to wait to find herself thoroughly entertained. The equal parts baffling, bemusing, and comedic dispute that ensued had Teij almost strangling herself from the struggle of keeping her cackling muffled. While Eight spun deeper and deeper into a mystifying mental whirlpool mess of her own creation, every misdirection she made only served to pull the others in deeper. Like little satellites being pulled out of orbit to spiral into an inexorable black hole. Teij swallowed enough giggles that she began to worry the resulting hiccups might upset her stomach and cause her to toss up all over again.
After taking the bare minimum amount of short, shallow breaths to steady herself, Teija responded to Mikey's silent yet overt plea by leaping into the confused fray herself, with the rather unabashedly enthusiastic cry of; "Oh oh, let me try!" as she leaned in.
Her voice had a slightly nervous, breathless air to it, an almost giddy quality, but the gaudy emphasis she employed every few words into her ridiculous fiction more than made up for it. "Spike-y-dearest is on vacation at his holiday home in Beat-People-Up Land, in order to dedicate more time to his favorite hobby! While he's gone, he's making Nine look after his stuff so it doesn't get," she broke off to snicker for a moment, "dusty. Like a caretaker! Only, one that tortures people," Teija added thoughtfully, looking awfully undisturbed for the subject matter.
She smiled openly, with a brazen and honest kind of charm, as she plied and prompted the Eighth leader encouragingly for some of her reclusive sense. "Remember you had a nice time when he said goodbye? I got you two sweethearts candy floss and everything..." she reminded Eight of this with a tone of playful tease, before sobering in the next sentence. "So if you don't remember, I'll be very hurt on his behalf," Teij sighed disappointedly, just like any reasonable person might if say, they'd been promised the sugary goodness of Peeps and then let down.

taffy789 • 26 September 2017 at 2:43 AM

Jane paused reaching for the doorknob when Karen called out her question. After pondering this for a quick moment, Jane turned to the Ninth leader, shaking her head slightly.
“The thing is, Karen,” Jane explained, a tiredness etching into her expression as she reflected on her own words, “with Eight…. EVERY question might as well be an open-ended one. Or,” she went on, “for that matter, even the most clearly open-ended question could be answered with an unflinching yes or no. Once I’d witnessed somebody asking Eight her favorite ice cream flavor, and she responded to that question by saying “yes” before taking a bite of a peeled orange like it were an apple.”
Jane shuddered at the memory, but she hastily composed herself again.
“I suppose, however. That in want of conciseness, you can begin with the simple, closed-and-shut case questions. But whether or not you should break from that mold really is up to your discretion.”



When Teija had piped up, all giddy like, all that twisted confusion on Eight’s face melted into genuine curiosity as she focused those big, bright eyes on the second assistant.
As Teija went on with her explanation, Eight pulled a face as if she were tasting something bitter and gross.
“I remember that good bye! It wasn’t nice, not like the cotton candy! That was nice! And yummy! But I don’t remember eating floss?” Eight darted a glance over Teija, and then cocked her head to the side like a confused puppy not understanding a simple command of “sit”. “I don’t know why anyone would eat floss! Even floss made of candy! That sounds grossssssss.”
Eight emphasized her opinion on consuming floss by sticking out her tongue.
“And and and!” Eight continued, and the hand holding the Caprisun shot into the air, waving wildly about, “I KNOOOOOOW Spike-y is on vacation! But I thought he was gunna be HERE! I thought the vacation was OVER but now it’s NOT and apparently Spike-y doesn’t even have a HOUSE anymore when he does come back ‘cuz KAREBEAR IKEA is SLEEPING IN IT!”
Eight stomped her foot on the ground, and she pouted.
Back on the couch, Tina had calmed down enough to not have to filter her agitated breaths through a makeshift couch cushion filter, and she slowly began tidying up the sitting area to its once unruffled glory.
The movement distracted Eight, and she momentarily hushed to watch Tina tidy up, before drifting back again to where Teija looked at her. Eight stared at the girl for a full five seconds, unblinking.
Then, suddenly, Eight cleared two feet of space in a blink of an eye to practically be a centimeter away from Teija’s body. Although Teija was already short, Eight was shorter, and the top of her head bumped up against Teija’s nose. Despite the sickly green-blue mess of a dye job that now colored Eight’s hair, those dried locks smelled faintly of bubblegum and then, strangely enough, chocolate. The two smells went together as well as their corresponding tastes did- which is to say, much, much, so very much poorer than expected.
“Oh!” Eight exclaimed, loudly, right up into Teija’s face. “I know you! Yeah! You know Spike-y! January told me like, a few days ago! …Oooor,” Eight grinned, and laughed. She tapped the side of her skull. “January didn’t really TELL me! But she knew! And now I know!” Eight gave Teija a loud wink as if letting the girl into an ill-kept secret, and she laughed again, explosively.
Behind Teija, Mikey paled.
“Wait. You don’t mean like. Jane by saying January? You couldn’t have seen Jane a few days ago… She said she just now found where you were yesterday… And that- that doesn’t…” He trailed off, choosing to twitter his thumbs instead of speak anymore. It had taken a few hasty words, but eventually he’d realized he’d been asking a question that, never mind, he didn’t really want to know the answer to.
He didn’t need to worry about that answer anyway, because Eight apparently hadn’t paid any attention to the boy. She took a step or two back from Teija, rocking slightly on the heels of her sneakers as she did, in a swaying, whimsical sort of motion that made it seem like Eight’s entire world was topsy-turvy and shaking and she herself was just going with the flow of this earthquake that no one else could feel.
When she’d backed up an appropriate distance, Eight shot out an arm towards Teija, ramrod straight. Held up to the girl was the Caprisun, and Eight said, cheerfully, “You know Spike-y, righto? Then ya need to give this to him! Right away! It’s important, because it was ‘posed to be a gift from him but then he wasn’t here but I already said it was a gift for him so it’s his now? I think that how that works? You can’t take back a gift because once you say something is yours its yours forever and that’s how that works, right?” Eight blinked, a bit confused there. She continued, more slowly. “Even if… the gift is something somebody else wants really badly n’ stuff…” Now her hungry eyes drifted back to the Caprisun, still held out for Teija to take back to Two. She continued to stare at it, wistfully. “Buuuutttt you should give gifts to friends ‘cuz it’s nice and stuff… even if you really want the thing… another friend of mine taught me that! But he’s dead as a corpse in a hospital or a bad memory or something right now! So there!”
Eight then held out the Caprisun, more forcefully, but despite her best efforts at trying to be a nice friend, her eyes kept drifting, traitorously, to the so very delicious and so very final Caprisun Pacific Cooler.

demon • 6 October 2017 at 9:44 PM

When they surfaced, Dustin grappled with the snow under his hands and knees, their physical presence assuaging his nausea from the shock phasing trip, even as his touch tainted the white crystals a blotchy, watered-down red. Hale needed no such recovery period. Having released his grip on the older teen, Dustin was aware of the boy now standing over him and the cat, not making any particular move, just watching.
Dustin's partner had retreated into the depths of his hood sometime during the whirlwind trip through the mountain, and he could feel her scrambling around in there, hopefully trying to orientate herself in a way that didn't put pressure on that bad leg of hers. Reaching behind himself, he held up the bottom of that hood briefly to assist her, while lifting his own head to take in their new surroundings.
They were at the top of the cliff they'd been hiding under, now. The same one that had been raining rocks down upon them until very recently.
The rebel responsible was standing near the edge, hunched over and peering downwards, no doubt trying to locate them. Oblivious to how it was showing them its back. Dustin turned to Hale to find him already gone, striding over to the other rebel, and... shoving it right off the precipice with a foot to the lowered, bent-over back.
There was a horrible scream as it fell, eerily piercing the white and monochrome mountainscape, and Dustin barely suppressed a shudder- even though he knew the fall wasn't big enough for huge chances of serious injury. It wasn't a human, it was their enemy, and Dustin had done much worse himself today, but, seeing Hale perform such a move, he... saw something he had wished never to see.
Of their little group, their ragtag runaway super-powered family, Jasmine had been the leader. As the oldest of the five, she'd taken up the mantle of being their face, the shield that protected them from the outside world at large. It was an unbelievably tough job, and not one to be done alone, so Dustin had been there to support her, and offer the primary care to the younger children that she couldn't. Cathy was the most independent of them all- she'd lived long enough as a lonesome stray to find any other kind of life difficult to understand. However, she eventually learned to trust and depend on the others for support when she needed it. On the other hand, Hale had always been looking to others for guidance- mainly little Guithe, since she'd always been the smartest of them all, at least in a battle of quick wits. But Dustin had thought the young male would take after him, that he was already doing so, that Hale... might grow into a gentle, nurturing young man.
It made Dustin want to laugh, bitter and bleakly, because there was no way he could call himself that, so how could he expect anything of the like from Hale? It was pure folly now. This land had doomed them all. Feral powers or not, they had all become monsters... just in order to survive.
Claws tore into his jacket, the sharp, distinctive tearing sound enough to wrench Dustin out of his depressing reverie, and into the present moment. Cathy, his mission partner, had jumped out of his hood and now clung to his shoulder and upper arm, fixing him with a wide-eyed, slit-pupil cat's stare. Hale was giving him an odd look, too, but the cat's he better understood.
Ah. His aura, was it escaping him again?! Dustin wasn't skilled enough in the art to tell. The boundaries appeared blurred and he might as well be standing on the beach at dusk in pajamas, blocking ocean waves with bedsheets for all the sense it made to his eyes. Still he tried, and judging by the relaxing of his more sensitive and attuned companions, had some success.
But since when could Hale sense anything like that? He'd never done so before-
Hale's eyes had never been a ghostly blue-gray before either, nor his hair...
In a flurry of kicked-up snow, Dustin's four-legged friend tackled the boy, both of them going down in a rolling scuffle that smothered the two in the mountain powder, not that they hadn't already been thoroughly dusted with white beforehand.
"Cathy!" Dustin called out in alarm, scrambling to his feet towards the tumultuous heap the two had formed together. Because while the cat's tackle had been friendly in nature, that person that she had tackled, it wasn't a friend, or family like they'd thought. It was-
The ginger fuzzball paused in confusion as one of her sheathed-claw paw swipes failed to make contact with anything material. The parts of her feline form that had rested on top of the other person dropped down onto the cold earth. While Dustin joined her at the cat's side, 'Hale' had retracted himself from their proximity, moving backwards until several more meters separated him from them, as well as the chilly sweeping wind and the lightly falling flakes of the sky.
Nudging the tabby carefully but insistently with the back of his leg, Dustin ensured that the two of them also retreated several paces, although his feet had to stop before he could fear losing sight or sound of Hale, for those would be his only warning if he- if he got even that. It was quiet, and Dustin listened as the air howled all the more freely in the negative space that distance created. In a voice low, dry and hoarse from all that the mountain breath had stolen from him, he told Cathy; "Not Hale."
From the way she was shaking underneath all that fur, Dustin really thought that her hind legs might be about to give out. They'd certainly earned the right, given the beating they'd taken. In comparison, Dustin was in rather better shape, having only been sliced and stabbed in a place or two. So he stepped in front of his companion, even while his mind was still whirling, trying to come up with a single way he could protect anyone from a power like Hale's. The boy could literally go straight through Dustin without lifting a finger against him if he chose, so even if he were to threaten 'over my dead body', it would be about as effective at making Hale stop as Dustin singing the Macarena would be at making Hale dance. That is, not very compelling at all, since this power could just choose to ignore him!
Cathy also didn't seem to think much of Dustin's attempt at protecting her. She padded around to his side, even limping on the leg that was most likely broken, in order to gaze up at the power that had overtaken Hale with glowing yellow-green eyes, bright like traffic lights with both worry and warning.
That wasn't what Dustin wanted and he begged her to change her mind. "Stay back, please, you're already..." It didn't matter, Dustin soon realized, as the power stood back and merely eyed them quietly, hands at its sides and no indication of wishing them harm. It had actually helped them, taking them out of the path of danger, disposing of an enemy for them.
"Hale, you..." he stared at the power and it just continue to stared back at the both of them for one long, silent moment.
There were dark shadows, Dustin noticed, around the power's pale eyes as it looked up at him, down at Cathy. It appeared that Hale's body had been spending a lot of time frowning of late, and not enough sleeping. It spoke, but in a dull monotone, like a washed-up actor reading straight from the script; "I'm doing this as one last favor to him. That's all." The power turned and began to walk away.
"Waiit! What happened to Hale?" Dustin cried out desperately to the figure's retreating back.
"Don't know. Don't care." The rebel glanced back for a moment, eyes still gray and somber. Then; "Don't die," was the last piece of wisdom that power gave before parting with them, disappearing into the snow-covered mountain rock.
Although Dustin wanted to chase after that child... it was physically impossible. In addition to that, he had to acknowledge that their chances of living up to Hale's final words would seriously decline if he dared waste time and energy trying to pursue him (with a far more laborious method than phasing). He and Cathy needed to find shelter, and fast, or else they would risk dying from- the elements, their injuries, the rebels finding them, exhaustion- there was no shortage of things to choose from.
As the snow spun and the wind billowed around them on that snowclad, mountain cliff, Dustin wracked his sore and tired brain for a working strategy.
So, they wouldn't last back to camp, they hadn't the stamina for it. A-C was a merciless realm of ice, rock, wind and snow. Although it appeared as a grayscale dimension, made of black and white and every shade in between, its true nature was more akin to a black hole. A black hole that, if you let it, would suck in every last speck of vitality and life that one had to give, chew it up, and never spit it back out again. When Dustin and Cathy ran dry of the strength to defy its will, it would swallow them, but only after crushing all hope and resistance from their bodies and spirits. So... while they couldn't escape it currently... if they could just find a place to rest inside it then... they might just be allowed to endure it, rest and recuperate.
The rebels had survived somewhere here in the mountain range. It had to be possible. They had to have shelter. If the wind picked up enough that a blizzard was summoned, he could try digging- a snow cave, they called it- but Dustin wasn't confident in his ability to make it, not anything that would work, not in his current state. In the long run, it definitely wouldn't be enough to secure their survival. Finding what the rebels had left behind... It was their only real chance.
Knowing this barely felt reassuring as Dustin fought against the relentless onslaught of weather, as it seemed determined to sap at his power. At first it seemed like something to scoff at, even knowing better, but as the struggle dragged on ceaselessly, no end in sight, it began to weigh on him... With every meter gained, the push of the wind seemed to put up a fiercer resistance against his progress, each movement expending more energy than the last. Every step was a hazard, too, as there was no easy way of telling what was solid white-covered rock, or where it was just fluffy snow that might give beneath his boots. On top of Dustin's physical condition, the weather had taken a turn for the worse. After what Dustin guessed at being most of an hour had passed (though it felt like forever), visibility was brought down to several meters before being engulfed in a screechingly bright whiteout. Staring into the utter absence of a horizon burned at Dustin's eyes, even as the snow-filled sky seemed to cause everything to darken, blending into a featureless gray save for dancing snowflakes.
Even in this cruel, unforgiving environment, he was still surviving all right. His coat and outer gear, built for these conditions, ensured that he stayed dry and adequately not cold. Cathy was as small and light as possible, draped over his shoulders, under his scarf, and while it kept her covered, she kept him warm. All the while, his exhausted brain remained entertained with the hopeless questions that plagued his mind without rest, chasing each others' tails around in a perpetual, despairing spiral.
What if they weren't anywhere close to where the rebels had been hiding now? Were any rebels still after them, ones that could survive and navigate a snowstorm with ease, and were only waiting until his legs gave out in order to enjoy an effortless kill? What if they were right outside the rebel's hideout, but just never found it in all this snow?! Or what if they'd successfully sealed it all off on the way out, leaving no hope at all behind for him...?
No answer to those questions existed in his head, so Dustin had no choice but to just keep going, hand occasionally groping at the craggy bank at his side, searching.
At some point during this mindless, onerous, endless torture, without any way of knowing when, he glanced back over his shoulder and noticed the tint of red in the trail of footprints he had left behind him. Despite the distance he'd traveled and the time that had passed, the substance appeared no less bright against the pale purity of the snow, as it continued to leak from his body.... Like desperate refugees fleeing a violent and war-torn land...
A cold, numb hand, reaching under his scarf to the front of his neck, came back with the glove, some time since frosted over with mess from the stretch monster's undoing, now slick with fresh red. Staring at it too long, his vision seemed to... fog, slightly. He tried to think, where else, where... had he been hit... hit again?
Rattling his head to clear his sight, he thought slightly more lucidly; it should have clotted over by now, right? Even as Dustin felt increasingly woozy and light in the head, he continued to stumble through the wind and the snow.
Eventually, he found it. A cavity in the side of a mountain that was devoid of the worst of the cold, the ice and snow. Dustin had to squeeze in through the edges, and in a moment of careless excitement, he managed to accidentally let the cat on his shoulders get scraped by a sharp piece of rock that jutted outwards, eliciting a prickly yowl from his passenger. However, it was also a source of potent relief, to hear for sure that his partner had made it here with him safely, not having gone out from the pain of her injuries, nor succumbed to the cold.
Settling his backside down on the rock and packed earth below, Dustin spared no effort to making himself comfortable, for now was not the time for rest. First things first, he set about bandaging their exposed wounds. He started with washing his gloved hands with the freshly fallen snow outside, then binding the breaches of importance on both their bodies.
Cathy, though thoroughly bruised and beaten in places, especially those legs, had only one cut of any significance- a jagged one stretching along her right shoulder for a few centimeters. It wasn't worryingly deep, at least not immediately, and the flow had nicely abated thanks to her sustained period of inactivity. But he knew that it should have stitches in order to heal well and properly, as soon as that was possible... For now, he could only cover it securely with a torn strip from his singlet, the least precious of all his current assets in cloth. Dustin also had to straighten the leg he thought was fractured or broken, during which Cathy managed to react little despite the pain she had to be experiencing, and he felt satisfied that it was a clean, tidy break and set in a position where it would not easily worsen.
As for himself, Dustin went through the practiced motions with a weary brain, a ginger snout relentlessly pushing on his hands every time they began to slow... Until a faint rumbling noise, resounding throughout the cramped little crevice, alerted him to the fact that his companion had drifted off into the gentler realm of sleep. Having double-checked her injuries, and feeling fairly confident that she faced no danger from concussion or too much blood loss or hypothermia, Dustin was content to let her be while he wrapped strip after strip around that awful gash on the back of his leg, that he realized now was the cause of his stained tracks from earlier. His throat, his calf, his back... He did what he could for each of these worst-hit places, and that was it. The extent of his capabilities, now...
He looked down on the sleeping cat fondly, as she lay curled up at his side, pressed against him for the meager pickings of their shared warmth through his thick winter coat. But it wasn't too cold, and she wasn't seriously hurt. Dustin was glad, glad she was going to make it. He'd done it. As much as was possible.
In his heavily gloved hands, a few remaining scraps of white string... He'd had to entirely shred up his singlet before he was done, sacrificing it to the patron gods of first aid in order to cover the area of their combined bloody ground. Now this was all that was left...
He shook himself to stay awake, determined that he wouldn't fall asleep, wouldn't black-
His head slumped against the side of the cave wall, the hard stone causing a dull sensation of pain to blossom throughout the back of his head, but Dustin was no longer conscious enough to feel it.
... out.

asi • 24 October 2017 at 11:21 PM

"Understood." Hearing Jane's rather intricate reply to her straight-forward question, Karen couldn't help but feel a sense of trepidation invade the hard frown lines around her eyes, and seep inside the dark stony brown of her pupils. She'd never known what to think of the Eighth leader by description... or the Eighth pseudo-leader, as the case may be. That hadn't very much bothered her before, as Nine was a woman who liked strictly to reserve judgement of others for her own eyes, and not rely on the whims and weaknesses of others'. However... having listened now, to a very trustworthy and convincing account... Karen had to consider the idea that even when faced directly with the person, that individual may present a problem that her judgement couldn't easily resolve. Or at all.
If someone like Jane couldn't work Eight out in a matter of years, Karen had very little chance of making great progress in one sitting.
But she wasn't doing this alone. She had all the advantages that Jane and her experience and intimate knowledge of the leader provided, all on her side. With that, Karen had already found out a lot of things she might have never suspected, so... Why despair now, when she was already ahead?
And with those thoughts in mind, any apprehension Nine had been simmering in about the upcoming interrogation felt misplaced, and fell away as she straightened, moving to follow Jane out of the door and into the corridor again.
"We'll set things up in the third room down the hall, if I recall correctly the first's a mess from an amateur job earlier this week and the second's still waiting on replacement furniture..." Karen made these remarks with a thoughtful but brisk and business-like tempo, and she waved an underling of her own over to briefly impart instructions for this set-up before they entered the next room and greeted Eight herself.
Nine was prepared for it though, or so she thought. In fact, she was now eagerly waiting for Jane to introduce her...


Teija's smile began to curl up and shrink on being really confronted with the unadulterated chaos that was Eight in her natural form. Although she had found the wild unpredictability of the girl something very fun to watch, she quickly discovered that it was much less fun to actually try and manage, when the conversation didn't exactly go her way. The tell-tale signs of the platinum blonde's discontentment were displayed through the quirky, confused tilt to her eyebrows, furrowing in some frustration, and the way in which her cheeks were sucked in... All of these were obvious signs to anyone who knew her that Teij's metaphorical whiskers had been tweaked. She decided right then and there that she really didn't envy Eight's assistant's job, not that she'd exactly considered that she might before.
Still she laughed boisterously along with Eight at the paling Mikey's expense. "Nothing gets past this one, huh," Teij said with a crooked grin directed his and Tina's way. Even while certain Eightisms seemed to set her back, eye twitching back and forth as she was forced to recalculate the conversation's trajectory... Something about this also pleased and continued to delight her at the same time. Teij had a formidable sparkle in her eye that didn't dim even when Eight was expressing her displeasure through whining like a child to her. It was as if she realized she could have no sway over this natural calamity in personified form, and while she would have preferred it if she could... Teija was completely satisfied knowing that nobody else was able to sway this wild entity, either.
Thus contented, she offered the leader a sharp, toothy smile, complete with a respectfully courteous nod. "It's very nice to meet you, Eight. Since I'm going to be serving as Two's assistant from now on, I look forward to working with you where our jobs may overlap in the future," she said these formalities despite knowing that Eight would never respond appropriately in kind. It was the kind of professionalism that Two demanded from his subordinates regardless of circumstance, and she would meet those expectations. "If there's anything I can do for you, just let me know," Teij promised, but with an undercurrent of insincerity. Her first priority would always be Two's orders over anyone else's requests- and he'd already instructed her to never bring any visitors to him, for instance.
She would have stuck out a hand for Eight to shake, despite the clear and imminent physical danger such a move invited, however the second assistant was forestalled from any such interaction by Eight's generous, rambling offer of a gift for Two, and a Caprisun Pacific Cooler was thrust her way instead.
Teij should have probably expected that, somehow.
Hands still filled with an unsteady heap of papers that Four's assistant had so unceremoniously dumped on her, Teija gave Eight a second look, carefully assessing the way the girl's eyes still clung so faithfully to the shiny cartoonish packaging as if drawn by a stomach-based spell. "Why don't you hold onto that for now," Teija suggested helpfully, tone softened to emulate kindness, while a wry smile tugged insistently on her lips. "After all, it might... melt!" she declared convincingly. She figured that if Eight didn't need to make sense, Teij probably didn't have to try hard to either, at least when talking to her. It was only fair.

demon • 28 October 2017 at 10:51 PM

The sound of raised voices did violence to the dusty, musty still that hung over the tunnels, dislodging more dirt from the packed ceiling- whatever the sporadic shakes that plagued the area had missed- and thus aiding in the campaign to drown the already unclean floor. There was a certain discernible snarl-like character to the clamor that promised to make blood run cold regardless of content, though in that it was not lacking, as the words, half-whispered half-shouted, floated down the passage to land in several unsuspecting ears... "And this, this is how you repay us? With this crap? We bust out backsides out there for you and come back to this?! Hell, Greg almost died on the last time and after that you've the nerve to tell us you're out?" This last accusation was punctuated by a rough commotion, something thrown or shoved but without great impact, just a messy cascade of low sounds fumbling across the corridor.
Whatever reply this might have received was inaudible to distant ears, but the further-angered response was not. "If you don't do your job and deliver, who's to say we will next time? After all, you're not the one going out there... this time." There was a final forceful thud before the sounds down the hall dispersed, numerous pairs of feet scuffling away until there was nothing.
From their place around a corner, where Tracy had stopped and tapped her shoulder on first hearing the confrontation ahead, Raven made a discontented expression, face twisting into a grimace as she realized it was already too late. She hadn't meant to let the altercation get away from her, but she'd been too occupied with listening and trying to figure out what it was about to catch up with them. Or shake off Tracy's initial staying of her.
"What was that all about?" Raven wondered, sending her companion a sideways glance, expecting to be met with a look sharing equal curiosity. That's not what she found, however.
Instead, she was met with a curtain of hair that showed nothing. "Someone else's problem." Nothing except dull indifference. After a moment spent peering around the corner to ascertain that the coast was now clear, Tracy continued leading her on their way.
"Hey, wait up, I thought that had something to do with your job. I mean, a work dispute, management?" she held up her hands as if they encompassed the essence these two things, and then shoved them together to hint strongly that they might just be related.
Tracy barely spared her a cursory glance or thought in return. "My job ain't every little dispute, that one's nothing to do with me," they said, and continued looking around like... like they were worried or scared of running into what they'd overheard before.
Raven kept apace with the other, still wanting her bathroom trip, but internally she was indignant. Seriously, she'd got out of Zach's company to sink her foot into this mess? Some time spent in Tabs' company was beginning to sound more appealing by the minute. "Do you get to keep your job by avoiding your job?" she began to question flatly, and moreover; "Is that how you got it in the first place?" Having seen the veteran, the idea that she'd appreciate this behavior was a hard, nigh impossible pill to swallow.
"No," Tracy huffed, and, from the direction their hair was swinging, Raven could tell they were refusing to look her in the eye as they jumped topics, feet slowing in accordance with their interest. "Where's Teij got to, is what I wanted to ask," they said, a hand behind their hair and scratching at what had to be approximately their chin.
Raven's eyes narrowed at the continued avoidance, but she responded to the question nonetheless. "Oh she... buzzed off early in the morning somewhere," she illustrated wiht a careless wave of her hand, like Telly had gone up in smoke- and she might as well have.
Their hair bobbed vaguely. Raven realized that with their unusual power, Tracy had probably realized Teij had teleported out of here, or presumably they would have been able to find her. "She say where?" they prompted further.
"Can't remember." Raven gave them a hard, flinty-eyed look to say that even if she did, she wasn't sure how freely she'd be offering them that information, after being treated to all that fancy side-stepping just now. She was rebellious like that.
Tracy made an understanding sort of sigh noise and resumed walking. After some time had passed in slightly less than companionable silence, they broke it by saying, "Honestly Birdie, in a job like this, you're gonna hafta realize that sometimes, it ain't worth the effort." It was followed by an almost unheard mutter; "Not that yours is anything like mine."
"What are you talking about?" Raven glowered her frustration at them, tired eyes and head still cognizant enough to summon a dark hazel storm and thunder in her undertone. "If you just put in enough effort-"
"It's definitely not effort," they snapped at her and physically pulled Raven up short with a spidery hand gripping her shoulder. Before she could open her mouth to reply, however, they jerked a thumb abruptly towards the door on their left. "Washroom. I wait here while you clean up." Tracy then turned away, hands buried deep in their pockets and foot tapping out a blatant refusal to engage with her on the subject any further, at least for now.
Raven felt pretty much like she'd just been dragged backwards through a thorn bush, so bewildered and irked was she by this exchange, but that also just ended up contributing to her wanting a shower, so she shouldered her way past Tracy into the bathroom and spent the next few minutes hosing herself down and then scrubbing. She had to admit, it felt great to attend to those rough spots from the skirmish the other day that she'd been ignoring. The cold water on her head did a lot to wake and revitalize the brain which had still been slow and heavy from the previous night, too. Her arm complained when she stretched it... But Raven was getting used to that.

taffy789 • 30 October 2017 at 11:03 PM

Eight’s eyes widened at Teija’s rejection of the Caprisun gift.
“M-melt?!?” the leader exclaimed, in equal parts horror and amazement. “It DOES that???”
Having stopped smothering herself, Tina peeked at her Teija over the top of the couch cushion she held in front of her body, like a protecting shield from all the crazy. She felt some slight concern over this gamble her friend had taken. Either Eight would fully believe the melting Caprisun story and that would be the end of the discussion…. Or Eight would demand more explanation and get lost in the weeds again over some easy-to-understand detail.
If the latter happened again, Tina wasn’t sure how much more she could take without finally going insane herself and finding the closest torturer to help finish her off.
Thankfully, before Teija could reply to Eight, Mikey gave a sudden yelp and was pushed to the ground by the door swinging open on him from behind.
“Oh shoot, Michael! I apologize!” A familiar voice exclaimed, its natural soft and careful tones rising to a fretful, expected loudness. Jane quickly squatted to her knees and helped Mikey stand up again.
“I’m okay,” he assured her, wobbling a bit with his cane as he worked to steady himself. Standing up from the couch with a sigh, Tina walked over to go offer the guy an outstretched elbow to help him balance, which he gratefully used as he made some quick readjustments to his prosthetic.
From across the room, a much, MUCH louder exclamation than Jane’s sounded off.
“GASSSSP! JUNEBUG!!! YOU’VE BROUGHT IN THE KAREBEAR GIRL!”
After getting a better look at who’d entered the room behind Jane, Tina could see that Eight wasn’t spouting some nonsense.
Sure enough, the newest leader of the torture wing was in the room, looking about as half as intimidating as the old one- which, Tina knew, was still immensely intimidating.
Tina quickly turned her head away to avoid direct eye contact with Nine.
Eight, however, was less fearful.
Pushing right past Teija and Jane, Eight was pushing against Nine before Jane could even finish introducing the two. Jane had managed to get past the “Eight, meet Nine, Nine, meet Eight” nonsense and was in the middle of explaining to Eight who Nine was when Eight’s loud chattering to Nine drowned out any of the assistant’s words.
“Karebear!!!!!! Ikea!!!! We were just talkin’ about you!!! And how you stole Spike-y’s house!!!! And about how you’re not the one all dead yet!!!” Eight, despite forcing herself so much into Nine’s personal space that there existed mere inches between the two, made a motion like she was going to shake her co-workers hand.
“But Wolverine and a few others are dead but you aren’t so yay for you!”
As she said this, Eight pressed a now lukewarm Pacific Cooler Caprisun into Nine’s hands instead of shaking it.
“Careful!” She added with a grin, and she stepped back from Nine while motioning towards the Caprisun. “I just found out that those melt today!!! Better be fast!!! And I guess that your gift now because you’re the new Spike-y, or something??? Oh and cotton candy girl is being all mean and won’t take the Caprisun to Spike-y just ‘cuz it’ll get all melty!”
Eight puffed up her cheeks in indignation, and then she said, loudly, for Teija to plainly here.
“BuuuuUUUuuuuuUUuuuut since you’re like the new Spike-y could you just get all mean with her until she’ll do it like Spike-y will?”

asi • 12 November 2017 at 2:15 PM

"So you decided to show, huh," said Septa, leaning coolly against the door frame he'd literally just walked through, seen Manny and then backtracked in order to 'lean coolly' against it. A tray of various things he'd brought with him had also been quickly placed down on a convenient cabinet top before he performed his entrance.
The man looked over at him and scowled, processing his words slowly... and then glanced deliberately at the analog clock by the door, which was pink and featured Disney princesses, where it hung up and to the left of the posing leader's head. Then Manny began really glowering at Septa. "What," he grounded out in painful, faltering English, "did you say?"
The leader began clapping, slow and loud, echoing through the small but spacious, hollow office room. It would have almost been menacing, if he wasn't so obnoxious about it instead. "Oooh, well done! That phrase really worked. Okay, so what I said was- hey, don't you want to get your little book out, write this down?" he mimed the opening and scribbling inside of one.
Wordlessly, Manny pulled said book out of his pocket and mimed throwing it at the leader in return. 'You- late!" he jabbed a finger in the direction of the kitschy, out-of-place clock.
Septa frowned reproachfully at this unfriendly greeting. "Only by like, an hour," he lamented the other's unfair impatience, weren't this man's expectations simply too cruel?
Manny held up three dark stocky fingers while he floundered over the word; "Three. Three hour." His antagonistic glare really helped make up for what he lacked in verbal communication skills.
"Hours. I think you mean hours," Septa helpfully saw to correcting his grammar form, accompanied by a wink and a speedy snap of his own bare fingers.
"Yes, hours. You agree," the dark-skinned Italian then turned away, hunching back over the sheets he'd been working with on the table, alongside a variety of other items...
Septa was already shaking slightly with laughter from the wordplay. "Oh alright, you win." He swept into the room on light, silent feet, cradling his tray of equipment for one moment before depositing it in the next on an almost clinically clean counter running along the eastward-facing wall. There was a glass cabinet overhead that stretched the same distance. Contained within it were rows upon rows of different colored pharmaceutical bottles, the sorts typically used for containing pills, powders and liquid medicines. This same set-up was mirrored on the opposite and back walls, save for where the other door gave way to the en suite bathroom. The forth wall had the low wooden cabinet more in the style of Septa's paper-ridden desk than the rest of the room, the entrance, and a sizable fridge.
The wild-haired leader rested back against the aforementioned storage units, continuing to chat all the while. "But hey, on the upside, you get me smelling like daisies! Instead of petrol..." He pinched the middle of his pale blue button-down shirt, bringing the fabric up to his face so he could smell it. "Actually, you can still kinda smell it. The benzoin is strong in this brand." Impressed, he sniffed again. "Mmm. Daisies and gasoline."
Judging by the other man's unentertained expression, he listened, understood and cared for Septa's frivolous words in about equal measure. "Pay me overtime," Manny rumbled, the clearly memorized phrase immediately tweaking the corners of the leader's mouth upwards in amusement.
He let go of his shirt and stepped forward to swipe a bottle of disinfectant soap off the table and rub it all over his hands, gloved and not, saying lowly while he did so; "Now that would depend on the quality of your labor, not how much time you waste doing it, which I couldn't care less about," he massaged his hands together until dry. "I only want results."
One glance at the clueless dark-skinned Italian showed he didn't follow the English, but he still knew the softer tone and the cold, focused look, understood what they meant. On to business then. "Alright, you want this done in time for tonight or not?" Manny switched languages, and the difference in his ability was palpable.
"Yes," Septa answered seriously in kind, beginning to look over what had been laid out on the table already in trays. "How far did you get," he asked without inflection, leaning as far in over the table as the long length of his body could allow- back flat and neck craning.
"Med down to E." Manny grunted. He waved a vague hand gesture down the remainder of the table. "Can you check that it's how you like?"
"It's not about how I like, it's about getting it right," Septa held up a bottle with a blue lid, selected from the ranks with uncanny precision, and didn't glance at it twice before saying; "Didn't I make a note for you about increasing Donovan's dosage?"
Skimming the register of entries, Manny cursed as he located the scrawl on the margin of the page, squinting to read it. "Either I'm suddenly illiterate or your shorthand is actually impossible," he accused the leader.
"Well, that depends," Septa sounded oddly indifferent and unaffected as he peeled off the named label and smoothed it down on a different bottle plucked easily from the well-stocked shelves, this time with an orange lid. "Have you been sampling the merchandise?" his tone was truly neutral, uncaring either way. "Because if so, you should tell me what immediately so I can administer the counterpoison. Please note that getting it wrong will prove equally fatal," Septa intoned dispassionately, exactly like the caution disclaimer on a slightly disreputable pharmaceutical commercial, only far more leisurely. The new bottle replaced the old in the color-coded array. Septa spun several with a purposely careless finger until all the labels were facing different directions, looking somewhat appeased.
Manny adjusted several marks on his worksheets before he looked over, appearing appropriately wary of the leader, and spoke defensively, "... I haven't taken anything."
To this Septa only nodded and gave a quick and flippant, "Good." With his eyes he was still busily drinking in everything the table sight had to offer him.
There was a nervous, sharp edge to Manny's eye as he followed Septa's movements, watching as he picked a new bottle, weighing it gently in his bare hand and then the other. Not daring to let apprehension permeate into any other aspect of his body language, Manny continued; "Since when did we give out poisons?"
"Well, everything's a poison if taken in excess," observed Septa, suddenly turning away, abandoning his inspection of the readied wares in order to attend to the tray he'd brought with him instead. More glass containers were placed on the counter from it, but these were different. "So since always."
Manny frowned at this, but there was nothing he could do except watch the other's busy hands at work. "Then let's not give anyone too much." But his eyes couldn't even keep pace.
"Every effort to make Goldilocks proud," murmured Septa idly without looking away from his quick-fingered hands as they danced what seemed to be a clearly practiced rhythm, every movement conducted just as if it had been performed a thousand times before, and counting.
Giving up on the fingers, Manny took in one by one the ingredients and instruments used, growing increasingly concerned, and curious, with each mystery piece. "... What are you doing?"
No acknowledgment, then the stirring stopped. A glass rod was extracted and placed on a paper towel, slightly damp.
"Adding flavor..." Septa relaxed against the counter and took a sip from the beaker, holding it delicately with one pinky sticking out like it was a tall glass of champagne ordered from a fine restaurant. "Mm," he pressed one finger into his cheek as if to say 'delicious', though it looked anything but, commenting; "Tastes mostly like sugar." The translucent stuff was a more viscous liquid than water, so it slowly, slowly sank back down the side of the glass, and he had to lick the remainder off his lips, causing Manny to recoil slightly.
"That's not a drink, what the heck is that?" He couldn't decide whether to be more impressed or repulsed by the leader's guts, and was stuck somewhere vacillating between the two.
Septa set the pasty solution aside, smiling without warmth or feeling. "Like I said, flavoring. Makes things slide down easy... And provides an enteric coating." He turned his back on the guy again, like he didn't have a moment to spare to even look at him. He'd gotten hold of a tiny brush and started painting one of his nails with the goop.
"You mean- what? Not for the pills," Manny was freely able to make a perturbed expression, one that then made the rapid transition to disturbed. "You could get everyone sick like that."
"What, with mono?" Septa laughed at this, but it wasn't his usual boisterous guffaw, or even that silly giggle that always spelled trouble. It was empty, and... humorless. He shook his head. "No, no. I was only checking the condition of the materials. It's the test batch. If some actually need it- and I bet they do-" He went searching, simply shaking some bottles until they rattled, dipping his gloved hand into others and rubbing the tablet between his fingers, all the while saying; "They never get all the trippy ones right. Capitalists, always cutting corners, amiright." Septa then examined one instance closely, holding it up in front of his face.
"See?" He licked the pill, then made a face, clicking his tongue in dissatisfaction. "Weak enteric coating. Not enough PVAP for this one."
Manny frowned. "Are you serious?" His look was skeptic, with a loath-to-ask pinch of 'what does that even mean' worn unfashionably on his face.
Smiling in a way that was disconcertingly disconnected from his usual friendly range of expressions, Septa stalked forward until he stood right in front of Manny, uncomfortably close, then placed both hands on his belly, cold and strange to the very uneasy Italian. "What that means, dear apprentice, is that it will break down too early in your stomach and that may not be something the thin, precious layer of mucosa that lines your stomach would enjoy..."
"Just stop talking about mucus like that," Manny shot at him, eyes ablaze with abject and horrified disgust, and shoved Septa's groping hands away from his rather chubby stomach.
Septa just looked down on him with a twisted faux-smile. "Am I grossing you out? It's a part of your body. Also located at the sites of numerous orifices... which I can only assume you to be familiar with. Soft, smooth and velvety in texture, and such a pretty pink color... Mucous membranes secrete thick protective fluids that hydrate tissue and..." When Manny started looking queasy enough at the visual image Septa painted that regurgitated matter on his shoes seemed an imminent threat, Septa veered his digression into less descriptive grounds. "Did you know it's the stuff that keeps your stomach from digesting itself? All that concentrated HCl, as powerful as battery acid, capable of eating through wood or even metal..."
Manny began to look up in slowly dawning alarm as Septa sililoqued on. "True, it's not often fatal, but if the gastric ulcer develops at the site of a blood vessel... or if it causes the lining of the stomach to split open... or if it becomes inflamed and swollen... Well," Septa said, voice so silky and lullaby-soft that it might have lured his listener to sleep if the substance hadn't been disturbing enough to keep him awake at night instead. His eyes, dark brown like bitter chocolate, left Manny's own so Septa could circle the table, footsteps conferring a low drumming tempo to his audio track. "But I'm sure the healers here could save you. They're all very good... for nervous sweaty teenagers who don't have the first clue about what they're doing, that is." Septa's feet came to a stop right back in front of Manny again, close enough to smell his perspiration if he wanted.
"Anyway, if people get those mucous membranes irritated, they won't be coming back for more pleasant experiences of the kind, would they, and then we'd have a problem on our hands, wouldn't we, Manuel..." he paused deliberately, back arched slightly to put him on level with the shorter man, fingers brushing lightly under the other guy's chin to compel him into meeting Septa's eyes again, as they seemed to scour his for any trace of... something, Manny knew not, only that whatever the result of the search, Septa was apparently content with it.
"So yes," he decided, straightening up in order to clap both Manny's cheeks simultaneously with enough force to jolt him, "the quality in this case is seriously subpar but hey, it's only the outside and that's nothing if not an easy fix, for me that is. The BZPs on the other hand, yikes," he said while chewing on one side of his mouth on a pill Manny hadn't seen him slip inside. "Do we have enough in reserve to replace this batch? Great, and remind me to remember to threaten those guys with contracting elsewhere. Or, you know, spiders," he went on to suggest with an evocative wiggle of black gloved fingers. "Whatever rocks their boat," he concluded with an absent-minded hum.
Feeling eerily like he'd just had his spirit slapped back into him, Manny wasn't in the mood to offer the leader any further entertainment on the subject. "Okay... Goldilocks," Manny grumbled, striving to get back to whatever passed as normalcy for them.
Unfortunately for him, Septa took this as an invitation to revive his stupid personality and wink at him. "Hey, I'm sure if I tasted you, you'd be just right-"
"You'd like that wouldn't you," Manny deadpanned, and when Septa just grinned and shrugged, he turned away in disgust. The side of his hand tapped against his chest as he did so. "Please. Go screw yourself."
"No need for that~" Septa informed him, wearing yet another of his most insufferable looks. Meanwhile, Manny began to contemplate the tribulations involved in slipping some of these poorly coated pills into the leader's food. "Now don't you have something to do? Have you updated the logs in the database?" he waved a hand in the direction of his computer, and Manny scowled.
Septa knew he hadn't, for good reason. "The password?" he prompted, testily.
"2As7bEs7tOs11g," was the helpful- and painstakingly clarified- reply.
As Manny worked his way through all the tedious numbers and codes between the paper and digital records, he couldn't help but sneak a glance over every now and then to the curious business Septa was undertaking on the counter.
And then he spluttered just on the spit in his mouth, staring across the room before accusing with a hint of laughter in his tone; "Is that what you wear when you shower?"
Septa didn't seem to hear, though. In addition to the bedazzled hairnet that had inspired his outburst, Manny also noticed the clear, protective goggles he'd put on, and plastic white gloves slipped on now over both hands. All things considered, Manny then decided it a good idea to keep a safe distance while watching him work.
After dousing the whole counter area in some kind of sterilizing spray, Septa headed over to the table to collect some things from tonight's stock, others filched from the shelves and pilfered out of cabinets. When a grand total of thirteen bottles had been scooped up all at once, seemingly at random- but Manny had paid just enough attention to guess they shared a manufacturer- he carried them back to the counter. After picking one and shaking it lightly he snapped open the lid and rolled a couple of tablets out onto the same hand, then proceeded to do the same for two of the other bottles- all with his right hand. Once Septa had a full handful of pills he tipped that into a flask which he'd been preparing in the meantime with his left hand, having emptied into it several different fluids and various powders and then stirred with several swirls of his wrist.
Then he flipped over an hourglass and, crouching slightly so that the sand was pouring down at eye-level, watched the pretty pink dust slip through the narrow neck to pool at the bottom of the lower glass bulb, transfixed.
The next time Manny glanced back it was to see Septa distractedly shaking the device to make it sparkle. "Aren't you using that to, like, measure?" he gestured towards the leader's currently simmering flask.
And apparently this time he wasn't too immersed in his work to answer, "No, I just like how pretty it looks."
"Isn't that what snow globes are for?" Manny questioned rhetorically.
He agreed; "Yes, I think you're right. Catch!" And Septa threw it his way. Not in a gentle, gracefully soaring arc, but literally threw it over his shoulder without looking... and the aim was directly at Manny's head.
He would have received a faceful of glass had his reflexes been just a little weaker than they were. As it was, Manny fumbled with the delicate doodad once, twice, nearly dropping it a third time before he managed to discard the hourglass onto the desk and into safety. Needless to say, the Italian teenager cussed creatively all the while, before finally managing to shout a coherent message back at the leader, "Don't throw things when you're... whatevering!"
Septa spread his arms out wide in what looked an awful lot like mock surprise. "Wow, don't tell me, did I leave the CIF3 lying around somewhere again? How careless of me," and yes, he was being incredibly sarcastic.
"What..." Manny shook his head, promptly giving up on asking and instead resorting to the succinct simplicity of, "Screw you!" while swiping the back of one hand's fingers under his chin in a sharp forward flick, to show just how little he cared for Septa's crap.
Septa returned his attention to his flask and as if on cue the pills began to fizz and bubble. The liquid contents gradually changed color as he swished it three times in his hand. Then with a thin pair of tongs he extracted the pills and began dipping them in the new, large beaker of paste, laying them out on a tray after he was done- And the finished products looked... awfully, awfully nondescript.
That normalcy struck more fear into Manny's soul than any product of Septa's more overt insanity ever did, because at least with that you could tell. Since the leader wasn't looking his way, he allowed himself a private shudder, more unnerved than he'd ever admit to anyone else.

demon • 12 November 2017 at 2:19 PM

"That's sufficient," Septa finally sounded somewhat satisfied, and he pushed up his safety glasses from over his eyes to glance unimpeded back at Manny, looking at him for the first time in over a half hour. He smiled lightly, not... apologetically, but as a sort of peace offering, he explained, "Normally I do the checks and touch-ups earlier, only I've been... busy, lately," he confessed, brown eyes sliding over the other man to gaze out into empty space as he stalked past on restless feet.
Manny took him in for just a moment, then grunted his acceptance of the scant explanation that was all he was getting. He'd seen Septa do crazier things- far, far crazier things- than anything he'd demonstrated today, anyway. But the noise also expressed well his derision. "Right. Busy with L.R.J.'s bed sheets," he retorted, causing Septa to pause, cheeks coloring a pale pink from surprise as Manny had the gall to leer at him. "From what I hear, you really enjoy laundry..."
In the next second, the ruthless young man smirked back, never one to shy away. "I do ensure a lot of laundry needs doing," Septa agreed, an aloof and unflappable composure to his face. Combined with his classically handsome features, it wouldn't take a lot of convince anyone that he was sculpted out of marble, and just as unfeeling. Manny wondered all the time. "It's that freshly laundered smell." And he grinned, sharp white teeth on display until Manny was compelled to grimace and back away, sick of proximity to the leader.
"I don't know how they put up with you," Manny said eventually, struggling to maintain the even tone of his voice, and not let it be overcome with his overflowing bitterness and resentment. "Especially when you're acting like an utter fool," he glared at Septa, wishing he had the power to manifest knives and do some damage to that stone cold smiling facade, or discover if it was the same all the way through.
"And you're asking me," the other responded, the heavy comedic weight in Septa's words dropping down on Manny like a ton of bricks, and it left him fighting to contain his roiling, violent dislike for the leader, at even the most implicit reminder of Bree, or rather, her history.
He was snapped out of it by the distinct staccato cadence of Septa's sharp and professional Italian, ordering him to, "Now put this crap away would you, it needs to set before it's ready," as the rack of coated pills was shoved into his arms.
"Where does this go?" Manny had to ask him.
"In the fridge, next to the insulin, over the gabypentin." He gestured vaguely, a broad sweep of his hand that was aborted halfway through on remembering the bottle in his hand still needed its lid screwed back on. "Uh, shift the ethanol."
Manny looked at him, in deadpan; "You mean the booze." Because all of Septa's weird stuff aside, he knew that one.
"Sure, if that's what you're using it for," Septa allowed with a magnanimous roll of his shoulders. He tightened the lid until sealed airtight and waited one beat before adding; "But you should probably refrain from sampling it."
Manny gave the leader yet another suspicious look for the guy's mental polaroid collection but completed the task without any fuss, save for wrinkling his nose at the clinical fridge smell as with large, careful hands he rearranged its contents.
As soon as he was done, Septa waggled a hand downwards in his direction to summon the unenthusiastic Manny back over again. He wanted to be updated on the results of the database check. "Have you accounted for our losses?"
"There's been nothing since the five last month," Manny summarized with a glance at the page just to double-check.
Septa nodded again, crouching to examine the bottom of a cupboard, pulling a box out and onto his knees to look over the contents. Meanwhile, he proceeded to intone instructions over to his unofficial assistant. "We've got one more. Add: 2.5 p.w. rec, av-d 6.2 Med..." He continued rattling off a list of abstract references, only about half of which Manny had learned the meaning of, but all of which he jotted down dutifully until Septa added a name. "Courtney."
Manny's pen stilled. "Courtney," he repeated. "Wasn't she- isn't she from...?"
"Spec ops," Septa allowed, and there was a pause as he apparently found the need to open a particularly tough bottle with his teeth. Manny then watched as it was flung into the rubbish bin across the room, bouncing inside it briefly with a triumphant clatter.
"Cinque's?" He looked to confirm.
"That's right. Note," Septa continued his list in that same dispassionate tone; "Trip, 5d in 4, temp rec..."
But Manny wasn't listening to that now. "She was friends with that girl, wasn't she-"
"Did you get everything?" Septa was prompting him, completely uninterested in the questions Manny was asking.
He insisted, "Sette-"
A glass jar was set back down on the counter with perhaps an iota more force than was strictly necessary. Septa... was beginning to sound less than patient with him. "Yes, until 'that girl' Cassie died and she stopped coming to the club. If it wasn't for that I would have noticed the signs at least two weeks ago, crit for one. Temp rec 8.10 Hi STAT, ec 2-3 for now, are you getting this all down?" There was a dull edge to Septa's tone that sent a shock of adrenaline flooding into the recipient's bloodstream, but still Manny refused to say the 'how high?' to Septa's 'jump'.
Instead, he frowned. "If it's so urgent, why don't you just tell Cinque-"
Septa actually set aside what he was looking through in order to turn and stare at Manny, eyebrows raised. "Telling the boss?" he echoed, a slyly amused smile snaking its way across his otherwise blank face. "Now that would be unethical."
He had to be joking. "Hypocrite. There's nothing ethical about you," Manny spat out, to which the leader laughed. Again, coldly.
"Oh come on now, you're getting up in arms about my tampering with things? You know what they sell on the streets. And you know the buyers never have a clue what they're getting. Not really." Septa pulled off his glittery hairnet and shook his tumultuous black hair loose, spilling out around his face like a frame made of darkness. "People put substances they don't understand the contents and effects of into their bodies all the time, and purely of their own volition. That's how it always goes. That's their choice. And it's hardly got anything to do with me." The plastic white gloves he wore were shed next, tied together in one practiced motion and tidily disposed off. His bared hand was rubbed into the palm of his black-coated left, trying to rid his skin of that dry latex feel. "Anyway, you can hardly talk to me about informed consent," Septa commented lowly, roughly, a quality to his voice that was raw and angry and maybe a little hurt and-
And Manny didn't have anything to say to that.
He turned and this time the emotion in Septa's eyes was real. That or he was an even better actor than Manny could dare to contemplate. There was frustration, and- and heartfelt concern. "Why'd you do it? Why did you tell me she was going with you without even asking her," Septa trailed off at the very end, teeth chewing tentatively on his bottom lip as he stared across the table at Manuel. He'd needed to know the reason, but he soon realized he didn't need to hear it.
He could read the answer in his eyes.
Because she needs to get away from you. You're a bad influence. Of course he'd picked Bree up when she was at her lowest, when no one else was helping, be they unwilling to try or not even caring enough to notice. But as soon as she was better, they wanted to nothing to do with him. Wanted to take her away from him.
As it should be.
Septa relented on the subject and turned back to task. After a while, he followed up on a bottle they hadn't yet managed to add to their growing assemblage on the table. "The 12.2. You haven't found it yet?"
"No! How are these dumb things ordered?" Manny complained, kneeling beside one of the lowest shelves.
Septa recited automatically, in a tone like a nursery rhyme; "Right to left, strength divided by density-"
"What?" Despite their shared fluency in the same language, all the strange and specialized technical terms Septa was apt to use threw him off, and at least some of which Manny strongly suspected to be made-up. Septa had a system of some sort, and it seemed to function all right for him, but after working here for so long, Manny was just about convinced it was too convoluted for any other man to understand.
"Should be just below you to your left-" Septa halted abruptly, stilling.
Manny thumbed heavy-handedly through the stock, rereading every label and growling in frustration. "It's not there. It's not... I can check the other-"
"No," Septa cut him off with a sigh, like he'd just realized it was futile, and, "Don't bother."
Pulling himself up off of his aching thighs and bent toes and out of his crouch, Manny could now look over the height of the desk and fix the negligent leader with another piercing look, albeit only the back of him that he could see. "We wouldn't have this problem if we stocked well in advance-"
"Not an option, kid," Septa immediately rebuffed while digging around a different storage unit, muttering to himself; "Aha, just the phosphate I was looking for. I knew I left it up here for some reason." Manny frowned at the leader and his lack of discourse until Septa turned around to address the guy properly. Hand proffered now as if proposing some formal business deal, he suggested, a certain bounce to his slim hips and quirk to his coltish smile; "Tell you what: I'll fix this, while you fix things with Bree."
Not at all impressed by this bright idea, Manny countered, "I don't have a great deal of faith in either of us succeeding. These things take time-"
The answering grin he received made Manny's tongue stop in its tracks, and he glared back as Septa taunted him; "No? Well I'm sure I could make up with Bree and have her forgive me, so do you want to swap?"
Manny's hands clenched around the sides of his pants. "No..."
"I figured you wouldn't want me doing that. And as for the other thing, unless you can pull the twelvers out of your butt like a stage magician, I'd say you're bang out of options on that front anyway," Septa remarked, just now scratching off the coat of his home-mixed paste he'd painted on his index fingernail earlier.
Manny began to ask with burgeoning trepidation and uncertainty, "How are you going to..?"
"How are you going to get Bree to forgive you?" Septa readily asked instead, one hand resting playfully on his cheek as he leaned over his paper-piled desk and watched the other.
Manny sighed, making a painfully remorseful expression. "Get on my hands and knees?"
"Good plan," Septa complimented him with a somehow simultaneously both compassionate and insufferable smirk. "Practice?" He lifted a toe as if to offer his foot for Manny to get down for and clean.
"Screw you," Manny flipped him off, then warily followed up with the hand signal for 'and you?', wanting and not wanting but feeling like he had to know what Septa planned to do.
That feeling was confirmed upon hearing the leader's coolly delivered answer. "I don't have the same material or equipment as our suppliers, but I'll compose a substitute," he scrawled a name across another label and introduced the bottle to the rest at the same time. "That was 10.0 Lup," he added offhand.
"You-? For 12.2 Hi?" Manny demanded, batting a hand in front of his face because Septa was out of his mind; "You can't be serious, I don't know half of what's in there but you could-"
"I haven't killed anyone yet, have I?"

asi • 12 November 2017 at 2:22 PM

On hearing Septa say that, Manny stopped everything, breathing included, to show him an extremely dubious look. It had been a dubious question, but Septa kept going anyway. "I grew up in a lab doing stuff like this. In fact, I did your job when I was five years old sans wage, so don't say I don't pay you enough," Septa shook his head in apparent disbelief, either at how employee standards had risen over the years, or at his childhood spent in the dastardly bowels of slave labor, who knew.
Manny shot him another suspicious look, as this narrative didn't seem to be aligning exactly with what he'd previously heard from the leader; "I thought you grew up in a bar," he accused, eyebrows heavy and scrunching.
"Mmm," Septa hummed, seeming unconcerned by his disciple's profound doubt. "A facility built to house a dangerous assortment of chemicals and plenty of ready test subjects on which to trial reactions... I wonder which that is," he mused knowingly, and more than a little sarcastically, giving Manny a guileful side-eye all the while.
Manny was certainly not put at ease by that. "You should really not tell anyone your thoughts on mixing chemicals, medicine and recreational drugs," he warned the leader, fingers tight around the pen he held while crossing another entry off the printed-paper spreadsheet before him.
"Really now, Manuel," Septa said, sounding the more impartial part of the teacher once more, lecturing as he worked; "It's all the same stuff. If I handed you a vial of ether- Diethyl ether, what would you think it was for?" he tested his student, whilst reaching up into the highest overhead shelf.
Manny admitted reluctantly; "Well, I have taken it... not that I'd particularly recommend the experience."
"Yeah, that's because you're my drug addict bud." Septa strode over and slung a skinny arm around the man's broad shoulders, not withdrawing it even as he suffered Manuel's highly affronted glare.
"That's what I'd have thought... Until you said what you just did, now I'm worried you'd use it to burn the place down," Manny removed the offending limb from his body, taking careful note of the bottle Septa was carrying and noting that no, it was not anything volatile and prone to exploding after shaking, to his great relief. If Septa was going to end up starting any fires, it would darn well have to be after Manny had gotten completely clear of the room. And its local neighborhood.
Septa had absolutely no regard for Manny's concerns, although that wasn't news to anyone. "Sounds like a fun experiment!" he replied, observing, "Though I've no doubt our resident scientist could think up some different, more creative plans for it. And if you asked Maureen?" Septa peered into that bottle before spinning its lid on until closed.
"That's a joke, right?" Manny's brows drew in tight. "To her anything's medicine..."
"She might be more familiar with its uses in relieving pain and invoking sleep," Septa surmised, again seeming unconcerned. "The lines between chemistry and medicine and fun are perilously fine, and each and every one of them imaginary, Man." Tilting his head, he wrote something new on the outside of yet another bottle. "Don't you know it's all a matter of perspective?"
Manny stepped back and took another look at Septa, considering him from the soles of his espadrilles to the transparent pair of goggles still discretely nestled in the leader's black fluffy hair- with a perfectly normal and respectable outfit for once existing in between- and finally told Septa; "I think you could impress a lot more people if you tried showing them your brain, rather than your body..." He conceded this grudgingly, but with some small hope. If the leader could change-
"Good thing impressing people isn't anywhere on my evil agenda," Septa said as a dryly humorous aside to an imaginary audience, as the only one on hand wasn't prone to laughing for him.
Manny responded lowly, in all casual seriousness, "About your evil agenda... I'm pretty sure even they would take away your bar if they thought you were using it to experiment."
Septa didn't sound or look bothered by this, simply remarking in turn; "Now if I was still experimenting, I'd be hauling people in for autopsies and still you know, curious about whether licking people's toes turns me on." He provided an almost in-character kind of smile on the resurgence of one of Manny's earlier puckered looks of revulsion. "Come on, do you see me writing notes, taking any of this down?" He stood tall and straight backed to did a mock impression of a cruelly calculating scientist, looking down on his subject with eyes of ice and making notes on the air in front of his face. And he did it well.
Manny scowled through the imaginary pad at him, hating how very convincing that performance was. If he'd been subject to more than the most cursory of examinations before coming to IOD, he might be suffering PTSD flashbacks right now, just from that look on the leader's face. "When do you ever take useful notes anyway."
Septa paused. "That's true, the logs are really for your benefit." He patted Manuel on the head fondly and just a little condescendingly. But when he withdrew and Manny continued to relentlessly glower at him, Septa's kind and friendly impression transformed like glass under the sustained fire of a blow torch, and slowly melted away.
"Don't screw with me, Manny," Septa's voice had mutated into something low, dark, and ugly with underlying violence as he delivered his warning. "Though I'm sure you couldn't do a good job of it if you tried..." He amended quietly, matter-of-factly, without even a shadow of his usually essential sense of humor; "Don't try. You won't like the fallout either way."
"I get it, I get it," Manny grumbled in English briefly before resorting back to his native tongue to mutter the assurance, "You don't need to tell me twice."
And regardless of demeanor, Septa couldn't seem to resist teasing him here; "In this language at least."
"Oi," Manny barked at him for that jab and then threw up his hands, resigned to leaving the rest of their dangerous discussion well enough alone now. "Enough with the death threats, puta, have I ever done anything to you," he muttered out his aggravation, shaking his head incessantly at all the annoying and unnecessary provocations Septa subjected him to.
"Hey, it's the family business, Mann, I can't let it go to ruin." When the leader uttered this, Manny was surprised to look over and see a deep melancholy overtaking the muddy oceans in Septa's doey brown eyes, and it briefly stunned him into stillness.
Septa, however, was evidently not so affected as he seemed since he was the one to quickly break Manny out of his stupor with a bid for more action, prompting with; "Now would be a good time to start strangling me, if we want to stay in character." When Manny responded with an acute 'what the heck' kind of look in return, he shortly explained, "Molly's coming now."
"Seriously??" Manny looked between the leader, the door and back at Septa warily, "How close is- What are you going to do?"
"Relax," Septa returned in a drawl, eyes rolling. "This is the kind of thing I have you for."
Manny scowled and began to threaten him; "If you're going to start throwing yourself at me-" Manny punched him on the cheek, just missing the nose, the minute Septa tried that.
Then right on cue, the door opened, an unmistakably large figure announcing herself against the backdrop of the relatively yellow light from the corridor outside.
"You two aren't fighting again are you?" Molly crossed her thick arms and with a knowing look, sighed plaintively, "Meeenn."
She then went on to add more quietly and much faster, so that nobody would have the chance to question her; "Also it's totally lunchtime and I need my legally required break period, so if I could get that, thanks Septa sweetie."
Seeing as a much more welcoming candidate for cuddling had just arrived, Septa quickly abandoned harassing his hostile apprentice in order to embrace the friendly, ample mass of his assistant. "Molllyyyyyee!" He sprung forward to wrap his arms halfway around her in an enthusiastic hug, rubbing his cheek into her chest in a way that could only be taken as rather intentionally, given their notable difference in height. To his amusement Septa could actually hear Manny retching in the background, and knew Molly must have given him some kind of impressive look when he managed to stammer out in English, "Better you, not me!"
Septa grinned and straightened somewhat, arms still clinging to his assistant openly while his mind and mouth worked smoothly together, ensuring that the situation would play out to his liking, naturally. "I still need time with this, but you haven't left this room since breakfast, right Mans? Go and have some lunch with Molls while I attend to things here. Means you can practice your English with a lovely native speaker, too," Septa pointed out, all this while fawning over the girl at his side, bestowing several kisses on her cheeks and squeezing her waist in a doting, appreciative manner that made her flush in embarrassment and smile despite herself.
She still pushed him away after a minute of this treatment, complaining that; "Off, boy! I don't have the patience for you today."
Manny made an irritable 'fine' gesture for what he understood of Septa's words, and gave a rude one for the rest that the leader chose to ignore. He gave one last look over the computerized spreadsheets before closing them down, and remembered to report; "By the way, Renata came by earlier and picked a whole bunch of green up. Rebeca tried to do the same, actually..." There was a 'but' that went unspoken at the end of that sentence, one he didn't need to explain to Septa.
The leader just nodded. "Oh, don't worry, I know what's up," he gave his temple a tap along with a smile that Manny recognized as anticipatory, and his skin promptly started crawling, even though he knew it was probably nothing awfully bad... Just more craziness to look forward to that night. "And hey, Manny. Maybe sort out your little problem before you come back, yeah? Hands and knees," Septa reminded, with a wink. Then the warmth seemed to leech from his eyes as he added; "I'll sort out my end, too." That was followed by a circuitous gesture to a package laid out on the cabinet by the door, Septa defining it quickly with a half-smile plus the words; "Oh, and the bulk of your payment."
Molly was tapping her foot in annoyance, looking between the two men in wide blue-eyed bewilderment. "You know I can't understand you two like this, no fair!"
Reading Manny's suddenly very serious, uneasy look, Septa separated from his sometimes-girlfriend, straightening and looking attentive in return. He knew exactly what the other was wondering now. "Is the stuff you get from me doctored?" he asked aloud on the other's behalf.
"Yes," Manny confirmed his question, dark eyes shifting nervously from side to side as he awaited the leader's answer. His hands loosely clutched the packet he'd picked up, wary of holding it tightly but clearly still unwilling to let it go without a fight.
Septa didn't answer immediately, taking his time to consider first his company, and then the room at large. "... I've studied the human body for more than 10 years now," he became quiet again, looking rather morosely off to the side at his array of equipment sitting statically on the desk without him wielding it. "My teacher for much longer than that, and she taught me everything she knew."
This wasn't news to Manny, but it was also rare that Septa was ever so explicit about what it meant to him, what he did. Septa answered his question then, seeming earnest for as much as Manny could ever tell. "I'm not giving you anything right now. But if I do, I expect you'll know what's good for you and take it. Do you understand, Manny?" he chirped this with an upbeat sing-song tune, but the eyes he stared with were cold as Hell frozen over and left no room for doubt on the sobriety of intent with which these words were spoken.
"... Yes, Sette." Despite this admission, or perhaps in part because of it, Manny couldn't help but throw out some final words of caution before quitting the leader's office room, reminding with no subtle threat; "But don't touch my girl."
Septa waved him goodbye cheerfully. "Only if she touches me first!"
The whole conversation between the two of them was, of course, all spoken in Italian, meaning that none of the substance could be otherwise understood save the intimate nature of the exchange, and- oh dear. He heard the first words breathed out of Molly's mouth before the door closed; "That was intense. Are you sure you don't want to date him too?" and chuckled rather perversely, wondering if she wouldn't have a new bruise on her cheek to outshine his in a minute.
Once they were gone Septa set about gathering back up the tray he'd brought in, leaving some things used or unnecessary behind and picking up others he now needed. Then he left the room, making his way shortly to a certain men's bathroom and finding it to be hospitably abandoned. He closed a particular stall door behind him with a light 'click'. Then he set his tray down on the toilet seat, and with a faint scraping noise, shifted one large tile aside from where it had been embedded in the floor. No such sound followed when he pushed open the well-oiled hatch resting just below, causing a wash of cold sensation as space expanded underneath him. Hands flat on the bathroom floor now, he shimmied his way down the narrow gap, finally grabbing his tray and replacing the entrance tile on top... And into the darkness, he descended.

demon • 12 November 2017 at 2:28 PM

Karen walked into the room following Jane and was essentially assaulted immediately by a hyperactive, squawking child, Eight. At least, that's how Nine immediately identified her, and nothing that happened consequently made her consider with any haste otherwise.
And while most of the girl's excitable babble of a greeting flew right over the Ninth leader's head, one part did not, for it was a misconception she would neither stand nor sit through hearing. Nine drew up her tall, strong frame to her full advantage, and resolutely rebutted Eight's claim of her usurpation of Two, and any wrongdoing therein. "I didn't steal anything, I earned it. If Two ever wants to fight me over my position then he's welcome to," Karen asserted, the burning heat in her chestnut brown eyes declaring that if anyone wished to challenge her honor, they'd receive their match and more than they'd ever dreamed of asking for.
And then Nine was presented with the strangest ultimatum she'd ever encountered yet.
In the absurd form of a small foil pouch of juice concentrate, of all things.
... First of all, Karen had absolutely no idea whether she could make Two's assistant do anything. While this was one opportunity with limited potential for embarrassment and bad consequences to find out... she still wasn't particularly thrilled by the idea of making a girl take Two a Caprisun. Seeing as it involved Two-anything, it sounded unusually cruel. Could that qualify as crimes against humanity, she wondered?
Then again, finding out information through use of cruel and unusual methods was practically an exact replica of one half of Nine's job description, and she was hardly going to wimp out now. Even if it meant an annoyingly awkward and unnecessary social situation on her hands now- that had to be infinitely better than experiencing any kind of fallout later, when she was perhaps forced into a corner with much more at stake than a Caprisun. And it would have the upside of not causing her to lose the apparently very precarious points of Eight's favor, such as they were... Karen wasn't sure how good it would be to go into this interrogation with the girl already very displeased with her...
So begrudgingly, like a sensible middle-aged man conscripted to war, she would go, and test her hypothesis.
Karen made her way across the room to the young, paper-laden assistant, Caprisun in hand and each footstep seeming to make an echo dispropportionate to that weight that she carried. She felt ridiculous but managed to ask, she thought, while still sounding sane; "Here Teija, could you please take this?"
And the blonde assistant smiled amenably, rearranged the papers she carried and consented to do so, but oh...
Her smile showed sharp teeth and her eyes blazed like daggers with the blades set on fire and it occurred to Nine then, that although Teija kept her wits about her and did her best to conceal how she felt about the matter... Karen was perceptive enough when it came to other people to not by fooled by such a superficial facade, and the truth was... Two's assistant very clearly did not like being told what to do by her; not one bit.
Since Nine had definitely not intended to make any enemies out of this simple litmus test, her composed face immediately fell and Karen hurried to compose an appropriately apolegetic expression that might make a bid for Teija's forgiveness. However, the girl had already turned away, Caprisun in hand, in order to... pass the undesired item off to the somewhat awkward Eighth boy in the room, as quickly as possible.
Karen pinched the bridge of her nose over this petty action and hoped it wouldn't bother Eight so much that she'd kick up some kind of fuss, or something.
In an effort to circumvent that kind of nonsense outcome, Nine quickly employed some diversionary tactics by getting immedaitely down to serious business, starting with giving instructions to everyone about what they could expect to happen next.
"Now if you'll just follow me, I have another room prepared where we'll be able to better conduct this interview. Erm, maybe you two could help?" Karen looked between the two Eighth division teens hopefully, because it seemed like Eight-handling had to have been printed in their job descriptions somewhere, since they were still out here when her division had jurisdiction and god, she hoped so because it didn't seem like her workers were going to volunteer.
All the while, Nine also considered the result of her little experiment with, well, some small amount of dismay. So she could get Teija's assistant to do what she wanted, seemingly, if it was within reason and she asked politely, probably, but... It was pretty much impossible to take advantage of this without making a serious enemy out of the girl, and regardless of where the young woman's assets lay- be it in physical assets as per Nine's first, rather prejudiced appraisal had suggested, or otherwise in mental or actually useful physical abilities- her position still had substantial influence in the grand scheme of things, and as such not something Nine wanted as an antagonist.
A sharp feeling of discomfort began prickling at the brunette's skin. Teija was going to make Karen let her sit in, wasn't she...
Nine exchanged a somewhat uneasy look with Jane before proceeding. It seemed that things weren't even going to be as tangled and difficult as they'd thought- but instead, worse.

taffy789 • 12 November 2017 at 10:15 PM

Mikey had straightened up, looking alert and anxious as Teija approached him. He kept a slight hold onto Tina’s arm, pressing against it slightly and using it to stand taller, though he still stood a bit shakily on his hastily re-adjusted prosthetic. Tina rolled her eyes at this, shooting a knowing look to Teija as the girl pushed the Caprisun into the guy’s free hand.
“Uh?” Mikey squeaked, staring at the thing as if he were just handed a ticking bomb.
He lifted a nervous, sunglasses-covered gaze to the girls around the room, and he gulped with some mild fear on his part upon seeing the way Eight was pouting in his direction.
“I, uh,” He said while swallowing the air that had just dried out his mouth, “I’ll… get this to Two. Don’t worry, uh, Eight.”
The leader put her hands on her hips, and that pout deepened.
“You SUUUuuuUUUUUuuuUUUUreee?” she questioned, seriously.
“…Promise.” was all Mikey could offer her.
Eight smiled at that, and Mikey let out all that anxious breath he’d been holding in.
At Nine’s attempt to segue away from the Caprisun fiasco, Jane stepped forward, as calm and ready as ever.
“Eight,” she addressed her leader, with a measure sort of care, “Nine wishes to speak with you, privately. Is that agreeable to you?”
“Mmmh? I hardly ever know what I’m agreeing with!” Eight answered, full of her signature pep. “But I love talking with friends! It’s fun!” With that exclamation, she bounded back towards Nine, and made a grand show of latching onto one of the girl’s arms. “ ‘Cause we’re friends now, huh Karebear? Oh! And if we’re friends and talking, then it’s like we’re going on a date! Right?”
Tina entered into a surprised coughing fit at that comment, but Jane remained poised and unfazed.
“Yes, it is,” she agreed with the leader. “You’re exactly right, that’s how that works.” Jane tossed a quick look of apology Nine’s way for those words, but her saying it seemed to pacify Eight and caused the girl to simply hum with content.
Smiling tightly, Jane added, “Eight? You don’t have a lot of time left on this… ‘date’. Maybe you and Nine should head out now?”
Eight lit up at that suggestion.
“Yeah!” Eight cheered. “Let’s blow this popsicle stand!” Then, her eyes became far away, and dreamy, as she continued on, “Ohhh! Actually popsicles sound AMAZING! Can we go TO a popsicle stand??? That would be soooo cool~!” Rambling further on about popsicles and ice cream, Eight tugged Nine out of the door, in a good hurry to find where they were keeping all the popsicles.
That being done, Jane turned to the two Eighth division workers.
“Mikey? Can you assistant me further? You are the… one being oh so entrusted with that incredibly important juice pouch, after all.” Jane smiled with that comment, and Mikey blushed with the joke at his expense.
“Sure,” he agreed, and shrugged himself out of Tina’s stabilizing grip on him. As he rushed off to go catch up to Nine and Eight, Jane made sure to call out after him, “Oh! And please be sure to steer Eight away from the direction of the cafeteria! We’re going further down the hall, to the right!”
Tina watched Mikey go, and her sharp eyebrow’s raised upwards as Jane finally set sights on her. “Tina.” Jane began, nodding at the girl. “I despise to have to abandon Two’s assistant here by herself.” Looking particularly sheepish, Jane turned towards Teija, and spoke directly to her, “She obviously is deserving of her own face time with the Eighth leader, and I recognize it is… extremely impolite and discourteous of us to pull Eight away as we had to. I am not blind to expressions of feeling, after all.” She paused here, ducking her head a bit in a show of anxious submission to the second assistant. “But I feel, and um, it may be in the best interest of your time and sensibilities to not have to sit through a job interview between two new coworkers. Most likely it will be the very same sort of… for the lack of a kinder word, zaniness you saw with the Caprisun issue.”
Jane sighed a beleaguered sigh.
“So, as I know Tina came from the teleporter unit as well, I hope you both are on well-enough terms for Tina to act as a guide around the new ninth division as we, erhm, cox Eight to giving an insightful opinion on what she wants her new work schedule to look like as she continues to help supplement the new ninth division in their efforts to gather information from the enemy.”
Jane concluded all that with a small, weary smile.
Before Teija could protest either way, Tina laughed.
“Yeah, sure, Jane! I’ll show Teija around a bit. I’m sure she doesn’t want to sit through some boring old meeting.” The Tina turned away from her boss, and faced her old teleporter buddy completely. Slyly, she added, while pushing her sunglasses to the top of her head, “I’ll be sure to keep her out of your guys’ hair for you!” Tacked onto to the end of that sentence came a grinning, deliberate and completely seditious wink at Teija, conveying the promise of tons of mischief in one swift action.
Backing up to the door, Jane paled. “I! I surely wasn’t trying to imply that I wished for Two’s assistant to-”
Shaking her head in amusement, Tina waved Jane onwards, reassuring the girl that she had everything under control.
After Jane stopped paling enough to say a quick goodbye and exit the room, Tina whipped around to her old coworker, hands on her hips as she grinned mischievously.
“So!” She said, shaking her hips in a slight, teasing manner, “Do you want to go sneak into their conversation with Eight? Or do you want to go do something interesting with me? ‘Cuz,” Tina grinned, “in true teleporter-unit fashion, I have your back for either.”

asi • 17 November 2017 at 3:55 PM

Having just narrowly averted appearing unamenable to Jane's very politely spoken and seemingly logical requests, Teija turned back to Tina with a pleased smile on her face after hearing the other girl's suggestion.
"I knew I could count on you, Tin!" So saying, she slung an arm familiarly around Tina's shoulders, posture easy and confident. Like any successful apex predator of the wild, her petite yet robust frame seemed well-fed and always ready to spring, in spite of any earlier episodes of bodily stress that may have occurred. She continued, hanging closely by Tina's head, though not so much as to sound loud or breathe too heavily on her; "Let's go watch the upright Nine getting completely confounded by your crazy boss. I mean, this I gotta see," she proclaimed exuberantly, eyes narrowing behind her sunglasses in barely suppressed excitement.
She couldn't wait to witness what Eight would get up to next...


Nine had to admire the finely honed management skills that Jane demonstrated in whisking her and Eight out the door, presumably so she could handle the ambitious second assistant by herself.
Unfortunately that left Nine alone with Eight, and aside from hesitantly attempting to herd her in the direction of the interrogation room she'd instructed her workers to prepare, Karen was at a small loss with how to handle her should she not choose to cooperate with the direction Nine had in mind... A popsicle stand had to be very close to the end of the list of places Karen was prepared to go; especially since she hadn't the faintest idea of where they might find one, save for hitching a ride all the way back to America- not an option, for obvious reasons.
So in response to Eight's own insistent, tugging hold on her hand, Nine reciprocated with a slightly firmer grip of her own, intending to steer the unruly girl to the interrogation chamber through pure force of will if she had to... But before they got down to business, there was one thing Karen to set straight, a matter of great moral and personal importance to the leader. She had only one reservation holding her back: how to let this strange, clingy, manic girl down easy? And it had to also be blunt enough to still get the message across-
"I... already have a girlfriend," Karen lied impulsively through her teeth.
Meanwhile, several ninth divisioners had just so happened to have chosen that particular moment to enter the corridor, and judging by the looks on their faces, they definitely heard their boss say that.
Karen stopped just short of facepalming out her feelings of personal failure when they turned away to immediately begin to gossip excitedly among themselves. This was not how she'd planned on coming out... not that she'd ever been in the closet, really. But naturally she'd had one or two private fantasies, which, while embarrassing in their own right, still managed to have a little more dignity and finesse than this.
Oh, well. Nothing to be done about that now, her witnesses were already scuttling hastily away, presumably to spread the sapphic word. And since Karen doubted shouting after them would make her feel even marginally better about it, so she refrained.
As soon as Jane reappeared, Nine stopped just short of latching onto the Eight-shaped buffer her presence provided, and instead rather managed to usher them to the interrogation chambers in what she considered a passably professional fashion, although perhaps not with the flying colors she preferred, so to speak.

taffy789 • 18 November 2017 at 2:36 AM

Mikey had caught up to the two other girls just in time for the Ninth leader to come out to everyone in the hallway.
Unlike the ninth divisioners that had quickly scrambled off to preach the Good Word Of The Lesbian to all whom would listen, or whatever, Mikey stayed close behind to be able to catch Eight’s reply to that subtle rejection of her advances.
“Oh?” Eight grinned up at Nine, still clinging onto her arm. Eight pulled Nine’s arm tighter to her chest. “That’s GREAT that you have girl-friends!” She said those words obviously separate, despite Karen having not pronounced the word herself in such an unrelated manner. When Eight smiled wider, all her teeth shone. “Because if WE’RE new best girl-friends, and YOU have other best girl-friends, then that like!!! Makes those girl-friends MY girl-friends, because that’s how friendship works! The best friends of my friends are my friends!!! So we all get a lot of girl-friends that way, right???”
Despite himself, Mikey couldn’t suppress a slightly snort from behind the two leaders.
“Outsourced lesbianism.” He commented, smirking at his own joke, “This is the future.”
It was then that Mikey heard the “pat pat pat” sound of flat shoes on tile rushing up from behind him. He turned his head, slightly, in time to see Jane, looking a bit pale, stepping past him straight to Nine’s side. He watched as Jane pressed a pair on sunglasses into Nine’s hand that currently wasn’t entrapped, pressed near Eight’s stomach. Jane muttered a quick apology before turning her attention onto the Eighth leader, who regarded her assistant back with little expression.
“…Eight,” Jane began, patiently. She sounded absolutely tired, and her voice seemed almost strained with quietness. “Perhaps… it is better to let Nine’s arm go? You’d certainly would let everyone…. Walk a bit easier.”
Eight gasped, scandalized. “But Jennifer! This is a new friend!”
“A new friend who very much would let to be able have use of both arms.” Jane pointed out simply, and frowned.
Eight stuck out her tongue at her assistant. “Oh! What do you know! You have no friends!”
Jane’s frown deepened, and she turned away from Eight.
Mikey watched as the assistant rubbed the bridge of her nose in agitation, moving the sunglasses slightly up and down on her face. He watched her take in a deep, calming breath. She turned back to the two leaders, this time speaking up to Nine.
“…We’ll get started with the interview soon enough,” she assured the leader.
Mikey, in his opinion, enjoyed the decreased pace of movement Eight’s clinging to Nine made the group move at. He found it certainly easy to keep up with, despite his own clunky cane tapping away on the floor with a heavy “clunk clunk clunk”. At one point during the journey, Eight flipped around while walking and waved at him, as if she was checking back on him to make sure he was still following behind.
….Not knowing how else to respond, Mikey just had waved back, if a bit awkwardly.
When Jane called the group to a halt in the interrogation wing, Mikey wasn’t the only one in the group confused. Eight had stepped away from Nine, finally letting go of the other girl’s arm. She approached one of doors to an interrogation chamber, glancing over the plaque naming it “Room #3” with an expression of subdued curiosity. As Eight tilted her head and wiped her hand over the bumpy letters of the plaque, Mikey could hear Jane talking to Nine.
“You can go in and get ready, if you want. The earpiece is on the table inside. Eight should follow in right behind.”
Mikey dully listened to these instructions not meant for him as he glanced around the surrounding hallway.
Like the rest of the interrogation wing, everything was sparkling, clean, pristine.
Featureless, intimidating doors lined the hallway on both sides of him; the only thing differentiating any of them being the plastic, shining plaque stuck onto each one. “Room #1” on his left, “Room #2” to the opposite right, “Room #3” again on the left, but now further down the hall- and so on. Between each of the rooms was sandwiched an unlabeled door that Mikey knew to be the observation rooms for the interrogation chambers, though he wasn’t sure who would ever want to sit in one of those for it’s necessary purpose. He, however, considered the thought of it being possible that some the interrogation workers napped in one of these many rooms in their spare time… Then again, he frowned to himself, having heard the rumors about how difficult having Two as a boss was… Mikey doubted the observation rooms were ever used for the clearly optimal purpose of sneaking naps into the work day. Despite working under a leader who had emphasized max efficiency, Mikey thought humorlessly, Two’s old workers had really let a good opportunity to utilize some often unused space slide right by them with that one.
Eight piping up, loudly, to his right woke Mikey back up to the current situation at hand.
“I’m not WORKING right now, am I?” Eight asked, staring Jane down with a great, exaggerated frown. “Spike-y never makes me work anymore!” She let out a whine of compliant, “So it’s totally not FAIR!”
Nine, as Mikey noticed, had entered Room #3 for… some reason. The only ones left out in the hallway now were him, Jane, and the base’s resident crazy leader.
The crazy leader who was currently very upset.
“I wanted POPSICLES, not to WORK.” Eight stomped her foot in a show of defiance.
Jane stepped forward, closer to the girl. “You’re not working. You and Nine are just going to… talk about work, and things, in here.”
Biting her bottom lip, Eight glanced from Jane, to the interrogation room door, back to Jane. Her gaze focus on her assistant, and her mouth settled into a thin, stubborn pout.
“I don’t WANT to go in there!” Eight said, shaking her head so violently that her bob of green-blue hair seemed under threat of being cast off through the air. “Bad things happen to people when they go TALK in there!”
“Well,” Jane straightened up, and a sudden stern edge caught her tone which surprised even Mikey, “’Bad things’ are not going to happen to you, but you do need to go in that room. For work. One’s orders.”
Eight stared her assistant down, her stubborn pout not fading.
“…No bad things?” she repeated, huffily.
“No bad things.” Jane promised, less stern this time, but more exhausted.
Mikey could see Eight’s face reflected in Jane’s large sunglasses. Suddenly all he saw in them was the back of Eight’s head, as the girl had whipped around to stare directly at him instead.
“… No bad things?” She asked, pout lessening in intensity as she made a scrunched-up face of scrutiny at him.
“Uh.” Mikey felt at a loss of how to respond to that, if only because Eight acknowledging his existence never ceased to make him feel like an escaping prisoner who just got a spotlight shone down on him, suddenly and without any prior warning to the danger. But Jane’s sunglasses-covered gaze had fixated on him, almost desperate in how her mouth turned down in the corners and how her brow creased itself into a knot of anxiety on her forehead. The answer he had to give was an obvious one.
“Yeah.” He shrugged, helplessly. “No bad things.”
Eight softened at that assurance.
Mikey further offered, “…Maybe afterward your…. Uh, talk thing, Jane will even find some popsicles for you too?” while ignoring the great frown that had now appeared under Jane’s sunglasses.
Eight exploded with brightness at that.
“Oh yeah!” She cheered, happily, “And then afterwards me and you and Karebear Ikea can all go on a date together!”
“Uhhh.” Was all Mikey had to say to that, his mind going unhelpfully blank when it should have been planning the quickest avenue of escape for himself.
Thankfully Jane swept in after that and, taking advantage of Eight’s newfound good humor at the promise of frozen sweets, herded the leader into the interrogation room after Nine. After closing the door, Jane produced a key out of her pocket, and Mikey made a hesitant “urpfh” sound as he watched Jane lock the interrogation room up tight. Jane explained to Mikey as she pulled her sunglasses from her head, “Nine is fully aware of this precaution taken to avoid Eight running off again and disappearing for another full week.”
“…Uh-huh,” Mikey muttered, wondering to himself what kind of crazy person would willing lock themselves in a room with Crazy Eight. He shook his head at the mere absurdity of the idea while he hooked his own sunglasses onto the collar of his shirt. He rubbed at the back of his neck as he glanced once, worriedly, at the interrogation room door. “…So, Miss Jane, are we just going to… wait out here until we here some ungodly yelling and need to rush in, orrrrr-?”
Jane was already walking towards the door left of the interrogation chamber.
“Oh, no.” She explained, her voice at its natural quiet. “We’re going to watch in, of course.”

asi • 20 November 2017 at 12:38 AM

Karen had her mouth halfway open to correct Eight when a moment of clarity led her to instead shut it promptly. Because against all odds, this inane young girl had actually managed to interpret Karen's words not only in a way that was factually correct, but one that also put to rest all of Karen's fears about having to handle some warped idea of romance at Eight's hands for the next hour or worse. Once Eight had clarified that she had only the most rudimentary understanding of the social context usually entangled with the word 'date', Karen was only too happy to go along with the childish notion if that was all it entailed. It would also give Nine an easy out if she ever wanted to dump the leader's presence on one of her 'friends' (read: underlings). And if Eight had no concept of lesbianism, then honestly, Karen would be glad to say that wasn't her problem, rather than bother being offended by it.
The next thing that happened involved Jane passing her a pair of dark glasses and proceeding to argue with the figurehead of a leader over Karen's use of her own arm... Feeling secure in the knowledge that she could always retrieve the limb by force if the moment required it, Karen only followed the example of the others in the hallway and slipped on the sunglasses one-handed.
Though their pace was slow, the distance was short and they soon arrived at the room where the interview was scheduled to take place. Once Nine's arm was released from Eight's custody she nodded at Jane and took her advice, heading inside first to prepare.
The room, like the rest of the ninth division was, of course, impeccably clean, if smelling just a tad too strongly of bleach and other harsh disinfectants for Nine's taste. There were three items of furniture inside, aside from which the space was entirely bare; the centerpiece desk, which was simple steel and long enough that one could not easily reach over it, and the two chairs on either side, which could not be more different in style. The chair closest to the door was very ordinary, a plain stackable chair of twisted metal beams and plastic that offered firm, serviceable but not especially comfortable support, and... one that was beleathered and reclining, like a dentist's chair. It... was possible that it WAS an authentic dentist's chair, before being repurposed by IOD. If that was indeed the truth of its origins, Karen was sure the straps to hold down hands and feet were modifications the original model was not equipped with- or else she had completely neglected to notice them in her childhood.
... That thought didn't seem particularly sleep-conducing for her adulthood either, so rather than linger on such thoughts, Nine instead hastened to the side of the table and retrieved the earpiece from its surface, attaching it to her person and testing the fit with prudent fingers, then visually in the reflection of the one-way mirror wall. By the time Jane had convinced by whatever means the whining Eight to enter the room, Nine was ready and waiting with an expression on her face that promised an exceptional game of poker, stoic and unbreakable.
"Please, make yourself comfortable," Nine instructed, not indicating that this was a friendly meeting, but also not that Eight was her prisoner, either. She nodded in the direction of the dentist's chair, by which end there were also a pair of handcuffs attached to the equally strong metal of the desk. "You can try on the bracelets if you want..." she offered with cautious optimism, thinking that if Eight allowed her to restrict her movement by that much, things would certainly be easier going forward...

taffy789 • 21 November 2017 at 10:01 PM

The observation room was a small, rectangular space with two long benches stretching in its middle. The lighting was poor, and dulled a sickly yellow that spat itself onto the white walls and gave everything it touched a poisonous shine. Both walls directly to the left and right upon entry were largely ate up by a gaping pane of glass hiding itself under sheer white blinds that could be pulled up and away at ease. Two boxes with speakers perched on top had attached themselves on the wall at the far end of the room. One more towards the left, and the other to the right. It was the right box that Jane swept up to as soon as she entered, the box with the label of “Room #3” over its top. As she opened a small door on the box and began to fiddle with some dials inside, Mikey closed the observation door behind himself as he entered, and he began to soak in the room.
The first thing noticed was how the yellow overhead lights turned the brown skin of his hands this yellowed, infected color that reminded him of this word he only knew because the doctors at Coreka kept using it around him- gangrene, or something. Either way the color was ugly and unpleasant, and Mikey would’ve shoved his hands into his pants pockets and out of sight had they not both been full- one with Caprisun and the other with cane handle. He moved towards the left window of the room instead. Lifting his cane handle, he used it to move the bottom of the blinds roughly up, rattling them noisily around with the action. The room the window spied out into was empty, and dark. Peering into the shadows, a sensation like ice, like a numb frostbite feel that Mikey was all too familiar with, crawled up his back as the grayed form of a solidarity desk pressed close against the sharp outline of a dentist’s chair stared back at him from the dark. Not wanting his spine to be the body part next amputated due to that shivering cold traveling across it, Mikey yanked his cane away from the blinds, dropping them and obscuring his view to the torture chamber of room #1.
As he grimaced at the rising feeling of something…. unsettled twisting in his stomach, a sound like someone crinkling an empty bag of chips sounded off from behind him, and he flipped around in time to see Jane tugging open the blinds to room #3.
Over the speaker in the corner, the sound crackled, as if Nine’s voice had stomped through dry fall leaves on its way to the ears of its listeners.
“########## braclets ##### want?” Nine said, and Mikey winced at the distortion.
Jane muttered something negative, and she returned to the box in the corner and resumed fiddling with the speaker’s dials.
Mikey stepped towards the other window now.
This interrogation room was not empty, nor pitch black. Yet it maintained the scary, terrifying dentist’s chair and the pristine, lifeless desk. The only thing lively in the room appeared to be Eight, who pranced through the open, featureless space of the room donned in bright, clashing colors and flowing with energetic movement.
Mikey watched this, and he felt a sudden disquiet at this contrast.
He glanced in Jane’s direction.
“Hey. Miss Jane? What’s exactly going on here?”
Jane dropped her hands from the speaker’s control box.
“Oh, um, yes. Well.” She sucked in a quick breath. “Nine is interviewing Eight about some past work-related incidents.”
“Ah.” Mikey responded, and he looked back, towards the window. “…Like an interrogation?”
“…No.” Jane paused, but then admitted, quietly, “Unless Nine decides it comes down to that, I suppose. But she did not seem prepared to utilize the… harsher tactics, if that is what you are concerned about seeing. So please, don’t worry.”
That was the end of that conversation. But the contrast between the girl in a bright yellow skirt running around the stark white room became more blatant to Mikey, and it gave him the strangest heartburn. After rolling his tense shoulder blades, he looked over at Jane again, and saw the girl now adjusting a small headset/mic combo on top of her head. Though Jane seem preoccupied with the task at hand, Mikey felt the need to speak towards her still.
“…Not to like. Question your knowledge about Eight or anything but. Is this… really necessary?” He gave Jane a side-eye as she held up a push-to-talk device and examined the buttons without turning it on.
He continued. “I mean, when I talked to Eight, she didn’t seem to have all that much going on up there to even interview.” He gave a harmless shrug. “No offense intended by that or anything, just like. Stating facts. What I saw.”
“Michael,” Jane assured him, sounding almost amused as she spoke, “Eight is capable of more lucidity than one may realize. I myself have been privy to her small moments of clarity. If Nine isn’t able to pull a solid interview out of our Eighth leader, then I am not positive who will be able to.”
She returned to adjusting the microphone near her mouth.
Mikey nodded. “Yeah. I get that.” He said this, but the dentist chair that Eight had now perched herself on was still there, in the middle of the room- a reminder of what the room was most commonly used for. He frowned. “It just seems…” The word he wanted was lost on him, so he settled for second-best.
“…Weird?”
“I spoke with Nine before this, and she is as positive as I am that she is certainly within her scope of operations to pull one of her fellow leaders in for a mild chat.”
The explanation was so precise that Mikey couldn’t think of a way to respond to that, which was all very well, considering in the next moment, Jane leaned into the microphone, pressed the button to click it on, and spoke to Karen through it.



Eight had wandered into the room right past Karen, not bothering to heed the girl’s instructions on making herself comfortable. She moved through the empty space instead, behind the dentist’s chair and stared up at the blank walls of the room with a frown on her face. She didn’t seem interested in Karen until the other leader spoke up again, this time about the bracelets.
This caught Eight’s attention, and the girl twirled around to lock those bright, big eyes onto Karen’s sunglasses. She popped up on her tippy-toes and plopped her elbows down onto the headset of the dentist’s chair, leaning over it from behind.
“Hmmm, but KAREBEAR~” Eight hummed, “I already GOTS loads of bracelets! See!!!”
She leaned over the back of the chair more completely as she thrust her arms fully forward, showcasing to Karen the multitude of jingly, colorful bracelets rattling about on her arms. The accessories made a cacophony of noise with that deliberate, flashy movement. Eight’s collection of bracelets certainly was impressive; she had yellow ones, green ones, blue ones, pink ones, violet ones, red ones; she had metal charm ones, bulky plastic ones, thin, small ones, those cheesy slap-on ones from the 90’s….. Eight flashed a grin to Karen and, slipping around the chair to jump up and perch on top of its big armrest, she continued chattering as she dug a bracelet off from around her wrist.
“ ‘Sides Karebear~ Those bracelets on the table aren’t fuuuUUUUuuun~! But do you know what IS a fun bracelet???” Tugging a thin, yellow rubber band triumphantly from the tangle of jewelry on her arm, Eight slammed this promise of fun onto the metal table between the two girls, and the “Silly Bandz” obliged itself to slowly twist into the outline of a giraffe.
“THIS is a fun bracelet!” Eight cheered with delight. “See!!! It turns into a tall dog!!!”
*Nine?* said a voice coated in static.
*Nine?* Again the voice questioned in Karen’s ear, less distorted now.
*Can you hear me? Oh, I do truly hope you can. It’s my fault, I neglected to test this device from a greater distance beforehand, and you cannot answer me back now, and-*
The earpiece fell silent again as the sound clicked off.
After a moment of quiet, the static hum returned.
*In either case. You and Eight are audible in the observation room. All is well on our front. Even Two’s assistant is currently being given a tour of the rest of the new Ninth division by one of my aides, who I trust will give a shallow and harmless opinion on your division’s current state of affairs. All has been taken care of.*
A click, and radio silence again.
Followed by another hesitant resumption of communications.
*….But onto the more pressing matters at hand, this. Interview. As I stated previously, I feel a suitable beginning inquiry would be work-related issues- Eight’s past with Two, as you’d deemed necessary to question about. I hope Eight will not be too difficult for you. And, I-*
Jane’s chattering cut itself off as Eight piped up from in front of Karen.
“Hey? Karebear?” Eight stuck out her tongue at the leader. Then, she whined, “Can we GOOOOOOOOOOOO???”
Swinging her legs onto the desk, Eight heaved her body from the armrest and launched herself onto the metal desk, sliding onto its large top with surprising ease and grace of movement. She pulled her knees up to her chin, sitting and peering at Karen from over her legs. She complained again, louder. “This place isn’t fun. It doesn’t have popsicles. And I don’t like this place.”
*Oh no.* Even slightly muffled by the static of the ear piece, Jane sounded as beleaguered as ever. *This is what I had been concerned over, Nine. When Eight dislikes something, she simply runs off to who-knows-where.* A distorted sigh. *However persistent the pleas may be, I do implore you to listen to me….* Dead static, no voice. *….If you can even HEAR me.* Jane whimpered with concern into Karen’s ear piece. *Maybe you can? Signal to me if I am audible? A furtive thumbs up? And if you require me to provide a greater insight into Eight, the same gesture may be used, as well…*
The static of Jane’s voice trailed off, by Eight’s loud, consistent complaints remained.
“This place is LAME-O.” Eight continued to insist. Pouting and pressing her chin to her knees, Eight muttered, almost traitorously, “…. SPIKE-Y would’ve been nice and would’ve let me LEAVE by now…”

awesomeness • 23 November 2017 at 12:25 PM

Tina grinned widely in response to Teija’s affectionate strangle-hold on her head. Laughing, Tina lightly shouldered her old coworker off of herself, adding a breezy comment of, “Hey. I remember how you were in the teleporter unit. Ruthless. All I wanted to do was prevent thirty solid minutes of arguing.”
She teased the other girl, slightly, before turning away from Teija to face the exit. She took a moment to swallow whatever fluttering excitement felt at Teija, previously one of the most powerful teleporters in her unit, thinking her reliable. Then, she remarked, totally coolly, easily, “…’Sides! My plan ain’t that… special.” She shrugged, and started walking towards the door, peering out of it, and into the hallway, as if searching for something.
Seeming pleased with what she saw, she waved Teija forward. As the two left the room, Tina further explained, “See. I’ve only been working with Jane for a bit now. But I’ve noticed like… her quirks?” She smiled, slyly. “For example. Jane can be…. Surprisingly stubborn about like, getting the stuff she wants done? Even if it don’t seem it. Buuut… When things take her by surprise, that’s when she tends to… roll with them, and let them be.” Tina paused, then summarized- “Basically what I’m saying is, I’ve seen her wave people away from conversations to talk one-on-one with people before, buuuut I’ve also have seen people walk INTO these more private conversations and Jane never like, tells them to leave?” Tina gave a tight, amused smile at that. “Maybe she thinks it’s impolite, or something? In whatever case. What I think is. While Jane would’ve not liked us laughing at Nine trying to wrangle Crazy Eight, I don’t think she’ll be able to say no to us if we accidentally walk in on this conversation during our “tour” and stay to laugh at Nine.” Tina gave that knowing, seditious wink to Teija. “Now all that’s left to do is stalk the group from afar and figure out where they’re going.”
And stalk they did.
Following the sound of Eight’s loud voice through the halls was easy enough for anyone to do, even at a distance invisible to any parties being “stalked”. As they traveled into the interrogation hallway, Tina frowned, curiously at her surroundings. The frown only deepened as, upon rounding a hall corner, she watched as Jane locked tight a door to an interrogation room before disappearing with Mikey into an adjacent observation room herself.
“…Huh.” Tina commented, and walked with Teija towards the interrogation room with the label of “Room #3” on its door.
She, looking confused, stared at the door for a moment before walking right and opening a door to the observation room that Jane had not walked into.
“Does this mean…?” Tina muttered, and after flicking on the observation room’s light switch, entered and pulled up the blind on the left window. Light from the interrogation room flooded the dimmed shades around Tina, bathing her in that bright, white overhead heat. She let out a mild noise of surprise at seeing Eight sitting on a table, her knees pulled up to her nose, while Nine watched on, looking as stern and non-nonsense as ever.
“…Are they trying to, like?” Tina furrowed her eyebrows. “Chain Crazy Eight up to talk to her? I mean. Effective strategy, but, uh-” She glanced towards Teija, as if waiting to see what the other girl’s thoughts were before daring to speak further.
“…Either way,” She said, turning her attention towards the speaker labeled “room #3” on the far wall, “…I’m not one-hundred-percent positive on how to get the sound working in here? I kinda knew about the dual-observation room thing because of some…. Scary rumors I heard, but I’ve…. Never actually have BEEN in one, thank god.”
On the other side of the one-way glass, Eight seemed to be getting more agitated about something, and was doing a lot of mute pouting. It looked a lot like a mime putting on an exaggerated display of fake emotion for an audience, and it was almost uncanny in its façade when performed silent.

asi • 27 November 2017 at 5:48 PM

Karen watched the other girl make her way around the room, and listened, unfazed, as Eight showed off her collection of armbands. In contrast to her interviewee, even while she sat silent and still, Karen remained very much at work, trying to figure out how she might best play Eight's scattered game of redirection. If she allowed her, Eight would probably just grab the thread of the conversation and run away with it, misleading her into a discussion of... a bangle shaped like a giraffe... There would definitely be no virtue in taking the long way around to see if Eight would let anything slip up- she was made of slipping, but nothing useful, and Karen had to reconsider her approach again already.
Jane started talking in her ear and Karen moved her attention onto that instead, eyes looking stonily ahead while her gaze was turned inwards... After a while, it became clear that the Eighth assistant-ere-leader wasn't going to be the most succinct disembodied voice Karen had ever had in her head, though Nine certainly wasn't about to complain either. But obviously Jane had caused Karen to lapse into silence for too long, because Eight promptly took up that opportunity to start bellyaching.
Nine stared obstinate-eyed at the crouching girl in front of her, and without shifting her line of sight, made a fist with all fingers curled inwards save the thumb and gave a brief, subtle and immediately forgettable gesture with it in the direction of the glass observation wall she expected Jane was behind- one that looked more like a casual shrug than an intentional wave of the hand.
Then, focused on what Eight had just said, Karen leaned forward and asked her with candid interest; "So Two never made you do anything you didn't want to... did he?" she prompted, a grim glint alive in her dark brown eyes.


"Those scary rumors," Teij said, while looking into the brightly lit, windowed abyss of the next room over, allowing her eyelids to flutter as her pupils adjusted but not close; "What you've heard..." she continued slowly, and with an audible pause, "is probably more than accurate."
Then she turned her head back in Tina's direction with a toss of her bouncy blonde hair, and made light of it all with a convincing smile; "Unless you meant one of those ones involving cannibalism, because I can guarantee you he's not into that, at least not on the reg," she flashed a look that appeared halfway between a smirk and a grimace, vanishing before it could fully decide which it wanted to be, and Teija shrugged widely. "Eating at all, that is, he forgets to do it half the time, I don't know what he runs on. Bets between pure willpower, or the blood and souls of his deceased enemies," the assistant asserted, before offering with a wink; "If you fancy either of those, I'll take you up on it. When I manage to find out, I can let you know."
While there appeared to be ample room for abuse provided in those terms, if Tina was betting woman she'd likely reckon from Teija's expression that the girl was genuinely, impertinently curious enough to see that kind of wager honestly through, so far as it was in her power to complete.
That motion made, the blonde then wandered over to the control panel in front of the thick one-way glass and began to fiddle with the interface, trying to get a feel for the operating system so she could work out how to get things working.
"I haven't used one of these before, but I can probably figure it out," she muttered in explanation, leaning over the thing. Unfortunately, none of the ideas she'd had for unlocking it had worked so far. All the while, Teij kept glancing back over into the observed room #3, staring at its occupants' faces. As it turned out, her background meant she had been thoroughly trained in the art of lip-reading, and could understand every movement of the mouth that was caught by her gaze. She couldn't think of a plausible way to bring that up to Tina, however, so Teija just kept her own mouth shut, and eyes fixated on the actions of others. Though it wasn't nearly so entertaining that way...

taffy789 • 30 November 2017 at 9:22 PM

“Oh. I hadn’t been talking about Two.” Tina explained to her friend, watching Teija as she swiveled the dials around. “Though,” she remarked, “It’s always welcomed to hear confirmation that somebody ISN’T a cannibal.”
She watched as Teija’s gaze drifted away from the speaker box and towards the interrogation scene going on. Knowing the intensively curious nature of her old coworker, Tina’s lips upturned in slight amusement at this.
“Okay.” She declared, stepping up towards the speaker. “My turn. You can watch Nine and Eight talk in the meantime.” After cracking her knuckles, Tina got to work messing with the speaker dials.


Eight lifted her head up from its sulk at Karen’s question.
“What???” She exclaimed, loudly, “No, Spike-y has always been so nice to me! He even told me that I didn’t have to work here with him anymore!”
Eight hummed, and, kicking her legs out, scooted forward to sit on the edge of the table again.
“Like, yeah! Way before I had to like, read memories and make sure people weren’t lying and stuff!” Eight scrunched up her nose. “But I didn’t like it! Sitting and waiting around was BORING and the people in these rooms were always so UNHAPPY and their memories were BAD too!” Eight’s face twisted up, unpleasantly, as if recalling this fact left a bad taste in her mouth even now.
“I didn’t like it!” She declared, sounding upset. “But people kept saying I HAD to do it! Which was mean to me!” Eight pouted, but her expression softened as she added, “But then Spike-y said I didn’t HAFTA anymore even if some other people didn’t like it! And that’s how I knew we were friends! Because he did that nice thing for me, and friends do nice things for each other, and he did a really nice thing for me and then he kept doing nice things for me and that’s how I know Spike-y is nice and my friend!!!”
Static hummed in Karen’s ear.
# Nine, this is true. The old One was interested in keeping Eight useful for some task until her leader status could be safely revoked. Two undermining One in this way was an… upset, even if he did prove able to obtain the same results more efficiently on his own...#
Jane trailed off there, and Eight hopped down from the table. Turning on Karen, Eight put her hands on his waist and told her interrogator, “And if you wanted to be nice like Spike-y you would let me leave too!” Then, huffily, Eight dramatically put her back to Karen. She looked out, over the metal desk and empty dentist chair of the interrogation room, and Eight went quiet.
When she finally turned back to Karen, Eight blinked foggy eyes at the girl, and a grin broke out across her face.
“BuuuuUUUUuuuuUUUuuuut~” She sing-songed, “I don’t WANT to talk about Two anymore! I wanna talk about NICE things like ICE CREAM or HORSIES or EATING!” She giggled, somehow more nonsensically than before. Slipping around Karen, Eight made it to the exit, and she frowned as she shook the door handle and found it unable to open.
“Come OOOOOOOONNNNNNNN Karebear!” Eight exclaimed, continuing to loudly and wildly shake the door handle, “Don’t you want to LEAVE and go to a NICE place and have tons of FUN???”
# Ummm.# Jane spoke in Karen’s ear, though drowned out considerably by Eight’s bellowing and door-shaking. # Did I mishear, or did she just forget to use “Spike-y” instead of Two? I suppose she might had said Two-y, which I’ve heard said as well. But-#
The rest of Jane’s now quiet muttering to herself was almost inaudible due to the ruckus Eight was now making by the door.


“Going back to what I’d meant earlier,” Tina spoke up, eyes fixated forward on the speaker settings, “The scary rumors I mentioned were about like, what the interrogation wing does generally.”
She fiddled with the volume control, making a slight static hum fill the air. She turned it back down.
“…Basically. It’s rarer that Glaeroes actually get captured and brought in. And when they do, it’s usually only one. But, sometimes, a whole squad that get captured together.”
Tina fiddled with a dial, producing no audible effect.
“So… when that happened, it became a rare opportunity to try some… other methods of interrogation.” Tina seemed to have a bit of trouble speaking here. “They’d, uh. Separate the group. All into different holding cells. Then when one was dragged out for interrogation, they sometimes would… move another person to one of these observation rooms to… watch.”
Tina shrugged. “And thankfully they had two observation rooms per chamber, in case some interrogators in training had to observe that day too.” She drifted off, then remarked, dryly.
“Apparently the people in the interrogation squadron way back when were either oddly religious or had a terrible sense of humor, because… Well, have you heard what they used to nickname these rooms when they were filled up with onlooking Glaeroes?” Tina turned away from the speaker dials to shoot Teija a questioning, uplifted eyebrow at this prompt.

asi • 2 December 2017 at 5:09 PM

Teija laughed. Like a mask, the look on her face was hard to read. It hid the sudden influx of embarrassment she felt for jumping to the wrong idea, based of what she had been thinking about, and then thoughtlessly blabbing about it when her friend said something that sounded incidentally similar. It hadn't been that bad a leap- what kind of torture had Two NOT been involved in? But it was still too Freudian for her tastes, and Teija hated feeling like she was slipping.
Not saying anything further for the time being, she gave up on the control panel so Tina could take over, and retreated further into the small room, taking up a spot beside the glass so she could better watch the changing expression on Nine's face.
When Tina began to elaborate, Teija relaxed a little more. She was still watching the conversation between leaders, listening with her eyes so to speak, but giving no perceivable reactions to any of it, even when Eight sprung up and ran for the door. Instead, she succeeded in playing it off like Tina's dialogue was the only one she was hearing, even while her eyes remained focused elsewhere.
The teleporting second assistant didn't know much about her boss' old faction. She'd had a friend or two among enforcers, who hung around the outskirts of just about every area on base, since their job was keeping order everywhere. But the stuff that occurred deep in the dark heart of the division's walls... Teija had purposely kept away. Reason being, she hadn't been allowed. Communicating with Gene had been forbidden by the higher-ups of their organization, for fear of anyone- Two, really- getting wind of what they were up to... Not that it had done any good, he'd still gotten everything in the end. And Gene had spent all her time alone, in a place like this...
She turned her eyes away from Eight's muted wailing and clamoring by the door, and Nine's composed, unflappable inaction- likely waiting for the manic girl to calm down. Calm so that Nine could really put the fear of harsh words and cold steel- and no god in this world who would save her- into Eight. Teija took the moment to re-examine the observation room. One of many similar units in the division's giant puzzle. It was clean- everything here was so clean- and it was dark- had to be, for the two-way mirror scheme to work- and it was small but not claustrophobically so, unless one was crammed in here long enough, Teij supposed. Other than that... There was no character to it. It was bare. It was empty.
Teija replied to Tina, finally, blithely, carefree; "Nah, I don't know! So what did they call them?"


It was hard to swallow anyone willfully describing Two as 'nice', given what he did.
As Eight gave in short, childish words her account of how Two had earned that adjective, Karen took a moment to look towards the ceiling... and wonder how she'd feel about her own friend, Lily, calling her the same thing. If she really knew the details of the things Nine had done. Would Karen be just as skeptical and dismissive now? Or would it simply take a little longer? Staring upwards made Karen remember she was still wearing that cap, along with Jane's sunglasses. Had to look pretty funny, even in a bright room like this. Especially for the current leader of the fearsome Punishment and Interrogation division.
Most of the things Two had done on record... were things she'd do too, if or when it came down to it.
She wasn't here to judge him on the morality of that. After all, it was her job now, and she knew it wasn't a role that they could avoid having performed. Karen had determined she could run the division with less pain and cruelty than Two had done, but she wasn't going to persecute him for that. It was not evidence of him acting traitorously, against Falchion interests. It had only been him operating for them in his own way, and no human was perfect. Nine knew the division's efficiency was dropping daily under her management, and was yet to see the point where it would finally even out and settle outside of Two's unyielding disciplinarian reign. Even if Karen personally wouldn't, the administration and the base at large would forgive him for his methods, for they were within the bounds given to those in charge here. Where it wasn't admired, it was acceptable. And Karen, too, would accept those imperfections.
If he was indeed human.
She remembered when he had shown Karen the ropes to his old division, walking her through these halls and letting her stop and examine each room to her suspicious and mistrustful heart's content. He'd been patient, surprisingly, and even a little teasing in banter, commenting on how the Ninth position was usually saddled with menial tasks like making sure uniform distribution was in order. Since Nine had never heard anything about that since she'd landed this job, she suspected it had been dumped on someone else instead- Seven, perhaps, by default. Two had ensured that Punishment and Interrogation had undergone as seamless a transition as possible to the change in leadership... she had to give him credit for that. And Karen could never forget how he'd instructed her through that worst but necessary part of her job training. When her hand had finally started to shake, he'd said not a word.
She could never forget that, nor the strange look on his face afterwards, when they were done and the world washed clean of red. He'd gone to smoke and Karen had handed over the lighter she never used to him. He hadn't said thank you... But considering what they'd just done, words like that would have sounded unnecessary anyway. Two had just breathed that thick, filthy smoke over the heavy silence that had threatened to trap her alone with her thoughts. She remembered the way he looked then, clean-shaven face and clear skin seeming at odds with the pollution the cigarette emitted. And then he'd addressed all her harebrained, half-believed theories with one short, easy line; 'Nine, I'm only human.'
The fact that he hadn't seemed to have done terrible things to Eight while she was under his command... That he seemed to have actively made an effort to prevent Eight from experiencing... well, any kind of work... Well, that was all Nine would allow that to mean to her investigation. It was probably just as Jane said, anyway, only a question of efficiency in Two's merciless eyes.
Karen took off her cap, tugging her dark, ribbon-bound ponytail free of its clasp and put her cap down on the table, laying her hands crossed on top of it for a second. Then she turned her head over her shoulder so she could look at Eight, standing as she was still by the door, and saying in a dry, solemn yet conversational tone, "So Two isn't a nice thing, then?" It was the logical conclusion of Eight's words, and while Karen knew logic was not exactly Eight's strong point, she couldn't very well leave that implication alone.
Especially when Jane made her comment. It seemed possible the second leader really wasn't Eight's favorite topic after all, despite what the girl might want to have her believe. Nine pressed the topic, continuing from Eight's own protests. "Did you and Two often leave and have lots of fun? Did he leave without you? Or did he send you away instead," she suggested, a slightly derisive twitch to her dark eyebrows, half hidden behind the frame of her shades.
All this was spoken during Eight's clamoring, so if any of Karen's words were missed in all the noise the girl was making, along with the mumbles of Jane in Karen's ear, it could hardly be helped. From then on, Karen waited silently until the short, colorful girl had died down a little before telling her, in lieu of an actual explanation; "I can't leave either, so we might as well talk about Two."
She crossed her arms, still sitting straight-backed, hard-faced in her interrogation chair. "You say you don't like this place, yet you still spent a lot of time here even though Two wasn't making you work... right?" and she waited for confirmation.

demon • 2 December 2017 at 5:41 PM

As soon as Raven stepped back out of the washroom and into the open again, she was greeted by a rare glimpse of dark glimmering eyes as the swaying column of hair approached her. Not intrusively, or confrontational as she might have expected after a slightly rough-edged parting, but with slender hands raised- asking forgiveness.
"Birdie, I'm... sorry 'bout earlier," Tracy conceded, and Raven was surprised. She was used to grouchy, cynical, apathetic, dark-haired, poor-hygiene males who didn't apologize after saying something stupid to her. Not that she'd really put Tracy in all those categories- Raven knew she was describing one person much more than another, and she could only suppose it very wrong of her to hold Dreadlocks to standards as low as Zach's. She stopped, even when her initial intention had been to march on out and head straight away for wherever their next destination might be, thus forestalling any kind of pause that might invite comment.
Of course, that meant that the said comment was all but ensured to be spoken, and in the very next second she was proven right. Behind all that hair, a set of lips were put together and whistled when their owner caught sight of her own hair- and what she'd done to it.
"Ya didn't have to go and do that," they told her, voice weighed down by some hesitancy given that they no doubt knew if she hadn't known that, it was rather too late to go back on any of it now.
Raven was, of course, nowhere near silly enough to seriously humor any delusions so great as that, however. "I wanted to." She shrugged. "It was getting out of hand," was all she said in explanation of the moment when, finding herself staring dissatisfied at her reflection in the bathroom mirror too long, Raven had grown compelled beyond reason to act, grabbing her knife from beside the sink without delay and ruthlessly sinking its serrated edge into the unruly bush her hair had become.
Now that the billowy black wilderness reached only so far as the tops of her shoulders, the worst of it could be considered tamed, and the remainder... Well, it could continue to make itself a puffy, roughly-cut nuisance until it was properly trussed up, but for now, its range and potential to make trouble had been very much cut short. Raven patted the choppy ends of her new trim for an experimental, self-conscious moment before settling on being content. While her preference was long hair for herself, the practicality of something shorter had always held its appeal, and she thought the change wasn't a bad sight on her either.
But it wasn't the look so much as the reasoning behind it that struck her companion, and it bothered them, enough to ask; "Why do you care so much? Y'know they don't think you care half as much as you do." They sounded like they were frowning. Guess they didn't really like her new 'do.
Raven countered; "Why don't you?" then looked back at Tracy seriously. "Don't just tell me I don't get it and not offer me an explanation. Make me understand. What's so hard about your position?" Because what she'd seen of it; jabbering endlessly on the phone, eating their way through a peanut butter jar, and the routine fix of the always broken coffee contraption... It really didn't seem that bad a prospect, after all.
They sighed, shrugged their hair. "It's... 'bout time I pack my bags, that's all, Birdie," they said finally, with a casual air, and yet exhaling heavily, with a weight that Raven still didn't grasp. When this garnered no immediate response, they elaborated for her. "M'on the field, next."
"Like, you're being reassigned? Like you're losing your job?" Raven prompted, reacting with slow incredulity, unsure how she was meant to take it, even as Tracy shrugged broadly again in assent. Raven's tone grew both softer yet more steely as she became more convinced of her way of thinking, pushing them in a way in equal measure encouraging and ruthless; "'Cause you're doing such a bad job? Because then all you have to do is a better one and then-"
"No," Tracy could be heard gritting their teeth behind their hair, grinding molars together as if that blunt pain could alleviate the sting their own words delivered them. "It's not about my job. It's over, it's done. Had my go, that's how it works around here. It's about time, and mine's almost up."
"What? The veteran can't keep you on any longer?" The concept was foreign to Raven, she hadn't even considered that others' positions might just expire. There'd been no term clause on her contract- not that she'd actually been given one, of course. And really, Five could fire her at any time, if that's what he wanted to do... But Tracy-
Tracy's head was angled down towards the ground, moving at an angle like their gaze was tracking something. Knowing their power, they were probably picking apart the different trails left behind in the dust. "Viki can't. Even if she wanted to, wouldn't. It... helps motivation. Stops corruption. Gives some hope," they said, and then admitted; "Did for me."
A stranger passed them by in the otherwise empty corridor, they both kept silent for a while, standing out of the way until that person was out of earshot. Once the disturbance had faded, Tracy continued by commenting; "Was lucky to get it at all. Not 'xactly got great qualif-fications, y'know."
Raven frowned over at them, looking straight into the dense forest of brown, thick, matted lengths of hair, as far as she could see. "Then why-?"
"Got a good reference. Friend of a friend of Viki, all that," Tracy waved a hand aside in a careless gesture, and with that much information, the connection wasn't exactly a hard one even for a slightly woozy morning-headed Raven to figure out. It had probably been Telly's recommendation, that was the reason Tracy had landed such a cushy position, at least for a time.
With that said, Raven just lingered there awkwardly a while in the corridor with the current management- even if they wouldn't be that for every much longer- a dusty silence building between the two until they finally spoke again.
"Hey, Birdie, what's your power? It must be somethin' pretty strong... for you to be so confident an' all. Get the position you got," they observed, quietly looking her up and down. There was something shy about their mannerisms, the way they held themself now, like there was something holding them back, or that they were withholding from her.
Raven said nothing in return. She couldn't.
They gave some sort of a snort then, or was it a laugh? Tracy went on to explain, a slight acerbic edge to their tongue as they told her; "The rest of us just hafta settle for gettin' our backsides kicked... sooner, rather than later."
All Raven did in response to that was nod stiffly, her right arm twitching, hot sparks crackling down its length before she was able to shake the sensation away.
She felt like Tracy was giving her a look then- possibly some kind of small smile? It was hard to tell when all she had to go on was the tilt of the head and the tone of their voice, but Raven still reckoned it was so as they said to her; "C'mon. Somethin' I wanna show ya," and started off in an unfamiliar direction, at a pace it was easy to keep up with.
"Anyway, I gotta start gettin' ready for gettin' out, that an' training the next kid t' take the role. I don't wanna spend any time runnin' around fixing the silly mess your Fiver made in my last week on the job," they mumbled during the walk, thinking aloud to themself almost as much as they were talking to Raven.
And at her bewildered look, they proceeded to explain the whole debacle that had culminated in the dramatic moment they'd just been lucky enough to witness.
"They were getting violent over sweets?" When the dreadlocks nodded, each strand bobbing in time, it was all Raven could do to try and suppress her ensuing groan. "Can this place get any weirder?" she wondered aloud in vexation.
At that, Raven heard a sudden smirk in Tracy's voice when they next spoke. "Think you're about to find out, Birdie..." And with a quick push of their thin, bony fingers, the door in front of them began to swing open, revealing in one small second all of that which laid within. There was a lot to take in, of course, but one thing arrested Raven's attention nearly right away, and then held it tightly, fiercely, unwilling to let go. A large banner, with painted letters in thick, black bold ink, read:

After reading that sign several times and gaining no better understanding of its content, Raven's hazel eyes inexorably drifted back to the very first thing they had hit upon in that room. That was... a large life-sized mannequin covered all over in cheap stuck-on bushy brown fur that Raven slowly realized was supposed to be a poorly-made approximation of the mythical creature Bigfoot.
Having caught Raven's stare while it had still been fixed on the banner at the end of the room, Tracy built off of that rather than the budget Bigfoot in their lazy introduction to the club, "Or the OCC for short. Trust me, Birdie, here you're gonna find the best people ya ever met. The absa-lute best," they drawled, amusement practically flaking off of their body at the same rate their dandruff was falling. One of their hands patted Raven's arm lightly, just above the elbow, to welcome or rest ready to steady her in case she needed it- it flew almost completely under her radar since that was very much preoccupied with trying to comprehend the absurd clubroom and its eclectic contents.
Several comedic beats later Raven asked warily, still not entirely sure she knew what exactly was afoot here; "What's a... cryptid," and the whole room stilled.

taffy789 • 3 December 2017 at 11:44 PM

From his spot sitting on a cold metal bench in the observation room, Mikey winced at hearing the constant “clack clack clack” of Eight turning the doorknob thundering over the speakers. The girl looked completely out of it, giggling in Nine’s face and giving her those booming, nonsensical responses.
“Oh?” Eight had said, “Nah, Two-y is super duper nice, and he keeps me safe and takes me to fun carnivals? With horses? That spin around and go up and down? And bright lights? And I’ve never been to a carnival before that except I do remember one, and THAT ONE had these apples on sticks and usually apples are FRUITS but these were all SWEET and BROWN, and my friend got it stuck in her hair, which is like this one time I remember too of getting BUBBLE GUM and blowing a REALLY BIG BUBBLE and-”
She blabbered on, jumping from topic to topic with oh so little room to breathe in-between.
From her position standing in front of the glass, Mikey heard Jane deeply sigh. The girl readjusted her headset, and she clicked the push-to-talk again.
“I’ve seen this before.” Jane explained into the microphone, to Nine. “Eight appears to have… levels of lucidity. This is what I was attempting to earlier warn you about. In these moods, she’s liable to simply run off to who knows where. Thus the locked room now. It was the only precaution I could think that would help you obtain the answers you desire. Admittedly, despite myself, I never fail to get… somewhat caught off-guard by this behavioral shift. Nine, I was hoping you could… procure more beneficial results than I ever could hope.”
On the other side of the glass, Mikey could see Eight fluttering around the observation room yet again.
The girl laughed and giggled and snorted and ignored all of Nine’s own questions as she plopped right down on the edge of the large, intimidating dentist’s chair. She continued to chat up about many nonsensical “nice” things, from candy to ice skating to acoustic music to cooking to eating and all topics in between. As she blabbered on, her left arm nestled itself comfortably onto the armrest, pushing up against the built-in cuffs as she leaned over to talk towards Nine. Mikey watched this while wearing a slight frown.
Static erupted again from where Jane stood, also watching.
“…Nine.” Came the first word in her address to the leader. “As… I’ve seen this, nothing short of a miracle will stop Eight when she gets lost in the woods like this. I always feel. As if my hands are tied when given this situation to deal with. However. You are in a vastly different position than I am. In this case, I feel as if your more… forceful attitude would be greatly advantageous to obtaining a straight answer from Eight.”
She clicked off the push-to-talk after that, and perhaps due to the lack of static humming around her, Jane heard and turned to face Mikey as he made a noise of alarm.
Mikey gave a helpless shrug at Jane’s attention.
Jane sighed. “Michael. I was told to offer Nine my personal advice and insight into the situation. What I said is what I truly believe would be best, given all I know. The best I can do is only hope Nine chooses to take my advice in some manner.”
“Yeah, I get it.” Mikey replied, and, after nodding in mutual agreement, Jane turned her attention back to the interrogation room.
After a few seconds passed, so did Mikey.