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Vorpal: sure, am I coming to u or vice versa?
Little Fox: I can come to you - where are you?
Vorpal: the hospital. Ran ragged spreading the word. Needed to refuel.
not hup. Gimme a few and I'll go outside
Fox: oh then you come to me. Going to the deep woods
Vorpal: oh I'll fit right in
Fox: I can open a portal when you're somewhere safe
Vorpal: gimme three mins
Fox: ok
In other words, time enough to dive, leaf, and fly to a rooftop nearby. Which she does, in that order.
Once given the all-clear, Fox opens a portal to the deep woods of Wissahickon Park. She watches carefully, closing the portal as soon as Vorpal is through.
"We need to go to the other side." Fox looks - nervous? She chews on her lower lip. "I mean maybe not need to but - " but she will feel safer that way. There's ... worry and excitement in the crinkles at the corners of her eyes.
The leaves coalesce into a familiar Vorpal after the portal closes, and she nods. "Alright. You want to lead the way, or should I just pop on over?"
"I'm going to key it so nobody can follow us," Fox says quietly. "Hold this. Don't drop it. It's extremely important. You're about to save somebody's life with this."
"I hope."
She passes over a tiny, fire-scorched fragment of something that looks like blue glass, but shimmers beautifully in a way that glass doesn't quite. Jackie doesn't need kenning to know this is something magical.
Fox's fingers curl through yantras the Autumn has seen several times before, and the iris to a Spirit Manse opens. "Table for two," she offers, gesturing her in.
"I am?" Vorpal asks, frowning a little unsurely- but she takes it with that inhuman precision and holds it delicately as she watches the iris form, stepping in once directed...
"Okay," Fox says quietly as the iris closes behind them, isolating them both in the Shadow. She walks over to the little hammock that she always has in her Manse and sits in it sideways.
"Okay. So. Shortest version of this possible." Fox presses her palms together. "I was looking at the timewalk I did of the event yesterday, and I ... wanted to know what happened to the head. I think I told you this before, but the brain cases in the Mark 2s? They're... they have people in them. The Creator, that fucker, they took the... I don't know. The minds, the souls, the... people... of people who died like 70-ish years ago, and they put them in the Marks, right?"
"So this thing that attacked the cop yesterday? When I looked at the timewalk, I could tell that like... the head exploded off." She chews her lower lip. "And that means a person... died. For real, this time."
She clears her throat. "When we first met, I saw the magic you used to give me a cheeseburger. You had very little of the thing and what you used was... like Time magic. You literally turned back time on the object. And I can do that, but not... not for keeps, not easily."
"So..."
V listens carefully, that sense of reality's fragility fading into the background as they moved on to simpler things. Things she understood. "Okay. I hear what you're saying. And- gods. I still hate every new thing I learn about those things. Real people trapped inside them; and now soul-destroying infections nothingness... this, at least, is something I can help with. Happy to, in fact. I'll need some help, it's limited by my natural knowledge of creating things, but if you can lend me some of that, the impact will last even after your effect on me fades."
Once Fox shares her magic, and Jackie feels as good at Creating as she does fighting, she invokes the magic. It takes a moment, and she plays it carefully- speaking to the shard and mentioning the previous owner- the Creator- as she brings her arms out into the hands of the clock- and Turns Time Backwards, wedging her limbs into the subjective timeframe of the sliver she's been given and walking it backwards, sending it step by enchanted step towards wholeness.
The small piece of twisted, scorched material untwist, un-scorched and expand, pulled through time, fate. It goes through the same sort of process of its destruction, but in reverse, regenerating its various pieces and then generating a blinding flash and some amount of heat.
Bumps, twist and impact marks that one would expect from unarmed combat occurs and it's visual sensor are some of the last things that reappear before the rest gets cleaned up and shiny, just like new. Then a signal starts playing from the voice box continuing through the robot's voice.
"Null Entity no longer detected." A mechanical voice drones. "Incident report avail---" the voice box glitches for a moment, replaced by a feminine voice sounding like it's spoken through a tin can with a wire and it is a desperate voice. "Please, I need help!"
There's a solid hour where Fox had to ritually cast that magic on Vorpal, and strange marks written on her with a random marker Fox had in her pocket. (A Sharpie is great for ad hoc runes.) "Don't rub those off for at least an hour or the magic will stop working," Fox explains to her.
But after the hour of slow-moving yantras and vulpine vocalizations along with a strange, warped language that Jackie can not quite understand, she waits, and watches, hopefully.
As the pieces start going back together, Fox holds her breath, and as it powers up, she flaps her hands nervously in the air. The robotic voice makes her gasp, and she reaches trembling hands for the brain case. "Jackie, you did it! You did it! You saved -- "
"Hello, yes, we're here! We're here! You're not alone." Of course that would be the first thing an Orphan of Proteus would think to say. You are not alone. Members of your tribe, your human tribe, are here.
An hour. That's a lot of time for the hyper-active, hyper-sensitive woman to sit still and take in the strange language and odd little rituals.
At least it's easy for her to not touch herself. Years with bladed fingers will teach one such discipline.
Vorpal studies with quiet curiosity as she uses knowledge that isn't hers to rebuild and reconstruct the unit, pieces reappearing damaged and warped, correcting, the undestruction proceeding apace until-
"Oh. There really IS a person inside..!!!"
"Are either of you familiar with the Mark II program at all ?* The voice speaks. "If you're not, I really need someone who is."
Part of the head displays that auxiliary battery life is at 100%.
"Yes. There really is." Fox's eyes brim with tears, and she roughly knuckles them away, clearing her throat. The look that she gives Vorpal is intensely grateful and brimming over with emotion - and promises at least 3 smooches later. At least.
She swallows, and turns her attention back to the brain case, reaching her hands out to wrap gently around it and lift it up as carefully as if she's picking up a kitten made of glass. "Yes. I've been studying the Marks for years. I'm familiar. Your case was damaged, but I managed to find enough material so that Jackie could restore it. You can call me Fox. What's your name?"
Vorpal moves closer as shadows press to Fox's hips beneath her clothes, unsure if it's safe to smear the sharpie yet and taking no chances. "Hi. I'm Jackie. I'm sure this has to be quite disorienting, I'm sorry about that. And the initial reply was a bit unprofessional out of relief for your well-being. We were hopeful you'd be restored by the process, but we've never revived a person in hard storage media before, so we couldn't be sure."
"Okay, so, this situation is very complicated and I'd be very willing to explain what happened." The voice is obviously nervous. "But I jettisoned myself out of the braincase and I'm flying toward the Asteroid belt." The voice then gets a little lower, as if she's speaking to herself, well, it sounds more like praying at this moment.
"please say it makes sense, please say it makes sense, please say it makes sense."
She cradles the brain case in her stubby little fingers, and hopefully Vorpal will forgive her if Fox doesn't look away but stares at the case like it holds all the secrets of the universe.
Rather than saying it makes sense exactly, she asks, "Are you trying to make it back to Marsbase Hermes?"
"Oh. Hm. So you ejected when it broke but retained your connection to it, allowing you to keep communicating through it, but from the sound of your concern and context, your actual presence has passed Mars orbit and you probably need retrieved? Am I in the ballpark?"
Is the only reason she's confident that the asteroid belt is beyond Mars the fact The Martian never mentioned it?
Yes.
Is she right anyway?
Yes.
"I was trying to go back there when I ejected. And yes, I need a retrieval, that's the skinny of it." The battery display on the helmet goes down to 99.8% Auxiliary.
"But because the chassis sent the signal about being attacked by a Null Entity. Marsbase Hermes locked me out of reception for security reasons."
"Which is sensible, but, I can't go back there without significant effort and..." a long, quiet, contemplative silence. "I'm not sure I want to."
Another moment of silence. "My name is Kimberly, sorry, I got distracted."
TheUserWin - She/They — 02/20/2023 3:21 PM
The case does not contain any traces of abyssal taint, scrutinizing the material and the rest of it comes up with what one would expect from a Mark II unit head.
Except that the head does not actually contain the mind and soul, however, there is a space/mind/force/death effect that seem to be maintained where those particular bits might be
She lifts the necklace around her neck up and holds it up to her eye, looking at the brain case through the sapphire embedded in the eye of the wolf carved out of wood on the little pendant she always wears, as if the gem was set in the wood for exactly this purpose. (This is because that is absolutely the case.) Fox's gaze flickers to the battery display and she frowns mildly; she's never been good at hiding her emotions and usually doesn't really try. "It's okay, Kimberly. What's your surname or call sign? Talk to me about who you are and what happened with the Null Entity. We're working on a retrieval plan."
"Why wouldn't you want to go back?"
"Makes sense. And it's a pleasure, Kimberly. No apologies necessary. Trust me, we understand you've got bigger concerns on your mind." For the most part, she's aware Fox knows more than she, Jackie does, and she's content to let her puzzle out what needs puzzled, and reach out as needs be. When she catches the frown about the battery, she taps Fox's shoulder and swirls a finger counter-clockwise. Kimberly isn't the gizmo, after all, it's just anchoring her. Rewinding it might well rewind the battery, too. If necessary. Though she hopes to have Kimberly safe before then.
"Kimberly Lance, Enginieering System Specialist, AKA "Black Fleece"." Kimberly answers with a somewhat more official voice, though there is a sort of tiredness to it. "And it's a pleasure to have other people to converse with."
There is a bit of a pause when she considers Fox's question. "I am Black, Red and Blue Certified. It means I work with the Mechs and defense systems, the various support machines of Marsbase Hermes, the physical sciences and the maintenance of all that's inbetween. I'm also good at figuring out the weird computer systems, even if I'm not technically certified for it."
Kimberly hums nervously for a moment. "I don't really want to go back in part because my dissent is a constant one voice against many. I've had enough time floating about here to consider the implications."
"The other part is what happened with the Null Entity. it's that I was uh..." there is hesitation and maybe fear, even. "doingthingsimsuperdupernotsupposedtodo." she mumbles, working through the fear.
A little nod from Fox towards the Elemental, and she wrinkles up her forehead, then taps her temple and gestures towards Vorpal's with a little questioning look on her face. Telepathy is a fine way to carry on conversations without being overheard, but she needs consent, of course. "Your dissent?" Fox asks.
"I've been out to Marsbase Hermes once," Fox offers, scratching at her cheek absently. "I didn't get very deep into the politics there." And another beat. "... what were you doing?"
Everest (He/Her) - Vorpal — 02/20/2023 9:03 PM
A nod! That's fine by her.
"Well, you sound a whole lot smarter than me, Kimberly, color me impressed!" Jackie offers supportively, no sarcasm to be detected. "And... yeah, it can be intensely isolating to realize you're the only one of a particular persoective around. More so if it's a morality issue."
Jackie giggled at the last part. "Oh, I love things I'm super not supposed to do. Last time I did those, I distilled the thematic essence of severance into a literally realized concept of severance. That was a trip."
"Yeah what Jackie said. There's this... mass Assent, Dissent thing we do for almost everything. Everything grievance and such is given a fair hearing and discussion and such." Kimberly says "It's not a bad system for a society like what we have there, but when I'm always the one with the... dissent, or the weird idea no one thinks works, or what have you, it's pretty isolating in some ways. It's not a bad place, I just don't feel like it's mine anymore."
The braincase battery does not continue to decrease for the moment. "So, I kind of figured out a way to 'jostle' this particular Mark II unit's system to Hijack it fully, for a short period of time. By, pushing parts of the system a bit further than they're meant to."
"I've been doing that on and off for a while. I've seen how people on Earth view them, what the units do, beyond what I'm meant to." The voice gets a little quieter. "So I've been trying to find a way to maybe help sometimes. Fix things, improve things."
"There was this one building on this unit's patrol that was out of power for a big while. I timed one of my hijacking attempt just right and went to try and fix it." a beat. "It was a trap by the Null Entity, it made electricity just not work somehow, no matter how I fixed it. New wires, new placement, new everything."
"Eventually, 2 Earth citizens came down and found a creepy robot in the basement. One of them almost completely took the unit's head off. Null Entity grabbed on to the systems and chassis. It couldn't get the head, because it was disconnected."
"Chassis sent a signal that it was compromised by Null Entity and self destruct signal was sent back, the Null signal is higher priority than an ejection. So I never was received back at Marsbase Hermes."
There's a moment where Fox folds her fingers in the air -- Vorpal can feel her mind reaching out, like gentle fingers brushing over the Elemental's forehead. It's not dissimilar from the way it feels when Fox snuggles up to her: tentative at first, careful not to cross boundaries unwanted, but then real, present, warm. There's something so incredibly and deeply real about the Thyrsus. She exists Here and Now, even when her mind is also flinging itself all over the place. Vorpal can feel her sorting through her thoughts -- all kinds of concepts whiz past at the speed of light. Phrases like "the Whorl" and "Anima Mundi" and "summoning from an Iris". A memory of the cold feeling of the Astral wind across her soul, brief and fleeting, the coldest she's ever been.
That's followed immediately by the warm, calm thought: She's not too far out. We can still save her.
Things click together in her mind as Kimberly keeps talking. "I know those people. They're with us. They survived the explosion, they're okay."
"Okay. Got it. Have you been able to run any analysis on yourself? Are you injured, as far as you can tell?"
It's always amazing to peek inside Fox's head and see the speed with which she sorts through impossible concepts. Vorpal's mind is- well... sharp. It cuts from thought to thought, slashing across the intervening distance without really but grazing across it. She's not a being of archived knowledge and complex understandings- she's got a spotlight that whips across the surface of her knowledge and memory, highlighting one detail, bouncing to the next, and often arriving at the right place quicker than one might otherwise. Her mind settles into Fox's like dusk over a bonfire. Slow, steady, unconcerned and comfortable. Not an unknown, frightening dark but the comfortable shadows cast by familiar flames in the warmth they cast.
"Good. I was worried- but I had no doubts you'd have it handled. Let me know what I need to do to help."
"That sounds like a good system- until everyone starts responding the same ways. Then it sounds like lip service to something worrisome," Jackie states quietly.
"You have, haven't you?" Jackie nods slowly to herself. "It's good of you to find ways to help. I've got reliable accounts of them breaching all lines of legality to resort to putting high-caliber bullets through limbs to keep non-violent, un-arrested individuals present for harassment and extra-judicial interrogation, and deployment of arrays of extremely lethal laser drones to quell "resistance to arrest" no more involved than trying to walk away. With leeway like that on machines like these, everyone who can help fix and improve things is a blessing."
She listens, too, to the story of what happened, and comments quietly, "That must have been terrifying. To throw yourself out there and just... not get scooped to safety."
"I'm glad to hear the citizens are safe. I'm sorry there's so much trouble given to Earth's citizenry in general."
"I had a mild headache at the start, I think one of the citizens managed to use an ability to knock my psyche silly, but otherwise, I'm still one coherent array of thoughts." The Auxiliary battery display shows 99.6% now.
"I did not really get scared in the moment it happened. Isolation was a boon at the start, but it got pretty bad after that." If the voice that first came out of the restored head is anything to go about, it must have been a nightmare.
Fox goes quiet for a while, both her thoughts and her emotions that Vorpal can hear, and her speech. After a minute, she seems to sort of resurface. "Okay. Kimberly, here's what I propose:"
"I'm going to go and make a report to my people, and I'm going to take the brain case somewhere safe with me so that we have a means of contacting you. I can't keep this connection open all of the time, because I don't want to risk that I might mess something up by trying to recharge the case. We'll make contact at specified times so you're not alone too long. I have a plan -- several plans -- for trying to retrieve you."
"Do you think you can hang in there for a couple more days?"
"Yeah, I'm sorry too. But it's not your fault. You're helping. Lots of folx aren't. And... yeah. I bet it got bad after that," Jackie murmured quietly. She listens as Fox proposes a plan, but shivers and hugs herself when it ends with a few more days of waiting. Still, maybe that's not so bad. She'll have to see what Kimberly says.
There is a series of sounds, satisfying sounds of High Tech fantasy computer buttons and screens being pressed that comes from the voice box. "AE Pod integrity is at 75%, so I'm good on that front so long as we're not dealing with a timeline that counts in weeks. If I know rescue is coming, I can hold on mentally." The voice is hopeful, relieved.
"Communication is not particularly complex to achieve, as long as you have the head with you. "
"Hopefully I can try to help more once I'm out of here." A beat "And with less explosions."
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