trans_9 | Testing Boundaries [ Open ]

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Testing Boundaries [ Open ]

The Sensorium...of all the various strange and bewildering places she'd found aboard this madhouse, it had proved to be the most interesting. It was like an old science fiction movie, one of the improbable ones that gathered a cult following and generated money for greedy toymakers. It was like being plugged into the Net again, almost, with the freedom and power to change the world around her at command, and after only a few hours in the hollow, Netless silence, it was blessing to have something to take the edge off. Unprofessional, that, but still reassuring to have something so utterly human inflicted on her.

The Major had spent a few hours sifting through the available simulations and programs. Heavy-arms training runs, adventurous little role-playing games, even a few tactical simulations. Mostly it was just fluff, or half-finished or any of dozens of things that were little else but dry educational or pure entertainment in value.

So, what else could she do but program her own?

'Begin with what you know,' ran the old adage, and so she had. The city spread out before her was dark, tinted glass made inky black with night time and reflected neon and streetlights like a spectrum of eyes from every corner. This wasn't exactly accurate, as a simulation; Tokyo had never had as Jiggabachi helicopters or powered exoskeleton-toting soldiers wandering it's streets and skyways. Perhaps it had as many criminals, but they weren't so blatant. Then again, the point of this exercise wasn't realism, was it? Nostagia made these lacks seem obvious, maybe, but as Motoko stood on the edge of a flat-topped roof at what she'd deemed the "beginning" of the course, she decided it would do for a testing ground. Varied landscape and opponents would be a good measure of her teammates skill— among other things. Damned if she was going to go haring off anywhere with nothing but a blind knowledge of her teammates and hopeful wishes.

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"That's quite the beautiful landscape you've set up," came the voice only a couple meters behind Motoko, "looks like ... Tokyo, is it? Near the end of the twenty-first century." Picard came into view, a cigarette hanging off his lip, and dressed in an outfit much more nostalgic than the cyborg woman's. He tipped his fedora to her, smirking lightly. He hadn't expected anyone in here, much less a newcomer, but here had an opportunity to at least say hello.

"I'm Captain Jean-Luc Picard, and the commander of this crew. It's a pleasure to meet you."

Motoko hadn't bothered to alter her clothing from the skin-tight plantsuit. The gun strapped under her old flak jacket was more than enough nostalgia, as far as clothing; this was Tokyo, after all. If it had been real, she could easily have walked around in just as she was without being given a second glance. The Major didn't flinch, or look at Picard as he entered, only half-turned her head so that her voice would carry back. She could hear the way he moved; light and rolling. He wasn't a threat.

"Twenty-second," she corrected, mildly, not bothering to return the introduction with her name. She'd been born at the turn of the century, when cyberization technology had been in it's infancy, "It's not accurate, but since when was artistry the point?"

Edited 2009-09-04 20:37 (UTC)

"Hmm, well then, I apologize. In my own timeline, this would be around fifty or sixty years after mankind's first warp flight. We'd already had First Contact with an alien species, and were on our way to building and commissioning warp-drive vessels to explore space in." Plucking the cigarette from his mouth, Picard took advantage of a natural pause in his explanation to exhale a small cloud of wispy smoke, away from the Major, of course. He smiled, setting the cigarette back between his lips.

"And yourself? I see certain signs of technology that we certainly didn't have at the turn of the twenty-second century."

Now she looked back at him, listening with an bland expression that was miles away. She let smoke and the last of his reply wisp off the edge of the building before replying; an odd, thinking silence.

"About twenty years ago, cyberization technology had it's first successful human trials," Motoko answered, her tone musingly philosophical, almost idle, like the tapping of a pen when you're only waiting for the hours to pass, "It's a technology to allow those severely damaged by accident or war to use prosthesis to restore lost function. In many ways, it's an improvement over the natural state. That's human nature, I suppose, to seek bigger and better things."

She could have elaborated, considered doing so, even. This Jean-Luc Picard was easy to talk to; he thought before he spoke, and noticed small things. Still...no. Wait and see.

"That is fascinating," Picard replied. "See, medical technology didn't advance near so fast in my time. At least, not where prosthetics and cybernetics are concerned. Even in the 24th century, we're continuing to make advances. My own heart is a top-of-the-line artificial replacement." He smirked, taking the cigarette butt from his mouth and flicking it over the edge, letting it fall in the ashtray top of a large waste receptacle. "However, psychological and biological medicine advanced extremely quickly during this time. By the time the twenty-third century rolled around, disease had almost been eliminated from the country, and genetic engineering was an outlawed aspect of the past."

Walking to the edge of the building, he sat down along it, letting one leg dangle over the side while he conversed with Motoko. "Bigger and better things. You may be right, there. And it's not just technology, or land, or wealth. No, that drive for bigger and better, to continue to seek and grow is what allowed Earth to end war on our own planet, to help found the United Federation of Planets, to establish Starfleet. Humanity thrives on knowing we're imperfect. We seek out perfection, and because of it, we better ourselves every day by trying. It's what it means to be human." He didn't bother getting another cigarette, though he did pull out a small metal flask and take a sip from it. He might as well hold up the noir image. Wiping his lip, he offered the flask to Motoko.

"Humanity is a child, growing and evolving like any other species. There's more out there waiting for us. For my part, I can't wait."

Motoko just blinked at him for a moment, staring as if she could impart all the stupidity of his passionate, moving, completely uncalled for outburst in one red-eyed look. What was this man; a politician, or just an idealist idiot?

"You really like giving speeches, don't you, Jean-Luc?" the Major asked, archly.

Samus continued her search of the entire ship, checking every possible hiding spot on Stacy. The Sensoriums toke the longest to clear each day, hunting for any sign of Sam.

This was a set up she had not encountered before. Changing the scenery would alert the occupant to her presence. Not to ruin her stealth, Samus carried on her pursuit of Sam stalking through the streets of this metropolis.

She moved quickly, light on her feet, running through the dark alleys. Eyes moving, checking around corners as she slipped through the city.

"Only when the whim strikes me," he said, glancing over at Motoko. His wry, self-deprecating grin made it obvious that he knew how she felt about his speech, and just how amused he actually was by it. "Do you disagree? It's perfectly valid if you do, I'm just curious. Your attitude, your bearing, your succinct speech patterns ... you're military, or para-military of some kind, aren't you? Special ops, or internal affair, perhaps. Like the old NSA or CIA of North American history."

Edited 2009-09-04 21:53 (UTC)

"I'm a cyborg," She replied simply, remembering her few run-ins with the CIA. The American Empire employed some of the pushiest, most blindly opportunistic fools she had ever met, "Do you know who really runs this city? Organ smugglers. They kidnap young girls and cut them into pieces to sell cheap to dying people who can't afford prosthetic bodies. At the same time, a major pharmaceutical company has been letting thousands die every year by selling ineffective medication for an extra six percent on their profit margins. I could be wrong, but this world is as full of death as it is renewal. Humanity never really changes, it just gets a new face."

She blinked— where had that edge of bitterness come from? Motoko grimaced and killed the running process that had been supporting it, and the emotion died with a whimper, "I'm with the Public Defense force, Section Nine. I guess you could say I'm 'top of the line,' as well."

A wide, six-lane street— bare of the traffic it would have been a lifeline for in reality— crossed Samus' path, or was is she who crossed it's? It was a brief interlude of free air around her, like a clearing in a dense and darkened forest. The Jiggabachi helicopters circled the city like dragonflies, and when someone crossed their line of sight so openly, they did not leave the opportunity to waste.

Like some morbid machine amalgamation of wasp and falcon, the helicopter stooped on Samus' position, weaving a line of destruction towards her in automatic machine-gun fire, leaving divots of concrete splashing from bullet's impact points like miniature fireworks. It was massive, black steel and whirling, deafening blades, and very quick. ping-pin—chk, and a seemingly insignificant hole sprouted in the tinted glass at the front of the cockpit. The craft listed to the left, the main blades stuttering and failing as it fell the now-brief distance to the ground, but momentum carried it's steel onwards towards Samus at fatal speed. Motoko hit it from above like a ton of bricks, heels extended and momentum transferring the weight to the ground through twisted steel and still-hot motors in an instant that arrested the motion abruptly.

Mildly, she stood among the wreckage, crouched, and leaped free, "Don't you ever watch where you're going?!"

"Change doesn't happen overnight. People don't change in a microsecond. It was gradually, over the course of centuries and three world wars that my own world changed for the better. Yours can, too. It starts with one person. It always starts somewhere. Someone gets the idea: 'this isn't right'. It grows from there. That doesn't excuse the actions taken by those people who murder and profit from it, or from the corporations that attempt to save money and make more by essentially killing their own market. What it does mean is that those ideas they have will fade, with effort. I've spent my entire life in Starfleet standing against such ideas and shortcuts. It's not an easy path." He sighed and shook his head, figuring that Motoko would simply dismiss his words as another speech, which was rather disheartening to the captain, as he could tell from her own words and her bitter tone that she felt as strongly about what happened as he did.

"Top-of-the-line cyborg. My own experiences as a ... cyborg were not so altruistic or positive as your own." She didn't remind him of the Borg, not really. Still, it was hard to use the word 'cyborg' and not think of the dangerous pseudo-race. "If cyborg bodies are so expensive, and you're associated with a public defense branch, I believe it's safe to assume that your branch is not like others. My guess is you deal with national incidents and potential international incidents. Possibly cybercrime of some kind. If cybernetics are so advanced in your own world, I'd imagine neuro-enhancements would be one of the major technological breakthroughs."

The mass of destruction plummeting towards her failed to worry Samus as it probably should have. Quick reflexes and a sudden burst of acrobatic action removed Samus from direct danger of a falling wreck of a helicopter.

Samus' face didn't reveal the interest or surprise she experienced when watching Motoko's extermination of the helicopter, never letting her sentiments reflect on her always apathetic countenance.

Samus briefly wondered why everyone on this ship was concerned with her safety. While she knew that she could never take down unarmed, she could have just as easily slipped back into safety. Had she wanted to cause a commotion, the Sensoriums had the convenience unavailable on all other parts of Stacy; it allowed her to use her powersuit. It's firepower would be more than enough to take care of anything the city could send her way.

Standing calmly, she met Motoko's words with cold confidence, "Always."

"You're an idealist," Motoko pointed out, with a hint of a smile, "But think of it this way. Maybe fifty people lose their lives to the organ smugglers and the mafia that controls them every year. Out of those losses, more than three hundred people who otherwise would have died in their hospital beds get to live to a ripe old age. It's not fair to those who suffer for that kind of ecology, but at the same time, the organized nature of that business makes it difficult and expensive to stop them permanently. So long as they keep their activities within an acceptable minimum, it's not considered to be a problem by the government. Do you want to decide who deserves to die? Even I'm not so arrogant."

As for the rest, she let it slide. He wasn't entirely wrong, but we wasn't right, either. Crime wasn't the word for the jobs she took, and so many things had very little to do. If he wanted to talk Cyborg Philosophy, he'd have to do it more cleanly; she was not discussing the particulars of her job with anyone she'd only just met, "The net is vast and infinite. You can't destroy the bad parts without also removing the good. That's the point I was trying to make, it's just the way humans are: a mixed bag, no matter how you try and cut it."

Motoko returned her power face in kind, then flicked her eyes up, and behind Samus, where the explosion and gunfire had attracted a multi-ped tank and another Jiggabachi, closing fast. Decision made, Motoko's gaze shifted back to Samus.

"This is a training sim," She offered, as authoritative as ever, "Think you can handle it?"

"I've been called worse," said Picard with a laugh, "but I never intended to make the point of me establishing who lives and who dies. However, I'm making the point of who lives. Stealing a young girl and murdering her to save someone else's life with her organs is inherently wrong. There's no such thing as an acceptable minimum for murder. To argue that point from that perspective isn't arrogance, it's basic human decency. Is the loss of a man or woman or child in a hospital, dying from organ failure a tragedy? Yes, it is. Would I be willing to end the life of another person against their will to save that other individual? Absolutely not. My own life was saved by a prosthetic, a technology available to everyone in the Federation regardless of ethnicity, religion, political creed or species." He paused when she began speaking about the net and it and humanity being similar.

"You're referring to the former World Wide Web, correct? The internet. The internet itself, from my studies of it, had no good or bad sides, only a stark neutrality that could be used for good or ill by whomever."

Edited 2009-09-04 23:39 (UTC)

With a flash of gold light, Samus' powersuit materializes around her; words ineffective compared to this response. She scanned the landscape deciding the best course of action against her mechanical foes.

Missiles made quick work of the Jiggabachi. One to front end sent it spinning into a nearby building. While seemingly less showy than Motoko's actions, the launch of the explosives resulted in several impressive blasts and a mess of fire and ruin in its wake.

Turning to the tank, Samus realized it would take more than a missile to destroy it. She coupled more rockets with charged beams. As it closed it, she ran to meet it. The bulkiness of her suit did nothing to slow her down, avoiding blasts was not an issue. Her grapple beam yanked off a plate; she sends several more blasts into the tank's inner workings. Tank down.

Nanoha had heard about this wondrous Sensorium, but hadn't yet had a chance to see it for herself. Only it was occupied, and had its own self-contained world active already - from the landmarks around her, Nanoha could tell immediately that it was Tokyo, but a Tokyo that she'd never seen before, dark and heavy.

There was a woman in there, too - Nanoha recognized her as the one with whom she'd exchanged glances earlier. She approached her from behind, quietly remarking. "I've never seen Tokyo look like this before."

'If you can't live with the world the way it is, then change it yourself,' she'd once told a criminal of the caliber she was currently describing. It seemed that this was the kind of person who'd do that without needing to be told. He argued with that same transcendent surety Daisuke had spoken to her with, once upon a time.

"The Net is..." Motoko paused momentarily, fighting past half a dozen easy metaphors, "It's everywhere and everyone, all at once, like a thousand voices in the back of your head. Most people have some kind of access. For that reason, the most common voluntary prosthetics are eye implants or replacements. For someone like me, a full-body Cyborg, it's not something I'm often cut off from."

...or so she thought. The smoke cleared in a hurry and the ground rumbled at the impact as the tank came down to ground again: it had jumped, landing to the other side of the original wrecked Helicopter. For herself, Motoko was nowhere to be seen as the tank turned, ponderous steps that cracked the asphalt under them. It's man gun was not so slow, canon whirling to face her like an angry bird, and fired a shot that made a two-lane crater when it hit.

Silently, Motoko turned her eyes towards the girl, evaluating silently without moving her head, then flicked them back to the skyline. She didn't say anything— what was there to say to a statement like that? This was Tokyo, the way it looked at night, if Tokyo had ever been crawling with tanks and power-armored soldiers and predatory helicopters.

Well, yeah. That was mainly what she was referring to. "Are there always so many soldiers here where you're from?"

"No," Soft and curt, still looking off into the distance, "It's a training simulation."

Picard felt a cold sweat suddenly drip down his back. "Like some kind of ... hive communication?" he asked, calming himself as much as he could. "I ... have a little experience with that, myself."

"Oh, I see. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt."

She paused - this woman was obviously military, Nanoha could tell. So, perhaps best to introduce herself militarily. Though she didn't salute, she stood straight. "I'm Captain Takamachi Nanoha, magical combat instructor in the TSAB. A pleasure to meet you."

Wonderful. Samus has a long history of enemies that can't seem to stay dead, this was typical.

Avoiding shots was much harder at a close range. She slips into the morph-ball, zipping around, avoiding being stepped on, and leaving a trail of bombs behind her as she goes. She had to think out a new strategy and fast. This wasn't as simple as she had anticipated.

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Testing Boundaries [ Open ]

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The icon implies motoko has gone for Coffee. This amuses me.

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Sure, Motoko. Go take a break while Samus does all the work.