trans_9 | Phase 5 - Pirate Fight!

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Phase 5 - Pirate Fight!

They now know what they're up against: space pirates. Interdimensional kidnappers and ruthless scallywags, that hijack ships, and sell the ships themselves and their contents for profit.

Their spaceship is rammed through the hull of the bridge, they're outnumbered fifteen-to-one, and the pirates have some very shiny tech on their side. But even with Stacy suppressed, the crew has her on their side, as she's trying her best to hide them from view and not allow her internal defenses to be used against our stalwart Meatcrew.

Now, in the area outside the bridge, which is home to a wide open space surrounded by a network of hub tunnels and the like, the crew is going to make their stand against the pirates--and the success of this fight will decide the fate of the rest of the crew. It's not easy task, either, considering the powerful weaponry the pirates have at their disposal, and the physical strength, cyborg augments, and powers a number of them have. But they do have a plan.

Will Team GTFO succeed, reopen the ship, and be able to go back to help the others fight against whatever was released against them? (Is it already too late to help them all?) Or will they fail, will those Left Behind have to cross their fingers and hope for the best, will the crew be doomed to a horrible fate in the meat markets (both literal and figurative) of the of the pirate black markets known as the Chopping Blocks?

[ooc: As usual, old threads are still open. And subthreads will be left open so folks can tag them. For instance, even after the subthread with the pirates retreating goes up, the pirate FIGHTING can still be tagged. You can also tag multiple subthreads, since it's a big-ass brawl and you can do fun stuff like having your character flung across the fight.

OPEN FOR TAGGING]

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"Time you don't have," he said flatly. "We all know it. It's a cascade fail-failure." And the evidence was in his own voice already. He could already pick up the harsher tone seeping in as well as the occasional error. It wouldn't be much longer before it began to affect more critical systems than his speech centres.

It was obvious to him that it's highly unlikely he'll simply recover from this, or that he'd want to pay the price that a recovery would demand. Losing parts of his personality, himself... it was too much like what almost happened before with his ancestor. He didn't want to have it happen again.

But yet his counterpart didn't give up, kept working and rewiring parts of his core despite the damage and the occasional sparks burning his hands. Brainy wished there was some way to help, or to get him to stop. Because...

"I'm not human," he said aloud. "I'm not even org-organic. Not enough for it to matter. I'm... replaceable."

He won't stop. He refuses to just let him slip away, without devoting the entirety of his vast intellect towards saving him, as is, whole and unchanged. He deserves that much, those minutes of unbridled thought and pure concentration.

"I have a team-mate who's synethic. Gear. He's a Linsnarian. Before the Legion became unfettered from causality, there had also been a new recruit, Babbage, a combat Mechanoid from Robotica--which housed an entire species of sentient robots. Computo's creations, after he achieved true sentience."

He briefly looks sidelong at Brainiac before making sure not to look away from his work. The sparks do burn his fingers, but if he feels it at all, he makes no show of it. (And later, when he has the chance to reflect on it, he'll be filled with immense gratitude that Billy is showing such dedication to the same cause, wordlessly toiling away).

"They are sentient. You are clearly sentient. You are a person. I can even see why you'd want to be a human specifically, given our species, in both our worlds and how cold and callous they are, but you're already a person."

That usually stoic voice starts to change, emotion starts to leak into it, unbidden.

"You seek to better yourself--one of the primary traits of sentient, evolved organics. You seek to be more--"

He watches systems run down and fail, as they try futilely to stop it from happening.

"I'm organic and it means nothing. I'm significantly colder than you are, more callous and cruel by far. I disdain other sentients and stay as emotionally detached as possible. You go out of your way to embrace emotions and form emotional attachments, attempt to understand the feelings of others. Organics are just machines, at their core, biological machines. They have to choose to be more than that."

Brainy can't help it, he can't stop it, all of that Coluan resolve crumbles, that wall of emotional repression crashes down; he can't stop the tears that start to pool in his eyes, the way his voice hitches. It's subtle, but it's there.

"You are unique. You are immeasurably valuable. You are far more...human and organic than I am. You seek to be more than you are, and in that way, you are already more."

Edited 2009-11-08 07:07 (UTC)

If anything he only seemed to be encouraging Brainy to work faster, to push himself to try for the impossible and pull together the scrapped, burned out remains into something that worked, kept him whole for a while longer. But there was a difference between that and making something that will work enough to get him back to the lab for the extensive repairs he desperately needed. But his counterpart kept trying anyway, and there was a kind of determination there that, if it weren't for their matched intellects, he might have even thought it was possible as well.

But the emotion in the other's voice - emotion he'd never heard there before - betrayed the truth of the situation better than anything he could have said.

"I-- Thank you," he said, and there was a ghost of emotion there despite how inhuman his voice had become. "That means a lot to m-me. But you're wro-ong."

He frowned, like imminent core meltdown was more of an annoyance than something that would end him completely. He wanted to be able to say this with his own voice, or at least without the distortions affecting him.

For that reason he drew resources from the failsafes set up in his core functions, rerouted them to other areas to allow for the few things he needed to do now. It noticeably weakened what was left of his core, but a few more minutes and it wouldn't matter anyway.

"I'm not better than you," he said, and his voice did manage to sound slightly more stable, like it used to. "You're organic, you can become more than what you are more easily than I can. And... there are people here who care about you. Who accept you despite all those things you say are flaws."

His eyes flicked away for a moment, but there was no room for uncertainty or secrets now. "...I was jealous of you because of that. I'm sorry."

"You needn't apologise--for anything. Despite our rivalry, I--"

There's a hum and then silence as one of Brainiac 5's vital systems shuts down, and then another. The pauses in Brainy's words are his voice hitching, as it voice tries to betray him by letting out sobs. But he clamps down on it, controls it, so that he doesn't.

"My whole life, I sought-- an intellectual peer. My mother turned out to be insane, and no one else--no one else ever seemed to understand--"

Another hum, and a whine that dies down to nothing.

"We're supposed to be the same individual, but we're so different, we're hardly the same person at all," he says. "And yet we're so similar, we've suffered such similar hardships, that--"

Another whine, and he looks as if he wants to close his eyes in grief, but he can't do that and keep trying to save him. But he knows the chances of that. They're now just working because B5 deserves the effort, not because he can be saved.

"It's familial. Rather than simply seeing you as a version of myself, I feel as if you're...some sort of family member, that grew up apart, under separate conditions, that I've only just met now, like I've been seeking my entire life to find. Perhaps like a sibling. The Legion is my home, but I still wanted at least someone, that--that evoked those sorts of feelings. I wanted to meet someone that understood the things I did, so I didn't feel like as much of a--an oddity. Despite my intellect--perhaps because of my intellect--for all I've inflated my importance, there are times I've felt.... And--"

He wipes at his eyes so he can see better to work, knowing at this point that they may as well give up, and still refusing to.

"--And alone. As irritating as you've been--" Here he gets a small, sardonic smile. "--you have no idea how much you did to assuage those feelings. If you can't trust any other measure of your worth, at least ask yourself this--how many individuals do you think manage to evoke such strong emotion from me?"

Edited 2009-11-08 07:23 (UTC)

He could barely feel anything now, and it occurred to him that maybe he should be afraid of this, of ending and there being nothing left, but he wasn't. He would like to think that it had something to do with being a Legionnaire, a hero, but he thought it more likely that he'd simply lost that function already.

At least it made things easier as something else inside whined and stuttered to a stop.

"I wish we could have met sooner," he said quietly. "Family isn't a concept either of us are very... experienced in. To have someone like that around would have been... nice. Despite our diff-erences and arguments. Maybe things could have been different for us th-then..."

He tried for a smile of sorts, but it was overridden by a gasp as something gave inside his head now, the cascade of damage spreading further than he'd thought. He'd likely lose some motor functions next, so Brainy made an effort to move now, reaching a hand around and into his own chest. His counterpart would likely be mad at him for interfering, but hopefully he'd understand as a small purple disc was removed from the tangle of parts and held out to him.

It bore the familiar logo of his - their - ancestor.

"It's a backup dis-disc," he explained. "Normally it would have a complete copy of my pro-programs, but with how dam-maged I am, I can't be sure." Now he managed a smile. "I trust you with it more than anyone else."

He takes the disc, and a cursory scan is...not promising, but right now, his expression stays the same. He doesn't want to give false hope, or dash his counterpart's hopes entirely as he dies. The disc is handled like a treasured thing, put in a case and put into Brainy's belt.

And like Billy, he still won't give up trying to fix him.

"B-Brainy..."

Jeka slithered forward, taking her dying friend's hand as her eyes filled with tears. She wanted to say something, anything, but had no idea how to put it into words...

The door connecting the bridge to the hallways outside slams open as a dark haired teenager wearing a red cape over his plant suit pushes his way in. There's an 'S' etched on the front of it. He looked a bit like Kon. A few people in the room would recognize that face exactly, though.

"Brainy!" He shouts, looking around wildly until he spots the prone Coluan. "BRAINY!"

He's at his side in an instant, being careful not to jostle the other Brainy or Billy as they work to save him.

Brainy tried a smile for Jeka's sake, though it was far from easy. He couldn't think of anything to say that might help in any way, and he could already feel systems shutting down in his critical areas. It was really only a matter of time...

His eyes widened slightly as the door burst open and the last person he'd expected to see arrived. "S-s-s-uperman?"

"H-Hold still, Brainy," Superman says, licking his lips and glancing desperately between Brainy and the two working to repair him. He doesn't even blink at the weirdness of the other Brainy; the situation's just too horrible for him to even care. "They're gonna fix you. You're gonna be fine. Because you're a hero. You saved everyone."

Tears are rolling down his face. Brainy might feel one or two of them fall on his cheek, if he can still feel anything there.

"Y-You saved everyone, just like I knew you would. You've always been a hero, Brainy. I hope you know that, I hope you know it in all your circuits, and in your heart because you've got one." He swallows hard. "I'm so proud to be your friend, Brainy. Proud and honored."

Brainy didn't know when Superman had woken up in Stacy's pod cavern, but he was grateful that the Kryptonian hero had managed to make it up to the bridge as quickly as he did. It meant he could see him one last time before the end, and knowing that he'd saved his hero as well as everyone else... It made him even more certain he'd made the right choice.

He just wished he had enough control over his speech centres to say that it didn't matter now, what happened next. He'd done everything he'd promised as a Legionnaire and a friend.

But all he could manage was a twisted, broken noise that might have been a 'thank you', and a faint smile.

And then when another stuttering whine suddenly stopped, he did too.

For a moment, Brainy just sits there, tools clenched in scalded hands, and that is all he can do. Just sits, and thinks, as if coming up with a solution post facto will allow them to go back in time and implement it. It's almost reassuring that nothing comes, because if he'd thought of a way to fix the other Brainiac after it was already too late, he wouldn't be able to forgive himself.

Then he says, quietly, tonelessly, "You can stop now, Sensor."

The tears keep rolling down Superman's face, and...

...He fades away to nothingness as Jeka's shoulders begin to shake.

"I couldn't let him die alone, Brainy," she said as her tears finally rolled down her cheeks as well. "I couldn't let him die alone..."

He was there, and she was there, and the rest of the Team GTFO was there, but she couldn't let him die without someone from his own Legion. And after what she'd seen in the Sensorium (http://community.livejournal.com/trans_9/142301.html?thread=10272733#t10272733), she'd had to bring him his Superman.

She buried her face in her hands and bent double over her fallen friend. The tears the illusionary Superman had cried had vanished with him, but they were replaced by Jeka's own.

Later, he'll think to thank Billy for his efforts. Right now, however, Brainiac 5 isn't sure what to do, so there's another few moments of listlessness.

Finally, he composes himself, carefully puts his tools back in his belt, and stands up, seemingly unperturbed, and turns to the others.

He opens his mouth to say something, most likely intended to be something stiff and emotionless and informative. 'His vital functions have ceased.' Something like that, but he finds that he can't say it. His voice is caught in his throat and creaks each time he starts to speak.

So he simply turns away, hand rubbing the back of his neck, aimless, moving around as if something is coiled inside like a spring, and moving is the only thing keeping it from snapping.

And then, for no apparent reason, that spring is twisted so hard it snaps anyway, and with a movement so sudden they likely don't see it coming, he smashes his hand right through a control panel, then smashes it again, sending clear fragments of plasti-glass flying. Then again--and when he withdraws his hand this time it's bleeding, and the remains of the panel are sparking.

And he can't seem to stop doing it.

"Brainy..BRAINY!" Danny says, while trying to grab of Brainiac's arms.

"Brainy, I can't even begin to know what you're going through, but you have to get ahold of yourself. This isn't going to help him. He died to save us and the ship, not so you could smash the bridge to pieces."

Brainy stops, and just stands there, staring at the damage, panting. After a moment of looking dazed, he finally speaks again.

"Yes," he says distantly. "Yes, of course."

Her voice is very, very calm.

"There's work to be done, isn't there."

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Phase 5 - Pirate Fight!

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