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trans_92009-11-12 12:04 am
cabbage-butt.livejournal.com) wrote in trans_92009-11-12 12:04 am
Entry tags:
Wailing and Gnashing of Teeth
Brainiac 5 had not met with the others. Glanced around to see who was there, if they were alright. Brenda is fine, and so is Koko, there had been no reported casualties other than the people from the Pod Caverns. Tragic, certainly, but not his focus at the moment.
B5's body had been placed on a clear work-table, and then Brainy had gotten to work. First, his casing had been popped open again and lay discarded for a time on a nearby workbench. Next, the casing of his face. One might think that it would be disturbing for Brainy to see the mechanics of his friend's face exposed like that, but if he does, he shows no sign. He works silently and methodically, taking apart the components inside his head, checking for any backups, any information storage devices--anything undamaged that he can salvage some code from. The backup he'd been given is severely damaged, and there's no way B5's personality engrams can be restored from it, but if there are pieces stored elsewhere, even just fragments, pulling them together into a coherent whole is a possibility...
This isn't an organic being, after all, where life functions ceasing destroy the core processor via oxygen deprivation.
However, his investigation uncovered nothing useful. All of his memory storage components had been reduced to melted circuits, his core processor is fried...
After calmly doing his investigation, the moment he comes to the final conclusion that there is nothing to be recovered, he calmly puts his tools down, and calmly picks up an empty work tray, and calmly tosses it into a wall as hard as he can, where it thuds against Stacy's flesh unsatisfyingly. His expression never changes.
Then he takes a deep breath and goes back to work, putting all the parts together again, snapping things back into place. After that, he tidies up, his role of engineer and coroner becoming one of mortician. Cosmetic repairs are done to B5's torso casing to make him more presentable for the funeral services. The mechanics of his face are set to lock it in a peaceful expression, like he's simply sleeping.
Brainy folds B5's hands across his chest, with the hand that wears his Legion flight ring on top. The surface of said ring gets polished until it glitters brightly and is prominent to the eye. The last thing he does is tousle his hair. Not out of affection--it's messy, and hardly presentable.
It isn't so much that he believes it matters, this ritual, this preparation. He doesn't. When he died himself, be it sooner or later, he cares nothing for what's done to his own body after. But B5 had wanted to be human, to be an organic being, and people were so funny about these things. About deaths and burials and culture and rituals.
This isn't done for Brainy--in fact, this is the last thing in the world he wants to be doing, and were he being himself, the pragmatist that he is, he'd be reducing B5 to his core components for later use. They are valuable.
No, this is done out of respect for the dead. B5 had wanted to be organic, had wanted to be human, to be treated as more than his parts. So it's a body Brainy prepares, before it's launched into space with the same pomp and circumstance that any other Legionnaire's would be. It's a body he eventually covers with a sheet when he's finished, a body that will never move of its own volition again, a body that will be present for words spoken about a being no longer there, that B5 will never hear.
Given the last instance, Brainiac 5 is glad that he managed to say all that he managed to say when he could.
And then, at the end, his hand goes back to tousle the blonde hair, sticking up past the sheet, of the young man that would have been his brother if they'd had more time to be family, and this time, it's not because it's messy.
[ooc: Please ask me on aim (psychicsaphie) or email before tagging: psychic.saphie@gmail.com. He'll likely chase out most gawkers or people who don't know him or didn't know Brainy trying to offer condolences, so you might not find it worth it to tag. Who he lets in the room sort of depends on who and on the first thing they say when they come in.]
B5's body had been placed on a clear work-table, and then Brainy had gotten to work. First, his casing had been popped open again and lay discarded for a time on a nearby workbench. Next, the casing of his face. One might think that it would be disturbing for Brainy to see the mechanics of his friend's face exposed like that, but if he does, he shows no sign. He works silently and methodically, taking apart the components inside his head, checking for any backups, any information storage devices--anything undamaged that he can salvage some code from. The backup he'd been given is severely damaged, and there's no way B5's personality engrams can be restored from it, but if there are pieces stored elsewhere, even just fragments, pulling them together into a coherent whole is a possibility...
This isn't an organic being, after all, where life functions ceasing destroy the core processor via oxygen deprivation.
However, his investigation uncovered nothing useful. All of his memory storage components had been reduced to melted circuits, his core processor is fried...
After calmly doing his investigation, the moment he comes to the final conclusion that there is nothing to be recovered, he calmly puts his tools down, and calmly picks up an empty work tray, and calmly tosses it into a wall as hard as he can, where it thuds against Stacy's flesh unsatisfyingly. His expression never changes.
Then he takes a deep breath and goes back to work, putting all the parts together again, snapping things back into place. After that, he tidies up, his role of engineer and coroner becoming one of mortician. Cosmetic repairs are done to B5's torso casing to make him more presentable for the funeral services. The mechanics of his face are set to lock it in a peaceful expression, like he's simply sleeping.
Brainy folds B5's hands across his chest, with the hand that wears his Legion flight ring on top. The surface of said ring gets polished until it glitters brightly and is prominent to the eye. The last thing he does is tousle his hair. Not out of affection--it's messy, and hardly presentable.
It isn't so much that he believes it matters, this ritual, this preparation. He doesn't. When he died himself, be it sooner or later, he cares nothing for what's done to his own body after. But B5 had wanted to be human, to be an organic being, and people were so funny about these things. About deaths and burials and culture and rituals.
This isn't done for Brainy--in fact, this is the last thing in the world he wants to be doing, and were he being himself, the pragmatist that he is, he'd be reducing B5 to his core components for later use. They are valuable.
No, this is done out of respect for the dead. B5 had wanted to be organic, had wanted to be human, to be treated as more than his parts. So it's a body Brainy prepares, before it's launched into space with the same pomp and circumstance that any other Legionnaire's would be. It's a body he eventually covers with a sheet when he's finished, a body that will never move of its own volition again, a body that will be present for words spoken about a being no longer there, that B5 will never hear.
Given the last instance, Brainiac 5 is glad that he managed to say all that he managed to say when he could.
And then, at the end, his hand goes back to tousle the blonde hair, sticking up past the sheet, of the young man that would have been his brother if they'd had more time to be family, and this time, it's not because it's messy.
[ooc: Please ask me on aim (psychicsaphie) or email before tagging: psychic.saphie@gmail.com. He'll likely chase out most gawkers or people who don't know him or didn't know Brainy trying to offer condolences, so you might not find it worth it to tag. Who he lets in the room sort of depends on who and on the first thing they say when they come in.]