Strange, strange little girl [OPEN]

[comedownthisroad]

Tay is perched on the steps of Gate of Heaven Catholic Church in South Boston, watching people go by.

Or, well, that's where she is in the Sensorium, anyway. She'd started out in the Barnam's estate, which... was too strange, empty, but none of the AI versions of her family felt right, so she'd switched it out for a random South Boston street, with random AI citizens.

Well, not so random - she'd been baptized in Gate of Heaven, and had her first communion, and sang in the fuckin' choir until she got kicked out for beating another kid up when she was twelve. She'd been relieved. But still, it wasn't as if she'd been to confession in three years, or mass more than on Easter and Christmas either. It's familiar enough that Stacy can re-create it believably, but it's not full of people she actually knows and cares about.

She's likely to be a lot more loose-and-easy with anyone who wanders in, since she's on her own turf, in a way.

Comments

[mustbemade.livejournal.com]

Adrastos is back in the Sensoriums. He had thought he would see if it could recreate his own family here, but curiosity drove him to look around when he saw that someone had already set up a different scene.

Adrastos moves among the citizens, taking in the scene. He has never been to this place's counterpart in reality, so he isn't sure where it was meant to be. But even he can tell when he spots the only real human in a sea of temporary AI citizens. (Of course, it helps that he's wired into the ship and can--usually--tell what else is.) He makes his way over to her.

"What is this place created to resemble?" he asks.

[comedownthisroad]

"Southie," Tay replies in her best Southie accent. Her accent is a little less broad, really, but missing home makes her play it up a little, subconsciously. "South Boston, for the woefully uninformed. And we are sitting on the steps of Gate of Heaven Catholic church, which my family probably helped fuckin' build, though I never really paid attention to shit like that."

She looks a little amused by the fact that he has no idea where it's supposed to be. This must be what it felt like for people she wandered in on. Amused and a little sick to their stomachs because a strange person wandering around like that is a sure-fire way to ruin any illusion of it all being real.

[mustbemade.livejournal.com]

Adrastos looks around, up at the church and back out at the street, taking everything in. "Why here?" he asks. In his mind, there are specifics--If you did not pay attention to it, does that not indicate you do not care about it?--Why not your home?--Why recreate people you have never met?--but aloud, he only says the two words. If he notices her amusement, he does not react to it.

[comedownthisroad]

Tay frowns a little. She hadn't even thought about why she wanted to be in Boston - as much as she'd defend that city to anyone trying to talk it down, she wasn't really that attached to it. But...

"It's home," she says with a shrug. It's someplace that makes her feel safe and like she has some sort of control over her life anymore, and it's really the only place she knows well enough to recreate - all her trips out of Southie tended to be one-time visits, for hunts, and that only rarely, since her wings haven't come in yet. "Why not?"

[mustbemade.livejournal.com]

"It is not your home. It is a church where you used to live. Why not recreate your home?" Most of Adrastos's family is made up of AIs who imitated humanity fairly well, so it doesn't occur to him that AIs might not be able to recreate preexisting humans. (He is also terrible with people, which might have something to do with it.)

[comedownthisroad]

Tay doesn't want to admit out loud that her home was creepy without anyone in it, and creepier with AIs of her family who didn't feel quite... right. She's got her pride. Probably more than is healthy for a 15-year-old girl to have, sometimes.

So instead she just shrugs. "'Cause I'm a Southie and I miss my city?" she offers, though it doesn't sound particularly convincing. "What do you care?"

[mustbemade.livejournal.com]

Adrastos wouldn't understand anyway, so that's probably for the best.

"I was merely curious." Adrastos was always curious, to be fair. His father had encouraged it. "You prefer the city to your home?"

[comedownthisroad]

Tay looks... truly baffled by this guy. "Home's... more than just the house you live in, y'know. It's the places you're comfortable, with people you care about. Sappy shit like that."

Oh, Tay. So insightful, yet so... facepalm-inducing.

[mustbemade.livejournal.com]

"So the city is your home as well. But... you prefer your city to your house?" Adrastos really doesn't understand the distinction, having lived most of his life in the same two buildings without ever seeing the outside except through a window.

[comedownthisroad]

"It's just a house."

She pauses, and makes a face at one of the random AIs passing by, clearly picked up from her thinking about home. She did not need to deal with an AI of her fag cousin Aaron. She actually kind of likes Aaron, and he's the closest to her in age, and... it's just creepy. She imagines him gone. He disappears, thankfully.

"Plus I'm not really comfortable with fake family members walking around. It's just... weird."

[mustbemade.livejournal.com]

"'Fake' family members? You mean the AIs... unsettle you." Somehow, Adrastos can't be surprised by this. Diaz pretty much prepared him for that.

[waylostandfound.livejournal.com]

Nathan was stopping by the Sensoriums. After that intense meeting with getting Cybil back up to speed, he could use some time to unwind a little. He was going to try flying around the Nevada desert, but the church surprised him. Catholic church too, too many memories reminding him of years of attending Mass with his family. Well, another way to unwind, and he approached the building.

[comedownthisroad]

"You're not a Southie," Tay says as Nathan comes closer. She tilts her head a little. "Guess you're a religious man, though, if you're headin' into a random church in someone else's little virtual reality playground."

She can't say hello like a normal person because she's probably never met one in her life.

[waylostandfound.livejournal.com]

Nathan nodded as he stopped for the moment, "Guilty as charged, I'm from New York, born and raised. Though Ma made sure we attended Mass every Sunday growing up at least."

[comedownthisroad]

"I haven't been in ages," Tay says. "Not counting Christmas and Easter. They kicked me out of the choir when I was twelve, only go back for special occasions."

She grins widely, baring her teeth almost unnervingly. She has fond memories of the fight that led to her expulsion from the choir. She was just so sick of fucking singing. "Granddad's real religious, but my dad isn't, and most of our younger cousins aren't, so it works out."

[waylostandfound.livejournal.com]

"Yeah, it's about the same for us when we got older." He knew his mother often went still, but him and his brother, not so much. And his father... well Dad always was a hypocrite until he died.

"One of the last times we all went together was for my Dad's funeral service."

[comedownthisroad]

"Huh. Sucks. You still go for Easter or Christmas, or did you manage to get out of that snoozefest?"

Tay isn't exactly a paragon of sympathy. Or tact. Or enjoyment of religious services. Never were any of those so clear as right now.

[waylostandfound.livejournal.com]

"Usually yeah. Looks better in the polls if you're religious actually."

Yeah he's a politician and was a lawyer. Not the best thing around necessarily.

[comedownthisroad]

Tay makes an uncertain, vaguely dubious expression. "Polls?"

...What? She never had anything to do with politics, she's not even sixteen yet! That and she never really gave a shit because her family fucking owned that city, but that's beside the point.

[waylostandfound.livejournal.com]

"Voting polls? Gives an idea of what a candidate can expect in an election. I uh, once ran for Congress."

[comedownthisroad]

"Oh." Tay feels a little stupid, now, which makes her a little cranky. She'll try not to take it out on you, Nathan. No, really."What'd you do that for? I mean, you're not ugly, and you're not old, so aren't there less boring things you could do?"

Tact, thy name is most certainly not Tay.