[Open]

[indeliblepast]

Sumeragi glared at the console, and instructed the computer to bring up the simulation once more. It was a fairly simple one - just dodging an oncoming asteroid field - but she'd run it three times now, and each had ended with her ship as an asteroid bug-splatter not too far in. She could drive a car just fine, but the finer controls of the ship eluded her. She had imported the Ptolemy's basic design and control scheme into the program, so at least it was a ship she was vaguely familiar with.

Nonetheless, ten minutes into this fourth run, a fairly loud stream of curses - in more than one language - could be heard outside the door to the sensorium she was using.

Comments

[carrieswar.livejournal.com]

"I'd say. I'm assuming when you say tactician, that means you were fighting some kind of war or battle before you came here, right?"

It didn't take much to clue him in, being all too familiar with that all himself.

[indeliblepast]

"Mm... not me specifically - I used to work for the military, though," she replied. "Humanity is very good at making war with itself."

[carrieswar.livejournal.com]

"Ha! Tell me about it." Jr. knew that well enough, being a product of war himself. "Even when there are other things on your ass threatening to wipe you out. We can be pretty stupid, sometimes."

But, hey. Sumeragi was there, and she looked to be perfectly fine, at least on the outside. Jr. considered her for a moment before adding, "Hey, how'd that mission go, by the way?"

[indeliblepast]

Oh god, the away mission. She'd almost managed to forget that. "We succeeded. For a given definition of success anyway."

[carrieswar.livejournal.com]

And that response said so much. Jr. have her an awkward smile. "So ... it wasn't fun, I'm guessing."

[indeliblepast]

"They made us play some sort of... dance game. On a platform above a pit of giant electric eels." Oh, how she wished that was an exaggeration.

[carrieswar.livejournal.com]

"Giant..." Man, he couldn't even repeat that. Dance game actually sounded sort of cool until that second part. Jr. let out a sympathetic huff. "Man, you're makin' me glad I didn't get chosen for that. The hell did you have to do all that for?"

[indeliblepast]

She ran a hand through her hair. "Hell if I know - we were kind of ushered into it without really being asked. Other people had different challenges, I think."

[carrieswar.livejournal.com]

And now came the important questions.

"... nobody fell in, did they?"

[indeliblepast]

"No, thank god." That was a scenario she really didn't want to imagine. Ugh.

[carrieswar.livejournal.com]

"Well that's good. At least you got out of there in one piece."

[indeliblepast]

"Yep. With some chocolates and a weird horn-thing for our troubles."

[carrieswar.livejournal.com]

"Huh ... while chocolate can be a treat on a ship like this, that still seems like a crappy deal for what you had to go through. Unless you really like chocolate."

He shrugged. Why did missions on this ship always have to be something horrible or something that made absolutely no sense? Or BOTH?

[indeliblepast]

"I like chocolate - but I don't like chocolate nearly that much," she replied. "I hope someone somewhere got some readings or something that were actually useful out of it."

[carrieswar.livejournal.com]

"What did you have to go down there and do, exactly?"

[indeliblepast]

"They said the place was uninhabited, and we were looking for some signal beacon or something - guess they were wrong."

[carrieswar.livejournal.com]

"They do tend to be ... ether wrong or uninformative when sending us on these things. Gets annoying!"

[indeliblepast]

"Oh god. In that case, the next time they call my name for one of those things, I am marching straight back to somewhere nobody can find me."