Even the Devil Wouldn't Recognize You [Closed]

[meat_mooks]

With the information they received from Zetta, the hack team arrives at Programming, armed with the tools they'll need to make digital avatars of themselves to go into Stacy's programming, as if it were virtual reality. Cortana again reminds them of the danger, mentioning that if they die in this world, they will die in the real world as well, and that any injuries will translate, though more minorly, to their physical forms.

The hackers close their eyes and sink into the digital world. When they open their eyes again, they are inside the lobby of an empty hotel. According to the AIs, they must explore the hotel and find where the files are, which will hopefully manifest themselves as physical cabinets but are more likely to show up as something much more esoteric.

"Good luck," Cortana wishes them, and the hack team sets off and splits into groups.

Comments

NPC NOTES

[meat_mooks]

[OOC: Please feel free to NPC finding whatever bizarre stuff you want in here. I kind of based this plot on The Shining and Inception 9and God Complex from Doctor Who, so feel free to find ghosts, monsters, upside down rooms, things that terrify your characters, and anything you want. If you need idea or an NPC, please let me or Pixle know. -Lisa]

TIM, PUNCHY AND ANWEI

[meat_mooks]

Tim, Anwei and Punchy find themselves in an elevator that seems much more rickety than usual for such a nice hotel.

[battorch]

Tim, while certainly not trusting of the elevator, wasn't going to raise any concerns with it-- it wasn't a high enough priority for them right now, simply something for them to be aware of and prepared for.

He stood at the back of the elevator, arms crossed, but more than subconsciously aware of where his grapnel would be, on the avatar. He kept an eye on the other two with him.

((ooc: my priorities are so great I had to upload this icon before tagging.))

[nunpunching]

"We doing this on the downlow or going in guns blazing?"

Punchy's wearing that shit-eating grin that he always gets when he's about to do something cool and risky. He's contributing. After the total dead ends he's been running into with Brainiac, he could use a win to boost his ego, which is fragile as any teenager's.

Except Tim's. Apparently Tim has an impervious ego.

Also Punchy is possibly trying to smell Anwei's hair because she's kind of hawt.

[anwei]

Anwei was trying very, very hard not to think of a certain set of programming instructions: the ones that had given Horanckk his freedom - and had destroyed every other AI she had merged them into. She had no idea if the code could be run out of her thoughts, but this seemed a bad place to find out.

"If we're looking for records, in a simulation of a hotel, they might be - the hotel register? The guest list, or reservations list? I don't know if they will be displayed in this environment as electronic files or as simulated paper records."

The elevator rattles harder, and seems to be moving on a decided slant. She keeps one eye on Punchy and his hair-sniffing; the other looks to see if the elevator has an EMERGENCY STOP button.

Where the EMERGENCY STOP button is, there is instead a button that says EMERGENCY CATERPILLARS.

Oh dear.

[battorch]

"The logical assumption would be that it would be in one of those locations," Tim agreed. "It might be too obvious, but it'd be irresponsible to not check there."

But he couldn't say much else on the matter, one way or the other, because it seemed like they had a distraction to deal with. He swore faintly under his breath, and pushed past the other two to pry the panelling open. He just hoped his virtual tool belt had something he could use to force the thing to a stop.

"I guess this is our stop, whether we like it or not."

[nunpunching]

Punchy, of course, has a more straightforward method he plans to use. He pulls the nun puppet back and punches the paneling.

And then retracts his fist with a yelp. Turns out he didn't listen to Cortana's directions about not trying to use any superpowers in the virtual world. Whoops. Somewhere in the real world, Punchy's physical body develops a hangnail.

Thankfully, the force of the attack breaks the panel open anyway, which opens the door of the elevator. And opens up into a hallway full of doors to hotel rooms.

And the hallways has zero gravity.

Welp.

STATURE AND ENGINEER

[meat_mooks]

Angie and Cassie end up searching through the hotel's luxurious relaxation area, including a spa and pool.

And a mermaid in the pool.

And a Reaver sitting in a chair at the spa, having their face exfoliated by a blank-faced human in a pink smock.

What.

[magnetlips]

There was more than enough to gawk at but Cassie's first reaction wasn't to stare at the mermaid or the Reaver. Instead she held out her left hand. It was exactly the way it had been before... well, the bomb exploding hadn't been an accident, had it? Touching her face she found that was normal too. She had the sudden urge to to find a mirror.

But that wasn't why she was here.

"I guess we try and look casual? Where should we start?"

[re_engineer]

"You know. This is probably one of the few places that my armor would come off as casual." This wasn't the first time Angie had been inside Stacy's databanks like this.

And if Cassie really wanted a mirror, she could check herself in Angie's armor.

She looked around, frowning. "Probably better not to bring attention to ourselves. Look for the office?"

[magnetlips]

Checking herself out in Angie's armor would be rude not to mention awkward. Mostly awkward.

"Any ideas where that would be?"

[re_engineer]

Especially on the front.

Angie looked around again. "Well. Every spa has an office somewhere, right? There needs to be front desk, at least. We can start there."

[magnetlips]

"Then I guess it's time to check in." She looked around for a staff member- someone other than the person exfoliating the Reaver. She'd rather stay away from anyone who could rip off her face and eat it.

ANWEI AND NAOTO

[meat_mooks]

Re: ANWEI AND NAOTO

[anwei]

Anwei nodded to the young blue-haired man. "I saw you at the podpop, but I didn't introduce myself. I'm Anwei Ayles."

She looked at the box labeled 'Pair B.' "What sections of the hotel have you already examined? So far, we only found an elevator and the zero-gee hallway, and this room." And nothing that particularly suggested valuables locked away, that required a key.

[thedetectiveprince]

"I am Naoto Shirogane, greetings again." she replied nonchalantly, tipping her hat at Anwei. "Unfortunately the...tiger...seemed it fit to carry me only to this room and the nearby hotel lobby." She pointed to a direction to the left. "I found no clues, despite it's location, of any hidden passages nor of clues which might aid us. There was no central map system either." She seemed glad that Tony had decided to go off with the boys instead of insisting that she ride on him some more.

"Perhaps we could head off to the right? Logically, there are usually personal offices close to the entrance. We may find a clue considering our predicament."

[anwei]

Anwei turned on her heel, looking at the room of switches. Was there going to be some occasion where they needed to beat information out of someone? She squinted, seeing if the flickering code that underlay everything might resolve into something more useful - but it didn't.

She flicked a glance at Naoto as well, but he also seemed solid. Hopefully he was who he said he was.

"Lead the way. Have you considered how we should present ourselves to any 'staff' we may meet? If we are classified as 'guests', our ability to access private areas could be cut off. Perhaps we are - safety code inspectors? Visiting executives from the main branch?" Would that work - would Stacy be able to 'absent-mindedly' suppress any automated defenses to let them through?

[thedetectiveprince]

"That depends entirely." They continued to walk as the corridors shifted around then, at one point walking upside down, but Naoto didn't seem too phased by it. The TV World had removed most of her surprises when it came to virtual worlds or those from another world. "Considering Stacy's technological advanced structure, I would assume that there are several automatic defenses that will hinder our progress. However, we have some of the ship's AIs aiding us in this endeavor," she explained. "When I left, along with the...tiger...she gave me a small bag. Perhaps we can find something in it which will aid us." First however she mentioned that the go to what looked to be a bathroom stale.

And thus, a small tiny little bag was taken out of her coat like someone trying to peddle drugs.

Inside there were what looked like a few computer chips, which Naoto had not figured out their functions yet and two strange badges.

"I am, however, at a loss of what they could be useful for." The badges didn't appear to have a pin or a magnet behind them, but if they turned them around, they would find the world REBOOT written on the back.

[anwei]

Anwei was used to rotating environments, but not under gravity. She kept her eyes locked ahead, focusing on the imaginary horizon - and watching for other members of the team. Angie and Cassie were in here somewhere...

"We will have to find out if Stacy's internal iconography presents as relevant to the hotel environment." They probably would find out, whether they liked it or not.

In the stall, she looked at the chips but did not touch them. "If Cortana's guidance is valid, we will be able to find where these can be used." The badges were examined a little more closely, but finally Anwei shook her head. "Hopefully these don't actually invoke a reboot process, because I think having that happen while we are inside the system could easily be fatal."

TIM AND PUNCHY

[meat_mooks]

[battorch]

Red Robin is trying very hard to not be annoyed that his designation had been 'tightwad.'

He's also hoping that the tiger turns out to be more useful than annoying.

He doesn't particularly care that Punchy didn't wait for him, and it only takes him a brief second to catch up-- he'd not have waited in the same spot, most likely-- keeping his cape under control as he did so.

He didn't really have much to say as he scanned the hallway. Punchy already knew what he had seen, and he knew that the other teen wouldn't exactly hold his thoughts back if he had input.

[nunpunching]

Punchy's still too stoked to be riding a talking virtual tiger to take Tim's (perpetually) dour mood into account. The hallways are long and the tiger has some difficulty initially figuring out how to walk in the low gravity, but soon enough it's bounding in zero-g with Punchy on its back.

Finally, they reach a door with a padlock over the top, all chained up. It's so tempting that there's no question that yes, this is the room they're looking for. Punchy pulls out his key and righteously(!) turns it.

The room appears to be empty, made entirely of metal. And there at the end, a file cabinet.

Can he be having bropounds now, Tim?

[battorch]

No, Punchy. None just yet.

Tim ignores him, for the most part, and instead just heads right for the file cabinet, opening it up. This is, after all, an important enough task-- and the faster they get this done the faster they can return and apply what they've found.

[nunpunching]

The files are exactly what they were looking for. And the system even provided wite-out and markers for them to do their work!

Outside, in the real world, Punchy and Tim's fingers are flying over their keyboards as they rewrite Stacy's coding here, stripping away the protections she gives the Daligig. Stacy will be unable to distinguish them from even the untagged animals in Hydroponics. Inside the virtual world, their work is a lot more messy, with paper strewn everywhere.

They finish and shove the paper back away in the cabinet. Punchy raises his hand for a high-five...

...and then doors open in the walls, and roman soldiers start to walk in. Faceless, armed with spears and sword, wearing short armored skirts that show off that they have fabulous thighs. And looking murderous.

There must be thirty at least.

[battorch]

Tim swears under his breath, but he's quick to react-- one hand diving quickly for the expandable staff with him, shifting into a fighting stance immediately.

He was used to fighting large numbers-- but not of this variety. Combined with Punchy's strength, they should have a fair chance. They couldn't afford to lose-- they needed to make sure their work was done.

"Watch your back."