[Episode One] Sanctum

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Main Room With The Hole In the Ceiling

Marie looked over at the pitifully thrown glaives. Well, they were perfectly fine weapons, weren't they. She picked one up, emitting a magnetic field to prevent the Overseer from pulling it back to her easily.

"Try not to damage the central processor," she told the stupid-ass mercenary who apparently just wanted to put his junk inside the Overseer or something. "I still want it."
 
Main Room Wreckage

It didn't take much for Deimos to spin sideways and let the glaive fly by him. In turn, he rushed forward, pata raised from the depths of his cloak. He narrowed his eyes as he roared at the top of his lungs.

He swung his blade at the side of the machine wildly, screaming "I'll make sure you see my team in hell! But first..." He would finish his flurry with a drop of the blade, aiming for the chink in the machine's armor where its shoulder linked to its arm. "...I want to give you a taste of your own medicine!"

He didn't want to think about the Overseer's response to his statement. He needed every drop of adrenaline he could get. Every spite-fueled second of catharsis-inducing carnage as one swing leads into the next. He just had to hope his blows were enough to tear this metal-bound monstrosity limb from limb.
 
Main Room

The Overseer remained stationary, unable to return to their feet. As Miko drew his weapon however, it simply rested its hand on it. As it discharged, the barrel was forced downwards, sending an explosive plume of shrapnel and rock berating them both.

It remained stationary, mostly unresponsive as the apparently maddened Deimos lashed out at it, to no satisfying, choppy results. Blow after blow, it simply recoiled back into position, locked in an attempt to stand like a well-armored punching bag. Despite their best resilience, the due damage had been dealt. The feminine machine seized, their glassy eyes reflecting a pure orange glow as white text scrolled across their view of the world, and themselves.

With an echoing blast, a flash of light erupted from the back of their torso. The machine crashed under its own dead weight, slumped forwards as its head fell. The pyramid-shaped head of the Overseer bounced unevenly across the floor, sliding to a halt a few yards away from the rest. Across the room, the remaining glaives fell, and became inert. From the back of the fallen robot now emerged a licking blue flame that had engulfed half their reactor in the overheat process.


In the crashing and bashing of metal, Deimos had barely heard the Bouncer barreling towards him and Miko. The Bouncer pounced, catching both men in its heavy grip as it tackled them to the uneven ground. The other two Bouncers reformed, pointing their now-inert patas towards the rest of the crew until they could back away to their commanding unit. Once clear, they began to rush, Picking up the Overseers limp body and trying to choke the flame away.

Dahlia slumped, letting herself slide all the way down against the wall. She exhaled deeply, trying to think. The other robots, minus the one tackling Miko (not that he didn't exactly deserve it) and Deimos, didn't seem at all interested in starting any more fights. There was a light feeling twisting in her stomach, about the way Deimos had lashed out, which left her to wonder what all had happened in that past. At this point, she couldn't bring herself about to comment.

Breathe. Dahlia breathed, leaving one problem solved. The large, rotating mechanism that once presided over the room was partly destroyed from the impact. Shattered glass littered the floor, along with metal plates, and water. There was still the library, and those devices. These robots certainly weren't of Ayenian design, not with that level of armor. There was also that metal book, wherever her hires had launched it. There was at least that. They could still turn this day around.
 
"Well then." Grey said as he stood, having previously launched himself away from the grabbing bouncer that he had been wrestling with. "Where has that book gone?" Noting that the robots no longer seemed interested in a fight, and that deimos was apperently crazy just like th eoverseer, he started his search, while keepign an eye on both parties involved, moving debries around as needed with his extra arms.
 
Marie had finished dragging Reman's limp body into the ship, returning to the main room. She fished around near where Reman was, grabbing the book. "It's a little damaged if you'll accept it in this current state, Grey."

"Can someone help me pry the battery out of the ground?" she asked.
 
Deimos feel to the ground, having not even noticed the bouncer before it was on top of him. At this point, he had calmed, with not even the energy to try and fight his way from the machine's grip. Though it was uncomfortable having his blade pressed up against him, and his tail wasn't exactly appreciating the position of the machine.


Do you... hah... mind?" His words were breathy and rushed, as though trying to keep pace with his heart pounding in his chest all the way through to his ears.
 
Main Room

The metal book in question was in alright condition. It had a noticeable squash on the top lip from its earlier impact, but other than that there was nothing but scuffs and marks. The notched circle on the front face had gone from a light teal to a bold, neon orange. The interior of the book, which when previously split showed all kinds of titles and other information, was not a solid orange pane of light, spread across two curved displays. White text flickered across the left side of it, all of which in a blocky, unknown font. After a few moments, the light flickered away, leaving the book lifeless and dark. Attempts at flipping the nonexistent pages came without success.

If the book was at all connected to the robot that just crashed, perhaps it would be best to hold onto it.

The Bouncer released their grip on Miko and Deimos, backing away onto its two feet. It kept the sword pointed at the two, exchanging targets every second or so. Like the brown one encountered before the mess, there was a consistent, electrical whine wicking off the blade. The other two Bouncers has succeeded in choking out the flames, but had otherwise been quiet.


After a minute, Dahlia released every bit of vexing air that had welled up in her lungs, pressing off the wall. Though she didn't fight, she was exhausted. The Scholar walked over towards the disembodied head of the Overseer, voicing her thoughts back to the rest of the crew. It was time to take control of this once more. "Alright, Arbs. Go find a better spot to park the ship. Use the rock clamps if you have to. Grey- you try and figure out what that is."

The Scholar looked at the two downed men, checking them over briefly for any screaming wounds. After that, she resumed with the plan. And being annoyed. "Miko, get your ass up, and help Marie get that battery."

The short scholar squatted to pick up the removed, pyramid-shaped head. Her face lit up with brief surprise as he head turned out to be heavier than one could have first expected. With a huff, she hoisted the roughly 40 pound head off the cold floor, carefully looking it over. After a moment, she turned to face the brown and blue Bouncer that had retreated to the Left Wing during the chaos. "AND, we're going to take turns resting here. If that is alright."

Between the display of the beheaded Overseer and the surprising hostility coming from this short woman, coupled with the fact this group just took down several units, the Bouncer thought for itself just this once. "...Carry on."

Dahlia turned back to the group, letting one last vent of hot air roll out of her nostrils. There was one last end to check.


When Deimos came to and sat up, he found himself staring eye-level at the disembodied Overseer head, being held by Dahlia. After letting whatever instinctual reactions fall, she spoke up. "Care to explain?"
 
Main Room

Marie looked at the now-broken 'book.' She looked at Grey.

"On second thought, that book is probably useless now...I'll try to recover the data from it, unless you want to try." Marie observed. She went off to begin examining the Overseer's corpse, as well as examining the area, flipping her paper notebook to a page where she was keeping a catalog of materials they could use to build and repair things with. She added a fair bit of scrap metal and probably a ton of burnt electronic components that could be harvested from the Overseer.

"I'd be okay with first watch. I need to think some things through, Dahlia." she told the expedition leader.
 
He sat there, pursing his lips in an attempt to gather together all that had just occurred. His ears drooped back, and yet he offered a smile that betrayed a sense of disappointment. "Where do you want me to begin, heh?" His gaze turned to the hefty piece of machinery in her hands, and his hand reached for his pata, pulling it away to reveal the hollow inside.

"You already know I lost my arm in an expedition gone wrong. That, and almost my entire party..." He reached for his gauntlet and locked it in place with a loud click, flexing his fingers a couple times to let the spirit within it get settled. It was always a... tingly feeling. As though he still had fingers that could fall asleep. "...Well it was one of those... things that did it. Looking at it now, and how it responded to my outrage, I... I get this feeling like I got the wrong robot. Should have known. That pile of metal is probably still in those goddamn ruins I found it in."

He shook his head before pulling himself to his feet, dusting off the bits of stone that now plastered his pants, leaving white puffs here and there. "Sorry I lost my cool and... sorry for all that collateral damage. If it's any consolation, I plugged the computer on the ship into a position where the falling crate would be LEAST likely to crush one of you guys."
 
Grey was delighted that he had found the book relitively quickly, and set to work examining it. The part where it flickered and seemingly died was a massive disapointment- but he could probably salvage the situation. On the other hand, there was marie. "Can you do it without erasing everything important looking perhaps?" While grey didn't exactly have an interface on hand and ready for the book, he was certain with many hours of work he could have rigged up somehing to properly connect with the book. Obviously it was somehow connected to the overseer- but which one held the data? And it also acted as an access card so to speak, for the library. Maybe with the data transfered to something that could hold it, they could make a new one.

"And of course, we'd need something that could actually hold all of this you know?" He didn't hand it right over to her, but set to work using his own data pad, and his two remaininc mechanical arms. Their ends shifting to weilders to fix his backpack first, repair the other arms second- if he could ever find th eone that marie shot off that is- and finally, throughly examine th ebook last. That would would take time, hw knew.
 
Main Room

Miko slowly picked himself off the floor. He checked himself over and noticed a few cuts and bruises but nothing serious. Mmm, love it when your sassy like that Dahlia. He thought to himself as he looked over to her and gave a nod.

"You got it boss, can count on me to get the job done." As he went to retrieve the battery. Things seemed to have quickly turned from just moments ago. Granted he had not expected the overseer to put up a fight still and turn the barrel of the gun towards the ground. He was impressed it was able too with such ease to move his weapon even against his powers.
 
Main Room

"Alright, Miss Dahlia..." The smol one moved out towards the pile of rubble Demios had so creatively made via his... Unusual entrance. The Downrider hovered above the structure idly, genly wavering from side to side slightly with minor shifts of the wind bumping into it. Arbs sighed, "Of course you did..."

With a glare toward Demios, Arbs retrieved a rope-like strand with a weight on one end, and a hook on the other. A small magnet-like attachment, freshly added, swung from her hip. "Hope you guys don't need me for a few. I'll be getting her back down." Swinging the hook around for a bit, Ahbls swung the thing into the air, it catching on some roof debris. A few firm tugs later, and she was climbing up using the periodic handholds to the rooftop, sans comically-sized backpack. She wasn't exactly that great in PE class.

Assuming nobody followed her, assassinated her, distracted her, or... Anything else, really, Arbs retrieved the rope on the roof, swapped the attachments, and used the magnetized head to climb into the Downrider. The lovely piece of junk that it was hummed off towards the front of the facility, where its pilot used the engine exhaust to... "clear away" some of the overgrowth to make a reasonably clear and flat landing area. She also didn't want to spend half a day walking back to the ship.
 
Main Room

Dahlia nodded briefly to Arbitrated as she made her exit, and then turned her attention back to Deimos. The Scholar set the polygonal head on a nearby rock, sitting down for a rest. She let out a huff, choosing to ignore that "LEAST." At least know she knew where that missing arm really came from. But, it did leave her with a little to think about. "So, there may be a line of them. I heard that other robot back there refer to them as an Overseer."

Miko and Marie found that the battery podium came out with relative ease. With the crystalline cell removed once more, the entire building shifted to a low-almost negligible power usage. The brown Pixy units looked at each other with their blue eyes, before nesting once more in the ceiling for some temporary low-power hibernation.

The black and white Pixy units however, continued their work. Regularly, they would look at each other, silently signalling with their hands and swords on what should be done. Left to their own automation, they continued trying to wake up their Overseer. One of them took the polygonal head Dahlia had set down, connecting it back to the main body with a thick ribbon cable that had been hidden away neatly in the need of a real neck. Still, no response.

Overhead, whatever light remained of the day outside dwindled. The scholar rubbed her face, squashing her features as she pulled her hand down from tiredness. "Alright. Once the sun rises again, we'll work on pulling whatever we can out of here." With that, she moved over to her backpack, laying out a thin pad with a red pull-tab next to the wall. When the tab was pulled, the pad exploded like a fluffy airbag with a muffled pomf noise. Admittedly, the portable, expendable bed was a little more comfortable than the flat bunks aboard the ship. So, Dahlia rested- not quite fully asleep, but resting.


Some Time Around Three in the Morning

For the most part, it was quite peaceful again. The sound of crashing water from outside filled the room as the minimal lighting cast the entire area in a dim, blue glow. At some point during the fight, Dahlia's standup lamp had been cut in half. It still however provided enough light for Marie and Grey to do their work.

The "book" took some time to figure out how to take a part. Wether designed to not be, or just to stump those from trying, it was a bit of a puzzle. To get everything out in one piece, several pins had to be shifted and removed, unorthodox screws had to be unscrewed, and the metal sleeve of the computer components eventually slid loose. The contents of the bisected computer included a large black batter box, two thin plastic screens, lights, several volumetric display bars that appeared to be of different manufacturing than the usual, and a black capsule of... something, that ran the length of the books spine. The whole setup was connected together by a flexible motherboard that appeared to be mostly set into and surrounded by a gelatinous material- blue in color."

Amidst their inspection, something clicked. A white, blinking box of light flickered on in the corner of the left flat display. After a moment, a whole line of text appeared. Then another, and then a cascade of unknown instructions. On the right display, a circle appeared, one with a squarish notch laid into the bottom half. A set of smaller text appeared under the white graphic. The only things decipherable were "ZEN" and "OAKLAND."
 
3 AM

Marie was used to pulling all-nighters. Not because they were regularly part of what she had to do, but regularly part of what she wanted to do. She rubbed a bit of sleep from her eyes, continuing to indulge in the complexity of the esoteric data storage methods in the book-computer. On some days, this felt like she was doing a surgical procedure. No, a composer would be more correct, like one of those old ones who sat well into the night, humming along to their own composition.

Except this was more of a dissection than composition, so it was, in essence, a surgical procedure? Seems about right. Eh, the whole field that she did always felt either like one or the other, depending on if she was sketching the design or actually building and repairing the physical thing.

The computer was opened. Gel? Cooling, most likely. She felt it with a finger, covered with a clean latex glove. Zen and Oakland? Perhaps the BIOS manufacturer and the brand.

"Do you know any manufacturer notes concerning Zen or Oakland?" she asked her partner scientist.
 
3AM

Arbles was currently a sleeping ball of thermal emissions next to the door into the room. She had made a little nook for herself using the walls and her oversized backpack, using a tarp and several blankets to make a relatively clean-ish, comfortable-ish(squared) sleeping spot. Her shoes were set neatly upright at the open side of her little setup.

She wasn't exactly the type of person to be up at 3AM, given that she had quite a few personal issues in terms of energy conservation. At least the easiest way to tell if she was alive was to listen for her soft breathing by standing next to the pack.
 
Downrider - 3 AM

Reman was beginning to show signs of consciousness, but the night terrors plaguing him at the camp began to rear their ugly head. Occasioanly throughout the ship, you could hear him quietly sleep-talk about the sordid nightmare he was having. He kept muttering the word Alpha. Over and over again, it was as if it was chasing him through the dream. His movements in sleep was as if he was escaping a great inferno, with only his sense of self-preservation intact among his chief instincts.

Occasionally, the cyclone key would glow in his room, lighting it with it's familiar green hue.

At one point though, Reman went silent, but the key did not. It started glowing blindingly bright, like if it was a flashbang, and then it went back to normal. It's not like anyone in their bunk could see, but anyone looking into Reman's quarters could see this blast of light.
 
Main Room

Miko having completed his mission of getting the battery he decided a much needed rest was earned. He grabbed up his stuff and took a seat a few feet away from Dahlia and her blow up bed. Pretty neat bed you got there. Always full of surprises my young miss. He thought to himself as he got more comfortable leaning up against a wall. He had wondered recently why the added attention he seemed to be giving Dahlia. He figured it was just due to the fact he would not get paid if she was killed. Then again she was soft on the eyes so there was that.

He snuggled up and let his eyes close. As he slipped off into a half sleep his mind started to wonder. Unknown to him his vector powers had crept over to were Dahlia slept. It formed an invisible dome around her. It would seem unknown to Miko, he was growing fond of her.
 
Deimos couldn't sleep. His head wouldn't let him. Nor did the rubble beneath his sleeping bag - courtesy of his showmanship. He blinked a few times, staring at the ceiling, ears pulled back and tail tucked between his legs. His arm was spread to his side while his gauntlet lay popped against the wall. Any time he glanced over at the others gathered around the book, the lantern light would turn his eyes to a pair of will-o-wisps.

The others knew his story by now. Where his arm went. What happened to his last team. In fact, it was coming to terms with it over the course of his time on the ISS Downrider that gave him his new, more jovial attitude. In a way, he felt like a kid again.

But seeing that... Overseer was like a kick to the jowls. Meagerly swiping his blade across its carapace like a toddler beating its fists against his father in a tantrum was a reminder why it all happened. He sighed. And rolled over to face the entrance of the room.

He made a silent vow -one punctuated by swiping his fingers across the stump on his shoulder- that history would not repeat itself.

And yet he already knew it wouldn't.

When Deimos' eyes had closed, he was greeted warmly by the emptiness of a dreamless sleep.
 
"Can't Say I have. Then again I don't really keep up with any brands myself." As was the usual, Grey had deeply reddened eyes, and hadn't slept a wink while working on the computer. And he suspected he would still be working on the computer well untill sunrise. But, he was having fun above all else. Having the chance to rip apart something... beautiful. Of course, he couldn't actually break it. Not really. It was unfortunate but this needed to be got running again in some capacity- a controled capacity, so they could get access to these many books. Or, at the very least, come back here at a later date.

"I would really like to crack that container for the black goo open and see if its the same stuff that we have dripping all over the place here. It could be anything, even some odd way of storing data. Now, Let me see how good my knowledge is of thise language, see how much of these lines of text i can figure out, and wether or not that circle with a notch is a button to be pushed, or just decorative..."
 
Site 0001
Main Room


Reboot complete.

Zen OS OAKc v 1.4
Last connection, 100+ days
Last update, 100+ days
Updates pending: 1 - v 1.41


152 Errors occurred last cycle.
Crash code: REACTOR_OL-DUMP_#07X
Halt updates.


OSC-01, the proper OSC-01, came to in a general state of dismay. The damaged Overseer came to the realization of their predicament quite quickly, trying to push themselves of the ground as quietly as possible. Her reactor was almost totaled, generating a minimal amount of power. To make matters worse. her internal battery was damaged in the fire as well.

She stopped halfway up, realizing that she was not alone. People were still here- asleep. The Bouncers quickly came to her aid, resting her back against a wall on her silent command. She was missing her backup computer, and several other parts the likes had scavenged up. To top it all off, her backup host was missing. Trying to gather her pieces in this state was... impractical at best.

Looking around the room with their lopsided, corded head, OSC-01 looked at one of the Bouncers. Promptly, the better-suited Pixy unit disengaged from the body, leaving it behind as it fluttered across the room. It caaarefully extracted the crystalline battery from the collective pile the group had formed, and brought it back to their master. The Overseer clasped the battery gently and simply slumped, reducing their personal power draw to a minimum while they reviewed the stored memory from their last operating cycle.

With that, the Pixy unit skittered away, up and out of the room through the ceiling.

ISS Downrider
Engineering


While Greys fiddling was debatable at being effective the screen eventually shifted from the lines of code to another blank screen. After a moment, a new set of diagrams faded in. The entire right side of the screen was taken up by a front-and-back schematic nearly identical to the robot they had just taken out. Most of the outlined diagram was painted in greenish and yellow tints, the center circle around their back was pulsing a deep maroon. Several orange boxes of text scrolled by along the side, likely diagnostic errors.


After a minute or so, one of the three green-eyed Pixy units scuttled their way into the quiet engineering and cargo bay of the small courier ship the wandering souls had called home. In a complete invasion of privacy, the Pixy unit floated silently through the bay, until it laid eyes on the working table the white-haired one and the previously established Grey had set up. There laid the codex, completely violated. She simply couldn’t resist.

A distinctly feminine voice spoke up from behind- familiar to one but not to the other. "I had figured you only wanted to tear it apart."

Grey hardly paused in his investigation of the text. Much more interested in actually trying to figure out the language than poke around the innards of a barely understood machine, at least for the moment. “Thought about it, but I figured actually trying to use it for something would be a much better way to spend my night.” Of course, he did at least glance back to make sure it wasn’t a massive robot instead of a tiny drone.

Marie reacted completely differently, as the sharp smell of ozone permeated in the air, she spun around in her seat, finger pointed at the voice...until she realized it was ‘just’ one of those little bobbles.

“And then study every component, see what we could and couldn’t use in the modern era, and then hopefully put it back together.” Marie replied to the now very much smaller Overseer.

Floating behind the two was a rather ghostly visage of the Overseer, wings folded proper and standing straight even through their feet- and robes for that matter, were nonexistent. The volumetric display appeared to be stitched together by a rudimentary system using lights, nanomachines, and mirrors being controlled by the Pixy unit. Over time, the polygonal geometry of the projection refined. Something appeared off about them at first though- the colors were mismatched. White for black and black for white.

The visualized Overseer looked between the two, sharing an internal bit of humor at the finger pointing. The voice stayed cool, but carried a tone of subtle passive aggression. “If you can, I’d like to keep it together for now.”

In a wave starting from the top and flowing downwards, the display of the Overseer shifted and corrected itself. The colors reverted, and the white and earthy green robes were stitched back together over the display, ending in a wispy, faded plume. They looked directly at Marie. “I don’t believe we’ve met. I am OSC-01, an Oakland Heavy Industries Overseer Model T."

Marie only stared at the Overseer for a bit. “Given that my first proper meeting was you and your robots trying to kill me, no. And too late, I’ve popped off the processor’s cover to inspect the circuitry inside already. I hope you’re not currently concerned with warranty.”

“I’m pretty sure that would have been voided when we almost dropped a ship on it.” Grey said simply, closely inspecting and memorizing the lines of text.

OSC-01 gave a short, stifled chuckle. She kind of liked these two. She soon returned to her usual demeanor, however. “I reviewed the saved memory from my last cycle. Quite a number, it did.”

The translucent image of the Overseer swept over and through the table to be on the other side- at a more comfortable angle. “Something in the last update I was sent contained a rather intrusive virus. Something that shouldn’t have been possible with my code construction. I’ve isolated the whole package for now, for further review.”

“Sounds like some form of malicious cyberattack.” Marie replied as she isolated a glob of fluid in a test tube, her other hand over the book examining what made it tick. “Attacking the time and date control, I’m guessing? Breaking anything that required a decent verification system?”
“Think the reason for it is more important. Well, to the overseer anyway. It will only be important to us if we find another facility.”

The blue glob was rather firm, bouncing back into its shape quickly after being bent or pressed. The calmed Overseer remained stock still, their green eyes blinking once. “It seemed to exploit a vulnerability in a layer lower than I operate, but I haven’t had time to run analysis.”

This was good, she already had extracted one bit of valuable information from the two. There wasn’t much she could do to politely nudge them to stop dissecting her backup host, but the two hinted at more.

“So, potentially it’s OS subversion or something. Well great.” Marie stated, continuing to feel the processor tick. “Software is where I lose my touch, most of what I know about that is from breaking things I shouldn’t.”

Marie got up to go get herself an energy drink from the small canteen on the ship. They were awful for a person’s health, but they were great for all-night research.

“One of your little ball things for some reason treated me like it did you, by the way.” she continued, slowly walking across the room.

Marie’s movement across the room finally caught Grey’s attention somewhat, particularly as she nicked an energy drink. On checking the time via his own mental reminders, he sighed. He really wanted to look at this more, but frankly, there were limits to what a creature of flesh and blood should do. He knew all too well what would happen if he started pulling multiple all nighters. And one good allnighter deserved another.

“I don’t need to go completely insane again. If I stay up all night i’ll just do it again.” With that, he started rummaging round in a nearby pack, until he found a small syringe labeled ‘emergencies only. Apparently, being tempted to stay up all night qualified. Largely left uncontested in his newfound quest for sleep, he quickly found himself konked out in a chair, his features slowly, well, doing what they did best, and not staying the same.


“G’night, then.” Marie replied, slightly surprised that his choice of sleeping aid was a syringe, as she took a long quaff of her energy drink and continued working. This time, though, she pushed the book aside for a large quantity of other spreadsheets, some that appeared like...armor.

“The Pixys are made to work, not so much to think.” OSC-01 said as she looked between the two, taking note of Grey’s apparent…. Shape-shifting. This was an odd bunch, that much was sure.

“Their recognition failed.” Marie criticized as she continued to draw in her blueprints, not even caring how Grey’s face just sort of...shifted. “I’m not the best at machine intelligence but the recognition was pretty bad.”

“It saw that strange electrical field of yours, and likely thought it was talking to me.” OSC-01 also noted the sketches of various armors and devices. Some of them looked familiar from memory. “I take it you’ve worked with that screaming boy?”

“Some.” she told the Overseer. “Though, never directly. We were both part of the experiment in some way, him through illegitimate coercion and I through ignorance.”

“He wants me to fix his bracer. Remove the speaker so it’s less...abrasive, I’d say.” she continued. “I...want to redesign it entirely. It’s awful. I hate seeing my twelve-year-old work.”

OSC-01 gave another suppressed hum, as if blowing air through non-existent nostrils. “Screaming your tactics only works on the timorous.”


As if by otherworldly coincidence, the prodigal noisemaker returns, groggy and with a cup of coffee, struggling to wake from both the injury and a night full of what could be dreams of anything as long as they were terrifying to him.

Marie… I think it’s time to take this damned thing of-” Reman’s train of thought was interrupted by a small little damaged robotic unit, sitting hapless on the table. This gave a thoroughly good spook to Reman, as he backed up quickly, tripped and fell, spilling coffee all over his legs, adding to his collection of various stains and fluids on his jumper. He weakly replies with; “Y- You brought the thing on the ship?!” trying to ignore the hot beverage he spilled on his trousers that is currently causing him great pain.

OSC-01, or rather the display of, spun around to face the returning bumbling nitwit. Parts of the projection got hung up in midair, taking a moment to catch up with the rest. They replied serenely, barely masking a tone of impudence. “I let myself in, Squall.”

Regardless, it was time to take that damned thing off. “B- Besides the fact that you brought something that just tried to eradicate us on our ship, are we still good to go to get this thing and scrap it, so I don’t have to live with it’s… nuances?

Reman stood up, finished what was left of his now half-full coffee, and put his arm in plain view of marie. Reman, still oblivious to the arcane asks, “If it’s some sort of ‘magic seal’ you could probably take it off, right?

“Probably not.” Marie replied. “If it was a seal the only way I could would be to scratch and break the seal.”

Then, how the hell are we going to get this thing off? Breaking it? Somre sort of arcane… Cryptography? User Recognition?” Reman replied, clearly stressed to be so close to removing the brace to end it here, not being able to take it off.

“If it’s that idiot who made most of this, he’s probably been sloppy as hell and left the seal somewhere he shouldn’t.” Marie replied, making space for Reman to stick his arm. “Even more reason for me to completely redesign this thing.”

OSC-01 spoke up as she continued to take in all the information she could on this ship, and its rather peculiar crew. She was rather… tongue-in-cheek for her situation. “You could cut it off.”

Reman, almost in defiant retaliation of the hapless book robot, spun a disc of wind, and tried to cut the bracer loose, to no avail, as it only sparked a little before showing no signs of damage. “Tried it. I even tried cutting off the arm, too.” Shortly afterward, reman set the brace down on a nearby working surface, and gestured for marie to go to it.

OSC-01 looked between the two as the white Pixy rested itself on the edge of the desk. The hologram remained in place behind it. As the two went on in a diatribe, the Pixy made a swift movement, quietly flipping the cover back onto the exposed processor in the book. These fools were going to get dust in it.

She didn’t quite understand the tech these two were talking about, and quite frankly, she didn’t much care. She did want, however, what she came for. ”The blue-haired one, she said she was the captain of this…. Vessel. Was she correct?”

Unsure of whether or not the group should trust this murderous novel, Reman replied cautiously; “Y-Yeah, why?

OSC-01 simply lifted their head, looking straight on in thought. These two were no longer of use for her time. One was unconscious, but it was going better than anticipated, no one had shot anyone. "...So I shall go have a conversation with them."

With that, the Pixy pressed off the table, floating up and away from the two. The holographic Overseer stuck their fan-like wings out, before forcing them down as it spiraled up from the bay floor without another word. It gave an impressive mirage of the robot simply phasing through the ceiling as it ascended away, but the illusion was short lived as the Pixy unit had to scurry back into the night the way it physically came.


---

Site Main Room
7 AM, A Much More Reasonable Time


Dahlia snored, her mouth agape long enough to allow a bit of dust to enter her windpipe. The scholar coughed, irking themselves back into wake. She wiped her eyes as the shifted back and forth on the now-deteriorating sleeping pad, blinded by the now shining sun wafting in through the brand-new skylights. It was a clear day, the overcast storm looming over the forest having finally moved on.

Dahlia finished wiping her face, before opening her eyes to face the first inherent challenge of the day. The holographic Overseer was standing- or rather floating, a few feet away form her and looking down upon the scholar for who knows how long. Dahlia about slammed her head against the psychic dome of force surrounding her, and with a serious of disgruntled and incomprehensible noises that came naturally with being alerted from sleep, lurched over to sweep the floor in an attempt to quickly find her gun.

"Calm," said the vigilant specter, loud enough to wake anyone else still nearby. It was going to happen eventually, might as well deal with alll of the possible knee-jerk reactions here at once.
 
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