ataraxion | One || Video

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[Rhys shows up on-camera, his brows furrowed slightly at the communications device. You're probably gonna notice pretty quickly that there's a mechanical port on the side of his head, and the corresponding eye is a bright, unnatural blue. And, of course, that he's sporting a yellow mechanical arm in place of an actual biological one.

But hey, nobody's perfect. Without much further ado, he turns the phone over so the camera is facing the floor, and there's definitely the sound of some buttons being pressed, some tampering that sounds like he's attempting to remove the back panel.]

Oh, for the love of- [The phone drops to the floor, the screen going dark. Rhys picks it up a minute later, flipping it back over so the camera is facing him again.] What kind of backwards tech is this? You have the technology to teleport us to different realities and you decide to give us an outdated ECHO recorder that my grandma could have built?

Look, is anyone on this junkheap versed with the network systems you've got going here? 'cause I've got the same functions in my arm and that's way more convenient for me. I've been trying to access it directly, but it'll probably take me awhile. If anyone knows how to cut corners, you know, now's the time to be helpful.

Also, hey. I'm Rhys: hero from Hyperion, new arrival, good with technology. [A pause, and then-] ...and if any of you are from Pandora, then you should know that I'm a totally laidback and innocent guy, and I didn't do it.

[[ooc: Forgot to post this earlier, but here is Rhys' Permissions post!]]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[Nerd away, bro. She can handle it.]

It's different. Wouldn't call this ship a "trash heap" in comparison, since people didn't even get far into space when they started throwing bombs at each other instead. Nuclear and energy warfare has a way of setting things back a few decades, though humanity isn't living in a Stone Age, either. Am walking proof of that.

[Given the technology that created her and all.]

Oh good, more things to chat about.

[Rhys grins, folding his arms across his chest and relaxing a little.]

Bomb throwing is kind of a pastime where I'm from. So, you were space-destined, started a war, and now you're not? Stranded on multiple worlds, or just one?

Just one. What most people don't realize is that the thing orchestrating most of the bomb throwing is a computer living in the global satellite network. So they're more or less stuck until that's taken care of.

Yeesh. [Rhys makes a face.] Sounds like someone got fired. Wouldn't have wanted to be the guy who programmed that.

Yes, that would be my father.

[She's laughing on the inside. Honest.]

...oh.

[Well then.]

I mean, I'm sure he's an upstanding... guy... like, definitely a great personality, right? Everyone makes mistakes! [Rhys lets out an awkward little laugh.] Wow, I really hope he didn't get fired.

[It's okay, Rhys. She's too blasé about the subject to get offended.]

Don't worry about it -- he's a bit of a bastard. Worse yet, he's of those types who tries to act nice. [She doesn't necessarily hate him, but she reserves the right to be resentful.] In any case, getting fired would've been the least of his concerns.

[Huff.]

Perhaps we should go back to technology. That seems like a more pleasant subject matter.

Yeah- yeah, people who are nice, man, screw those guys.

[Wellp. Rhys is very much a fan of a subject change.]

But, um. Anyway. Have you been in space before this?

[Even though she decides not to grave that statement with a response, she just. Makes a sound that's kind of like a laugh. But not really.

[Anyway, space. Fuck yeah.]

No. Have you?

I lived in a corporate space station for most of my career.

[He shrugs.]

It's pretty cool. Gotta get one of those fancy lamps though, lack of real sunlight can suck sometimes. [And, you know, any sort of compassion or emotion in general or trustworthy people, but hey, that's Hyperion for you!]

UVs usually do the trick. Not that it's much of a problem here.

What sort of work did you do on your station?

Oh you know, the typical.

[Arms dealing, treasure hunting, warmongering, murdering loads of innocent people???

Not that any of that is Rhys' fault. Definitely not.]

Mostly manufacturing and distributing weapons and other tech. High end stuff, not military grade.

[That's any other day in the office, really.

[~~Also Rhys you forgot to mention your janitorial promotion how dare.~~]

Sounds like respectable work. [Haaaahhh.] Does that have anything to do with what you "didn't" do?

[SHUT UP HE WILL NEVER ADMIT TO THAT IN A MILLION YEARS.]

Uh... well...

[He hesitates for a moment, rubbing awkwardly at the back of his neck.]

To make a long story short, the former CEO of our company tried to eradicate most of the bandits on Pandora and build a utopia there. He killed, uh. A lot of people in the process, and- [Rhys trails off for a moment, suddenly a little distracted.

When he refocuses on the conversation, he's notably a little more jarred, and he bites at his lower lip.]

-that's, uh, that's not to say that he wasn't a visionary. He just wasn't very popular with the locals.

[THAT'S TOO BAD YOU COULD BE HEAD JANITOR ON THE TRANQUILITY AND BOSS AROUND THE SPACE ROOMBAS.]

Oh.

[As for his story, though -- she's actually not too phased.]

Yes, that happens.

[She's talking like it's as normal and mundane as, say, going to the store and finding out that they're all out of eggs or something. Because THAT HAPPENS, too.]

And I take it, you get totally unfairly blamed for it too?

[He sighs, folding his arms. Life is so hard, you know.]

Well, am wanted by the government for terrorism and the assassination of the chancellor.

Didn't do any terrorism. The assassination part, though -- that's true.

["I am not a crook."]

Oh, that's not something that I'm going to worry about at all.

[Inward groaning- no, actually, wait, that was external groaning. Oh well.]

Please tell me it was political and not 'cause he was like, a dick or something.

While he was an asshole... [No, she's not going to go there.

[Sigh.]

If it makes things any better, it turned out that he was a simulated intelligence who could hop into another body, anyway. He just took advantage of the whole faked-death for political reasons.

Edited 2015-03-18 21:06 (UTC)

...that doesn't... make me feel any better.

[Rhys is about two seconds from closing out the video because well fuck on a stick, this could have gone a lot better and- and-

'Oh, for the love of- don't be a complete dumbass, kiddo. Tell you what: you kill her first, and you've got nothing to worry about!']

Okay- I'm not doing that. [He says it to nobody in particular, blinking down toward the video. Right. He's still talking to her.] -er, not, uh. Being an asshole, I mean, so hey, what's this about terrorism?

...

[Okay, she's not sure what she was expecting but consolation probably shouldn't have been one of them. Sorry, Rhys. She's is a bit of a freak.

[Her eyes narrow at his abrupt comment, though. ~~Rey will remember your reaction.~~]

Not much to tell. To make a long story short, as you would say, the not-so-dead chancellor set combat synthetics loose on the civilian populace. One of them a biological energy weapon with enough potency to render an entire city into a giant hole in the earth.

He managed to anonymously leak the criminalizing video footage to pin it on a more convenient scapegoat. Was just at the wrong place at the wrong time.

['Aw look, she thinks you're crazy. Are you crazy, Rheesie?'

He doesn't respond out loud this time, his eyes narrowed slightly toward her in response. Carrying on two conversations at the same time is not easy, especially when you're trying not to let on that the second person even exists. Four for you, Rhys, you try to not seem crazy, Rhys.]

Sounds, uh, pretty terrible. What a dick.

So, if he faked his death... did you actually kill anyone? Like, was there a host, or...?

['Smooth.'

Rhys clears his throat.]

Ah, hem, just, the whole 'assassin' thing is kind of a big word to throw around unless you actually killed someone on purpose...

["Did you actually kill anyone," he says.

[Rey laughs. Actually laughs. It's a strange laugh. She shouldn't ever laugh.

[For real, though:] No, suppose not. But most people don't get hung up on semantics. Officially it was declared a political assassination.

[Her fault for allowing there to be witnesses. And surveillance.]

It may help noting that most people also weren't aware that their chancellor wasn't human. So as far as they were told, it was cold blooded murder.

Edited 2015-03-18 22:40 (UTC)

Ah, I guess that'd do it.

[WELL, that makes him feel a little better. Just a little. He still doesn't know whether she would have killed a host to get to the guy or not, but regardless, Rhys is going to change the subject because that's way easier.]

So, do you like, work for any of the departments here or anything?

[To be fair, the whole concept of human hosts being occupied by artificial/synthetic intelligence isn't yet something she's aware of. And Rhys said he was human. Would you lie about that kind of thing, Rhys?

[She nods.]

Helped with starting up the security department here.

[Which means she's been here. For a long. Fucking. Time.]

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