007. video.

[sorrycharles]

Tests conducted on blood samples taken from the prisoner quarters have identified DNA previously isolated in samples taken from gurneys in the labs.

[ No hello, no good evening, Tranquility. Erik delivers the news with flat affect, leaned lazily off center in his seat. He’s wearing a white lab coat, one eye masked blind behind a patch and the other set dead on the comms device. Speaking of blood, the fingerprints smudged into his lapel are a familiar shade of reddish brown, for those who’ve been on board long enough to ruin a shirt or two.

He doesn’t look happy to be here. These days he rarely looks happy to be anywhere. ]

[ And Charles is here too, his own comms device sat in front of him and transmitting nothing, fingertips occasionally tapping the screen in favour of shuffling around paper notes.

He also isn't happy to be here, but he combed his hair and everything. His lab coat is clean. ]

The gurneys, along with reinforced cages, appeared on level two of the science department several months ago. Relics, perhaps, of the genetics lab that came before. As for the samples themselves, they contained evidence of human and animal hybridisation.

The blood stains also possessed inactive nanites, which meant I wasn't able to identify them definitively using the nanite technology that's been made available. However, I took some micrographs, and compared them with micrographs taken previously, and they were visually identical to active nanites with programming functions like [ and you can hear the disdainful air quotes as he reads it off his device ] "manticore advancement" and "manticore adaptation".

The manticores were prisoners. They were moulded by Van Rijn’s scientists.

[ Erik is more concise. He seems to be having some trouble separating his teeth. ]

Naturally Eszter has been mum on the subject of interplanetary conquest.

More vocal on the topic of saving the human race as she knows it. [ Somehow, Charles' input doesn't really undermine what Erik just said. He elaborates; ] I believe that what went on in the science department was kept a secret -- the majority of the original crew had no idea what was happening. They believed the Tranquility was their salvation and hope. I was able to get-- this impression from Charlotte Danaiu. What she knows is rather limited, but what she has access to knowing is. Greater.

[ This isn't Charles' favourite part, because it feels beyond his usual abstraction. He manages not to glance at Erik. ]

The presence I've talked about taking root in the ship, that has access to our minds, that has abilities we've begun to tap into-- upon talking to Charlotte, and reading her mind, I received the impression that it came here on account of the manticore experiments. I don't know how, or what it wanted, and I also know that no one on the ship intended it to happen, but-- it's what I think Resnik meant, when she talked about retribution for their sins. Something about what they were doing brought it about.

[ And he finishes there, not so eloquently, but unsure how to talk about it much further. ]

We’ve decided to call it Moira.

[ Also eloquent. Erik picks up again before Charles can interrupt with more than just a 'seriously?' side along glance: ]

We’ve consolidated what we know about it and the humans we’ve encountered from this universe into a table anyone can update. I’m attaching a link to the file to this transmission.

The aim is transparency and education. We should all be on the same page.

[ He leans forward to disengage the device, filling the frame. ]

Thank you.

[ OOC: Erik is maroon, dark green is Charles. FILE LINK - this is an IC document, feel free to contribute with IC knowledge and experiences. Characters need not feel obligated to identify themselves when making entries. ]

Comments

[voice]

[ryuuzaki]

Why Moira? Is that intended to be ironic?

[voice]

[sorrycharles]

It's personal. M O I R [ in case that's the next question ] A.

[ryuuzaki]

It's also the name of the doctor who directed the manticore project.

That said, it seems unlikely that this entity cares what we call it. If it did, it would have communicated a name to us a long time ago.

video.

[fullmoon]

Could the manticore business have helped anyone, do you think? [ Not that it would be all right to experiment on prisoners if it could. Hopefully his frown makes it clear there's no possibility of approval. Just— ] Or had they gone off the rails?

[sorrycharles]

It would be helpful if they found a habitable planet that was already inhabited, [ Erik is all too keen to clarify, directly to the point, all teeth and one pale eye.

His comms device has moved to a closer lab surface, out of the way and at an angle; Charles can be seen moving behind him, long hair and lab coat. ]

[fullmoon]

[ Some of Remus' favorite people only have one eye. But none of them have that many teeth. He doesn't move back from the screen, but his posture shifts—shoulders back without moving his head. ]

It would have been nice to think people in their right minds wouldn't do that. [ He isn't that naïve. Hopeful, is all. For those handful of seconds. But if they had a reason for it, however barbaric—never mind. ] Do you think Moira [ okay ] was here to punish them or to feed off of them?

locked video;

[lostsoldier]

[ Welp. Any commentary the soldier might have on how fucked up all that is or on Charles's marital problems is confined to a flat sort of look he doesn't waste anybody's time elaborating on. Instead: ]

What you said about Charlotte having access to more than she knows — Ward said something like that, too. She could learn to listen, I think it was.

You didn't happen to notice anything about how the hell she got here, did you?

locked video;

[forgodssake]

[ Was this locked to Erik? It doesn't matter -- Charles will accept it off Erik when it's passed to him, not that he can be of much use-- ]

My meeting with her didn't quite make it that far. Her mind has a lot on offer.

[milagros]

More and more this place reminds me of home.

( it isn't that particularly dismissive tone of I've seen much worse shit than this, just a sort of weary statement of unpleasant fact upon which she does not linger. )

'What she has access to knowing'?

[forgodssake]

I'm not sure exactly how to term it. Pending investigation. It's not entirely what I anticipated, put it that way.

[milagros]

Is it ever?

( genuine question, almost. )

[kutte]

So what's the next step? Keep our asses away from Van Rijn while we figure out what the fallout from their little science experiment was?

[sorrycharles]

Learn what we can from the resources we have about what we’re up against and arm ourselves accordingly.

Eszter has withheld details about their operation.

[ This would sound slightly less ominous if he didn't look so much like a lion who's been spritzed in the face with a water bottle in saying so. ]

I'd like to know if any of the others have been more forthcoming.

[kutte]

Withholding shit is how all of them operate, as far as I know.

[ not that jax expects anything different. ]

It might be easier if they figure we're already on to them.

voice;

[axeyou]

Aww. You named it together. Congratulations.

[Cooing over that detail because she's pissed about the rest of it is a logical response, thanks. Much sharper:]

So that's who we've got to thank for all this shit, huh. And you really don't think Charlotte knew about their little experiments? Because they weren't little.

[sorrycharles]

If she didn’t know before, she does now.

[ And she’s been conspicuously quiet about it, is the implication. ]

[servator]

[ "The manticores were prisoners. They were moulded by Van Rijn’s scientists." She thinks of the Rachni, of the geth in Moira's position, of Saren and the Reapers' in Van Rijin's place.

Shepard frowns deeply, considering in silence for a while. ]

Anything else in her mind we can use?

[ They've been in the dark so damn much lately... it's not been fun for any of them. ]

[video]

[sorrycharles]

She knows all sorts of interesting things.

[ By the time he appears on Shepherds feed, Erik is peeling a banana. The Tranquility has bananas. ]

She short-circuits when she’s pressed for details.

[lifescience]

That's horrible.

[And not wholly unfamiliar. Maybe she wasn't as far off base as she thought when she first considered this being a Hydra ship.]

Why would they conduct experiments like that?

[video]

[sorrycharles]

Human nature.

[ Erik answers more quickly than he can be easily interfered with, the intensity of his stare sparking electric, steel on flint. ]

text.

[culver]

Were you surprised they were doing [it takes her a moment to spell the word correctly:] hybridisation?

[text]

[sorrycharles]

no.

are you?

text.

[forgodssake]

not after all this time
the 'why' is what remains speculative, if ultimately inconsequential

Voice

[notyourutopian]

[This all hits a little close to home for Eleanor, so her voice sounds...uncertain, and tinged with anger when she finally asks her question.]

So you're saying they were making monsters here.

Voice

[forgodssake]

A lot of us have met them, or likenesses to them.

[ The division between real and a close imitation thereof is a fine line. ]

Tragically, 'monster' is about right. Made out of men.