0008: NEW ARRIVAL BRIEFING

[crux_npcs]

Who: New Arrivals, Graham Baker
Where: Briefing Room
When: Late afternoon, Aprilo 29th
Warnings: None

When awakening, the immediate surroundings are swarming with activity and very chaotic. The people in the medical ward are polite and understanding, but firmly refuse to answer questions until the briefing. Especially not after some group of kooks earlier decided that they'd throw a tantrum and bug out of the hospital before anything can get said. Either given hospital outfits resembling very comfortable pajamas, drone bodies, or their own bodies, they are escorted by polite, unyielding people in red and black uniforms to the briefing room. Fortunately for the robots, things are much more organized.

The Briefing room is large. Not enough to accommodate a giant, but spacious enough for several dozen people. The tiles are black and featureless while the walls are nice, soothing colors. The chairs are high-backed and well-cushioned, more like comforting eggs floating a foot or so off the ground than anything else. Set into the ceiling and floor near the front is a large holographic projector. The floor in front of each seat also has a smaller projector, allowing people to see what the bigger device is showing without having to angle for a view. As of now, it merely displays a rotating pyramid.

Ten members of Security line the walls and various exits, looking rather displeased to be here. Graham Baker, a balding man in an ill-fitting suit, stands at the head of the room with an easy smile, seemingly unbothered by any previous ruckus.

[Questions to the NPCs will go in the briefing thread. The rest of the post is there for people to mill about and do whatever with. The mods will not be doing hangar/medical awakenings unless it's specifically asked for.]

Comments

[gunholic]

"Yeah, after that creepy interrogation thing," Axl said, making a face at the thought of it. Nope, not getting over that anytime soon.

"And they reeeeeeeally want people in their military, I've noticed. Betting they piss off the neighbors a lot."

[tinywife]

"Creepy interrogation thing? What creepy interrogation thing?" Pinoko asked, curiously.

"And considering that mess with the Space Bikers, that's probably a pretty good bet. I still don't know how that one Space Biker grew to gigantic levels of tall. But getting almost-kidnapped wasn't fun."

[gunholic]

"You know.. have you heard of some random AI people, do you plan on blowing up the fleet.. that stuff," Axl said. Well.. he'd thought maybe everyone had to go through it? "I don't know what they might have done to the guys from the medical wing, but they downloaded me onto a terminal. Hell of a way to wake up!"

Scowl was a bit of an understatement for a moment.

"Space bikers? You guys have space bikers? Man.." All right space bikers sounded hilarious.

[tinywife]

Please excuse Pinoko for a few moments, Axl. She's busy looking horrified. "Acchonburike! Pinoko is so sorry! I had no idea they were doing that to all the robot-people! That's terrible!"

Science Captain McEngineer had better hope that he has metal shinguards. Pinoko might be inviting herself to tea with him. And his shins are not going to be safe if that happens.

"We have Space Bikers. The Jagtooth Clan. Their leader was named Bee'eef Slabthrust." And yes, that had been every bit as ridiculous as it sounded.

[gunholic]

Axl looked down, sighing. "The more things change.."

OF course, one freaking out person wasn't what he signed up for. "Hey.. it's ok. I'm all right. Honest."

Subject change couldn't have come at a better time.

"That sounds.. special. Kinda sorry I missed that one."

[tinywife]

"Don't be. The bikers smelled bad, and Pinoko was almost kidnapped."

She shook her head. "And then there was a virus thing that was transmitted by sound and everyone got sick. Things are never quiet for very long around here."

Pinoko considered him for a few moments. "So you're a robot? You look different than some of the other robots I've met."

[gunholic]

"Uh, yeah. I'm a reploid," Axl said, nodding a little. "There are other robots here, huh? Like what kind?"

Well, at least Pinoko was good on volunteering information. She seemed to know a lot about what was up.

[tinywife]

"What's a reploid?" Pinoko asked, curiously.

"As for what other kinds of robots, well, I've met a few Cybertronians. They're big. Like... really big. They need these little noodly bodies to go into buildings and stuff. Deadlock is a Decepticon. He's nice, but he doesn't want people to know that. I met another one, who said he was an Autobot. Deadlock said Autobots are jerks." Pinoko rolled her eyes.

"And then I met a robot... I don't know what kind he was but he was saying that he was a prototype. He was asking about his purpose and getting a job and stuff and basically being sad about everything!"

This was met with another eyeroll from Pinoko. That had been a pretty epic pity party.

"You're the first person-sized robot I've met."

[gunholic]

"Me! I'm a reploid," Axl said. Way to go, Axl. "Uh.. we're called reploids because we're all made after this one advanced robot's design, so we're all 'replica' robots or something. I dunno. He tried to explain it once and I kinda of zoned out."

Sorry, X. Your stories were kinda boring sometimes.

"So.. big robots called Autobots and Decepticons, and they don't like each other much. Sounds homey."

He didn't really know what to do with the whole prototype thing. Axl was a prototype, at least as far as he'd ever been able to tell, but throwing a pity-party over it sounded stupid. Then again, it seemed sometimes like being the king of badass mountain kind of required being a prototype, if you went by his partners.

"Well, most reploids are around human-size. I haven't met very many that top out above ten feet."

[tinywife]

"That must have been a pretty boring story," Pinoko said, smiling. "Don't feel bad, some people I know tell pretty boring stories too."

Looking at you, Doctor.

She scrambled up so she was sitting next to him. "So. Did they assign you a room yet or anything? Pinoko can show you around some if you want. The Teuberg is pretty big. I don't even know where everything is yet."

[gunholic]

"Wow. Guess it's universal, then," Axl said with a shrug, hopping down from where he had been sitting.

"I have some stuff loaded in this comm unit, but I haven't done much but mash buttons. If you're offering to give the tour, I'm listening."

[tinywife]

"I have a love-hate relationship with my comm-unit. It's like a really complicated space phone," Pinoko said, making a face. "I still don't know how to get it to do really fancy or complicated things."

Like call home. She was still trying to figure out how to get it to do that trick.

She hopped down from where she had been sitting. "Come on, Mr. Axl. Pinoko will show you around."

Axl, you just signed up to maybe do some shopping. After all, getting stuff for your brand new place was going to be important. "First stop is food! You can eat... right?"

[gunholic]

"Did you try reading the manual?" Axl said, waving the bits of plastic-paper at her with a faint smirk.

The question threw him off just a little. Not neccessarily that Pinoko thought to ask, more that actual organic food was a rare treat for leave days, not a regular thing. Maybe he had more getting used to space than he thought..

"I can. Mostly just for the fun of it, though," he said, "Shoot. I'm gonna need a regular energy supply." Maybe too much to ask to think that the place had that going already, though it wasn't like they hadn't had time to study his knocked-out carcass...

[tinywife]

"You have one step ahead of me. We weren't given manuals," Pinoko said with a sniff. "So I had to figure everything out on my own."

At Axl's discussion of food and needing liquid energy, Pinoko considered it for a second. Then shrugged.

"Well, when Pinoko and some friends went to karaoke a few days ago, Deadlock came with us. He was able to get stuff that he could drink. Like... robot alcohol. If they've figured out how to make that, I'm sure they've figured out how to make liquid energy," Pinoko offered. "But if you can eat for fun, that gives Pinoko someone to cook for again!"

[gunholic]

"It's in the phone.. but I asked 'em to print it for me since that's dumb," Axl said, grinning. "I can show you later."

The intel about there being some kind of high-grade already floating around was nice. He was starting to worry. Maybe worrying had rubbed off on him a little, or maybe it was just being plunged into starting over again. It wasn't fun.

"Sure. Maybe I'll even learn something from you!" And yeah, Axl was starting to learn how to cook, a little, here and there. It was interesting.

[tinywife]

"What do you know how to cook?" Pinoko asked seriously. "Can you make parfaits?"

Parfaits were serious business, all right?

"And you'll have to show me how to print out the manual for my communicator. I can sort of figure out how to work it. At least I can reliably make it print out a map now."

Oh those first couple weeks on the Fleet had been so much fun.

[gunholic]

"Uh, maybe?"

All right, maybe the 'know how to cook' was more 'look at pretty pictures in cookbooks and bother people who actually knew how,' but he could learn!

"Sure, I can do that. Maybe after we take that tour?"

[tinywife]

"Check. You don't know how to cook. Or if you do, you know how to make a whole one or two things. Typical."

She was used to that though. The Doctor said that he could cook too. Tea and Rice was not a meal though as far as Pinoko was concerned.

"That would be fine. Come on. Tour first!"

[gunholic]

"One or two things is knowing how..." Axl said, though he let himself be dragged. Hey, if Pinoko was going to feed him human treats and give him the tour, he wasn't going to complain a bit.