0003: NEW ARRIVALS

[crux_npcs]

Who: New Arrivals, Captain Jack Hollis, Science Captain Urist McEngineer, Graham Baker
Where: Briefing Room
When: Late afternoon
Warnings: None

When awakening, you'll find the area you're in to be very busy. The people in the medical ward are polite and understanding, but firmly refuse to answer questions until the briefing. The same goes for the robots in the hangars. 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.

The room is large, but not quite large enough for some of the bigger Cybertronians. They've been given drone bodies at least, skinny little things with no real features beyond primitive masks made of paper plates. There's seats for everyone, at least, well-cushioned and comfortable, and the room is pleasantly lit.

A few Security personnel, dressed in their red and black uniforms, stand at ease in the rooms in strategic areas. Three men stand at the head. One is Graham Baker, a slightly nervous-seeming middle-aged man wearing a multi-layered business suit that seems rumpled and oversized. The other two men are dressed in military uniforms, one with the blue undershirt and piping of Command, while the other wears the gold of Science.

[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.]

Comments

[interneet]

As she works on real food, he scans through the replicator's options, tweaking a few parameters here, adjusting one or two there . . . and completely nonchalantly pulling out a few sticks of generated pocky when it's done.

"And that's different?"

[soul_sister]

"Enough that I couldn't get out of it!" She slams down a pan with a loud, reverberating clang. She hasn't noticed his new acquisition yet.

"Why do I need to know physics! I don't even know what that is!"

[interneet]

Well it's not like it's more than an appetizer. And given the steady rate he's going through them, he is hungry enough that they're hardly going to ruin his appetite.

"It's pretty useless though, isn't it? Having a soldier who can't pass your army's basic training. No matter who they are."

[soul_sister]

"WHO ARE YOU CALLING USELESS!?" She slams a pan down and yanks up the heat, whirling around to point at him. "No one needs to know about cosines! NO ONE! They are not useful even a LITTLE!"

A beat. "Where did you get those?!"

[interneet]

"What's a cosine?"

He finishes the half-eaten on in his hand, neatly polishing off the lot.

"From your replicator. Seems things like that aren't hard to make."

[soul_sister]

"It's a STUPID thing that just exists for equa- Wait.... Our what? WHERE?" She pauses, her spoon falling back into the pot.

For what it's worth, whoever made the stew did an excellent job. As the sauce starts the simmer, the smell of spices and the stock fill the kitchen.

[interneet]

"On the wall. Didn't they tell you after the briefing?"

There is an odd alcove in the direction of his dismissive gesture, though it's easy enough to mistake it for an inset glass-bottomed shelf, and the buttons above for a decorative pattern.

For his part, satisfied that appropriate amounts of food magic are happening, he flips on his comm, rotating through apps until he finds a search engine to look up 'cosine'.

[soul_sister]

"Who had time for that!?" She had a tiny demon to find, at the time. She investigates it, peering from one angle to the next. It... didn't look like much. WHERE DID THE FOOD EVEN COME OUT OF?

More importantly IF IT IS A MAGICAL FOOD DISPENSER WHY HAVE THEY BEEN PAYING FOR FOOD?! She pokes at one of the buttons........... and then another.................... nothing......................... She rears back to punch the STUPID THING... when the food timer goes off.

SAVED FOR NOW.

"Here, grab three bowls." She points to one of the shelves while she gets her oven mitts.

[interneet]

"If it's your apartment breaking what you want is fine, but don't you want to see it work before that?"

He flips briefly through the holographic entry on cosines first (what's so confusing about that?), only switching it closed and moving to get the bowls right before she needs them.

"Three?"

[soul_sister]

"How can I see it work when it's clearly defective!" She snaps... pausing with the ladle as the bowls are set in front of her. She spoons in generous portions with a heavy huff and a slosh of broth.

"Mm. Chrono should be in shortly."

[interneet]

"Nothing here works if you keep hitting 'Cancel' halfway through commands. Though, I guess if it was switched over to voice commands even someone like you could use it."

There is, for a moment, something a tiny bit wistful in his expression as he takes the bowl closest to him. It's gone even before he turns, returning to the table.

"Chrono's the person you live with?"

[soul_sister]

She was, in fact, about to complain about 'cancel' being apparently THE WHOLE DUMB THING... when she catches the expression from him, just a flicker was enough. Her hackles settle and she picks up her own bowl after filling it. She leans back against the counter.

"Mmm. He's my assistant."

[interneet]

Completely ignores her hackles setting, blowing gently on a spoonful of soup before tasting it.

"Not a bad cook."

[soul_sister]

"I guess he's all right."

[overclocking]

A voice chimes in from the doorway, aptly timed and pitched in such perfect indignation that Rosette probably doesn't even need to look at him to know what's on his face.

"'All right?' Just alright?"

A beat, before he swivels to look at the demon-angel in his apartment, eating his food.

"... And where did you come from?"

[interneet]

"Japan, circa 2014."

He stops before taking another spoonful, leaning back a bit in his chair.

"Hey, Rosette, is there any bread?"

[soul_sister]

"I'm still waiting on that steak on a lobster dinner! Until then it's all right." She huffs at him, she ladles out the last bowl and offers it out to the puffed up demon in the doorway. Even as she puts some of their HARD SEARCHED FOR and notably expensive bread on the table.

[overclocking]

"I'll make steak and lobster when you get us the money to buy steak and lobster."

Still, he closes the distance and takes the bowl, frowning slightly as the bread gets deposited. But... well... house guests and manners...

"Did she offer you tea?"

He asks, almost directly in spite of himself.

[interneet]

"No?"

The bread remains untouched a moment more as he responds, a hint of honest confusion in the word.

"For something like that, isn't the replicator fine?"

1/2

[soul_sister]

"I thought I wasn't supposed to-"

[soul_sister]

"AH!" She suddenly cuts herself off and points at their new guest. "He fixed the stupid shelf thing!"

[overclocking]

"Stupid shelf thing..."

His eyes go to the demonangel person thing eating at his table, then to the replicator on the wall.

"That?" No, no, no. With an air of mild horror, "We're not getting tea from the wall. I bought a box when we first got here."

He punctuates this by retrieving said box and setting about making it, because good lord we are not barbarians in this house.

[interneet]

"You don't know how to use it either?" There's no surprise; it's almost as if Chrono's lack of technical acumen is only natural.

He reaches for a slice of bread without looking at it, attention very casually focused on Rosette and Chrono instead. "Where are you two from, anyway?"

[soul_sister]

"New York!" There's a pause, for just a second, as she realized, yet again, that this may warrant clarification. "... Earth." It was hard to actually deal with how weird that sounded. So naturally, she took it out on the bread, sloppily tearing off the heel for herself.

[interneet]

"Heeh, America . . ."

It's hard to tell if it's mild surprise or relief, but there's some small shift in his demeanour at that.

He tears a bite-sized piece of crust off his own piece, dipping it in the stew.

"From when?"