We Got Fun And Games

Space and other Dimensions, whether within the realm of the mind or other, less-savory regions.

Re: We Got Fun And Games

Postby Narrator » Tue Aug 30, 2016 4:52 am

Staring down into the shaft is not particularly encouraging. The cabin fits into the shaft almost perfectly. There's little footholds or other things one might expect in a shaft. Instead there are two lines on each side that, presumably, hold magnetic rails. A side-effect of this is that there's almost no light in there, the shaft just a gaping abyss of darkness, especially for someone as small as Vic is at the moment. It's hard to tell how many stories he falls in almost complete darkness but it feels like it stretches on for quite a while. Finally he hits the ground, relatively gently thanks to his minimized mass, and can feel his way around. There's a door down here but it looks old in comparison to the ones he saw further up, almost as if this part of the facility had been built significantly before the upper levels. There is no rust but there's a little bit of dust (something that was completely absent upstairs) and the door feels like it's of a different design.

It takes some prying but eventually it opens just enough to let some light through as well as allow him to slip out of the elevator shaft himself. There's not a lot of illumination, but enough to confirm his suspicions. This part is of the facility is definitely older by a couple decades and walking down the corridor he can spot the occasional faded words on the walls identifying this as some sort of US research facility. Super-conductor and extreme cold research from the looks of the occasional room he might peek into. All of it is long abandoned but some documentation is left in faded print-outs.

Experimental Neural Computer Chip Development
Project 031
Lead Scientist Dr. Hiroka Minamida


That's what it says on the first page of most of them, though the rest of it is scientific gibberish, reports, schematics of computer diagrams, performance reports on super-conductors and similar things. Research long finished or obsolete, though it looks like it was quite a bit ahead of it's time back then. As he's walking there's the faint hum of machinery still operating and he finally comes into a large room that has been cleared of it's previous things. Instead there is a large column in the middle made of the same gleaming metal found upstairs. It's several meters thick and spans the entire height of the room. Thick cables connect to the column all over and disappear into the walls, either through pre-existing ducts or newly drilled ones. It almost looks like a metal tree that has taken root in this room and spread out from it. The persistent hum is coming from this huge column and engraved on it in huge letters are the words PROJECT PANOPTICON.
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Re: We Got Fun And Games

Postby Victor Freud » Fri Sep 02, 2016 1:46 am

Victor had counted entirely on his tiny size & weight to density ratio to keep him safe; just as how an ant could be dropped from 5 stories up and survive. There had been a logic to his madness. He had counted on the detention center being lower, and perhaps he would have landed on top of the elevator car. But it seemed that he had miscalculated, the car must have gone up instead of down, which let him plummet to the very bottom of the shaft. Well there was always the stairs.

With so much dust and disuse around him, Victor felt more confident and returned to his normal size, brushing the dust off of his suit as he explored this strange level of the facility. He couldn't help but feel a little sad that so much of this was lost on him. Surely one of the students had heard of this professor, even if in a totally different capacity... ugh, alternate dimensions were almost as bad as time travel, and he'd already had a tiny taste of that this year. And the term "panopticon" meant nothing to him, other than sounding like a pretty cool Transformer. So this shiny chrome Matrix monstrosity was suitably-named. He spent a moment admiring the handiwork with his hands in his coat pockets.

"... whelp. Guess it's about time to break it." Given that this thing seemed to be the only reason anyone had been down here in twenty years, it obviously was at least somewhat important. He wasn't a hacker or an engineer, but breaking this thing was bound to at least piss someone off, if not something more serious. He immediately began looking for something to do some damage with, checking the other rooms for any sort of heavy blunt tool to sever the cables or, if he was lucky, some compressed gas tanks with those lovely dangerous WHMIS symbols on them.
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Victor Freud
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High Concept: Face Turning Heel
Aspect: Title of Your Sex Tape / The Gadfly
Aspect: Shrinky Dink Shenanigans
Aspect: Always Second Best
Aspect: Underestimating Badassery
Aspect: Dressed for Success

Re: We Got Fun And Games

Postby Panopticon » Fri Sep 02, 2016 2:27 am

Somewhere deep inside the electronic world Panopticon is sitting in self-induced partial isolation. It had been necessary to keep Hazard from accessing crucial systems and if that was all then it would be problematic but something that could be dealt with in time. Worst case scenario it would take until Conduit returned and crushed him into a fine paste. Or his power would run out and repair drones would reconnect the systems to the core. All within controllable parameters as long as the core and the Breach where still online.

But then explosions rang out in the distance. Not actually noticeable down here of course, but some cameras are still accessible and the worst case scenario has come to pass. Russians attacking the base. Apparently Conduit's radio-silence did mean that she failed to wipe out their fleet in it's entirety. Whether or not Hazard was working with them (and it seemed incredibly unlikely) this was incredibly inconvenient. The defenses should be on auto-pilot, less efficient but still suitable. Having to assume things was what actually stung. Compared to the usual deluge of data this was like being dumb, blind and deaf. During an active attack. Things would have to be sped up, fix some connections so there's an easy chokepoint to inject code through that'll shred anything in the outer system, including Hazard if he's still in there. Simple.

And then the absolute worst case scenario happens.

Code: Select all
>> Structural damage detected in Central Core!
>> Power levels falling, 3 of 8 power couplings offline!
>> Bandwidth to Main Facility offline!


Alerts that never should be tripped ring out. The processing core is under attack somehow.

Somewhere deep down a decision is made. Desperate times call for desperate measures and this certainly qualified. With an almost halting command Panopticon digs out one of the oldest pieces of code in the system. It hasn't been used in a long time ever since testing on the system concluded decades ago. Information that has not been brought to the fore in ages is pulled up. Things usually left to automated processes. Heartbeat. Brain activity. Muscle strength. It has been so long since those things actually meant anything. They feel like abstract concepts, completely detached from everything, monitored by programs so they could be forgotten systems. There is no time to lose, eventually too much machinery will fail and the process will stall due to two words that for the first time in a long while drive fear through Panopticon. Mechanical failure.

As Vic is tearing through machinery with Mass-to-Impact ratio punches warning klaxons go off as valves depressurize with loud hisses, energy conduits spew sparks and go silent when suddenly his rampage is disrupted by a sound not caused by him. With a loud clunk the large metal pillar suddenly begins to move, a seam appearing in the middle as ancient machinery creaks and pulls casings away like a complex metal flower blooming. Encased in thick layers of metal and machinery in another column made of glass, filled with a silvery glimmer. Another seal opens with a hiss and the silver fluid drain onto the floor as the glass tubes slides upwards. Gallons and gallons of the mercury-like substance fill the huge room, rising ankle-deep with a strange metallic tinkling sound as it reveals a shape previously submerged in the stuff. Hanging in the tangle of a medical sensors and tubes is a human figure. She's wearing simple white clothes and her face looks vaguely familiar. An old Japanese woman, maybe in her 50ies or 60ies in terrible physical condition but reminiscent of Ashlie back home none the less.

Spasms suddenly shake her as she begins to cough, spitting out more silvery fluid as she collapses to her hands and knees before ever so slowly opening her eyes, wincing as if even the very dim light in the room is stabbing her eyes. Her arms and legs are thin and spindly, muscles that haven't been used in ages twitch at the sudden exposure of her skin to the air, her veins dark, almost grey. She weakly pulls all the various sensors off of herself with the exception of a metal head-band that seems to be grafted into her skin all the way around her skull, shining through her thin hair. She somehow manages to stand up, knees almost buckling and the surface of the sea of silver that has filled the room ripples in response.

Her eyes are still mostly closed as she tries to recover from decades in complete sensory deprivation and only receiving artificial signals. Still she tries to look around the room until she finally spots Vic. The simple white clothes she's wearing look old and even still have a name printed on them, the fabric almost as worn as the notes Vic found earlier identifying her as Dr. Minamida, Section Head of Neural Robotics.

"You're the one I lost track of... Phasing? No. Mass-Manipulation." Her voice sounds like a dry rasp but despite her decrepit state her mind seems razor-sharp and between the half-closed lids her eyes are bright and perceptive, having taken note of the kind of damage Vic has inflicted on her systems and deduced it's likely cause.
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Re: We Got Fun And Games

Postby Victor Freud » Fri Sep 02, 2016 3:34 am

Victor's progress slowed once things started to shake, knowing nothing about the attack outside. Really, he knew almost nothing about the situation. Of the three of them that had arrived on the boat he probably would have been the easiest one to sway to Panopticon's viewpoint. When cables began jettisoning on their own and the cylinder began to open he started to fear the worst; that some sort of super-advanced God-like robot was going to emerge and reveal it's awful true form. That's probably why he had climbed onto a chair, looking much like the stereotypical housewife scared by a mouse when when silver liquid had encompassed the floor, images of the T-1000 filling his brain. Seeing Dr. Minamida emerge and in such a pitiful state pushed those fears aside, the young man standing in the pool of shoe-ruining techno-water once more and approaching her with his hands in his coat pockets.

"Huh, you kinda look like... oh right! That's her last name too! I always want to call her Miyamoto by mistake, that's why I always just call her Headmistress." He crouched in front of her to be more on her eye level. She certainly didn't look like a threat, if anything he'd be afraid of hurting her by accident.

"I guess it could be called mass-manipulation. We can talk about it on our way back to the surface, unless you'd rather share your story instead. Oh, and we'll have to stop by the detention center along the way, gotta let Emilie out. And the other guy too I guess." He offered her his hand with a kind of sad smile, not an ounce of smugness to it. "C'mon, you can ride my back it you want. And curse me out for breaking your stuff if it makes you feel any better."
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Victor Freud
Student
 
High Concept: Face Turning Heel
Aspect: Title of Your Sex Tape / The Gadfly
Aspect: Shrinky Dink Shenanigans
Aspect: Always Second Best
Aspect: Underestimating Badassery
Aspect: Dressed for Success

Re: We Got Fun And Games

Postby Panopticon » Fri Sep 02, 2016 4:13 am

For a moment the woman looks utterly confused at Vic's niceness, as if she's trying to figure out his angle and failing, perhaps unable to recognize honest to god compassion. She actually shies away from him a little, though perhaps more out of pride than fear.

"He wants the Breach. And he needs her forcefield to access it." she informs Victor coldly about the conclusion she's drawn from god knows where. "I can only assume you're here to assist him by crippling my central core?"
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Re: We Got Fun And Games

Postby Victor Freud » Fri Sep 02, 2016 9:34 pm

"Maybe, I dunno. I'm just here 'cause my classmates got themselves into trouble and the bottom of the barrel is the best they could get to get 'em out of it. We'll see what the others've gotta say about breaches and whatnot."

He remained crouched even though she moved away, though he pulled his hand back. "Look, I'm not going to hurt ya. If I was I'd have done it by now. But I'm also not going to just leave you down here and let whatever's happening happen with you at the bottom. So we can go on up together with some dignity, or I can carry you out like a sack a potatoes. And just so you know; I grew up on a farm, so I've carried a lot of potatoes."
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Victor Freud
Student
 
High Concept: Face Turning Heel
Aspect: Title of Your Sex Tape / The Gadfly
Aspect: Shrinky Dink Shenanigans
Aspect: Always Second Best
Aspect: Underestimating Badassery
Aspect: Dressed for Success

Re: We Got Fun And Games

Postby Panopticon » Fri Sep 02, 2016 9:57 pm

"I think you're misunderstanding the situation." she says as she looks around the room once more as if to remind herself of it's actual layout outside of blueprints and computer models. "I'm going to stop this imbecile from undoing decades of work. I may have been able to from down here until you destroyed my connection to the rest of the base, but now I have to actually physically purge him from the system." she says as she starts wading through the silver water towards one of the walls. She's still weak and obviously just declining any help out of pride at this point. "I sincerely doubt Hazard is here to help your friends or anybody but himself. Help me retake my base of operations and I'll send you home, I probably don't have to point out that I have the technology to do so."
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Re: We Got Fun And Games

Postby Victor Freud » Sun Sep 04, 2016 6:37 pm

"Yeah, but, I kind of went through the trouble of breaking all of this in the first place, I dunno how good I'd be at putting it back together. And you're the bad guy...?"

Well really, he had assumed she was. So far all he'd seen was the base responding to their intrusion, after being taken here by some loopy fellow. His confidence in the mission was waning.
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Victor Freud
Student
 
High Concept: Face Turning Heel
Aspect: Title of Your Sex Tape / The Gadfly
Aspect: Shrinky Dink Shenanigans
Aspect: Always Second Best
Aspect: Underestimating Badassery
Aspect: Dressed for Success

Re: We Got Fun And Games

Postby Panopticon » Sun Sep 04, 2016 9:12 pm

"Everyone is a 'bad guy' to somebody else." she says, heading for the door as she talks. "I simply do what must be done to oppose the fascist regime of Mutant Russia who chose to co-opt their oppressors' agenda instead of doing away with it. So yes, I'm their bad guy for decimating their troops and razing St. Petersburg, even without them knowing that it is the doing of a mere human." As if to undermine what she just said the sea of silver behind her begins to boil and lift off the floor, following her in thick quicksilver streams. Here and there the streams of what appears to metal at a glance is surrounded by a fine mist, belieing it's true nature of billions of nanomachines forming the semi-solid material.

"Your 'friend' is a wildcard but one that couldn't come at a worse time." she goes on as if nothing noteworthy was happening. "As for you, I don't have time to be angry about what you did, but if you continue to stand in my way then I will treat you the same way I treat all my enemies." Where the nanite-streams touch the walls and floor of the facility material disintegrates as thousands of nanites tear away at it. If that is meant as a threat it's a fairly effective one.
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Re: We Got Fun And Games

Postby Victor Freud » Tue Sep 06, 2016 4:52 am

"You, uh... you command a swimming pool of liquid metal, can repurpose metal to your will on the fly, and have a computer interface grafted into your brain; but you need my help to fix this place? I'm afraid to install windows 10 on my desktop, what help can I be?"
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Victor Freud
Student
 
High Concept: Face Turning Heel
Aspect: Title of Your Sex Tape / The Gadfly
Aspect: Shrinky Dink Shenanigans
Aspect: Always Second Best
Aspect: Underestimating Badassery
Aspect: Dressed for Success

Re: We Got Fun And Games

Postby Panopticon » Tue Sep 06, 2016 6:01 am

"I believe you misunderstand. I'm offering to spare you if you side with me not because I need your help but because there are bigger threats to be dealt with. Right now Russian forces are attacking the compound and in the wake of Hazard's sabotage they pose a significant risk."
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Re: We Got Fun And Games

Postby Victor Freud » Wed Sep 07, 2016 3:46 am

"... alright."

Well after all, what else could he say? If he refused he might have gotten drowned or skewered or something.

"If the Russians want to destroy this place, I guess the best way to get them to stop would be convincing them they got the job done. Is there some way you can detonate some of the surface structure in a way that makes it look like the whole place went up?" He theorized, not knowing just how extensive the attack was. Not that the idea probably hadn't occurred to her already.
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Victor Freud
Student
 
High Concept: Face Turning Heel
Aspect: Title of Your Sex Tape / The Gadfly
Aspect: Shrinky Dink Shenanigans
Aspect: Always Second Best
Aspect: Underestimating Badassery
Aspect: Dressed for Success

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