2023-02-15: In the Hall of the Mountain Mazin
- Cast: Koji Kabuto, Liam 7-020, Sayaka Yumi, Roux Louka, Shiro Kabuto (NPC)
- Where: Fujinomiya City - Infinity Research Site
- Date: U.C. 0097 02 15
- Summary: In the wake of Asciel Collette's raid on the Photon Power Research Institute and her discovery of Infinity, Koji and Sayaka loop their friends and fellow defenders in on the Colossal Mazin's existence, and discuss other developments in the Earth Sphere (chiefly the Kafim Wedding Incident).
<Pose Tracker> Koji Kabuto has posed.
Well. That was possibly one of the worst days in recorded history for the Photon Power Research Institute. With Mazinger Z, Aphrodite Areia, Roux's Strike Zeta and several Ichinana disabled, the Japanium mine raided, and the discovery by a definite hostile actor of the grave secret buried under the under-construction Photon Power National Plant / Anomaly Research Site, a total sea change is required in the group's operations - now that the secret has been discovered, it will almost certainly spread beyond the Lab's control - so pulling in more allies is an essential movement.
To that end, Koji and Sayaka have invited Roux and Liam up to the Research Site. The wild-haired Head of Experimental Research has just swiped his card in the main elevator's sensor to get through the SSS clearance restriction, and the enclosed metal box (large enough, at least, for an Ichinana to stand) is thundering downwards into the depths.
"I want to make one thing clear," Koji says as the lift descends, "before you see it - Atrytone's analysis of cause and effect is reversed; this anomaly only appeared in January last year, there's absolutely no way we could have been drawing Photon Power from it."
<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.
Atrytone did not make a very good impression in Liam, but he has no reason to believe she'd lie. She'd done a great job of running interference for the real intrusion squad, and what they found--what she broadcast--is... well, weird. Liam is not here on official NERV business, but he wasn't about to turn down the invitation. He has questions for him and Sayaka, too.
The cyborg follows Koji into the elevator, looking very official in his NERV jumpsuit and beret. He glances at the sensor, and the security clearances on the card. That's way, way above his pay grade.
"...What do you mean 'appeared'?" He glances at Koji, and then Sayaka.
<Pose Tracker> Roux Louka has posed.
The good news is that the Strike Zeta's armor plating can be easily replaced, and the severed arm can be refurbished from stock components. Nothing THAT rare was broken. It's a good thing that Atrytone didn't nick the thermonuclear ramjet engines! (These are less dramatic than they sound, since the nuclear process in question involves the standard fusion engine that powers essentially all spaceborne Mobile Suits, despite some crazed efforts to use energy fillers.)
Roux has been staying at a local spa hotel which she seemed to really like. Which means that what she was doing directly before this is why --
She's kind of glowing a little. Not literally, but she has very clearly been in the salon recently. Her hair is about two inches shorter from split-end removal, and is being worn loose and glossy, with a lingering scent of pine-blossom-essence infused oil. Her skin is immaculate, and with the removal of pretty much every dead skin cell and some application of photonic-infused chocolate-and-shea-butter face masking, the *tone* seems to have changed slightly - a warmer hue to the light olive. She is wearing a sleeveless dress with a vestlike boning and a long skirt which has been contoured to drift slightly when walking forwards, hanging at about mid-calf. (Not shown: Security buttons that will bring it up to working-skirt length.)
"Well yeah," Roux says, folding her arms glamorously. Any Matsumoto-face-treatment magic on her face is challenged by her usual expressions. "Photon power comes from treating Japanium, right? I don't remember all of the details, but it's a material, not a radiation or anything."
"That's a very good question, Liam," Roux says with a frown (which does suit the recent facial treatment.)
<Pose Tracker> Sayaka Yumi has posed.
Well. That was a disaster. The Photon Power League was left reeling in many ways after Atrytone's assault, with all its operations only now being underway again, after a few days of repair and damage control work. It doesn't slip Sayaka's mind that it was just awful timing with Valentine's day but well.. there's more pressing matters to get to.
Like the outside discovery of the giant Mazin that appeared under Mount Fuji under January, which she and Koji agreed it best to not keep fully under wraps anymore. When the lift descends holding Koji and the two guests, Sayaka is already waiting on-site.
"Precisely why we've kept it hidden so long is because we'd prefer to have an explanation of why it exists before the public knows about it. Our scientists are working hard at that, but... you can probably tell that something of this scale is dangerous."
Sayaka turns from Infinity to face the guests. "Oh, and.. Roux, Liam.. I'm glad you're both safe." Communications had practically broken after their machines were all disabled, so seeing them is reassuring.
To Liam's question, all she can do is throw up a shrug. "It really did just appear. One day, a group of miners uncovered it, where it definitely wasn't before. Koji has a theory about how it relates to interdimensional science, though..."
Sayaka's expression turns grim for a moment as she considers something else. "Another thing worries me. About the unexpected 'backup' Atrytone had. It seems like their alliance is shaky at best.. but it wouldn't surprise me either if Dr. Hell finds out about this sooner or later. Even if he's playing civilian philanthropist right now." Sayaka notes, guarded. Just have to hope that pre-occupies him long enough for them to recover before he makes his next strike.
Finally, she shoots a glare Roux's way, as if to ask HOW she looks so different and what's her secret. Because Sayaka is beyond stressed and clearly looks the part.
<Pose Tracker> Koji Kabuto has posed.
Koji nods at Sayaka's explanation. "We double-checked our geological surveys too, no indication of anything of that scale having existed even hours before it was uncovered."
Of what scale, Koji?
Fortunately, the answer to that is quickly apparent as the lift shudders to a stop and the doors open - treating the occupants to eye level with what is unmistakably a Mazin's face, but the size of, at the very least, a small house, the layers of its armour plating clearly visible to the naked eye. Fortunately, the lenses of its eyes are dull, and it shows no signs of movement.
It is still the head (and, looking down, full body) of a Mazinger so gigantic that any officially-deployed Mazin of the Research Institute could function as its cranial control vehicle.
Looking up at the titan under the mountain, Koji says, with all the gravitas the name demands: "Mazinger Infinity."
<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.
As the doors open, Liam steps out of the lift, his boots clanking on the scaffold. His eyes narrow a little as he glances into the cavern, but he doesn't seem to recognize the behemoth on-sight. It's big, and shadowed, and--
Recognition hits. That's an eye. That's an eye the size of a bus, if not larger. Liam's jaw falls open as he pieces together the rest of the face. He stares at it as Koji pronounces its name.
"Director Yumi," Liam says, with a startled twitch that quickly evens out into rapt attention. "I'm all right," he says. But the trivialities of why he is all right can wait when there's an anomalous behemoth right there in front of them. "It--really did?" The thought is at once amazing and horrifying. "I can... see you'd want to avoid a panic."
Liam's face tightens at the mention of Atrytone and her backup. "I'd... consider it exposed already," he says, with a grim little frown. "If it's a Mazin, then... how is it controlled?"
<Pose Tracker> Roux Louka has posed.
Roux frowns at the news of this - Thing. This thing that appeared inexplicably. "Last January," she echoes, in thought... and she then smiles at Sayaka, a little wanly, meeting her gaze for a moment. "Thank you," she answers quietly.
There may have been a passing sparkle.
Especially when she lowers her eyelashes, which are also unusually glossy and perfect, having, perhaps, been deliberately groomed by a specialist. "Oh... if you can find time, Sayaka, I've been staying there nearly a week, cumulatively, so far. At that point I get a half-day spa pass for a guest... would you like to come? Of course, for you, they might not even charge. Especially if you're willing to give them your endorsement..."
There are like four passing sparkles on that one.
Nearly all of the glamour erodes when the lift opens and Roux comes eye to eye with what is absolutely not Mazinger Z, nor Great Mazinger, nor anything else, and which is also obviously -- once she sees some gantryway for scale -- not simply *very close*. "Oh my god!!!" Roux exclaims. "Koji!! This thing's like a second SDF 1 and it *looks like Mazinger!!*" Most of the glamour is gone, although even so, Roux raises both hands as if to half-veil her face. She seems aghast.
"Was - was the earthquake bad? When it appeared, I mean? I know Mount Fuji's a volcano but--"
Roux steps forwards, looking up and around. "Did Atrytone send some kind of agent down an emergency exit or something?? Was there an agent on the inside??"
<Pose Tracker> Sayaka Yumi has posed.
Sayaka nods at the weight of the name Mazinger Infinity. "A Mazinger with unlimited potential. If a Mazinger can be a god or a devil.. this has far surpassed both."
As for Liam's next question, that one is pretty easy to answer. "You might've seen Lisa around. Blue hair, unquenchable curiosity. In truth... she's the control interface for Infinity. We found her around the same time. So theoretically, Lisa is required to control Infinity. So long as we keep her safe at all costs..." Sayaka explains. "No one should be able to control Infinity."
Sayaka manages a slight smile for Roux as well, first time today. "A spa, hmm? I could absolutely go for that. Although... it's going to have to be really good to get my endorsement." She concludes, proudly.
The earthquake... Sayaka considers that for a moment. "I don't recall there was an earthquake.. like we said, it appeared as though it always was there, even though we know it wasn't."
"Mmm. Seemed like she was just a distraction, while she had a squad inside. Shiro and the Third Company fought them off but.. not before they saw this."
<Pose Tracker> Koji Kabuto has posed.
"Sayaka, Bro!" Shiro Kabuto announces himself, joining the group with two of his officers, before coughing and correcting himself. "I mean... Director, Doctor Kabuto: We've completed our sweep, no sign of any more hostile machines in the mine. I'm gonna keep a squad on standby down here for a couple weeks, though, just in case."
Koji nods. "Thanks, Shiro." he motions to their guests for introductions. "You remember Roux, of course. This is Liam, one of NERV's pilots."
The younger man (twenty-two to Koji's twenty-seven) grins and nods, tapping a thumb to his chest as he introduces himself. "Shiro Kabuto, OCU Ichinana Corps third company captain. Lookin' good, Roux! Did you hit up the 'Photon Therapy Spa' or somethin'?"
Koji chuckles a little. "Shiro, what's your team's tactical analysis of what went down?"
Shiro stops slouching and takes on a more professional demeanour. "Right. Post-engagement analysis of the situation indicated that Atrytone was commanding a team of three Arm Slaves who gained access to the facility under ECS. Incredible camo, works on basically every frequency, but can't extend to anything the machine picks up, so we only really knew they were there once they'd managed to reach the Japanium stores and started grabbing as much as they could carry. Fortunately, that also meant they couldn't really use weapons effectively, so the damage they did to the scaffolding and gantries was... enough to hamper us but not totally disastrous. The worst we took was the loss of a Scrander pod here and there from bodyblocking their escape route, since they prioritised escape over engagement."
"How's Lisa doing?"
"She's trying to help repair Z, last I checked." Shiro glances to Sayaka as she mentions the girl. "Should I call her up here?"
"... No, if she's down in the Old Lab hangar it'll take a while for her to get up to the Plant. Besides, I don't want to dump too much at once on the people we're pulling in on this."
"Mm, gotcha."
Koji nods. "The first time I came down here to look at Infinity personally, it activated for a brief moment... and sort of... extruded her? There was a flash of light and she emerged from that crystalline structure in its forehead." He points. "Her name's apparently short for 'Large intelligent Systems Agent'."
"And, yeah, there wasn't an earthquake or any sign of the rock being moved around it, at all, and we've never found Mycenaean ruins down here before, either. Simply put: There was nothing to find until there was."
"Still finding your theory a bit big to swallow, bro," Shiro says, shrugging.
<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.
Shiro gets Liam's attention the moment he speaks. "Captain Kabuto," the cyborg says, a smile lighting up his face despite the grave subject at hand. "Glad you're well." He means it. It wasn't that long ago that someone tried to murder him. At least that trend continued during the incursion. "They knew the Japanium was here," Liam says, putting a hand to his mouth in thought. "Did they know this was here, too, or was it... a happy accident for them?"
Sayaka drops another bomb. Liam's seen Lisa around, of course, said hello, introduced himself--but he didn't know she was a /construct/, much less... "She's in danger," he says. "At least--we can't rule it out. That is..." Liam starts to metaphorically backpedal. "If she appeared not long after Infinity, Atrytone might put the two together."
<Pose Tracker> Roux Louka has posed.
'She's the control interface for Infinity.' This seems to shock Roux subtly, even if she doesn't do more than look as if she wants to gasp - doesn't gasp - and looks away for several seconds.
Roux is calmed by the time Sayaka finishes her explanation to Liam. Roux's guard and tension is mostly gone. "I think it's the equal of anywhere I went in the Jupiter Sphere, and they're loaded out there," Roux states, "but you might know better than I.~"
See? Tilde. She's fine.
Frowning at the rest of the scenario, Roux's expression lightens when Shiro arrives. "Wow! - The very same," she continues, "it's amazing, I'm staying at the hotel there. I think they want to give me a special rate." She doesn't explain why. Maybe that won't be continuing depending on how messed up the situation is. Then again...
"Ugh," Roux says at the news. "Illusionary disguises... give me a break. That's the kind of thing she'd probably think is clever, but where do you just GET that? I don't think the Federation's going to let you just buy that at Honest Ahmed's."
"... Extruded...? Was it like a cryogenic pod, or -- oh," Roux continues, frowning in thought. She glances at Liam, then Sayaka, with mild skepticism at Koji's acronymic statement.
"... Could it have been disguised somehow? Like optic camo that... failed or got broken by some other mining?" Roux asks, hesitantly.
"Well," Roux says, raising an index finger, "that's the thing, unless you *hear* it, there's no direct way to connect them, right? I mean, I'd assumed she was an intern from Europe you were fond of," Roux tells Koji in particular directly in front of Sayaka for some reason, "or something like that-- I haven't had the chance to meet her, though I saw her at that meeting when I did the Londo Bell assessment, we didn't really talk."
<Pose Tracker> Sayaka Yumi has posed.
"Shiro!" Sayaka greets the younger Kabuto, and isn't phased a bit when he goes for the first name. He's family. "That's good to hear, though. It'll be a lot safer with your squad keeping watch I'm sure."
The mention of Roux's spa recommendation being "photon therapy" gets a raised eyebrow. "Guess I'll really have to see if it's the real deal, huh?" A small grin towards Roux.
Sayaka nods at Shiro's analysis of the situation.. geez, near-perfect camo is going to be tricky to deal with if Asciel decides to keep being a constant thorn in their side. And to Liam.. "I doubt she knew about Infinity. She seemed.. shocked by its existence.. maybe even scared, seeing as her squad immediately opened fire at it," she glances at Shiro. "And even assumed we were secretly using it to generate Photon Power." And back to Koji. "I suppose that sounds the more parsimonious explanation than Koji's, but.." It's the truth, nonetheless.
Liam also notes that Lisa is in danger. "For sure, but.. she's definitely tougher than she looks, too. Maybe it's not so surprising that an entity that came from Infinity is powerful in her own right though."
Roux's mention of what she thought Lisa was also gets a major eyebrow raise. "I mean she does insist on calling him Master no matter how many times I informed her how inappropriate it sounds." Sayaka crosses her arms. "But the real reason is that for some reason, Lisa's systems recognized Koji as the administrator."
<Pose Tracker> Koji Kabuto has posed.
"Optical camouflage wouldn't affect its mass or density, which is what a geological survey detects; the difference in densities allows us to make predictions about the material composition of the mountain and direct the mining teams to find new seams of Japanium." Koji walks over to one of the computers set up in the research site. "Here's our scan from the fifteenth of January, the day before we discovered Infinity."
The mountain looks totally normal.
"Here's our scan from the sixteenth." And there's the silhouette of Infinity. "tectonic activity should have meant we discovered it a lot sooner than we did, if it had always been there to discover."
"And here comes the wacky part," Shiro quips, nodding to Liam. Koji looks like he'd throw a wad of paper at his younger brother if he had one to hand, but settles for: "I am hypothesising that large amounts of Photon Power allows one to affect the boundary between neighbouring dimensions and move through them possibly by converting energy directly into matter, and vice versa. Either way, I basically had only this anomaly to go on insofar as supporting evidence..."
He looks more serious. "Until Tsutsujidai also appeared out of nowhere in a form it didn't have before."
"Fortunately, there's nothing about Lisa that suggests any relation to Photon Power, let alone Infinity, apart from a weird physical change that she hasn't expressed since she emerged - her hair and eyes radiated Photon Power emission. Without knowing the conditions by which that happened, we can't predict if it'll emerge under other circumstances."
"Speaking of emissions, check the readings here; even though Infinity seems dormant, its reactor is constantly giving off passive energy about equivalent to one of our industrial-scale manufacturing reactors running at full tilt. If we wanted to, we could hook the Fuji grid up to it and run the entire city trivially. We're not doing that in part because we don't even know for sure how this thing got here, much less why, and because we're obligated to release pretty much every operational detail of the city reactors to the public, so we'd have to explain where all the extra power came from."
<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.
Liam turns to the indicated terminal, and watches as Koji displays the two sets of data. His lips curl in a frown at the sight of that silhouette. Like Tsutsujidai, he thinks--though he keeps that thought silent until Koji looks at him, and then says it out loud. Liam allows himself a moment of pride. "Tsutsujidai was... formed from something called the Cognitive Plane, I think?" He's not clear on the details. "Did this come from the same place, you think? It extruded itself from there into our dimension?"
"Best not to wake the sleeping giant," Liam adds. "For everyone's sake."
<Pose Tracker> Roux Louka has posed.
(Roux's eyes narrow at Sayaka, at the challenge of the spa. It's a friendly narrowing. "I guess you will...!!")
Roux's lips thin as the question of Lisa calling Koji ~master~ comes up, but other than a glance, she does not judge too hard. It sounds, at least, conditionally something LISA is doing, not that KOJI is doing or encouraging, or Sayaka would have just taken off her shoe and beat him to death right there.
So Roux thinks. She examines the records, which are not that close to her, before she asks Koji, "Would you trust Miss M- excuse me, she'll beat me to death with a shoe. SAYLA with this information? I can take a drive back to her when I leave, if you want... I probably shouldn't push it up or if Atrytone is watching, she'd notice." Or someone else.
"Do you think Infinity is connected to Tsutsujidai then?" Roux asks, scratching her cheek. She then frowns for a moment at the news of this enormous source of power, which has only just now APPEARED. "Yeah that would be a bad idea," Roux says.
Liam drops a minor bomb. "From the cognitive plane?" Roux asks. "So you're saying -- I mean, it just got THOUGHT into existence? By who?"
"Atrytone's a weird one," Roux says, then. "I talked to her, once. Like she called me, like I'd ENCOURAGED to do her if she wanted to actually understand people and not just do the Neo Zeon rhetorical twist thing. She was alright, but... it really felt like she was tense and anxious? She just didn't relax. Like she was quoting something a lot of the time."
Roux gestures with one hand. "Honestly it was this sort of endearing cuteness mixed with creepy intensity."
<Pose Tracker> Koji Kabuto has posed.
"Well, that's the big question, Roux - and maybe if we can figure out that we can find some answers, or answers to other things might point a clue as to who thought Infinity into existence. So far, though, all I really have to go on is that the phenomenon of Something appearing out of apparently Nowhere is similar. We're in that equal-parts-exciting-and-frustrating part of pushing the scientific frontier where we can observe inexplicable things happening but we still need to develop the tools to actually analyse those phenomena. We can observe the developments but we don't have any way to actually reproduce them yet."
"Sayla is on the list of people we should bring in on this, and she's pretty close to the Tsutsujidai side of it, so it's something we might be able to get a lead on. 3G have also been looped in on this, as has Administrator Nagisa from NERV, but other than that we're being careful about who we tell. Obviously I'd like to ask the two of you to maintain the same discretion. Might have to bring the Brave Police in too just in case Atrytone becomes a recurring threat."
<Pose Tracker> Sayaka Yumi has posed.
Koji goes into his theory, and Shiro teases him about the outlandish nature of it. "It's a theory built on nothing more than other theories." Sayaka nods, when Koji admits he had limited supporting evidence. And then she considers Tsutsujidai. "I wasn't involved in Tsutsujidai the way Koji or the scientists over at GGG were. But it certainly does tell us that there is much we can't explain with our current theories yet." She cedes.
And at the notion that Infinity could potentially be used to power the entire city, Sayaka shakes her head. "Atrytone is right about one thing... that would be a disaster waiting to happen." She explains in regards to the decision to NOT do that. "Besides, we're doing a fine enough job of it without Infinity." Another slight smile.
"I trust her too," Sayaka agrees with Koji on the subject of bringing Sayla into this. Someone like her, being involved with Tsutsujidai and having the connections she does, might be a good help."
"She was weird, wasn't she?" Sayaka crosses her arms at the thought of Atrytone. "Honestly, during the battle, I thought she was just trying to push everyone's buttons." And it worked - Sayaka is prone to getting fired up in battle. "Once I sat down and thought about it... yeah, you're right. She seemed tense.. maybe even anxious. About the potential of Photon Power." A wry smile as she adds, "Can't say her latest discovery will do much to ease that."
<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.
"Akane did," Liam says, "I think. It joined with this dimension when Anti tried to tell her she was being used." Through a kaiju deployment, but kaiju are one of the many languages of the desperate and unheard. But maybe... Roux is asking about this, and not Tsutsujidai. The mention of Dr. Mass earns a quizzical frown--she did relief work there, but... this doesn't need that kind of touch, does it? And what Roux says about Atrytone...
"I know she wants to help--claims to, anyway. But..." Liam trails off as he's reminded of how angry he got on the field. He looks away, at the vast, imposing Devil-face of Infinity.
"Director Yumi," he says, at long last. "Doctor Kabuto. I did... have questions for you. Not about this. Another dimensional phenomenon associated with specific kaiju, and an occult conspiracy summoning them into this world." A pause. Liam looks Sayaka square in the eye, worry creasing his face. "Do you anything at all about this? Or about Captain Yuliana Kafim of the REA?"
<Pose Tracker> Roux Louka has posed.
"Alright," Roux says to echo Sayaka. "I'll take it to her when I leave Japan. I don't think I'm going to have any trouble if I take a transpolar route, right?" Yes, she's gonna fly her nuclear powered mobile suit!!
What? Is that so weird?
Her lips purse at the prospect of Atrytone being a recurring threat. "I don't want to say the Newtype word, but I had this weird feeling when I was fighting her in space... It feels like she's taking a lot of burdens on her self? Like it's a kind of childish thing, honestly, though obviously I don't want to just say that if I'm trying to get through to someone, most people don't appreciate that."
A beat or two. "This was even before Photon Power came up!"
Back to Liam, who says some shit that Roux barely accepts as true and that mostly on social pressure. They WERE there, right? ("Oh I live with her," Roux explains about Sayla to Liam, which probably gives him future bad ideas.) "... Alright... well, I suppose you could ask her if she did this," back to Koji, "but I don't know if you could do that without telling her where it is. Even if I or Sayla did it, she's pretty smart, right?"
A beat passes.
Roux frowns with sufficient sorrow that it crosses through 'regular Roux expression' and re-enters a sorrowful glamourous expression. Damn that facial treatment. "... I still can't believe it... I thought she had that wedding in the back of beyond because her wife wanted to be spooky. But I guess she's really learned... SOMETHING."
<Pose Tracker> Sayaka Yumi has posed.
Sayaka listens to Roux, who's had past experience with Atrytone. "Barring the feelings associated with it, I definitely got that sense, too. Mostly when she pointed out Koji and I as the 'sole defenders' of Japan or some nonsense.. and seemed to imply that is a burden for herself instead." Sayaka shakes her head. "I don't understand her at all.. but maybe I will if she keeps being a pain in our sides."
"Yuliana Kafim... I know a thing or two," Sayaka nods Liam's way. "We were invited to that wedding of hers, too." Sayaka looks to Koji for a moment.
"And when that kaiju appeared in JOSH-A, I was assisting as a civilian contractor. I was not expecting a good old fashioned kaiju fight but.. I definitely got the sense that something was wrong." And so did the Japanium in the Ichinana, apparently.
"The Photon Power Labs also helped uncover a human experimentation lab in the REA.. who had their hold on Yuliana Kafim. Some of her lieutenants escaped but.. we don't really have a good idea about where they, or she went."
Sayaka also keeps the deal with Leina, to protect the crystal after the kaiju attack, as well as Banagher and Mineva themselves unsaid. She'd rather not let information about whereabouts spread, even with good intentions.
She turns to look towards Liam more directly. "What makes you ask, though? Don't tell me you've gotten involved in it, too..." It's mostly out of concern; it seems dangerous enough business, and disturbing too.
<Pose Tracker> Koji Kabuto has posed.
"I think Atrytone is frightened of 'miracle powers' like Photon Power," Koji says. "The way she talked about using... whatever that power source she has is, to destroy all others like it... It's similar to the logic behind the Ruin Apostles, Triple Zero's assertion that the use of miracles by intelligent life will cause the universe to stagnate instead of collapsing and being reborn. She clearly doesn't want to wipe out humanity, though, she's casting herself as some kind of... shepherd, or steward, I guess? Protecting us from ourselves. I get this vibe from her that she's maybe a Super AI who's working off some flawed schema as her foundation, but that's only because she sounds so young for how she presents, and from how she was talking to Officer J-Decker during the fight."
"I could ask miss Shinjo what she understood about Tsutsujidai's nature. I don't want to push her too hard, though, we worked really hard to drag her out of that horrible situation and I'd hate to cause a backslide."
Liam brings up Yuliana Kafim and Koji frowns. "She invited us to her wedding, which was, uh, a spectacle. Her wife, Elisa I think? Ended up fighting off an attacker, and whatever power she was using to do that stalled our Ichinana's reactor for half a second - like the Japanium stopped reacting to the energetic stimulus, or the emission was being blocked, or... something. We still have the machine quarantined, I think? It was right before things got complicated with Tsutsujidai."
<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.
"When she's ready for it," Liam says, to Koji. "She's making progress. She did... want to talk to /someone/. She mentioned Dr. Shishioh by name, but he's..." Indisposed. Triple Zero.
The wedding. Liam knew Yuliana had married, but...
The young man's eyes darken with concern as Roux leads off, and it only gets worse from there. The kaiju attack. The labs. The fact that Elisa can /somehow/ stall out an alleged infinite energy source. Liam is silent until Sayaka asks her question.
"Lucine and I were..." The horror is sinking in, now. If Elisa is complicit in the conspiracy, and not just a creepy coincidental red herring, then... "Targeted. Invited to the Frontier the day the first dragon appeared. While I was in Tsutsujidai, Lucine was ambushed, the Dianthus was stolen. Yuliana is--was?--the only lead we have."
<Pose Tracker> Roux Louka has posed.
"That place was a horror show," Roux says, distantly. "I'm glad they're all being helped, now." After this she looks at Liam, with a slightly wan smile. "Well, I suppose she's with her wife! ... Wherever they went."
After a little more time, Roux turns her head to look towards Koji and say, "Hold up though, go back. You think she's a Super-AI? I thought she was just doing a cutie-poo voice to flirt or something, or because she'd gotten screwed up somehow!"
"I suppose it's kinder than what I was starting to think," Roux continues, with another sorrowful look, "which was just that she was thinking like an -- I mean, like the Titans or something. Gotta stop anything unexpected from happening, or else the order we're on top of might get upset."
<Pose Tracker> Sayaka Yumi has posed.
"Definitely," Sayaka agrees grimly with Roux. "But yeah. I'm glad they all have better lives to look forward to." Each of them had their own individual plights, and while those won't be solved right away, there's at least a better chance at doing so any place BUT that lab.
"We never did get a look at who was inside that Arm Slave, remember. Being a Super AI.. it's actually pretty plausible.. considering how she spoke to Officer J-Decker like they were kin, at least." She answers Roux's shock about Atrytone maybe being a Super AI. "But we can't know for sure unless we get more info on her.. the Brave Police might be able to get a lead." She can't say Roux's perspective, comparing it to the Titans, is wrong exactly.
Finally, a worried look at Liam as he explains he was... targeted?? "Hmm. From that info, the only guess I can make is that she was after the Dianthus." Sayaka can't say she knows anything about that mech or why it would be desirable. But if it was stolen... "If we find any sort of lead on Yuliana, we'll let you know then. For now.. just be careful. Especially if the Dianthus paints a giant target on your backs."
<Pose Tracker> Koji Kabuto has posed.
"It's a maybe, but... the way she talked about things, that top-down perspective on 'managing lives'. It sounded like a computer's perspective to me. Maybe I just hung around the 3G Super Mechanoids too much back in the day, but..." He shrugs. "Something to consider, at least - I know 3G cared a lot about making sure the Brave Robo Corps were 'raised right', so if Atrytone self-actualized as an accident like Minerva X did, her developers wouldn't have been able to prepare like 3G did." The photographs of EnRyu and HyoRyu's AI blocks getting kindergarten education and human socialisation are adorable but not a procedure Koji expects to be standardised, especially given how suppressed Super AI fields are.
"... We should figure out how we're going to keep our promise to Minerva, Sayaka." Once more, things left un-done in the past rear their heads to bother Koji.
"That said, ultimately? It shakes out the same as the Titans - suppressing the dreams and hopes of humans in order to maintain an 'ideal' stability?" He shakes his head. "And then you start looking at people like they're just numbers on a spreadsheet, and it becomes easier and easier to justify atrocities in the name of 'preserving the peace'..."
"After the lengths we went through to get just one person out of an abusive mess, it would be wrong to turn the world over to that kind of perspective."
He frowns when Liam mentions being 'targeted'. "Captain Kafim has always been... pleasant, to me, but in a weirdly intense way? She reminded me of Tetsuya's issues when he was younger a lot - someone who was a little too into being a weapon. Relishing her work as a soldier a little too much. Plus, y'know, all the national intelligence work on keeping the REA's fingers out of stuff like the Research Institute, and our own counter-espionage teams, give us a lot to be concerned about. At the wedding, though, Sayaka and I both got massive Ashura vibes from how the happy couple were monologuing; that alone had us on high alert, to say nothing of the reactor issues."
<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.
Liam's hands tense and fidget a little at his sides as talk turns to the Titans, and the possibility of Atrytone being a constructed intelligence. "Need more evidence," he murmurs, though he's clearly not talking about just that. So they know Elisa has powers of her own beyond making random flowers bloom, but...
Liam's hands clench into fists. "She tried to help me," she says. "Told me I had to take control, or be used up. She's like me, except... that lab. The REA lab. They did something to her in there and I don't know /what/, but she can't--she can't just be a Cyber-Newtype who went wrong." Pause. Breathe. "Can't watch the videos. But... I have to know. Have to know what happened to her. We have to make this stop."
<Pose Tracker> Roux Louka has posed.
"Yeah, well," Roux huffs with a hand going to her hip, "I had Mr. I speak for space talk around me while grandstanding his way to free MS repairs, and I don't need anyone else telling me how to live my life. God! I feel like she suckered me." ("It's off topic but I need to tell you guys about Full Frontal," Roux tells Koji and Sayaka, although habitually, this sounds like she's going to complain about him, even if he threatened to nuke Earth or something.)
"She was pleasant to me too," Roux says. "I thought her vibes were weird, but I had pitched in when somebody raided an REA facility near the coast... I'd been rotating through for Londo Bell stuff. I guess that's how I got on the guest list."
A pause.
"People don't give speeches at their weddings on Earth?" Roux asks Koji. "I thought --"
She looks at Sayaka for validation. (Number of Earth weddings Roux has attended: One. Number of Neo-Bollywood films featuring a prominent wedding scene Roux has seen: Twenty-six.)
There's a pause as Liam speaks.
"We'll find out," Roux then says, because whatever occurred to her doesn't answer his heart. "We're still sifting through all that data. It might be something cutting edge or criminal - sometimes people don't write down the key information. It could be held against them... or it could make them superfluous, get them replaced. But we're as smart as them, and there's better motives."
Roux thinks about the Shuffle Alliance in the back of her mind.
Hopefully, she amends, with a miniscule seasoning of guilt.
<Pose Tracker> Sayaka Yumi has posed.
Koji's explanation for Atrytone being a Super AI makes a lot of sense. And... the mention of Minerva X gets Sayaka to look wistful. A big part of her still remembers how it happened by her hand. "...I haven't forgotten." She nods slowly.
And then she turns her focus back to the Kafim wedding. "Absolutely, major Baron Ashura vibes, and-" Roux questions whether it's normal to have speeches in weddings. "Yes but.. theirs were so -- weird. Definitely supervillain type monologue. Hence the Ashura comparison." She points out, slightly jokingly exasperated.
As for Liam... oogh, that's a lot more difficult. Like Roux, she can't make promises. "There's a lot of people who want the same thing as you." She states, thinking of how hard Leina is fighting for her. "Like Roux said, we'll find out. And at the very least, we can do our best to make sure that no one can be hurt that way anymore." It's easy to say you want it to stop.. action is the harder part. So despite her sympathetic look Liam's way, she still can't make any promises about Yuliana.