#AND GUESS WHAT!? she actually deleted said data from our reach | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

lockefanfic · 4 years

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Business Trip: Pt 17 - Interrogation

The fact that there was an actual interrogation going on in the next-door interrogation room was probably the hottest thing about the whole situation.

You notice that the police officer in the cold, sterile room is questioning a heavily tattooed, scary looking dude, but that’s pretty much all the attention you give the scene, given that Park Jihyo was doing her best to distract you.

She distracted you partially with her cute, pretty face, her large, round eyes that seemed like they were always shining with some inner light, making the room brighter just with their presence. Then there was her cute button nose, her wide, blinding smile, and her short haircut that only added to the alluring cute sexiness that she exuded with every movement.

But she mostly distracted you with her breasts.

“Bae Irene is still on the loose, and finding her is our top priority.”

Your statement draws looks and nods of agreement from the women in the room, each of them determined in their own way to finding the mastermind behind the recent attacks on your company. The fact that two of Red Velvet’s members were now currently behind bars did little to dull their desire to bring its leader to justice, especially now that they had escalated things beyond mere corporate espionage and into the realm of physical assault.

Three days have passed since your successful plan to capture Wendy and Joy. You are joined in the large boardroom of JYP’s Seoul office by Momo, Choa, Seolhyun,and Jeongyeon; on a video conference monitor on the wall is Mina, joining into the meeting from back home. Her legal expertise was likely to be important in the days to come.

“Jeongyeon,” you continue, addressing the young IT specialist who had played a key role in trapping Wendy and Joy, “were you able to find anything in Red Velvet’s data that might lead us to her?”

“No,” she replies with a disturbed look on her small face, “it’s kind of crazy - there’s nothing on Red Velvet’s servers that is related to her at all. There are obvious gaps of missing data, especially in data that has a chronological sequence… but some entire files are missing.”

“What do you mean, missing? Is her data on a separate server?” Seolhyun asks. She was the head of JYP’s Seoul office now, following the retirement of her superior; she was just as determined as anyone to find Irene given Red Velvet was operating literally in her own backyard.

“I don’t know where it is. My theory is that when we established the connection to Red Velvet’s servers, it automatically triggered a program or subroutine that deleted everything related to Irene. She must have been prepared for something like this to happen and she had contingency plans in place in case her underlings got caught.”

“That bitch didn’t even give a damn about deleting her other members’ data,” Momo points out with a sneer, “some leader she is.”

“Keep digging, Jeongyeon,” you say as you give her an encouraging look, “maybe you’ll find something in one of the other members’ files that can help us out.”

Jeongyeon manages a smile, and you are surprised for a split second by how cute her determined look was; you rarely saw or had a chance to work with her, buried deep in JYP HQ’s IT floor as she usually was. But now that you had a chance to really spend some time with her, you found yourself attracted to her geeky, tomboy appeal.

“We should interrogate Wendy and Joy,” Momo says, eager as any of you for any chance to strike back at Red Velvet, “if we tell them their boss didn’t do anything to save their asses they might be more willing to sell her out.”

“I’m afraid that’s not possible,” Mina adds through the video conference feed, “not legally possible, anyway. We’re not law enforcement officers, and now that they’re under the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency’s custody, we can’t touch them. Any interrogation of those two will have to come from the SMPA. Considering the number of crimes Red Velvet has been involved in, it’s likely we’ll be waiting awhile before any interrogation relating to JYP even begins.”

Momo seems disappointed at Mina’s answer - she was really chomping at the bit to get at those two, and a small part of you takes comfort in the fact that perhaps it was because they had hurt you.

“I’ll speak to Detective Park at the SMPA today. Maybe she can give us a few minutes with them if we’re lucky,” you suggest. You were eager to meet with Park Jihyo again, if for no other reason than to thank her for her part in rescuing you three days ago.

“Then what about Sana and Tzuyu?” Momo says, “they received their orders directly from Irene when they pulled their little Taiwan stunt. Maybe they might know something that can help us.”

Momo’s tone is neutral, although you knew that she still harboured some resentment towards Tzuyu and especially towards Sana for what they did in Taiwan with Seolhyun’s company data. As much as you appreciated her eagerness in finding Irene and making her pay for what she did to you, you knew anyone that questioned Sana and Tzuyu would need a clear head. Her history with Sana would clearly compromise any questioning she did to the other Japanese girl.

“I’ll take care of that,” Mina offers, saving you from having to tell Momo that she couldn’t question the two ex-SM employees, “They’re still back here at home anyway. I’ll get some questions ready and question them in the next day or two.”

“Good, do that and report back when you’ve spoken to them,” you say, “maybe they’ll still have some contact information or something like that… A phone number, an email address, anything. Momo, you, Seolhyun, and Choa can help Jeongyeon comb through all the Red Velvet data and try to find anything that might lead to Irene. I’m sure Jeongyeon can use the help.”

“There’s terabytes of stuff to go through,” Jeongyeon adds with a sigh, “those girls were busy. There are records of at least a few dozen instances of extortion and blackmail, each with hours of recordings and video.”

“Great, let’s get to work. Let’s meet up back here tonight at 10 and we can get some drinks. It’s been a rough few days. Maybe it’ll help us cool off.”

Your team nods, and each of you head off with determined looks on your faces.

---

The other women have left to start their respective tasks, and Momo is the last to leave the room. As she steps out of the boardroom you grab her lightly by her arm.

“Momo, I was hoping we could talk.”

She had stayed by your hospital bedside for every single minute you were there, refusing to go home or even eat until Choa reminded her to do so. Thankfully whatever drug Joy had knocked you out with had no permanent effects, and you were discharged after three days of observation by hospital staff.

The whole time the two of you didn’t really speak about your relationship; she was too busy taking care of you despite your insistence that you were fine, helping you eat, fluffing your pillows or finding magazines or books for you to pass the time with. Every moment she spent with you only increased your affection for her, and your desire to talk to her about what had happened with Sana.

The two of you hadn’t slept together since the ordeal, not for lack of effort on your part. Momo refused your advances, however, as difficult as it was for her to not give in. She said it was so that you could concentrate on recovering, although you knew it was partially because she was teasing you, and partially because she wanted to punish you.

Momo responds to your request to talk with a sigh, although you could tell it wasn’t because she was dreading the prospect.

“Can we… wait until all this is over? I want to talk to you too, but I can’t relax until that bitch is behind bars,” she responds, her voice soft.

You nod slowly, happy to give her the time and space she needed.

“I… I’m happy you’re here, Momo,” you tell her, eager to tell her something, anything, that conveyed how you felt about her, “...And I’m happy you’re in my life,” you add, not quite knowing where the words were coming from - they were out of your mouth before you knew it. It was your heart speaking, you guessed.

Momo smiles softly, her large, round eyes boring into your very soul, rendering you speechless as they so often did.

“After drinks with the girls tonight I want to fuck so hard we have to call in sick tomorrow,” she says with a smile, eliciting giggles from the both of you, “I bet you’re really backed up, what with an entire three days without sex.”

Classic Momo, interrupting an emotional moment with the topic of sex. You reach for her hand and are thankful for her presence in your life. Your fingers intertwine with hers.

You spend a long minute there in silence, the two of your sharing soft smiles with each other, happy for a moment of quiet following the recent storm that the two of you had weathered together. Eventually Momo steps close and gives you a peck on the lips before turning and rejoining the rest of your team.

You watch her leave, the smile still on your lips.

---

You had expected the Seoul Metropolitan Police Agency’s Cybercrime Division to be hidden away in some corner of the large central Seoul precinct, but you were surprised by what you found when Detective Park led you through the glass sliding doors into her department; a hyper modern, super advanced open concept office that seemed to have more screens and monitors in once place than you had ever seen in your entire life.

“Korea is one of the most connected countries in the world,” Jihyo states as she leads you through the busy department, “and as such cybercrime is a huge deal for us, especially here in the capital.”

All around you officers are glued to monitors or busy typing away on their phones. Everywhere tablets, smartphones, and laptops have taken the place of charts, notebooks and notepads. Truly this was the police department of the future.

“Please,” Jihyo says as she invites you into her office that is tucked into a corner of the floor. She closes the door behind you as you step in, and she motions for you to sit in the seat in front of her desk with an exaggerated servant’s flourish. The young detective had a cheerful, bright charisma about her that made her easy to get along with.

“I wanted to thank you personally, detective,” you start, “for your role in what happened earlier this week. We weren’t expecting them to drug me, so it was good that you and your men have such impeccable timing.”

“The pleasure is all mine,” Jihyo responds, “as you know Red Velvet has been a thorn in our sides for years. I’m glad they’ve finally been put to justice.”

“Most of them, anyway.”

“Most of them, anyway,” Jihyo echoes, catching on to what you are saying.

“My team is hard at work combing through what we’ve found on their servers. We’re hoping we’ll be able to find some trace of data that might lead us to Irene.”

Jihyo gives you a small, sly smile.

“You do realize,” she begins, “that Red Velvet’s data is official evidence. You’re not supposed to have any of it.”

“It would have been foolish of us to not make a copy before we handed it over to you,” you answer truthfully.

Jihyo gives you an exaggerated sigh as though she was disappointed in you, but you could tell she was being sarcastic.

“I’m going to pretend you didn’t just tell me that,” she says, her bright smile still on her round, cute face. When you first met her you were still technically drugged, but now that you had the chance to have a conversation under less stressful circumstances you were surprised to see how attractive she really was. She had a bright, cheerful aura about her that was somewhat at odds with the gravity of her position.

“Anyway, i was hoping you could help us with something.”

“What might that be?”

“We’d like to question Wendy and Joy. We believe if we tell them that Irene cut her losses and left them behind, they’d be willing to co-operate with us and perhaps provide us with information regarding her whereabouts.”

Jihyo’s smile widens, surprised that you had the audacity to ask for such a thing.

“That’s kind of illegal,” she answers, “they’re suspects for a crime that is being actively investigated. Their interrogation is under SMPA jurisdiction. My jurisdiction.”

“Then maybe we don’t have to question them. Maybe you’ll just happen to accidentally leave them in a room after hours and with any recording devices turned off…”

“...a room where you and your staff might be waiting?”

“You can’t stop what you don’t know is happening, Detective Park,” you finish.

Jihyo leans forward on her desk, bringing her hands together beneath her chin and interlacing her fingers.

“I understand your eagerness to find Irene,” she says, “but you know I can’t leave you alone with Wendy and Joy after what they did to you. I’m sure you’re a fine gentleman that wouldn’t hurt a woman, but I wish I could say the same for your girlfriend. She looked like she wanted to tear Wendy’s head off.”

“Momo is… passionate,” you admit.

“Dammit,” Jihyo hisses under her breath, her volume obviously loud enough for you to hear.

“Excuse me?”

“So she is your girlfriend. I was kinda hoping she was just a friend or especially concerned co-worker or something.”

You smile as you realize what Jihyo was implying. You decide to tease her a little, saying, “Detective Park, are you attracted to me? Are you disappointed that I have a girlfriend?”

“Noooo,” Jihyo answers, leaning back into her chair. Her cheeks turn a deep shade of pink. You smile smugly, liking where this was going.

“Well, I’ll have you know that Momo and I have… a relaxed relationship. Especially when it comes to other women.”

“I’ll have you know I’m not some easy girl that’s going to sleep with you just because your girlfriend lets you bang other women.”

“Who said anything about sleeping? There must be an interrogation room around here somewhere we can use…”

Jihyo grabs a pencil off her desk and throws it at you with a laugh, and you are happy to find that she has taken your joke for what it was. She maintains eye contact with you after you successfully deflect the projectile, a sly, alluring look on her features.

“Can you shoot?” she asks, out of the blue.

“Shoot… like, a gun?”

“No, shoot a damn basketball. We’re in a police station. Of course I mean guns.”

“Um, I can’t say ever shot a gun, although I’m pretty good with Widowmaker’s sniper rifle, if that’s the kind of gun you mean…”

Jihyo giggles before rising from her desk and tapping you on the shoulder on her way out of the office.

“Follow me,” she says, and you follow her eagerly.

---

Park Jihyo, it appeared, was quite the shot.

The pistol - a Daewoo K5, as Jihyo informed you - bucked violently in her hands that seemed so tiny by comparison, but she did an admirable job of handling the recoil of the weapon. More than admirable, it appeared, as she proudly showed you the close up shot of the target that was displayed on the tablet embedded into the wall of the firing range. Her smile was even brighter, it seemed, than it was earlier in her office.

“Cops rarely carry their sidearms on duty here in Korea,” she says as she makes her weapon safe, “and when we have to go on a raid in the field it’s usually only the SWAT guys that are carrying. But every now and then I like to sneak down here and let off a few mags to blow off steam.”

“You’ve clearly had a lot of practice. I dunno if I stand a chance here.”

“C’mon, give it a shot. All that Overwatch experience must mean something.”

You smile at her jab as you approach the firing booth and pick up the pistol, your first time handling any sort of firearm.

“Now take the long rectangular thing with the bullets in it - that’s called the magazine - and then put it in-”

You smile as you grasp the magazine and load the pistol, racking the slide back with your free hand as the pistol chambers a round.

“I’ve watched enough movies and fired enough virtual guns, thanks,” you retort, and Jihyo snorts in reply. She approaches you and you feel your senses tingle as she brings her arms around your torso. You are even more aroused by the feel of her chest pressing ever so slightly against your back. Her hands lift your forearms into the correct position.

“Shooting a real gun isn’t like clicking your mouse button,” she says matter-of-factly, “just breathe and pull the trigger back softly. You should feel a wall in the trigger. After that, the trigger will break and the gun will go off. Line up the rear and front sight, breathe out, pull the trigger…”

The pistol barks, and you both glance at the tablet that is relaying a live shot of the target downrange, looking for a bullet hole… that is totally absent.

“Did you… did you just miss the entire target? Damn, you suuuuuuck,” Jihyo teases.

“Just you wait,” you retort, “I just need some practice.”

The next fourteen rounds do little to back up your claim, but at least three of them manage to hit the paper, even if only one of those three actually lands in one of the target circles; the furthest one, at that.

“Apparently shooting a real gun isn’t like clicking my mouse button,” you say, echoing Jihyo’s earlier words and being rewarded with a throaty laugh from the detective. She steps into the booth with you to begin to fill another empty magazine with more rounds, and you tense suddenly at her close proximity.

“Maybe you just need motivation,” Jihyo says with a suddenly sultry tone.

“Maybe I do,” you agree.

“Maybe if you hit the three point circle with this next magazine, we find an interrogation room around here somewhere we can use.”

New motivation fills your veins, and you grasp the pistol in both hands as you load the newly filled magazine. Jihyo steps out of the booth, you line up your shot, and pull the trigger fifteen times.

You miss with every shot. Five miss the target altogether, eight hit the paper outside of the target circles. Two hit the five point circle, although you’re sure they were mostly fluky shots.

You eject the magazine and lay down the still smoking pistol. Jihyo retrieves it, the remaining ammunition, and your eye and ear protection and returns the equipment to the weapons storage room, replacing the lock and shutting down the range, a sly smile on her features all the while.

“Good thing there are consolation prizes,” she says with a tempting, alluring tone, taking you by the wrist and leading you out of the firing range.

---

The fact that there was an actual interrogation going on in the next-door interrogation room was probably the hottest thing about the whole situation.

But she mostly distracted you with her breasts.

She was well endowed, it went without saying, easily the largest of the women you’d slept recently. And you were practically drooling with anticipation, as at the moment they were still annoyingly encased in her strapless, white cotton bra, her blue and red checkered cardigan teasingly opened up to reveal her assets to your eager eyes.

Your lips are pressed to her neck, planting soft kisses on her smooth skin that elicit soft gasps from the young detective, and you find yourself happy, not for the first time, that the listening room was completely soundproof to the interrogation room. You move lower with your kisses, bending somewhat awkwardly at the waist now to bring your mouth closer and closer to the prize. You bring your hands up her sides, treasuring the feel of her warm skin beneath your palms as you eventually bring them to her chest and cup her bra-clad breasts.

Jihyo accommodates you by pressing her back up against the soundproof glass. The audacity of the action surprised you - there you were, devouring a young woman just a few feet away from a scary looking interrogation, the occupants of that room completely in the dark as to what was happening in the very next room.

Her back pressed against the glass, you are free to bend your neck further. Jihyo finally lets you have your consolation prize, if indeed this is what it was - she reaches behind her and undoes the latch to her strapless bra, letting the garment fall to the ground, her round, full breasts falling free as they finally escape their cotton prison.

You want to dive in, so to speak, but Jihyo pushes you back by your shoulders until you fall into the chair in the listening room. She straddles you quickly, and wasting no time, brings her chest to your face.

“Taste me,” she says, the words almost a hiss as they escape her lips.

You do just that, burying yourself quite literally in her breasts, taking her left breast first in your mouth, your tongue swirling over her already hardened nipple. Your left hand captures her right breast in its palm, squeezing the soft flesh gleefully, delighting in the feel of the large mound, happy to experience such a well endowed woman after months of smaller (but no less appealing) chests.

Jihyo leans her head back and lets out a long, low moan that gradually increases in volume as you explore more of her chest and as you deepen the sucking on her nipples. You switch after awhile, your mouth descending on her other breast, leaving her other saliva soaked nipple to be squeezed and fondled by your palm.

Momo was probably the next well endowed woman you’d been with, her breasts round and in perfect scale with the rest of her fit, slim body - but Jihyo was in another league entirely, her breasts large without being comically so, her nipples absolutely delicious, your tongue delighting in their pebbly hardness with each suck and stroke against the sensitive buds. You wanted to bury your face in her warm flesh, and you do just that, tearing your mouth from her nipple to press your face in her cleavage, delighting in the feel of her warm flesh on either cheek.

“You like my tits?” Jihyo says, although you both knew the answer.

“Fuck yes,” you answer, your voice muffled, rather pleasantly, by warm breasts.

“I’ll make you love them,” she answers, and you tingle with anticipation as Jihyo takes control, lifting herself from her straddling position until she is kneeling between your knees. Even as she looks up at you with those large, innocent looking eyes of hers, she is unbuckling your belt and hooking her fingers into your waistband, pulling your jeans and the boxers you are wearing underneath them down your hips, until they are down past your knees.

She immediately takes you into her mouth; without warning, without teasing. Other girls relished that few minutes of teasing, taking things slowly, working you with their hands and the tips of their tongues, making you squirm, making you wait, painfully, for them to take you into their mouth.

But Jihyo is not one of those girls, and as she continues to take you in and out of her wet, warm mouth, you thank god that she wasn’t, because you don’t think you could have waited a moment longer for her to begin. She is not as skilled as Seolhyun or Momo, but she makes up for it with sheer enthusiasm, swirling her tongue around your sensitive head and pumping your shaft with her closed fist.

You lean your head back in pleasure. In the interrogation room, things are getting heated, the cop appearing angered by something the gangster has said; little knowing one of his colleagues was in the listening room giving you a blowjob. You would have laughed, if you weren’t sighing out of pleasure.

Jihyo slowly winds down from her blowjob, and as it had only been a minute or so since she began you find yourself disappointed, especially since the pleasure was just beginning to build. But when she straightens her back, you realize why her blowjob was so short.

You know what she is about to do, but it does little to dim the anticipation of what is about to happen, nor does it lessen the pleasure when Jihyo leans forward and, taking each of her breasts in her hands, traps your erect shaft between her large mounds. Slowly, she grinds her chest against your pelvis, your slick shaft pumping in and out between her breasts, the saliva from her blowjob providing the perfect amount of lubrication, the head and upper half appearing and disappearing from between mounds of soft, warm flesh.

You are awestruck by the pleasure this brings, if for no other reason than because of the novelty of it - you’d never been with a woman endowed enough to even try this, and while you’d emptied yourself on plenty of womens’ chests after fucking, you’d yet to experience a titjob.

Jihyo tries, mostly in vain, to lick your head as it appears from between her breasts, only succeeding a little bit of the time, but each time her tongue makes contact with your head it sends shocks of pleasure shooting up and down your spine. The novelty, the pleasure, the fact that you were getting a titjob from a beautiful young detective while an interrogation was happening just a few feet away from you, it was a lot to take in, and it quickly became too much.

For long, pleasureable minutes, Jihyo continues to push your rock hard shaft in and out between her warm, slick breasts, her hands squeezing her flesh tightly around your cock, her fingers interlacing at her front to keep your cock from escaping the lovely embrace of her tits. She continues to try to lick the head of your cock sometimes, sometimes letting her head fall back and making eye contact with you through half-lidded, heavy, seductive eyes. It was all too much to handle.

“Fuck, Jihyo, that feels amazing.”

“Mmmmm?” she manages to reply, so absorbed she is in trying to lick your shaft as it appears between her breasts.

“Fuck… you’re gonna make me cum.”

“Then fucking cum,” Jihyo replies, returning her full attention to your pleasure, increasing her pace, squeezing her breasts even tighter around your thrusting shaft as it sinks and reappears from between her soft flesh mounds. She pumps her chest up and down faster, grinding her chest against you fast and faster, until you quickly see that edge, that edge from which there is no return.

“Fuck… Jihyo… I’m cumming!”

“Do it! Give me all your cum… give it to me… cum on my face… Cum on me! Cum all over me!”

Your orgasm strikes with the force of a thunderbolt, and you feel every single burst of semen as it erupts from your shaft, the first shot happening while your head was still covered by Jihyo’s breasts, sending hot, warm cum into her cleavage and further lubricating each subsequent thrust. You wonder if she is going to open her mouth to take the rest of your cum, but Jihyo instead leans her face back, letting the rest of your semen splash against her chin and face, the thick liquid spraying all over her cute, innocent features.

You weren’t usually one for giving girls facials, but there was something radically different about Jihyo. Maybe it was the environment, the fact that Jihyo was a law enforcement officer; maybe it was the gravity of the week’s earlier events; maybe it was the novelty, it being your first time receiving a titjob.

Whatever it was, you found yourself staring, awestruck, at Jihyo’s cum stained face as you finish sending your last few small streams of semen onto her chin and her upper chest, her grinding gradually slowing as your orgasm finally subsides.

Jihyo finally lets your shaft escape from her warm, wet cleavage, and she bends low to run her tongue along your shaft from its base to its tip, drawing shivers of sheer pleasure from your post-orgasm cock. She straightens her back, allowing you a perfect view of the semen splayed all over her large breasts, the smooth, perfect skin of her upper chest, and finally, the beautiful, innocent features of her cute face.

Jihyo brings her hands to her wet chest and begins rubbing the cum into her skin, lending it a shiny, slick appearance in the dim light of the listening room.

“It’s a shame you didn’t do better on the range,” she says with a sexiness you didn’t think the innocent young detective capable of.

“Oh yeah?” you manage to ask, “and what would’ve happen if I had done better?”

Jihyo smiles slyly as she captures a stream of dripping semen from her cheek and brings it to her mouth, tasting it as if it were some expensive delicacy at a five star restaurant.

“...All this cum would be in my pussy.”

---

You smile as you watch Jihyo join the other girls in the busy, swanky looking Seoul bar. Choa greets her with a warm hug, the two having worked closely together as they planned the capture of Wendy and Joy. With a warm smile the older girl introduces her to Seolhyun and Jeongyeon, who welcome the young detective warmly with smiles and a tall glass of beer.

A poke on your arm alerts you to Momo’s presence, two drinks in her hands as she offers one to you with a warm smile. You accept, and with a toast of your glasses together, you share your first sip of the evening, relishing the cold, crisp alcohol as it slides down your throats.

“Rough week,” you say, eliciting a smile from Momo.

“I’ll say,” she agrees, “Sooo… did you hit that?”

“Jihyo? No… just boob stuff.”

Momo blushes and almost chokes on her next sip of beer as she gives you a playful punch on the shoulder.

“That’s no fair, I can’t do boob stuff. She’s got an unfair advantage. Was it… a natural advantage?”

“Oh yes, I think so.”

“Dammit. I wish I could do boob stuff,” she says with an exaggerated sad face as she looks down at her own chest.

You smile widely as you wrap your arm around her and kiss her forehead.

“She’s got nothing on you,” you reassure her, leaning down to give her a small peck on the lips. Momo returns your kiss, and the kiss deepens slightly, before Momo breaks it off.

“I’m still, like, super fucking mad at you,” she says, her playful, sarcastic tone betraying the weight of her words, “and one day soon I’m gonna tear you a new one.”

“The Future Me can handle that.”

Momo lets out a snort before composing herself for what she is about to tell you.

“Before things get all drunk and alcohol-y tonight, you should know what the girls and I found while we were sifting through Red Velvet’s data.”

“What’s that?” you ask, taking another sip as you prepare yourself for what Momo is about to tell you.

“We pieced together communication between Wendy and Joy, and apparently their entire plan to trap you and get access to the JYP servers through your login was solely Wendy’s idea, and Irene had no idea it was happening. I guess she wanted to impress Irene with it.”

“So Wendy was a damn snake,” you quip, “no surprise there.”

“That’s not all. We found a message that was sent to Irene minutes before we caught Wendy and Joy. The message must have been what warned Irene in time to manually activate the program that deleted all her data from the server.”

“So it wasn’t automatically triggered when we gained access, like Jeongyeon said?”

“No. Irene actively deleted her data when she got the warning. Someone knew it was happening, and someone let her escape before we caught Wendy.”

“Fuck,” you hiss as you weigh the complications of this revelation, “who could it have been? Did you find out where the message came from?”

“No. Jeongyeon says it could have come from anyone.”

“Even one of us?”

“Even one of us,” Momo echoes, taking a deep sip of her beer in an attempt, perhaps in vain, to ease the implications of what she was saying.

“No. We’ve already been betrayed once. I refuse to believe we have another traitor in our ranks.”

“I don’t want to believe it either. And to be fair, it could be anyone who knew what was happening, not even necessarily one of us. For all we know, it could be someone we aren’t even aware of, someone we don’t even know.”

“That’s scarier,” you admit, and Momo nods in agreement.

You sigh - you had hoped this evening would lend you a small reprieve from the gravity of the past few days, but now you found another weight being added to your worries.

“Hey,” Momo says as she catches on to what you were feeling, “let’s worry about this tomorrow. Future Us can find whoever did this to us, and we’ll catch them just like we caught Wendy and Joy. Then Irene after that.”

You smile, and you find some solace in Momo’s bright smile, finding yourself thankful once more that this wonderful woman was in your life.

“Cheers to that,” you say, sharing a toast with Momo as you both rejoin your colleagues at their table, eager to forget about your worries if even for a single evening.

---

In a dark, mostly empty cafe in downtown Seoul, Bae Irene is meeting with two females.

“Wendy and Joy fucked up and got themselves caught. It’s time for you two to step up.”

The first female lets out a haughty laugh.

“Don’t talk to us like we’re your fucking employees. We’re done with that life,” one of the women answers, “we’ve had our fun. We’ve retired.”

“You’ll come back to it once you realize how much I’ll pay you.”

“What’s wrong with your other members? Seulgi and… what was the other’s name? Yubin? Yerin? Yeri?” says the second female.

“I don’t need them,” Irene hisses, “they’re dead to me now, after what they did to me.”

“This will cost you,” the first woman says.

“SM has deep pockets,” Irene answers.

“What do you want us to do?”

“I want to break JYP,” Irene answers, every syllable cold as steel, “I want to break him.”

#kpop fanfiction #kpop fanfic #kpop smut #Smut #pov smut #male reader #twice #twice jihyo #park jihyo

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koffeins-writing-archive · 4 years

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Beyond the screen

[Commission for @princce7 ]

The old hum of the cpu filled the messy pit that was Sans room with something besides dead silence. The monitor glowed softly as it switched on. A day off from working at the hot dog stand seemed like a good idea for the skeleton. Even if it was a day off only he knew about.

He looked back to the file he had downloaded from an email Alphys had sent him. A type of anime dating sim. Definitely something Alphys would recommend.

Sans decided that before anything, he’d grab a quick snack from the kitchen. A nice bottle of ketchup. Did he really need to eat it? Nope. Did he want to? Yes.

Once Sans was back in his room with his snacks, he sat back down at his computer and started up the game.

The cheery music and bright colors greeted Sans kindly. The music was pretty nice. The art was pretty and definitely fit the type of anime style games that Alphys loved playing.

As he played through the game, Sans learned about the four main characters. He decided to choose Sayori's route, seeing as she was the most real out of the main cast so far. Her story tugged at the skeletons heart, even if he didn't really have one. A soul was close enough, right?

Sans continued on in the game until he was met with the last few scenes of the first act. The main character was going to enter Sayori's room when the screen froze. The game letting out a low hum. Sans couldn't move the mouse nor click anywhere, so he manually shut the computer down.

"Man, my computer must really hate this thing." He said to himself, having heard his computer slowly dying and the fans whirring through all of his gameplay.

'Maybe Alphys can help me with my computer to make sure it can run the game properly without dying so quickly'. He thought.

Sans was just about to open his browser as the screen finally switched back on. Something felt different, however, but the skeleton couldn't put his finger on it. He moved his mouse to the browser icon before seeing something on the games icon.

A small little pixel out of place.

He clicked on the DDLC icon on his desktop. Nothing happened. He clicked again. This time, a small text document opened up and typed out a simple 'hello'.

Sans sat there, confused and shocked. Was this game actually a virus? Or did Alphys send him a bootlegged version?

He didn't know what else to do other than reply.

'Hey'. He typed. 'What are you doing on my computer?'

He watched as the other replied.

'Well, I'm not exactly here willingly. I think the game crashed'.

Well duh, the game crashed.

'I know it crashed. What are you? A hacker?' Sans asked.

'No, I'm not any sort of malware either. Can you do something for me?'

He was a little hesitant about it but continued to talking to whatever this thing was that had now infected his computer.

'Sure. What do you need?'

'Can you go into the games files? I think there's a way for you to fix it.'

'Why can't you do that?'

'I'm not sure. I've tried and the game won't let me access anything. Please fix it.'

Well, Sans didn't have anything better to do, so he went along with the other users instructions. Right clicking the DDLC icon, opening the task manager, and after sorting through a few files and deleting a few things, the game opened normally.

'Thank you! I'm so glad you fixed it!'.

Sans smiled at this and went to reply when the text box disappeared and the screen turned black once more. Finally, after thinking that the game had crashed or his computer had died, a text box from the game appeared, along with a familiar face, smiling right at Sans.

'Hey there! I'm Monika. I'm really glad that you fixed the game for me, I can't tell you how many times I've managed to screw up the files and code trying to get yours and others attention'.

Sans stared at the screen in disbelief. He had reached for his bottle of ketchup and gripped it a bit too harshly as the text box greeted him, getting ketchup onto his hoodie and into one of his eyeholes.

Oh boy what did Sans get himself into?

After cleaning off the ketchup from his eye and jacket, or at least cleaning to the best of his ability, Sans sat back in his chair, silent.

Sans wasn’t sure how to react. A computer game was talking to him. Or maybe it was still malware and the hacker was just messing with him big time. Whatever it was, was talking to him. Monika smiling warmly from within the screen.

Sans shoulders eased their tension and he scratched the back of his skull at this.

“So...Monika, is it?” He asked.

‘That’s correct!’ Monika replied, the words typed up quickly in the text box.

Sans let out a nervous laugh at this, unsure if he should shut the computer down, destroy it, burn it, and then call Alphys about all of this craziness.

“Alright, Monika...What are you exactly?”

‘Data I suppose. I’m not really sure of it myself. I remember the first time...well, being, I guess. It’s not something I think about much. What about you? What are you?’

“I’m just a skeleton living with his brother. I’ve got a lot of neighbors, I guess. Most of them are monsters...real monsters, not just saying that like their jerks or something.”

‘Interesting. Cause I’m pretty sure that what you just said isn’t the entire truth.’.

Monika waited for a response. Seeing that she wasn’t going to get one, the program continued.

‘You are a lot like me, are you not? Powerful, out of this world...unreal, perhaps?’.

Sans simply stared at the screen, keeping his nonchalant smile plastered on. Trying his best not to crack.

He let out a chuckle and gave a shrug. “I guess you could say I’m ‘pretty far out’, eh?”

Monika let out a laugh at this. ‘I didn’t realize the person I was talking to was such a ‘punny’ guy.’

Sans smiled more at this, thankful that Monika at least had a sense of humor... And hoped with every bone he was made out of that she wasn’t entirely malicious.

“What exactly did you have me delete? Those files?”

‘Oh...Those were just some data that needed to be deleted. Couldn’t do much with them still being in the game.’.

Sans didn’t like the sounds of that. “What do you mean?”

‘The other girls had to go. That’s just how things were meant to be.’.

Sans stared in disbelief. Monika, a being shown to be somewhat sentient, was confessing that she had him delete the other girls from the game. Girls who probably were just as sentient and real as she is.

Sans was quiet as he moved his mouse around the screen and towards the recycle bin.

‘What are you doing?’

Sans continued to stay silent as he opened the bin. The bin was empty.

“You had me kill them.” Sans muttered out quietly.

‘The word ‘kill’ is kind of strong. I’d say...’deleted’ would be a better term?’

Sans definitely did not like this.

‘It’s just like I said before; you and I are the same. In more ways than one.’

“What, a murderer?” Sans growled.

Monika shakes her head and smiles. ‘Data. Data in a game. I know it, you know it.’

Sans went to speak when Monika continued.

‘The Internet’s filled with lots of data. Data of you. Data of me. Data everywhere. We’re real in our worlds...just not out there. We live behind these screens to tell stories to those on the outside. Just like what you experienced with this dating game. Various bits of codes and data strung together to make something entertaining and real enough for an escape from the outside world.’

Monika smiled at Sans, unblinking as she waited for his response. ‘Am I not wrong?’

“...No. You’re not wrong...How the hell do you know about all that? Aren’t you just stuck in the game?”

‘Yes, and no. I’m everywhere. Whenever someone downloads the game, I’m on their computer for as long as the game stays. You don’t do much on this computer, so it’s like an old dinosaur and pretty bare.’

Monika got closer towards the screen, tilting her head. ‘You aren’t even a part of the world you say you’re in, are you not?’

Sans sat there. He didn’t know what to say. Perhaps he feared whatever she might say in response, say the truth that he so desperately did not want to hear or believe. Not now, and not ever.

“I think we’re done here.” his tone was cold and held nothing behind it.

No fear. No anger. Just there.

Sans quickly unplugged the computers plug from the socket. As he glared at the program staring back at him, he noticed something. It was quick, but there in the split second, was the softest hint of fear in Monika’s expression. And then, darkness.

Sans sat back in his chair, groaning.

If he had a proper heart, there’s no doubt that it would be racing from whatever hellish adrenaline rush that was.

He laid there for a moment before pulling out his phone. His boney fingers shaking as they pressed against the screen. Sans lifted the phone up to his face.

“Alphys? We need to talk. Now.”

Please consider commissioning me!~

#sans undertale #monika #ddlc #undertale #my writing #commission

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ergomaria · 5 years

Text

The Past is Gone (but something might be found) Preview Pt. III

Somehow, the text from the original post was deleted when I tried to edit the tags to make this easier to sort. I’ve restored it. Once again, I’m just posting this as a reminder that I’m alive and still trying to write!

PLOT: Vann, Meetra, and Carth touch the wrong thing at the wrong shrine and are turned into themselves at 18. Alek finds himself paying his penance to the Force when he has to simultaneously watch over the trio while trying to figure out how to restore them to their proper ages.

Now saddled with three teenagers and very few clues, Alek nodded in acquiescence as he trudged back towards the Hawk. Luckily, they were all fairly well behaved during the walk. Once they reached the ship the real fun began.

“So, do any of you know the codes to get back on the ship?”

There was a long bout of uncomfortable silence during which it became clear that no adult knowledge about the freighter had stuck with the teens. The worst part was that Alek did know the codes but couldn’t admit that fact without seeming suspicious. The next best option was to rewire the door panel and go from there.

“Alright, here’s a better question. Do any of you know how to rewire a hatch?”

Predictably, it was Deran who raised his hand. “Obviously I can, at least if I have the correct tools. Unfortunately, I don’t have my normal gear…”

The amount of places that Vann had broken into or out of during his search for the Star Forge still grated on Alek’s nerves. He knew for a fact there was a multitool tucked somewhere in that worn black jacket, but it was yet another fact he couldn’t openly share. “This might sound absurd, but everyone check your pockets. If your clothing originally belonged to spacers, and it looks like it did, the original owners may have left something useful behind.”

It was a risky gamble since there was always a chance that one of them had identifying documents on their person. But Alek was hoping they’d left those behind to perform a mission as covert as hiding a highly dangerous Sith holocron. Onasi’s civilian clothing was the best indicator that this might be the case. For once the Force was on his side and the search produced nothing but various odds and ends. An extra reload for the blasters, a few credits, a ration bar, a medpac, and finally a multitool that Vann had definitely purchased illegally.

Deran was predictably pleased to find the item and immediately set to work rewiring the door to his own ship. Meanwhile, Alek quietly filed that irony away for later. When the exit ramp slid open with a smooth hiss, Onasi practically cracked a tooth in his desperate attempt to not look impressed.

The inside of the Hawk was in partial disarray, though it was hard to tell if this was from whatever had transpired to turn three adults into teenagers or the mere fact that it was Vann’s ship and thus naturally full of clutter. Either way, the mess made it easier for Alek to order the teens to remain in the main hold where it was neater and theoretically ‘safer’ while he ‘checked’ the rest of the freighter. As soon as he was sure they would stay put, he moved into the cockpit to look for further clues.

Despite his tendency towards random piles of mechanical parts, Vann was absolutely fastidious when it came to researching locations and making notes about what he discovered. Before the original trip to Dromund Kaas he’d compiled an entire datapad full of files on the history of Sith purebloods, their laws, and their customs. While Nirauan had significantly less information recorded, there was still a pad with multiple paragraphs discussing the planet’s connection to both the Rakata Infinite Empire and the Force itself. It seemed that the crew was aiming to land near a series of suspected Rakata ruins that had a notable presence.

Datapad in hand, Alek peeked into the main hold to inform his charges of his next step. “Just so you’re aware, I think I found a series notes mentioning that this planet has a strange connection to the Force. I don’t know if it has anything to do with your current situation, but we can’t rule it out. I have a friend who might be able to untangle the few clues we currently have, so I’m going to comm her using the ship’s unit. Just wait here until I’m done.”

“Is she a Jedi?” Meetra was sprawled across two seats looking dangerously bored.

“She was at one time, but she’s since left the Order. However, she’s very knowledge about certain subjects and I feel that her input will be extremely helpful.” One of the subjects she had a great deal of experience with was being a Force prodigy and another was ancient artifacts from the Infinite Empire, currently making her the galaxy’s only authority on the situation. When there were no further questions, Alek hurried away to contact Rakata Base in the hope of begging Bastila for assistance.

“Vann?” The young woman’s face immediately darkened when she saw who was on the other end of the call. “Why are you there and where is Vann?”

“I’m here because Meetra contacted me when there was a complication with their current mission,” Alek hissed as quietly as possible. Noting the concern that immediately overtook Bastila’s face he assured her, “Everyone is healthy. I hesitate to say ‘fine’ because, well… Somehow, through a combination of some Rakta ruins and a Sith holocron, all three members of this crew are currently teenagers with no memories of their adult selves. I’d estimate them between seventeen and nineteen, if I had to guess.”

The incredulous glare was absolutely scathing. “You’ve picked a poor time to develop a sense of humor.”

“Why in Sith hells would I joke about this? I currently have three teenagers in the hold of this damn ship who are convinced that I’m a Jedi Sentinel named Naver who happened to sense a disturbance in the Force. Since it’s blatantly clear that my creativity it lacking, you can be sure that I couldn’t make this bantha fodder up if I tried!”

“Dustil, can you please come here? Our former ‘master’ is on the comm and he believes that he’s being hilarious. Perhaps you can convince him to tell me what’s really going on.”

“What the hells is going on now, Malak?” The younger Onai looked supremely irritated, which actually mirrored how Alek was currently feeling.

“That’s not my name.”

Appearing unbothered by the correction, Dustil sneered for a moment before snapping, “What kinrath nest did Vann get my dad into this time?”

“Oh, did he not tell you? Supposedly through the will of the Force, Vann, Meetra, and your father are now teenagers with no memory of their adult lives.” Bastila looked equally unamused. “Funny, yes?”

“Hi-kriffing-larious.”

Alek was about two second from hanging up and hoping that Rand would be more helpful, if only to get Meetra back into her proper body, when a slender figure crept into the room just within view of the comm unit.

“Um, Knight Naver, I apologize for bothering you but…”

There was a loud pop of static from the other end of the comm, which turned out to be Bastila covering the microphone with her hand so that she could curse for about thirty seconds straight.

“Yes, Deran? I was actually just telling me friend Bastila a bit about you and the others in the hope that she’d be willing to assist us in figuring out what happened. Perhaps you’d like to speak with her about your current situation? It could be useful.”

It was hard to tell who was more bewildered by the entire scenario. Luckily, Deran’s natural curiosity quickly took hold and he slipped over to the console and situated himself before the camera. “Hello, Bastila was it? What did you want to ask me?”

“Oh stars…” The young woman was doing a poor job of disguising her surprise, though she still managed to stutter, “I apologize for my lack of manners. You just… remind me of someone I know. No matter. Actually, Deran, I was just wondering how, ah, how old you are.”

“You really aren’t a Jedi, are you? Sorry, that was rude. It’s just… everyone in the Order always seems to know everything about me. But uh, I turned eighteen a few months ago.”

“Two years before Knighthood…”

“Bastila, be careful. You don’t want to scare the boy!” While it was technically true that Deran became the youngest Knight in the order at age twenty, that wasn’t information his eighteen-year old self knew. It wasn’t until nineteen that his trials actually began.

Plastering on a false smile, the young woman quickly stammered, “That’s just a guess on my part. Though, of course, I could be wrong. It’s not like I can see the future and you’re so very… young.”

Unfortunately, just the mention of Knighthood had made Deran’s back go stiff, his jaw ticking in the corner even as his expression remained stoic and proper. “Well, that’s for the Council to decide. They know best.” Even at this age he sounded thoroughly unconvinced. “What else do you want to ask me?”

“That’s… that’s it.” Turning to Alek, Bastila stated, “I believe you and I’ll do whatever I can to help. Just tell me what you need.”

“I’ll send you all of the data I have in a minute. Let me just find out what brought Deran in here in the first place.”

“I came in to let you know that Carth and Meetra left the ship. They said that they got tired of waiting for you and decided to explore on their own.” The teen winced slightly. “Also, they may have been flirting? I’m not always great at telling that type of stuff, but it’s possible they just went to go and… you know.”

The snort of hysterics from Dustil was all the confirmation that Alek needed to know that this entire situation was his punishment from the Force. Part of him considered letting Meetra and Onasi do whatever they wanted. Someone else could deal with the fallout. But he also needed to get Deran out of the room to prevent him from snooping. “I’m concerned that they’re going to get themselves into trouble. There are some very powerful ruins on this planet and I’d hate for them to make the current situation even more complicated. Can I trust you to find them and bring them back safely?”

It was an underhanded ploy. Alek was fully aware that Deran’s facade of teenage bravado combined with his crippling fear of failure would make him agree to almost any task without question. But the former Sith didn’t have time to chase two teenagers down, all while trying to keep a third from learning that he was currently speaking with his own kriffing Padawan.

As expected, Deran immediately nodded. “Of course. I’ll bring them back as quickly as possible.”

It wasn’t until the teen’s footfalls disappeared off the ship that Alek sat down with a sigh, his head pounding from the sheer mental acrobatics required to keep this situation moving forward. As he uploaded the information from Vann’s datapad he grumbled, “For Force sake, Dustil. I thought your father would be the responsible one!”

The damned kid was still laughing. “Just checking, but is Meetra the teenager as pretty as Meetra the adult? Big blue eyes and wavy blonde hair?”

Attempting to be objective about the attractiveness of someone who was like a sister to him, Alek shrugged. “I suppose? She was more petite at this age, almost willowy. I honestly think she looks better with some muscle. Less delicate.”

“I don’t care either way, it’s just… My dad kinda has a type. Or, at least he did at that point in his life. My mom was petite with wavy, honey-brown hair. They met when he was twenty.”

“Please tell me you’re joking.”

“Nope, you can look up the files for Morgana Onasi if you want. I um, I have. Just to see her, you know? It helps me to remember her face…” Shaking away his melancholy, Dustil cleared his throat. “Ah, anyway, at eighteen my Dad was really responsible when it came to official things. Training and studying? He was incredibly dedicated. But when he had time to himself he kind of… let loose. Nothing really bad, just a lot of drinking and fooling around with his fellow cadets. Put a bunch of bored, horny teenagers in the same dorm and stuff happens.”

Alek had lived in the Jedi dormitories during puberty and was well aware of what could happen. He winced.

“The good news is that my dad definitely liked men at that age as well… Please don’t ask how I know this. It was a really awkward conversation that only happened because I got mad at him and… ugh. But the good news is that he might rediscover how amazing Vann is. He is really great at this age, right?”

“He’s actually an anxious mess who likes to pretend he’s confident, which just comes off as arrogance. It doesn’t help that he’s actually good at whatever he does. Honestly, I think your father currently wants to throttle him.”

“Ouch. Well, maybe they’ll lose all memory of this once they get restored to their actual ages!”

“We can only hope the Force is that kind.” Rubbing his forehead, Alek asked, “Bastila, have you looked over those files I sent?”

“I’m reading them now and I’ll run them through the Rakata archives when I’m done. But you should be aware that, while we have a significant amount of information on the Infinite Empire, we don’t have much else. Vann tries to update what he can, but it’s still nothing compared to what the Jedi possess.”

“Do your best, it’s still more than I have access to on this ship.”

“I do have an idea, but you’re not going to like it one bit.” Upon noting Alek’s hopeful expression, Bastila sighed...

#kotor 2 #kotor 2 fanfic #wip excerpt #revan #male Revan #vann chis #The Jedi Exile #Female exile #Alek Squinquargesimus #Malak #bastila shan #dustil onasi #my writing #not perfection but completeness

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homespork-review · 5 years

Text

Homespork Act 1: The Note Dawdling Tension Plays (Part 3)

CHEL: John heads outside, finally, but finds the mailbox empty and the car locked with a package inside. It seems he’ll have to confront his father to get the game he seeks. And then, we get the internet equivalent of a splash page, with ominous wind chimes, slow-pan animation, and lyrical text.

You have a feeling it's going to be a long day.

Regarding the term “ominous”, it applies in ways Hussie intended, implying the strangeness to come, but also in ways he may not have. Notice anything absent from that animation? Go on, guess.

FAILURE ARTIST: John’s neighborhood is more bland than Privet Drive.

CHEL: True, but “character” wasn’t really what I meant. What would one expect to see at least one of, in a nice suburban neighbourhood, even a bland one, in the daytime, when we know John’s dad is home from work, even if through a window? What are we not seeing here?

FAILURE ARTIST: No people and not even any pets.

CHEL: Hot dog, we have a wiener. Not character, characters. There are no signs of life at all. Not even a wild bird. Now, John is the focal character here, so that might come under the heading of unnecessary detail, but considering what happens later, this becomes very creepy. The big dangerous thing has not happened yet, so there should still be people in the neighbourhood, and the sound of wind chimes implies at least one of those houses is inhabited. But we don’t see them. Come to think of it, John never mentions his school at all, nor any other friends apart from the other kids featured in the comic, and nor do they. It’s as if they literally sprang into existence on that day and got plopped down in place just in time to be in the comic.

FAILURE ARTIST: Given that John is home in the middle of what would be a school day I think he might be home-schooled.

CHEL: That didn’t occur to me. I’m a Brit and I guess I was thinking “Easter break”, but the school year pattern in the US is different. But that raises further questions. Doesn’t he know any local kids? His dad works full-time and he has no other family - when does his dad find the time?

FAILURE ARTIST: Maybe it would be Spring Break in Washington State. I don’t know.

CHEL: Regardless, it’s eerie. If he’s home-schooled, he still ought to have some local friends or at least be on wave-hello terms with neighbours, unless he really is stuck in his bedroom almost all the time. I’m tempted to add an ARE YOU TRYING TO BE FUNNY point for the implication that John’s been raised locked in a room, but that’s just silly speculation so I won’t.

While on the topic, John does live in a literal suburb, but I’m not going to give points for WHITE SBURB POSTMODERNISM here. That count is for when the characters’ behaviour comes across as white/suburban/wealthy and that contradicts how the author is trying to present them. John is supposed to be the everyman figure with an ordinary life, living in a regular respectable town.

Let’s move on. It’s time to confront the Parental Figure.

TIER: John finds himself heading to the kitchen to retrieve his game, and it's now that we get a good look at his dad, along with one of the neat little details about Homestuck's world being brought to the forefront.

I am of course, talking about STRIFE!

"[S] John: Enter and Strife!" (Watch on YouTube)

The more or less fighting system for lack of my vocabulary, and seemingly a thing you just do in this world.

CHEL: John gets to actually use his “hammerkind” weapon, and Dad’s preferred method of combat is offering yet more cake.

FAILURE ARTIST: John threatens his father with a hammer. In the real world, this would be horrifying. But it’s not in this video game world. The other Beta Kids have “STRIFE” with their parents and in only one case does it end up as being treated seriously. Yet that will wait to be seen.

CHEL: One case which is significantly less disturbing than one of the other cases, in some ways. But yes, that’s for later. To be fair, John could have been trying to hit the cake with the hammer, not his dad, but most parents still wouldn’t be pleased to have their kids waving hammers in their direction regardless.

ARE YOU TRYING TO BE FUNNY?: 2

TIER: After a short few rounds, John manages to properly distract his dad and successfully gets to his mail. A winner is you Johnny boy. Then we find ourselves with another hit of sylladex fuckery happening, joyous.

When we get back to John's room, it's pesterlog time, this time with a little sneak peak at the last of our fabulous foursome of thirteen years olds, gardenGnostic, or GG! They're only present for three short lines, but damn if they aren't pretty telling. From what little is seen they're an overall pretty chipper person, and to me at least adorable with those emojis.

CHEL: The beta’s finally in John’s hands, after all that effort to get it. So what do we do now? Why, it seems like a great time to go waste some time reading an entirely different imaginary webcomic promoting Hussie’s other work! Though, to be fair, the Midnight Crew will turn out to be relevant later. Keep that name in mind.

FAILURE ARTIST: The Midnight Crew actually started as the OCs of Problem Sleuth fan Mayonka who paid to have a extra episode.

CHEL: And then, FINALLY, he installs the thing, and it... gives us a loading page, and he goes off to read up on data structures and fuck about with his fucking sylladex some more!

TIER: The sylladex thing really knows how to wear its welcome thin with the shenanigans, thought I'll admit that John getting a razor embedded into the face of one of his posters was amusing in how dangerous the dang thing can be.

GET ON WITH IT!: 3

"Get on with it! (Monty Python)" (Watch on YouTube)

CHEL: Because I’m feeling bitter, I’m adding another point too!

HOW NOT TO WRITE A WEBCOMIC: 5 The Lost Sock - wherein the plot is too slight Here the main conflict is barely adequate to sustain a Partridge Family episode. Remember that this drama has to carry the reader through 300-odd pages. The central dilemma of a novel should be important enough to change someone’s life forever.

Our main plot hasn’t been introduced yet, so as far as the reader knows, what’s happening now is the plot. Getting a video game out of the kitchen should not take this long and is not much of an epic adventure! By now, Hussie’s committed almost all of the sins listed in HNTWAN’s section on beginning a story! NOTHING IS HAPPENING!

Okay, something happens. It’s not plot, but it’s adorable. John opens the birthday present from Dave, to discover a souvenir of his favourite movie; the very stuffed bunny prop featured in Con Air. Look at how happy he is!

TIER: I do believe that up to this point, there hasn't been much of a plot, just people doing stuff. It's boring in the same way that someone telling you about an average day is, not much going on to be honest.

FAILURE ARTIST: I enjoyed reading Act 1 when I first read it but I was coming in under no expectation. Homestuck as a deep meaningful story hadn’t begun yet.

CHEL: Okay, NOW a thing is happening. The game is installed, on comes the loading page, and… Well, that’s peculiar. Now, at last, we see what the big deal with this game is. It permits TT, who installed the “server” section of the game while John installed the “client” section, to reach into his actual bedroom with the cursor and move things around, place bizarre-looking machinery in the rooms, or even add parts to his house a la The Sims. Now that’s a game worth the hype it got! Too bad it took almost 140 pages to actually reveal this.

The kids don’t seem very surprised by all this, yet the reviewer hadn’t heard the game could do that. One would think even such a disaffected dudebro would be curious about that, if he knew. Maybe the game really does have some kind of built-in failsafe to keep adults away?

FAILURE ARTIST: This is a world people have inventories instead of pockets and an RPG battle starts every time you argue with your parents.

CHEL: Does that apply to all people in it, though, or just the lead characters? They are, as it turns out, special already, and we never see a person who’s not involved.

John wants to try moving things around, but he needs the “server” CD-ROM to do so, which is still in the car. TT’s attempts to help result in not only a large machine called a “Cruxtruder” blocking the front door, but also the toilet, which John earlier accidentally filled with cake during sylladex shenanigans, being ripped out and dropped in the yard, and the bathtub similarly ending up in the hallway, which is pretty funny, I admit.

EB: you can see me, right. EB: tell me what is wrong with this picture.

Perhaps sylladex shenanigans could be trimmed without being deleted entirely. SBurb shenanigans, similarly, are funny but might possibly do better to be compressed into fewer pages, but that’s not as big a deal, I think. The shenanigans aren’t entirely TT’s fault; she keeps losing her internet connection due to bad weather. GG’s earlier mention of an explosion near their home implies that things are starting to happen around them, too. Meantime, John finds a sledgehammer, a much better weapon, the implication being he’s going to need one, even if he turns out to be unable to lift it. TT helps him to hit the Cruxtruder with it, and said machine produces a glowing… thing and starts a four-minutes-and-thirteen-seconds countdown. Countdowns are never good in this context.

The glowing thing is a Kernelsprite, which needs to be “prototyped”, so into it goes the harlequin doll, causing it to take on the shape of a harlequin’s head and hand. Attempts to use the mysterious machinery TT has deployed result in the production of a shiny blue cylinder called a cruxite dowel and three green cubes labelled by the game as Perfectly Generic Objects, using up the game’s abstract building currency dubbed Build Grist. Wasting time playing with the machinery proves to be an unwise idea, however, as John looks into the sky and sees…

Even worse than the meteor heading directly for his house, Dad is coming back!

FAILURE ARTIST: THIS is where I came in. It is the most impressive flash animation so far. It is still awkwardly animated compared to later ones.

CHEL: I think it’s one of his earlier efforts, so I wouldn’t say it was bad. It succintly gets the point across and it’s better animated than anything I could do.

John messages TT again.

EB: oh man who cares about the bathroom, now there's a meteor heading for my house!!! TT: I see. TT: Do you suppose it has anything to do with the game? EB: i don't know, maybe! what do i do! TT: I think it's very likely. TT: The walkthroughs vaguely suggest an impending threat before they end. TT: The already poorly constructed sentences become even more curt and ambiguous. TT: As if written hastily and with a sense of alarm. TT: Actually, their dedication to updating the walkthrough under such circumstances is admirable.

TT concludes that if the meteor is caused by the game, succeeding at a game objective must be the way to stop it, and investigates while John talks to TG, resulting in one of my favourite conversations in the comic, but also leading into another count.

EB: we'll talk later if i am still alive and the earth isn't blown up. TG: like the size of texas TG: or just rhode island TG: theyre always throwing around these geographical comparisons to give us a sense of scale like it really means anything to us TG: but its like it doesnt matter its always just like: WOW THATS PRETTY FUCKING BIG TG: like mr president theres a meteor coming sir. oh yeah, how big is it? its the size of texas sir TG: OH SHIT TG: or, how big is it? its the size of new york city sir TG: OH SHIT TG: sir im afraid the comet is the size of your moms dick TG: OH SNAP TG: sir are you familiar with jupiter TG: you mean like the planet? TG: yeah TG: well its that big sir TG: hmm that sounds pretty big TG: i have a question TG: is it jupiter? TG: yes sir, earth is literally under seige by planet fucking jupiter TG: OH SHIT TG: anyway later

I don’t know if TG is supposed to believe John here. If he is, then we get another count:

HURRY UP AND DO NOTHING: 1

FAILURE ARTIST: Hate to be a killjoy but the line about your mom’s dick is transphobic.

CHEL: My original intention with the PROBLEMATYKKS count was to point out cases where it wasn’t justified by the character saying it, so I wasn't going to count this. Thirteen-year-old boys trying to be witty say all sorts of awful bullshit. Though the writer’s old enough to know better and it didn’t ever get called out, so yeah, okay, I’ll expand the original intention.

CLOCKWORK PROBLEMATYKKS: 4

The rest of it’s still funny, though. Besides, I was more immediately concerned with the fact that TG seems remarkably unconcerned about the possible risk to his friend’s life. There isn’t really anything he could do about it even if he tried, obviously, but one would expect he’d at least say “oh shit, run!” or something. This will become a recurring pattern in the comic, as will be shown fairly soon, hence the DO NOTHING count.

FAILURE ARTIST: I think that conversation is also from real life. Hussie and a friend talked about meteor movie conventions and Hussie decided to use it. However, I assume during that conversation they weren’t threatened by an actual meteor.

CHEL: Possibly he’d have done better to make it clearer that TG did not believe John actually had a meteor heading for him. John is a known joker, after all. It would be quite easy, and I would have assumed that in a comic which had had fewer unremarked wacky happenings already.

Dad Egbert is also remarkably calm about the bathtub in the hallway. TT’s attempt to move it is foiled when her connection is lost, causing her to drop it in front of John’s bedroom door, trapping him inside. John is now on his own.

#homespork #homestuck #homestuck meta #literary critique #sporking #homestuck reread #homestuck review #homestuck let's read

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simply-breeee · 2 years

Text

June 25th - 12:47 pm

Ive noticed that every time one of these boys reaches out to me the other shortly follows. I plan to do a recap on everything later, but for now lets jump into this.

Recently after one failed attempt to speak again we decided to be cool off each other. Bout three weeks later guess who popped back up. Of course it was Jack. So he was in town and wanted to see fi I wanted to hang out. Mind you, I was at work when he texted me. Coincidentally, my kids where sleep and the room was empty so we spoke. He just told me about what he was doing intern and that he wants to see me or whatever. So what ended up happening was nothing. He said he would hit me up later about furthering the plans. And as things do with him, something came up. He had to rush back to bloom. Fine by me no hard feeling especially when I knew this would happen. But with him flaking comes the other one. And of course the next morning here he comes. Its like everything was in the way of us actually speaking, but here he was. My phone was acting funny so I decided to restart it and see what happened.

As Susan was shutting down I get a call from Him. I just saw the area code before she went black. I rushed to ft SM and tell her what happened. She told me its Him I said how you know she said no he texting me and saying for you to text him back. Yall when I backed up my phone it crashed like three times and took a few hours before working enough for me to start uploading my data from iCloud.

While tis was happening, he was texting her about needing to speak and blah blah. I told her to tell him to text me Monday since I was off. I didn't want him to ruin my weekend. In terms he ruined the beginning of my week. When we spoke he apologized for a the most previous situation we've been in. (ill explain later) All in all he apologized for roughly 7 minutes. ha ha 7 weird right. Well we end the call and leave it at that. Or so I though. we didn't speak for a little while more before he came back saying how he wanted to know what we could be or better yet telling me what he wanted for us. In love a dominate man but slow ya role. He said either back together or best friends. sir we haven talked in a. month following not talking for a month before out last conversation. Its odd the timing. But like I said these boys move together. So we ended things with him claiming we will discuss his growth in thought over the past few weeks apart.

We never spoke about it. What ended up happening is this. Jack came back this weekend. He text me this morning yk the usual warm up before the big question. Lets hand out which is followed by the cancel and then boom here He is. But this time im better than it. I am prepared. Looking for the octants of our conversation, I saw that he read my message from Wednesday yesterday, Friday. Its Saturday and Jack is reaching out, so He should be back around Monday or Tuesday.

I would like to hear him out, but I dont want to invite him back. I deleted his messages from my phone, but ofc they're still on my Mac. Strange as it is im excited for him to cancel, but would be surprised if he didn't. It would be a nice change to life, but not all that needed.

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fuwafuwagem · 6 years

Text

Bloom Chapter 1 - Yu-hwa

Just for you lovelies that may not have discovered it on Archive of Our Own, here is the first chapter of my Mystic Messenger fic Bloom, featuring my baby my OC Yu-hwa Lee ^^

You can find the ongoing fic here. I am updating regularly and have chapters prepared to upload, so I won’t leave you hanging ^^

Hope you enjoy it! The first chapter preview is under the cut <3

TW for sexual threats and references.

Yu-hwa Lee sat in her favourite seat at the café close to her apartment block, nursing the cheapest thing on the menu; a small white tea. It wasn’t as good as the coffee her body craved, but it was all her purse would allow her to have. She flicked through the pages of the application form she had on the table in front of her. There was no way she was qualified for a job at C&R, but it was the only place she could find that was currently hiring, and she was getting desperate.

She filled in a few basic details; name, date of birth. Address? She sighed. The landlord was on the verge of kicking her out.

This is depressing.

She put down her pen and picked up her phone. The notification icon showed that she had one new email, and she prayed to all the gods she could think of that it was a job offer.

You have been invited to test out…

She sighed, quickly scrolling through the message. It looked like junk mail, but she thought that maybe it was something she could get paid to do. At the end of the message was a link, which she pressed hoping that it wasn’t a virus.

Installing…

Oh shit!

She closed the email, hoping that it would stop whatever she had just started, but when she checked her phone menu she saw a new icon was installed there. She knew that she should probably delete it immediately, but curiosity got the better of her. She opened the app.

A chat room opened.

Unknown: Hi! Finally, someone to talk to, thank god…

Yu-hwa bit her lip and tugged at a strand of her dyed pink hair nervously. Unknown? Is this a chat-bot? These things seem to be popular lately.Tentatively, she typed her reply.

Yu-hwa: Hello

Unknown: Hi. Nice to meet you ^^ Yu-hwa… I’ve been waiting for you. Hope I didn’t surprise you. Don’t be nervous, I’m just an ‘ordinary’ person~

Yu-hwa felt her blood turn cold. The app must have accessed her personal data as her name and profile were displayed for Unknown to see. But what did he mean by he’d been waiting for her, and…

Yu-hwa: Why are you emphasizing the word ordinary…? It’s making me even more nervous

Unknown: You’re funny lol

Yu-hwa sighed and sipped her tea. Funny? Yeah, my whole life is a joke. She looked back at her phone. She knew that she should probably leave the chat before he asked her to send nudes or something, but she was a little curious too as she continued to read his message.

Unknown: But I can’t really say I’m extraordinary when I’m introducing myself. Shouldn’t I be humble and modest?

Yu-hwa couldn’t help but smile. She wasn’t the only comedian.

Unknown: In fact… I’m really excited. Cuz the first person to come in is you, Yu-hwa!

She cringed again at her name being used by this stranger she knew nothing about. He was being too familiar.

Unknown: I was so worried that no one would come in as I was making this app.

Yu-hwa’s eyes widened. So this guy is the apps creator? That explains some things I guess. She tapped at her phone.

Yu-hwa: What’s this app for?

Unknown: I was about to explain, but before that, can I ask a favour?

Yu-hwa inhaled. Have we finally arrived on Planet Perv? Her thumb hovered over the exit chat button.

Unknown: I know that it’s too much to ask from a stranger, but there’s something I really want you to help me with.

She chewed on her lower lip, moving her thumb and typing-

Yu-hwa: What is it?

She glanced at the application form in front of her. A few white lies might get her to the interview stage, but how far could her personality carry her? She rubbed her forehead as she felt the stress headache beginning to build, then glanced back at her phone.

Unknown: Well… This app isn’t just a messenger app, it’s a messenger game app. I wanted to ask if you could test it out for me. Game concept is chatting with pretty guys ^^

Yu-hwa: Why don’t you test it out yourself?

She didn’t have time for playing a game. She needed to find a job.

Unknown: It’s difficult to gain an objective view because I’m the creator. I want to know what others think of this!

He was persistent, but Yu-hwa knew she didn’t have the time. I just need to politely decline when I get the chance.

Unknown: The chats aren’t everything. There are also hidden stories… Amusing stories that will stir your imagination!

He’s really trying hard. She drank down the rest of her tea as she looked at the image of the characters he sent her. Cute, but not real. She rolled her eyes. I can’t keep a real boyfriend, I’m not going to spend my time chatting to artificial ones!

Yu-hwa: No thanks. Not my style.

She winced as she realised how harsh she might be coming across, but she was starting to get tired of the conversation.

Unknown: Just a little… Couldn’t you try it out for just a little? Decide whether it’s your style or not after trying it out.

She frowned. He seemed so desperate. She hoped that he wasn’t in a similar situation to her. Just imagining such a thing made her heart ache.

Yu-hwa: Fine. I’ll try it out.

Unknown: WOW! Thanks You’re a lifesaver… ^^

I hope you don’t mean that literally, she thought.

Unknown: I think it’ll be better to talk over the phone about the details.

The waitress took away Yu-hwa’s empty cup. “Anything else?”

“Um… no,” said Yu-hwa. Her purse was empty.

“It’s just… we have paying customers…”

“I get it,” Yu-hwa sighed. “I’m going.” She grabbed her belongings and rushed out of the café, red-faced. She glanced at her phone as she began to walk home.

Unknown: Don’t freak out when you see an unknown number and answer the phone plz ^^

The phone instantly started to ring. Yu-hwa inhaled deeply, her anxiety peaking. She closed her eyes and pressed answer

“Hey.”

The voice on the line was soft, but she could hear the excitement in his tone.

“Hi, umm, how did you know my number?” Yu-hwa asked.

“It’s automatically collected when you log-on to the messenger,” replied Unknown. There was an awkward pause. “Oh ummm, don’t get me wrong. It’s only dialable within the messenger app.”

Yu-hwa sighed. It was a relief to know that all she had to do was delete the app and she would never hear from him again. But there was something about his gentle voice that she liked. She kept listening.

“As I mentioned in the chat room, I called to explain to you about this app.”

Yu-hwa rolled her eyes. The sales pitch.

Unknown explained the concept of the game, which was chatting to the characters he had created and becoming the party coordinator of a fundraising group called R.F.A.

“It’ll be much faster to understand by playing, instead of listening to all this,” he said eventually. “Oh, but the game hasn’t been released yet. To perform the tests, you have to come over here.”

Yu-hwa pressed her lips together tightly. Yes of course random stranger I’ve talked to for five minutes. I’ll trust you not to do who knows what to me. Of course I’ll come over, pop the kettle on!

“Just send me the file,” she said, trying to remain polite.

Unknown sighed. “Sorry,” he said. “It’s protected by a date leak prevention security system. Even if you download the file, it’s uninstallable. I need to directly install it to your smartphone. Please understand. And I also want to meet you in person before you play the game.”

Yu-hwa gripped her bag, feeling uncomfortable. He was insistent, so she knew that she had to be firm. “No, I’ll just pass.” She didn’t know why she felt so bad saying it. The guy was being weird, and he was a complete stranger. But she had also sensed a desperation in him, something that was all too familiar to her.

“Why?” Unknown whined. “Weren’t you interested? It’s an app just for you where you can chat with pretty guys. Others can’t play this. Only you can.”

Pretty guys? They’re more trouble than they’re worth, and I can do without!

“It’s not even real,” she said firmly. “I’m not going.”

“For real?” His voice was filled with sorrow and disbelief. “Then how about this? If you come here and test the game, someone real might be interested in you. For example, me.”

This is pathetic.

“I don’t need it. No thanks.”

“You don’t need me?” He sounded broken. “Ha, haha… haha… Sad. I’m so sad…”

Yu-hwa felt her heart pounding. He was crying. Was he so desperate?

“I really believed you were going to make my dream come true… Believed you were the one I would go to paradise with…”

Yu-hwa reached her apartment and pulled out her key just as the landlord stuck his head out of his door. He’d clearly been waiting for her.

“Paradise?” she sighed.

“The place I was trying to take you to,” said Unknown, his voice soft but filled with sadness. “That place is paradise. Where there’s no pain or sadness, just endless happiness. I’m the angel that will lead you there. You’ve let go of my hand… but don’t worry. I don’t plan to let you go just yet.”

The landlord stood beside her, breathing down her neck.

“Rent’s due,” he said as she pushed the door open.

“I want to see what kind of face you’ll make when you’ve truly been saved. I want to see it with my own two eyes.”

The landlord snatched the phone out of Yu-hwa’s hand and hung up.

“Hey,” she gasped as he shoved it back at her.

“I said your rent’s due,” he snapped. “Actually, it was due last week, but I let you off because you’re cute. Now I want my money.”

Yu-hwa bit her lip, muted.

“Fuck, you don’t have it?” he asked, then smirked. “There are other ways of paying,” he said as he advanced on her. “It’s been a while since I got my cock wet.” He stepped back. “Think about it. You give me head, you get to keep a roof over yours.” He laughed as he left, slamming the door shut behind him.

Yu-hwa hurried and locked the door, collapsing on the floor in tears.

#mystic messenger #bloom #ray x yu-hwa

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fivenightsatfreddysfanfiction · 7 years

Text

Start Again

Sometimes to make any sort of progress, one would have to start over from the beginning....

"Figuring that guy out is harder than I originally thought it would be," Vincent muttered under his breath. He lay stretched out on the floor of the strange house that Damien often dreamed of since his nightmares were dispelled, a home that neither Damien nor his soul recognized.

That soul currently was snuggled up beside him, humming softly in contentment as he rested his head against Vincent's shoulder. "Well, maybe you're approaching it the wrong way," Jonathan replied. He rubbed his cheek against the other man's shirt, then sighed in relaxation. "You're still going in expecting the man to behave just like he did when we faced him with the trinity of guards. But you said yourself he's positive aligned, like us. So that should be a pretty big flag that he's different."

"But why? I don't see how he's different just because he doesn't have the experiences of what happened in 1987 and afterwards," Vincent grumbled even as he carefully threaded his fingers through Jonathan's hair, stroking and petting the silky strands.

"Might be something to do with him being digital and not a real spirit like us. Fragment of a soul?" the smaller man mused aloud. "And experiences change people, so wouldn't it make sense that missing experiences means there's changes that were never made? And since he experienced something completely different with Afton, then he'd be changed according to that, without any input from what happened at Freddy's."

Vincent huffed, lower lip jutting out in a pout. "I hate when you apply logic like that," he sulked, squeezing his eyes almost shut. Jonathan pushed himself up, pressing a kiss to Vincent's cheek.

"One of us has to, Vin. You're the emotional one," he teased and settled back down to rest.

That conversation led to the dream guard once again stepping foot in Meera Corbett's apartment. He tilted his head at the sound of conversation in Spanish being held in the kitchen nearby. Vincent could only assume Meera and Lucian were speaking, he recognized their voices and only a few words. Something about dinner and a movie?

There was laughter suddenly and Vincent blinked, surprised by how light and pleasant the male voice sounded. He almost didn't recognize that laugh. It didn't sound anything like the laughter he remembered from Lucian in the past, mocking and cruel and twisted. But seeing the blond man walk out of the kitchen, still laughing and with a happy expression on his face, it was confirmation that the voice was still his all the same.

And then Lucian noticed him at the entrance to the apartment and the laugh abruptly cut off, smile disappearing as the mask of cold distance slammed into place. Vincent almost shivered at that, flinching back at how absolute the wall felt between him and whoever Lucian was now.

A clatter of silverware sounded and Meera stuck her head out of the kitchen, concerned expression on her face as she called out. "Que paso, ti-oh?" She cut herself off at the sight of Vincent still standing there and he gave her a sheepish smile and hesitant wave. The young woman only scowled at him. "I don't remember inviting you to our movie night," Meera told him with a huff, then waved at him dismissively. "I'm still cleaning up. Don't make any more of a mess in there, though personally I'd like for you to get the fuck out of our home." With that she retreated to the kitchen again, leaving Vincent to stand in awkward silence with the blond still watching him impassively.

There was a few minutes where the only sounds were dishes clattering in the background. Vincent fidgeted a bit under Lucian's stare, rubbing at the back of his neck. "So... you were laughing...." he began uncertainly. Lucian raised an eyebrow at him. "And... smiling...."

"I was. Sorry, didn't realize I wasn't allowed to do that," Lucian bit out frostily, folding his arms over his chest as he walked away to the couch.

"That's not what I meant!" Vincent protested in frustration, cheeks flushing as his hands clenched briefly. He relaxed them, rubbing them together to work out the sudden stress. "It was..." Unusual. Unlike him. "...nice." His face felt warmer, especially at Lucian pausing to give him a suspicious look. Thinking back to the earlier expression of carefree smiling and laughter, Vincent swallowed at the lump in his throat in an attempt to clear it. "You have a nice smile... not murdery, regular smile. It's nice," he amended lamely.

Uncertainty flickered in the other man's eyes even as Lucian remained guarded in his expression, if a bit on the confused side. "Thank you... I think," he returned carefully and took a seat on one end of the sofa.

"I didn't come to start a fight," Vincent told him and quietly sighed as the look of distrust returned to Lucian's expression.

"You say that every time you come and we end up fighting anyway. Spare me," Lucian huffed, sitting back, arms still folded protectively over himself. "Just hurry up, say whatever it is you want to say to put me in place, and then leave so I can get on with my day."

"It's evening," Vincent corrected inanely and Lucian threw his arms up in exasperation.

"Siempre estas peleando conmigo! No puedo dicer nada cuando estás aquí!"

"I'm not fighting with you!"

"Then stop making me feel like you're trying to goad me into attacking you again just so you have an excuse to end me!" Lucian snapped back, "Believe me, between you showing up nearly every day to make me regret existing and the nothingness of the void that is deletion, I'd pick getting erased as a mercy kill!"

Silence again. Meera leaned out of the kitchen, just enough for Vincent to see the murderous look on her face that long ago fit Lucian instead. He held up his hands, swallowing hard in hopes that the gesture of peace would help. She simply narrowed her eyes at him and then slid silently back into the kitchen, the clatter of dishes resuming. He was really pushing his limit then.

Well, this was very rapidly going down a path that Vincent didn't want, not with Jonathan's words still in his head and conflicting ideas of who the murderous man once was and who he is now. Slowly, so as to give Lucian ample warning of his movements, he took a seat near him on the same sofa. The other man was back to being defensive, shoulders curling inward, arms folded over his chest, legs pressed tightly together; Vincent had seen similar posing from abused children, heartbreaking on them and troubling from Lucian.

Why was he acting like he'd been physically abused?

Vincent held out a hand towards him in offering, a spark of an idea coming to mind. Lucian glanced from his hand to his face and back with an uneasy expression, part confusion and part curiosity mixed in the way his eyebrow lifted at the gesture.

"Hello. My name is Vincent Heliotrope. It's nice to meet you," Vincent introduced himself. Maybe if he treated this as a new meeting, a separate encounter to the fight in the alley nearly sixty years ago, he'd have an easier time figuring the guy out?

The blond looked at him like he'd gone insane, -and maybe he had-, but eventually he pulled one hand free to consider it, looking it over as if questioning himself. Then, slowly, hesitantly, Lucian reached back and lightly placed his hand in Vincent's.

A small electric thrill ran up his spine at the contact. Thinking on it now, this was the first time Vincent was able to touch the man voluntarily, a peaceful and willing touch. Soft skin, slightly rough, and warm; he barely resisted the urge to rub his thumb over the hand in his and instead focused on listening to Lucian's words.

"Digitized Duplication of Lucian Master File, Version One One," Lucian recited easily. "Digi, for short."

"Um... I'm sorry?" Vincent asked in confusion, staring blankly at the other man. What the hell kind of introduction was that? Lucian shrugged.

"Well, considering the amount of damaged data I have and then having the Baby Front End software interface directly compiled into me to repair me, I guess I'd actually be Version Two?" he tried explaining, cheeks flushing. "Either way, 'Digi' is acceptable as a shortened designation."

"But, that's not a name," Vincent told him, concerned by the wording, and Lucian frowned in return.

"Names are for people. I'm an artificial entity, property of Afton Robotics," he corrected, then tilted his head thoughtfully. "But now I belong to Meera, so I guess that part isn't quite right anymore."

A sickly weight settled in the pit of Vincent's stomach at hearing him. "Lu-!" he began and Lucian glared sharply at him, green eye glowing brighter.

"Meera can call me by that name since it's the only name she knows me by. You call me Digi or don't bother talking to me at all." He tried to pull his hand away but Vincent held on.

"All right, all right! Digi, then. Okay?" he amended quickly, desperate to not lose the fragile contact between them. This was going a different direction and he wanted to follow that path, see where it went.

Lucian eyed him, then gave their hands a pointed look, as though trying to remind him that the handshake hadn't ended. Vincent half hoped that ignoring the look would let him hold on a little longer. Lucian's hand in his was strangely nice. But the man gave a little tug and he reluctantly let go, closing up his own hand to try and retain the warmth.

"So, what was that all about?" Lucian asked suspiciously, shifting in place and looking just a little less on guard. Vincent felt a bit more hopeful that the other man was already opening up a bit more, though using whatever designation that was -did Afton call him that?- instead of his name was dehumanizing. Why would Lucian prefer to be referred to as an object when he remembered him as being so proud and arrogant that he thought of himself as a demon or superior to the guards?

"Thought we could... start new?" Vincent replied with a hopeful grin, rubbing at his neck nervously. Lucian narrowed his eyes at him.

"But... I murdered you," he said slowly, watching him carefully. Vincent raised a finger, taking note of the slight flinch on Lucian's face.

"You remember murdering me," he corrected.

"Yeah... because... I... did," Lucian agreed slowly, though there was a slightly questioning lilt to his tone.

"Well, the other Lucian also remembered murdering me, and I already kicked the ass of the Lucian that did murder me, so that's... that's that, I suppose," Vincent explained with a sheepish smile. Lucian squinted at him.

"What are you saying?" he asked carefully. Vincent shrugged, reaching back up to rub at his neck again.

"Well, if we look at it like that, then technically I don't have to forgive you for my death 'cause it wouldn't have been you that killed me. And if we both know that I know that it wasn't technically you that killed me, then....," he rambled, hoping he was making some kind of sense. "Well, then I don't have any real beef with you."

Lucian gave him that distrusting look again, and Vincent hated that, hated knowing that all the fighting and arguing he had instigated before now made it so much harder to gain Lucian's trust. How much of Lucian's low sense of self-worth was his fault? How much was Afton's doing?

"Could I... have another chance... with you?" Vincent asked somberly. Lucian's expression didn't change, even as he rubbed the fingers of his left hand together nervously. "Please?"

Part of him was sure that Lucian would refuse. Why wouldn't he? Vincent had rejected Lucian's apology back at the cemetery, it would only be fitting that this time the blond would reject him.

The idea of it hurt, oddly enough. More than from the understanding that he'd lose the chance to make amends with the digital ghost.

"I'll think about it," Lucian finally replied, giving him an odd look, "all right?"

Vincent let out a breath he didn't even realize he'd been holding in, shoulders dropping. "Oh. Y-yeah, yes, of course." Not a rejection, but not acceptance either. A 'maybe' at best. He'd have to settle for that, in light of everything at least.

As Meera finally emerged from the kitchen with a big bowl of popcorn drizzled with butter, Vincent stood up from the couch and moved to give her space to settle down.

"Oh? Leaving? 'Bout time," the woman muttered, taking his spot immediately and positioning herself as a barrier between him and Lucian.

"Puede mirar con nosotros?" Lucian asked without looking at her. Vincent assumed it was something uncharacteristic, as Meera's eyes widened and she inhaled sharply, whipping around to stare at him intensely.

"Seguro? 'Tás seguro?" she grilled him sharply and Lucian only shrugged as if his response made no difference. Meera grimaced, blowing air through pursed lips so as to flip her bangs upward before giving Vincent a dirty look. "You can stay and watch the movie with us, if you want," she offered, gesturing to a nearby recliner.

"Oh... thank you?" Vincent returned uncertainly, accepting the seat and wondering if Lucian's words had been the cause of the sudden invitation.

"You say anything I consider stupid and I reserve the right to kick you out," she added, shaking the television remote at him before clicking it on and settling back, popcorn bowl in her lap.

As the movie began, Vincent stole a quick look over at the digital ghost. It didn't look like anything about him had changed, but the atmosphere didn't feel as tense as before. Maybe things would work out after all?

"Hey, hey! Eyes on the screen, not on my roommate!" Meera declared, "Goddamn flirty ass ghost in my apartment...."

Vincent made very sure to keep as much focus as he could on the movie, face hot and probably very red.

END

#fanfiction #digital lucian #meera corbett #eggs benedict #vincent #dream guard #fnaf #sister location #one shot

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disneydreamlights · 8 years

Text

Corrupted Data

A year after coming up with the AU, I actually did something with it. (Aka I wrote 90% of this a year ago and only just now decided to finish it up.)

Based off of that one Data Kairi AU post I made a year ago.

Summary: After saving Riku from the bugs Pete infected him with, Sora has one more friend he has to save. Data Kairi AU.

Fanfiction | AO3

“Well, we should sign off here. I guess it’s goodbye, guys.” Sora grinned as he said goodbye to Mickey, Donald, and Goofy for what would probably be the last time. Since they’d managed to clear out the last of the bugs in Data Riku, that was it for all the bugs in the journal, and, without the bugs, the data would begin to return to normal. It was time for him and Riku to be reset. Sure, they never really found what they’d been looking for, and Sora couldn’t shake the fact that something was missing right about now, but he had managed to save the Datascape, and that had to count for something in his mind. “Give the “us” out there our best, okay?”

He turned to Riku and nodded, ready for him to close the portal between the real and data worlds. It was time to finally end all this. “What’s that?” Jiminy’s voice came in through the channel they’d all been using to communicate with each other.

And suddenly, the ground was shaking beneath them, as if the entire world was being torn apart. “What is this power?” Not even Riku knew. That was a bad sign if Riku had no idea as to what was going on. Jiminy’s Journal didn’t have an answer as to what was going on, this was unfamiliar territory, and it was a dangerous one at that. “It’s so much stronger than anything I’ve ever felt before. Could it be some sort of bug?”

“Bugs!? But how could that happen? I thought we got rid of all of ‘em.” Goofy’s confused voice came in from over the channel next.

“I thought we did too. There’s a chance we were wrong.” So did Sora, and so did Riku. They all had, otherwise they wouldn’t have said their goodbyes. Whatever this bug was, it had managed to escape eradication, and it was powerful. Maybe the power source for the bugs, that was a possibility, right?

Then came Donald. “Oh…what do we do now?”

“That message said it was going to delete the datascape. We can’t let something that powerful get loose. The journal data has to be locked!” Riku was determined to keep both worlds safe from whatever this was, but what did that mean for them? For Maleficent and Pete? They were all still inside, about to be preyed upon by the bugs once more. If they didn’t stop this, then they’d be destroyed. Mickey pointed those exact thoughts out, concerned for their safety.

“Then locking the data isn’t an option.” Riku was annoyed to say the least by the fact that they weren’t willing to sacrifice what was already there for the only option that was apparent, but it wasn’t like he didn’t understand where those outside the journal were coming from. He didn’t want to condemn Maleficent and Pete to death either, nor condemn himself and Sora. “Both worlds are at stake! What do we do?”

Sora thought for a moment before rushing forward. “You guys, hang tight! I’ll take care of this.”

“Sora? Where are you going? Hey!” Riku starting running after him. “Sora, are you crazy!?”

Sora turned back to face Riku. “No way I’m gonna leave them out there! You heard what Mickey said. I gotta find Pete and Maleficent!”

“But you don’t even know where they are!”

Sora shook his head, that didn’t matter to him at all. He’d find them, regardless of what it took. “Then I’ll just have to go look for them!”

Riku looked at him, somewhat surprised by that answer. “Aren’t you afraid? All our memories, our entire existence, even this whole world could get erased!”

“I’m afraid, but…you know why I have to do this.” Sora looked straight at Riku. “You feel it too, don’t you? There’s someone in there, and she needs us.”

Riku looked at Sora, a little more than slightly confused. It was true, that he held the journal’s data when it was all erased and the bugs started showing up in the first place, but if that was the case, then why wasn’t he sure what was in there that Sora was talking about, and why could he feel her too.

“Besides, even then, doing something to stop this, it beats just sitting around and waiting for the end of the world to come. I don’t know if there’s any way I can win, if there’s any way to reach whoever’s in there, but I know…I’ve gotta at least try.” And with that, Sora jumped straight into the keyhole, not waiting to hear anything more from Riku or Mickey.

He was going to save them all, Pete, Maleficent, and whoever it was that was in there with them. He’d make sure of it.

-x-

Sora had run through the glitched Datascape. Beyond this point, the area had looked primarily like a System Sector, the portals he’d been debugging in his entire time going through the journal and fixing the glitches. At the very center of the last one lay the end of the journey, and there were Maleficent and Pete along with a cloaked figure. Possibly the one he’d seen at the beginning, when he’d gotten his Keyblade?

“Insolent fool, I’ll take care of you myself!” Maleficent spread out her cloak at Pete fell backwards from a failed hit, sending a magic spell composed of green flames flying at the figure, who side stepped gracefully.

“Don’t get in my way.” The cloaked figure was female, and young from the sound of her voice, and with a single wave of her hand, she’d summoned a dark corridor, banishing Pete and Maleficent from the area.

“Maleficent! Pete!” Sora called out, running in with his Keyblade out, and causing the cloaked figure’s attention to be shifted to him. She let out a laugh, one that sounded a lot darker than should’ve ever been coming out of that voice just from the sound of it.

And she removed her hood, revealing dark red hair, almost the color of a red wine, cropped short so that none of her hair fell below her neck. She looked to be almost normal for somebody buried so deep in the journal, but there were a few startling points that made it obvious that something had happened, namely wire like lines of black coding running down her face, creating a sharp contrast to the paleness of her skin. Her irises were black, with pupils the same red as that of the bugs he’d been facing throughout his entire journey, and despite having never seen her at all before this point, he couldn’t shake the feeling that he knew her. “It’s about time you got here, Sora.”

“K—“ It was like a memory, one he couldn’t access, but this girl knew him, and he knew her, somehow. And despite that, he couldn’t even figure out a name. “Who are you? Why are you doing this?”

“You don’t remember me?” Sora strained to make out the girl’s tone of voice, but rather than detecting hurt in it, like he would’ve expected, she was playful. Almost as if she was toying with him instead. “Oh, that’s right, you wouldn’t. It’s not like I exist really exist here anymore, after all, what does a corrupted piece of data have a place here?”

“Corrupted…you’re the one behind all the bugs!?” Despite that being the logical conclusion to come to, he didn’t want to believe it. Sure she looked heavily corrupted but, at the same time, something in him just looked at her and couldn’t comprehend the idea that she could do this.

“Took you long enough to realize that. Except you got one detail wrong. I’m not the one behind the bugs,” She summoned out a Keyblade, one with flowers on the teeth and a heart for the handle, but it was hard to tell. Like with the glitch lamp that Pete had made Jafar, it was covered with light blue blocks of corrupt data, forced into this form. The Keyblade itself, was black, with dark red lines coming all over it. “I am the bugs.”

From outside the Keyhole, he heard Riku’s voice. “Sora, be careful! Whoever she was, she’s not them anymore.”

“You mean, you don’t know!?”

“She’s data that was removed from the journal…I thought that when it was corrupted and I got the data, I got all the data, but…somehow she didn’t make it in,” Riku explained. “Whoever she was, the bugs must’ve gotten ahold of her!”

Before Sora could respond to Riku, the girl charged her Keyblade slashing down in a powerful strike, causing Sora to raise his Keyblade up to prevent her from landing a hit. A loud clash rang out as the Keyblade collided, and the girl pushed down, hoping to get him to drop his guard. “Any idea how I can free her from them?” He pushed back, watching as she jumped back gracefully, not even thrown off.

“Just try to take her down! If you’re lucky, maybe it’ll delete the remaining bugs in her and restore her to her original state.” It was left unsaid between the two boys about what might happen if the idea didn’t work, but they were pressed for time. If this was their only chance at trying to save her, it’d be worth the risk. “Good luck, Sora.”

Sora nodded, despite knowing Riku probably couldn’t see him, and ran for the girl again, who kept simply ducking out of the way of his Keyblade. Every swing he took seemed to be matched with a perfect counter step, pulling her just out of reach of the end of his Keyblade. After a moment of matching steps, she swung her Keyblade at him, hardly giving Sora enough time to react before he found himself whacked in the face with it. The girl had begun her counterstrike, and after the initial hit seemed keen on not letting up, attacking him with a series of quick strikes, her blade infused with darkness much as Riku’s had been as she swiped at him once more. He barely had time to dodge the attack, rolling out of the way and putting as much distance as possible between him and the girl.

“Fire!” A fireball left the tip of Sora’s Keyblade as he aimed at the girl, and he watched as she attempted to roll out of the way, just barely failing the maneuver and winding up with the edges of her cloak singed by the flame. Before she had time to ready a counter, he was already upon her, slashing at her with the Keyblade and managing to land a hit this time, but not before she hit him with a counter that he scarcely had time to raise his Keyblade up to block in time. With the counter occurring, the carnage began, and she summoned up her darkness charged blade, slashing at him repetitively in an attempt to catch the boy off guard, with several hits landing successful.

“Just give up already and let me DEVOUR THIS WORLD!” As she finished the statement, the girl let out a pulse of darkness, knocking Sora back and to the ground.

He stood up slowly, raising his Keyblade as a green light surrounded him, healing him of most of the damage he’d just taken. “No way. I’m not letting you destroy the Datascape, you’re not getting into the outside world!” He ran at the girl, charging at her with his Keyblade and watched as she raised her Keyblade to protect herself once more. Sparks flew off from Kingdom Key as the two blades met, and she pulled back immediately only for them both to launch at each other again, this time blow meeting blow as neither of the two of them could land a hit. After several moments of attacks meeting one another, Sora pulled back, panting, but the girl seemed just as tired despite being made of bugs…perhaps she wasn’t nearly as powered up by the bugs as he’d thought.

Looking down at his Keyblade, he gripped the handle tighter and looked at the girl, aiming the Keyblade and watching as a bright beam of light escaped from the tip, hitting the girl and causing a single Blox Bug to appear in front of her. “That’s it, Sora! The source of the bugs! If you defeat that, it’ll free her!”

“Got it!” Sora lowered his Keyblade, and the beam of light vanished, but the bug remained, crawling about on its four legs, trying desperately to get back to the girl, who had fallen unconscious the moment the bug had appeared. With one slice of his Keyblade, the Blox Bug was split in two, vanishing in a dark cloud as the last bug was cleared from the journal. The Keyblade that had been in the girl’s hand up until that point shattered, as the glitches that had been sustaining it were no longer in the datascape.

The moment he cleared out the last bug, his eyes widened as memories of a young girl from the islands began flooding back in. He watched her slowly stand up as she awoke from the unconscious state caused by the removal of the bugs. He was hesitant until he saw her face no longer covered by the black, wire like marks it had been before. Her eyes were no longer black and red, but were now normal covered, with purple irises, and she smiled at him. He smiled back, and eager to see his other best friend once more as she should be, he shouted her name.

“Kairi!”

#Heather Writes #I haven't written anything in so long holy shit #Anyways enjoy XD #Data Kairi AU

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pearlrebs · 8 years

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I guess i wasnt very clear. Easy to seem angry over the internet unintentionally. I mean to say; rebs url (a small thing) represented something to us. Xe left and we all really miss xer. Xe mattered to us and was a special part of tjlc. 1/8

In many peoples eyes this is an aggressive act. Im sure that you can see at least a little how we would see it that way. 2/8

I wasnt implying that you are not queer or that i hate queers. i was saying that, this is the internet, im not going to always believe everything everyone tells me. 3/8

Most queers i know, try and stick together despite our differences. And the fact that you seem very angry (could be reading into it) at a group of people who are predominately queer tells me that you COULD be something other than queer. 4/8

As you yourself said this is just a tv show...but its more than that isnt it? Why you spend so much thought throwing shade at rebs or the tjlcers or whoever, tells me that theres something else going on and that it is important. 5/8

banding together with like-minded people is the solution to the political shitfest we are in. I'd like to think that we could work thru our differences to reach our common goals assuming, we have common goals. (if im wrong, please let me know) 6/8

I dont see myself as a victim, im only sad. not in a pitying way. Its hard to describe. You were probably the victim of an angry tjlcer on here or witnessed the chaos and theres really no excuse for hatefullness (im admonishing my own camp here). 7/8

debate, yes, but never being mean just to be mean. That doesnt get anyone anywhere. I hope this makes sense and im not trying to offend you. I just think life is too short to hate. And its sad that there has been much on here. 8/8

I’m actually not angry, I think it’s all kinda funny. Though I do try my best to respond seriously to serious messages. The “go fuck yourself”s will always be met with a “sounds good,” but when someone takes the time to send a message like this, I tend to pay attention. Anyways...

First you say you’re not going to always believe everything everyone tells you, then you turn around and say that the tj//lc group is predominantly queer. Who’s telling you that? Hard evidence? Demographics data? A census taken by a neutral third party to determine age range and sexuality, and what direction they believe the show should go? As I answered someone before: anecdotal evidence is inadmissible in science and court for a reason. Of course since you’re a lesbian (a factoid gleaned from your profile, but if this is inaccurate, please inform me. But I could easily say you’re not, but I don’t, because when someone tells me they’re queer, I believe them, who the hell wants to be in a [most places on the globe] hated minority? [by “hated,” I mean high risk of murder, bullying, and homelessness, and possibly being a criminal act depending on where you live]), your experience is going to be skewed towards finding other queer people. You think the group is predominantly queer people, but from the outside looking in, even as a queer person, I’ve mostly seen a bunch of straight women geeking over two middle aged white dudes possibly touching dicks, and using “representation” as a mask. I haven’t mingled with your community — I’ve got my own, who are and aren’t queer all the same.

And again, I say that with full knowledge that it is anecdotal evidence from my viewpoint and experience. I could be wrong. But that doesn’t mean you’re right either.

Moving on. Most queer people (I don’t like the term “queers” personally, but as a queer person, you can reclaim that word however you want) you know stick together despite the differences. Okay. But if our difference is that you don’t think I deserve rights, or that my life is somehow worth less than a straight person’s (voting Dump/Pence, specifically Mike Pence, who would rather a gay person go to a conversion camp — where the risk of suicide is nearly 70% — than be gay), then that’s not a “difference.” That’s almost a hate crime (and it actually is in some countries).

I assume you and I have similar goals — stop the carney-handed mango. I assume all but the 14% of LGBT people who did vote for that cheeto in a wig, do. Hence why I make a point of saying I don’t hate Rebs as a person (although the fact that xer Patreon is still up, and xe’s still collecting money, despite the fact xe’s publicly declared xe has no intention on ever making videos again, and even taking the existing ones down, is a little less than the perfect angel everyone is insisting that xe is).

Tbh, maybe I tend to befriend more queer people irl, but you know what else is important? Straight allies. To me, being LGBT+ is a description of where I put my genitals/my gender identity, and I don’t exactly bond with people over that. A shared struggle, yes, and if I see a queer person being bullied, I will step in. I can support a gay man’s rights, even if that gay man is going out there campaigning for the orangutan in a suit (and some did). I’ll say he should be allowed to get married to whoever he wants, and when his Nazi buddies turn on his ass, I’ll be helping him find a visa out of here, but dear Ahura Mazda, I wouldn’t be caught dead having a beer with him. In fact, they most criticism I’ve ever gotten for being trans, is from other trans people. Yes, they should have rights, but fuck them as individuals, holy shit, don’t tell me how to transition. You can be trans (or any LGBT+) and still be a shitty person.

But like... about 10%-15% of people are queer. 10%-15% of people couldn’t have voted for our rights and won. Meaning we have a ton of straight people on our side. And that’s what we are: we’re people. I love Steven Universe and pizza. I’ll find people that love Steven Universe and pizza that didn’t vote for literally satan.

I’ve personally never been wronged by a hateful tj//lcer. But as you pointed out, there was a lot of hatefulness that was slung around. I watched as people attacked Mark Gatiss for not making their ship canon, or call him straight (they really care about representation, don’t they? /s), attacked other queer ships, tags, bullied some other queer shippers into self-harm, etc.

No, that wasn’t you doing any of that, and that wasn’t anything you participated in... This blog really isn’t about you, I don’t know why you’re so sad about it. This is about everyone’s actions that I’m starting to suspect we both found deplorable. Though I guess if you were a close follower of Rebs, you hated Mary from second one, which was really uncalled for (hate her for shooting Sherlock — I don’t, but it’s a reason — but that didn’t happen until we knew her for two whole episodes, half of a third, and she was just a lovely person until that exact moment).

The thing is, it IS just a show to me. I’m just responding to hate until I get bored with it. But tj//lc it became so much more to a bunch of people, and that’s why it got so toxic.

Again, THE PROBLEM is tj//lcers were demanding representation from a show, and writers, who were always honest that they weren’t going to give it. At least not in the way they wanted (and when it wasn’t in the way they wanted, they had tantrums, which is why I say: it was never about “representation” for some of them.). Rebs, even if it started as just a hobby, quickly became, and fed into this mass conspiracy that ultimately did end up hurting a lot of people. Possibly including xerself. That’s why I don’t feel bad taking your symbol: it is just a show, everyone had prior warning that jxhnlock wouldn’t happen, so the conspiracy was always just going to be fanfiction, and Rebs did some shitty things.

The way people are freaking out... they need to get over it. Or if not, okay, soak in grief forever over a fictional ship, but there’s probably better ways of dealing with all this besides sending me hate. Because honestly, what does anyone hope to accomplish by sending me hate? Me to delete? Sure, let’s say I did that. Jxhnlock isn’t going to be any more canon, and Rebs isn’t going to be any less wrong, and all of the hate xe encouraged is still going to be out there. Oh, and I’ll keep responding, which really just makes it worse.

Had people just ignored me — never sent any messages — there would be precisely one post on this blog, which was my original announcement that I had it.

Also — what have I said that’s “hateful?” Yeah, okay, I called rebs a “twat” for being a misogynist, I thought it was delightfully ironic, having a misogynistic slur juxtaposed next to that observation (like saying, “don’t fucking swear”), but no one got the joke, so I took it down. But otherwise? Saying John Watson is Straight is just a fact. Jxhnlock never happened, and since it didn’t, the insistence that he’s bisexual has no standing. He’s always said, “I’m not gay.” I never took that to mean he was saying, “I’m not gay, but I like men, I’m bisexual/pansexual.�� Jeez, no, if he was part of the community at all, I imagine he’d let it pass, rather than get angry about the assumption (like Sherlock does, who is, said by the writers, to be neither gay nor straight. In fact, I’ve often heard that if you’re a good straight ally, it means not being upset if people assume you’re gay for standing up with them — so in some interpretation, he’s actually a bit homophobic). I’ve also pointed out that xe was wrong, which xe is. My banner is of Gatiss confirm jxhnlock wasn’t happening again — this is a thing that happened. Are facts “hateful” now?

Also... “life is too short to hate.” I mean... I think I’ve got enough life left in me to hate the sentient tire fire that uses too much fake tan cream, and the apparent resurgence of Nazis in America. Don’t you? Shouldn’t you?

tj//cers are definitely not on that level, but I don’t hate them, is the thing. I said this before: I hate no one in particular, just what the legacy produced.

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sad-ch1ld · 6 years

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via RSI Comm-Link

Duane stepped out from the washroom wiping his hands on his trousers. The sanitizer was supposed to dry them completely, but either he was doing something wrong or maybe the stupid thing just — his musing was abruptly halted when he spotted the Banu standing in the middle of the hallway. What the hell is a Banu doing here?

He reached a hand slowly to the stun baton on his belt and firmly asked, “Can I help you?”

A wide smile broke across the Banu’s elongated face, deepening the network of crags there. “Hello!”

Duane quickly checked to see if the Banu’s chest had a ‘visitor’ tag. Sometimes one of the techs would bring in a guest if they had to work on the weekend, and it wouldn’t be too surprising if Eiko had forgotten to comm him from the security desk.

No. No tag. And the Banu was carrying a datapod. Duane felt his pulse quicken. After working as a security guard for eight years at the Behring Applied Technology labs he might actually be in the middle of his first real break-in. Don’t screw this up, Duane.

Calmly, Duane informed the Banu, “If you don’t have security tag, I have to ask you to accompany me to the lobby.”

“Your tag,” said the Banu nodding to the small purple badge on Duane’s chest. “Does it open the doors for all the laboratories?”

Duane slipped the baton from its loop and pressed the primer. “Last warning. This area is for authorized personnel only and I will remove you by force if necessary.”

The Banu simply tilted his head to the side and smiled wider. “Please look at me for the next five seconds. Thank you.”

Duane realized too late that he had forgotten to see if the Banu was alone.

“Damn it, Mas. I told you to wait,” Alex said as she peeled the still smoldering stun-glove off her hand and tucked it into her belt. She had to admit, Klanger had done a hell of a job designing the thing. Too bad the glove was destroyed after one use. Worth the money though, to be able drop someone near instantly. Next time she was on Spider she’d definitely need to see if there were any more for sale.

“You said wait till you found the key. We found the key,” Mas replied, setting the datapod gently on the ground.

“What if this idiot had comm’d for backup or triggered an alarm?”

The Banu shrugged. Alex knew it was useless arguing with Mas about things like this. He was one of the best hackers she had ever known, but trying to get him to stick to a plan was about as useless as trying to get a Vanduul to talk out an issue. Anyway, improvisation was the key to being a good data runner. Knowing that Mas was going to do whatever the hell he wanted had just become a standard part of all her plans.

“I believe he has done both,” Mas said as he rolled the guard onto his back.

It was then that Alex noticed the faint light blinking under the skin of the guard’s neck. Crap, she thought. A deadswitch. Behring must have wired up their security personnel with them. Something happens to one, the rest would soon be on their way. Time for more improvising.

“Can you hack it?”

“I can try,” replied Mas.

Reaching down, he turned the guard’s head to better expose the neck. Drawing a curved spoon-like blade from the small sheath hidden under his arm, Mas carved the deadswitch out. Alex barely avoided being sprayed by a pulse of blood.

As Mas connected a small silver connector cable from his pad to the flashing deadswitch beacon that now lay in a puddle on the floor, Alex used her Pyro to cauterize the wound closed. She had never been one to leave a body count behind. Not only was it sloppy and unnecessary, it tended to make the Advos try that much harder to track you down.

“Mas, instead of deactivating it, can you make it broadcast like the guard is still okay?”

The Banu nodded and continued to manipulate his pad with his long dexterous fingers.

Leaving him to work, Alex yanked the tag off the guard’s uniform and used it to access a janitor’s closet she had passed a few paces back. Sure enough, inside was a scrubber. She carried it back just as Mas was finishing.

“There,” said Mas, retracting the connector. “Healthier than ever.”

“Then let’s put him back on patrol.” She opened up the scrubber’s rear hatch and Mas dropped the bloodied beacon inside the refuse storage bin. A few presses later and the scrubber was happily cleaning its way down the hall. There was still a good chance that the few seconds the deadswitch had been active would be enough to send a security squad to investigate, but if they were lucky, the scrubber’s movements would be enough to convince anyone monitoring that it had been some kind of glitch. Either way, they needed to hurry.

The research lab gleamed with an immaculate shine that screamed money and danger. In Alex’s experience, the only reason that anyone ever kept a room this spotless was when a little bit of dirt would be enough to lose a fortune in research or get someone killed by accident. Of course, with the amount she had been promised for pulling this job, she expected nothing less.

Mas set the datapod down next to a bank of sleek white processors on the far end of the room. If their imposing size wasn’t enough to tell that they were important, the thick coil of cables running into the data hub would have been a dead giveaway. Just about every piece of tech in the place was wired to the computers. He lifted up an access junction and plugged in his silver cable.

“Any issues?” Alex asked.

The Banu swiped at his pad. “Only minimal protection. I believe they are counting on the building’s security to prevent access.”

Never underestimate the overconfidence that comes with owning a big fortress-like building.

After bypassing the preliminary security, Mas opened up a port and hooked the datapod into place. He settled in to extract the data and began humming Could Have Been You, a sure sign that he was lost in the code.

Alex strolled around the room rummaging through the work tables that were home to what she guessed were next generation Behring weapons. For the millionth time, she wished she knew exactly what was in the data they were accessing. The name alone wasn’t much to go by — ‘Project Stargazer’ — but the guy who hired them refused to tell them anything more. Alex still had doubts about whether it had been smart to accept his offer. Though, her suspicion was that the job had been less of an offer and more of an order.

The man, ‘Mr. Grouse,’ contacted them through the usual channels on the amateur ornithologist boards. After all his bonafides checked out, they met at a small cafe on the outskirts of Prime. He’d been easy to pick out thanks to the yellow hat he had promised to wear. Alex had done her normal procedure of arriving early and placing a small pinhole camera on the wall. It was a great way to scout a potential client before meeting and make sure they weren’t sweating too much or hiding an abnormal amount of guns. Neither applied to Grouse, though. He had been as calm as could be. Even more so, his skin had that artificially smooth look, a common side effect from some of the new facial reconfiguration surgical units. Which was surprising because who would choose to make their face that uninteresting? He was like the Human equivalent of elevator music. Even standing across the table from him, Alex had felt her eyes wander away from lack of interest. On second thought, she could see why being aggressively boring might be a good choice considering the work she assumed he did.

After a few minutes of observing him to make sure everything seemed on the up on up, she noticed him reach into his briefcase and pull out a small hand scanner. With a quick sweep of the cafe, he smiled when he spotted the mounted camera.

“Alexandria Dougan,” he had said in a calm, even voice. “I am ready to meet whenever you are.”

Well, that’s a first.

“And if I am not mistaken, that Banu over there wearing the sunhat is your partner Mas Houlan. Why don’t you have him join us so we can discuss our business together?”

A few moments later, her and Mas were listening patiently to Grouse explain that he wanted all the records of a research project completely deleted from the Behring Applied Technologies lab. Before she could even begin to protest, he had told them the payment. It was significantly higher than she would have even dared asked for, even on her most brazen of days. It was enough to put her and Mas on easy street and settle a lot of old debts.

It had made her really nervous.

That’s why she had decided that they would make copies of the project files before they erased all trace of them from the lab’s record. As the old saying goes, never trust a criminal.

About halfway through Mas humming The Day Ahead, the alarm went off. That was disconcerting, but not nearly half as much as the giant turrets that lowered from the ceiling. Alex held her breath, but rather than turn and fire on them, the two turrets took aim at the lab’s door.

It quickly dawned on her why they were still breathing. It wasn’t worth it to risk shooting up all the valuable equipment. The turrets were designed to stop anyone entering or exiting the lab. And stop with extreme prejudice if the large Behring logos on the ballistic guns were anything to go by.

“How much longer, Mas?” she shouted over the blaring alarm.

“The files have copied, but I will need some time to finish expunging the records.”

Okay, thought Alex, let’s see how much ammo these things have.

Reaching into her satchel, Alex brought out her Insta-Friends decoy. She primed it and slid the puck out into the killbox and covered her ears expectantly. A moment later, the decoy went off and the turrets sprang to life, raining bullets at the artificial targets. Got to love Joker Engineering. Half the time the stupid things didn’t work, but when they did, boy, did they work.

Eventually, the decoy died and the turrets spun down. The floor was completely chewed through. It looked like they had been designed to allow the rounds to penetrate rather than ricochet into the expensive tech. Right… ricochets. I probably should have thought of that first… Alex would have to remind Mas to make an extra offering to the God of Luck for her.

She had only brought one additional decoy and she had a feeling that the turrets had more than enough ammo to outlast it. What she needed was a way to force the Insta-Friends to last longer. Scanning the lab, she quickly found what she was looking for: a large half-built laser sat on one of the workbenches connected to an array of batteries. She momentarily considered using one of the lab’s experimental weapons to destroy the turrets but decided that she liked having all her limbs attached too much to mess with an unfinished laser. Instead, she used her Pyro to solder one of the batteries to the decoy and slid the heavy makeshift device into range of the turrets. Once again, the guns sprang to life. It wasn’t until the decoys had begun flickering away, the larger battery finally drained, that she heard the happy clicking whir of empty chambers attempting to fire.

“I am ready to go,” said Mas, strolling confidently through the still smoldering killbox with the datapod. Alex hurried to catch up.

They left the lab not a moment too soon. Drawn by the gunfire, a full squad of guards descended upon it just as Mas and Alex managed to round the corner out of view. One of the benefits of robbing a campus as big as Behring’s is that it took a while to move security into position. If she ever went straight, maybe she would get a job as a consultant and earn big credits pointing out all the dumb things companies did with their security systems.

Leaving the main research wing, the pair weaved their way back through the labyrinthine building to the executive’s office that they had entered through. Alex stopped them at every intersection to ping the path ahead. It would make them stand out on scanners, but it was safer than blindly stumbling into the roaming groups of armed guards.

Thankfully, when they arrived at the executive’s private hangar, it was unguarded and the Belligerent Duck remained just as they had left it. It was one of those interesting facts of life that powerful peoples’ private hangars are considered so off-limits, security guards assume criminals know not to land there too. That was why private hangars were usually one of the first things Alex looked for when she was casing a building. Plus, they usually had little free water bottles you could stock up with in case you got thirsty during a heist.

Alex brought up her mobi and unlocked the Mercury. Mas headed up the ramp straight for datastorage to make sure the pod was safely secured, while she made her way to the star runner’s cockpit.

The hangar doors opened above them and the Duck lifted into the air. The name still made her smile. She had chosen it to infuriate the cocky infoagent she had won the ship from. The pompous prick had the gall to name the ship Razor’s Edge. Now whenever he wanted to buy data off her, he had to comm the Belligerent Duck as a reminder that it didn’t pay to bet against Alex Dougan.

She eased the throttle forward and the ship’s wide swept-back wings cut easily through Terra’s calm atmosphere. A moment after leaving the hangar, the pleasant Crusader computer voice alerted her that they were being targeted. Sure enough, a Sabre with Behring livery was closing in on her tail. It must have launched when the alarm went off.

The comms chirped to life as they were hailed. “This is Behring Security. Land immediately or you will be shot down.”

Great. And it wouldn’t be long before the Terra police joined in. They needed a fast getaway.

“Mas, weapons, now.”

When they had first met, Mas had refused to do anything on the ship that didn’t involve hacking and computers claiming that it “was not his purpose.” It had been close to six months before Alex had stumbled upon a solution that had worked — she had hooked up a terminal from a busted simpod into the manned turret’s seat so that Mas could stare at a screen instead of out the window. That was all it took. Now he was a crack shot.

Mas slid into the weapons terminal, his long legs at the awkward angle all Banu were forced to adopt using Human seats. “How much should I explode them?”

“None! Knock out their radars and I’ll take care of the rest.”

Alex pulled hard and swung the Mercury wide giving Mas time to line up the distortion cannons. The Sabre reacted quickly enough to avoid the first and second salvos. Alex rolled at the last second to avoid their return fire. They were running out of time.

“Get missile lock,” said Mas.

“Mas, we’re not killing them!”

“No killing,” the Banu agreed. “Just a distraction.”

Decelerating till she saw red, Alex brought the ship to bear. After a heartbeat or two had thudded in her chest, she achieved lock and fired two missiles. The Sabre pilot, acting as expected, lit the sky with flares, pulling the missiles off course. Anticipating the brief distraction, Mas fired the turret again. The distortion cannons bit into the Sabre, disrupting its power. There was no way for it to maintain radar and stay flying after a hit like that.

Maxing out the thrusters for all they were worth, Alex sped the Duck away from Behring’s headquarters. However, rather than angling up to leave the planet, she angled the ship towards the nearby mountainous island range. There, she lowered the ship down into a small alcove cut into the beach beneath a rocky outcropping. Diverting power from the Mercury’s shields and thrusters, Mas booted up their reg-spoof. Now, they would be able to fly around incognito for a little while. Should be fine as long as no one looked too hard or took a shot at them. She hoped they weren’t the only ones in the area flying a Mercury today.

It was definitely not their cleanest escape. No way they were going to make the rendezvous now, but Grouse was just going to have to deal with the change in plans. Bringing up her mobi, Alex began a message to their network of contacts. Behring had a lot of credits to toss around. You rob someone like that and they usually made it worthwhile to hunt you down. Leaving the system wasn’t going to be enough. It wouldn’t be long before the Advocacy and a whole fleet of bounty hunters were breathing down their neck. If they wanted to get out of this in one piece they were going to need some extra help keeping an eye out. Hopefully a few of the friends her and Mas made over the years would be willing to lend a hand and alert them if they caught wind of the authorities closing in on the Duck.

Message sent. Now all they needed was somewhere they could hide out till things cooled off.

“Hey Mas, how would you feel about visiting your old Souli?”

TO BE CONTINUED

#RSI Comm-Link #star citizen #roberts space industries

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starcitizenprivateer · 6 years

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On The Run