Chapter 2

[thenine]

Who: OTA
Where: Quad
When: Week 2, Day 5 - Week 4, Day 6
Summary: Chapter 2 prompts!
Restrictions/Warnings: Violence, blood, et cetera. For anything surpassing 'R' on a rating scale, please create your own log.
Notes: Please title your subject line in the following format -- Open / Closed | Date. OOC event information can be found here.

Quick Navigation
The Nine
The Company
Westies
True Leithians
Leith
Resistance
The RAC

The Nine: Poisoned Well

With the heir delivered and Lady Derrish returning to health, balance has been maintained amongst the Nine. Swift and efficient - and, some would say, unbelievable - medical attention administered may have steadied the Lady's life, but for those in the ruling houses, the atmosphere of tenuous peace only grows thicker. Land Kendry has launched an investigation - with particular focus on Land Hyponia - into the source of the 'attack' on Lady Derrish's health. Of course, that is only the surface, and some suggest, with hushed voices, that there may be more to Land Kendry's goals than to weed out an assailant. Land Hyponia has long since been in support of maintaining the Seventh Generation Accords, which it defends staunchly against any opposition. One of the most agitated among those in disagreement with the Accords is Land Kendry. Now is the perfect opportunity for them to rearrange the pieces in their favor, and with the information they've fabricated, they'll be able to replace the head of Land Hyponia with someone who is - at least hopefully - more pliable to their agenda. The Derrish have their own suspicions, the cure surfacing all too conveniently timed to have been a coincidence. When Land Kendry's investigation procures evidence pointing to Land Hyponia as the culprits, inflaming the crime with implied - yet vague - ties to the resistance, the Derrish publically accept the accusation. Behind closed doors, the solution seemed to have come as uncannily easily as the cure, and suspicions only rise. But for now, the two houses remain allied - ready to use one another for their own interests. For those among the nobility, it's the time to reevaluate alliances, assuring the old and gathering the new. The more support you have, the safer you are - unless, of course, you chose the wrong friend. Some turn to other members of the nobility, some to the RAC for hired guards, some to the Company to mandate investigations unsuitable for Killjoys, and some may even turn to the underbelly of society to accomplish anything necessary to stay on top. Or to simply stay alive.

The Company: Cleaning House

There will be no accolades, and no rest, for the hard working Company officials following the response to the True Leithan attacks. Assignments shift from one thing to the next, moving from bureaucratic nightmare to bureaucratic nightmare. While there’s always busy work to distract from the intrigue behind the scenes, it’s not liable to be any safer. Some officials will be charged with maintaining peace and order on Leith, as the outbreak of a pandemic slowly spreads over the moon. From helping the afflicted find their way to a place of treatment, to safe and efficient body disposal—burning corpses by the hundreds—to attempting to track down the source of the virus, it's best anyone assigned here take heed ‘lest they find themselves falling ill as well. Westerley, on the other hand, is a different kind of headache. With Harvest Week in swing, most company officials will be reaching for a drink of their own at the end of their shifts. Rowdy workers celebrating their time off, spending their hard earned Joy frivolously, and citizens whisked away by the atmosphere of celebration all mingle throughout Old Town. Property damage, fighting, less than subtle illegal activity, and crowding all become more of an issue than they usually are during this time. It's the perfect setting to lay down the law, or to not be noticed by it. On top of it all, each and every member of the Company's workforce can expect to have their documents double and triple-checked. Those with any suspected ties to Leith are likely to undergo a more serious investigation. One-on-one interrogations become common practice, and whether you're trusted or suspect, you may come face to face with a companion in your duties. True Leithan sympathizers are what the Company review is after, but anything else unturned will surely not be ignored. Cover your bases.

Westies: Harvest Week

Harvest week is in full swing throughout Westerley - visa workers have been shuttled back in droves from their time on Leithian farms, many of whom were willing to take some of their observations to information brokers for a price. Most had superficial information to sell (the state of unease on the average farm due to the impending Accords, the increased suspicion that the migrant workers were forced to endure, the fear of retaliation by the rebellion for the True Leithian attacks), others with reports of increased security and weapons caches on the farms of those whose sympathies lie with the “heroes” of the attack in Old Town. Old Town, however, is even more of a chaotic mesh of humanity with the mass influx of returning bodies. Bars stay busy day and night, the hokk and ale flow almost faster than most can keep up, and many Enforcers and Killjoys alike can make a good bit of extra joy (or free drinks) by moonlighting as security at the more popular locations. Despite all of the fun to be had, there is still the undercurrent of unrest, because Company checks have increased even more and Intake has become a revolving door of petty criminals being held for the smallest infractions. Everyone is on edge as the Resistance grumbles and the Nine search the shadows for something or perhaps someone. The unrest only worsens once Leith is placed under quarantine. And through it all, criminal activity is on the rise. Somehow, despite the strict regulation and transport of migrant workers, there is an increased access to Jakk and Bliss. Norn has an ever growing market, and weapons dealers are in high demand both in Eulogy and by private buyers alike. Something is brewing beneath the revelry, and no one wants to be caught unable to defend themselves, it seems. Not that any amount of firepower can defend against disease when P43X shows up on W3D7--but it can certainly make the symptoms worse.

True Leithians: Second Stage

Wounded and pressed to a corner, the beast rears its head and bares a maw of teeth and ruthless pursuit. The True Leithian organization does not take pause to mend wounds left in the wake of last week’s retaliation, no. They do not seek the comfort of safe haven and recovery. Instead they turn their anger and fear inward, sacrificing their own for what they believe to be the greater good. On Week 2, Day 6, three individuals slip into the crowds of Leith, mingling with the revelers and the families celebrating Harvest Week. They share smiles and laughter, they share conversation and drinks, but most importantly, they share infection. Each of the three is responsible for disseminating P43X, a viral bioweapon designed by Zan Nikora on behalf of the military in years past. During its conception, the aim of P43X was simple: to create a weapon which could demoralize and destabilize an entire population within a matter of days. To create madness that builds in the blood and eats into the brain, spreading through every tier of society. And though its use has long been out of commission, its engineer has lingered. Zan Nikora, kidnapped and held under threat of death not to himself but to those he holds dearest, is made to choose between the lives of his family on Westerley or the strangers on Leith. His choice is obvious, though far from easy. Reassembling the buried curse takes time, supplies, and testing. He is provided amply with the last two but scarcely with the first. But still he complies. When his madness maker is complete and his existence becomes a potential loose end, it’s not freedom that Zan Nikora tastes, but the poison of his own medicine. Only once the voices in his head have risen above whispers and turned to screams, when his mind can no longer hold secrets worth sharing, does he see his family again. It takes six days*. Six days and Zan Nikora stumbles through Old Town, eyes unseeing, mind riddled with disease—infection spreading. Mod Note: *W3D6. Cure and vaccines will be developed and disseminated beginning on W4D3, but will not be fully administered to all locations until W4D5.

Leith: Pocket Posies

Harvest Week in Leith marks a period of joy and relief. Bazaars are open longer, the ordinary bustle of the business day replaced with celebration and festivities throughout the evening hours. Vendors offer games for adults and children alike, the sky is a constant wash of soft pinks, purples, and greens from holographic firework shows, and music fills the air from different stages. All walks of life are welcome to join in the merriment, just so long as they have the right to be there. Anyone suspected of an invalid visa or citizenship papers are dealt with harshly, but quietly. Tucked away into the darkness of a holding cell like all of Leith’s more problematic elements. It is a time of peace and relief, this week, and they will not abide disruption. But within the hallowed days of celebration, a sickness grows, incubating. Spreading. First, it begins with an ache deep within the muscles. The body tires too quickly, the flesh burns with a blanket of rising fever. Whispers skirt at the edge of hearing, unintelligible but audible, filling the audio cortex with illusions and lies. Food loses its appeal, though the body yearns dearly for energy it cannot hold, and breathing becomes tighter, harder. Next the tide of high fevers, of lethargy. The brain devolves into paranoia and mania, the mind races with delusions and hallucinations. Pain follows, a pain that seems to emanate from every nerve without relief or pause, seeping through the muscles and aching within the very bones of a person. Some may wish for death, and for many, that wish will be granted in an unending sleep when the fatigue pulls darkness across the mind, plunges the last thoughts of a person into static slumber. But not all will succumb so readily, and therein is the weakness that ultimately shelved P43X during its initial creation. Its impacts are not uniform—while much of the population suffers dearly, most are sustained with timely medical interventions, and many others recover with the prowess of their own immune system. For Leith, bountiful in money and supplies, most of P43X’s more fatal properties are circumvented or delayed. But even in this lush world of affluence and peace, there are the poor, the underprivileged, and the weak. They are not afforded the same haste of care, the same salvation. Instead, they’re given graves of sanitizing fires, and their bodies turn to ash.

Resistance: Sleeping Dogs

The chaos of the festivities that go along with Harvest Week provides the perfect cover for the Resistance to begin moving once again. New cells need to be formed in the wake of so many executions and new members need to be recruited. Info brokers with Resistance-leaning sympathies have an opportunity to make a little extra joy by putting the disconnected sympathizers in contact with one another, aiding the vetting of Company insiders that need new handlers within the organization. For Resistance members already embedded within, they need to work now to find new locations to store what supplies remain and to begin rebuilding the stockpiles of weapons and supplies re-confiscated by the Company. Some may have heard of abandoned mines or facilities that can be retrofitted out in the Badlands while others are needed to track down rumors of Company made fallout shelters located within the under-city tunnels. For this, Company moles are essential - the only hope of accessing these shelters is with long forgotten Company passcodes. And the Scarbacks, well. Everyone’s heard rumors that there are many within their ranks willing to help with recruitment and contraband transportation, though there’s little the Company can do to restrict their movements at this time. Because of this, Scarbacks may also be the only ones that have a chance of getting into Leith once the quarantines go into effect. Those already aligned with the rebellion will be tasked with coordinating supply movements, making a deal or three with the devil on behalf of those unwilling to back down from the promises of the Accords. Caution and purpose should drive their movements because if the True Leithian attack is any indication… those nationalists are not going to let go of their precious land and status without a long, bloody fight.

The RAC: Holding Pattern

Warrants still flow in with a regular consistency - enough to keep the average team or agent quite busy. Every harvest season there are visa jumpers that need to be caught and low-level warrants claiming petty theft from farms by Westie migrants. The increasing number of disturbances and crimes in Old Town guarantee a plethora of local warrants to capture criminals across the moon or those that managed to escape an Enforcer’s arrest. Some, however, have either been requested by Seyah Kendry herself or volentold by their seniors within the RAC to conduct investigations into the attack on the Nine. And not all of these investigations are on the Lady’s behest. Some of the Nine aren’t quite willing to take Land Kendry’s word as law and have quietly requested their own investigations into the attack in Old Town and the Land Derrish misfortunes. (MOD NOTE: There will be a comment thread for teams to sign up for the specialized plot related warrants on the monthly warrant post, located HERE. Once teams have posted for a plot warrant, the mods will give them a location and focused assignment.)

Comments

westerley

[brickinthewall]

[Leith's the place to be, usually, for Hanna, but when there's bad things that go bump in the night, and those bad things happen to pay off, well.

Sometimes she just jets off into the night and finds herself ass deep in Harvest Week. Girl needs cash, and cash goes to the bad places.

As it happens, she's off to the bar, again, like always, and this time not planning to actually get shitfaced and hopefully not get into a fight. She had a notoriety of her own, and sure enough, sometimes the fights came to her and she just rolled with the punches.

Beer's the way to go. She's become cheap like that when she goes to these holes in the wall. The Killjoy, though, has a prickling along the nape of her neck, a gut-deep instinct that tells her there's a dog on the loose, someone's staring through the world. Paranoia made sure she stayed alert, at least. Underneath the mostly collected exterior is a caged animal.

Casually, she starts to scan the bar as she waits for her beer with a half-crazed look in her eye. She's taken some pains to cover her tattoos by wearing her usual oversized jacket, emblazoned with the last name KING on the left shoulder. Somehow, she was recognized faster by her ink than the last name she usually gave out...]

[ofobedience]

[Oh, and there's a dog on the loose all right, or at least, a Dog in the vicinity-- his Handler is around the place somewhere, keeping a covert but watchful eye, ensuring that things won't go down unless they're properly sanctioned, that Giovanni won't just turn on whoever happens to get in his way. Never mind that his track record is excellent, that he has no history of either biting the hand that wields nor any random passerby who he hasn't been directly set upon. The fact is, when dealing with Cerberus Units, one can never be too sure.

He knows her by sight, by scent, even if it isn't a personal knowledge or anything that goes deeper than the reputation that precedes her, the fact of having seen her around at Intake or during the course of a mission where Company and RAC paths happen to cross. And so when he moves to walk passed her in the crowded bar and happens to jostle her shoulder just a little too hard, chances of it being entirely accidental are slim too none.

Small pleasures. For something like him, you take them where you can.]

Excuse me.

[His voice is a slippery, sardonic thing.]

[brickinthewall]

[Her body temperature flares with the sudden contact, a wave of pure heat bursting and dying promptly.

Voices like his irritate her. They pretended to know, but knew nothing. They exerted authority over things they didn't understand, couldn't control. How many times had she lashed at people with voices like his?

Even worse? She recognizes him, some Company asshole or another. It's not entirely a secret how little she likes the Company.]

Fuck off.

[Sweet, dripping with toxicity, like a beautiful rose covered in thorns, a colorful animal doused in poison.]

[ofobedience]

[He does seem to have that effect on people.

Though in some respects she's mistaken-- there's nothing of authority in him and he knows it down to the core of himself, he's a weapon, a Dog, he's Company property and it's something he accepts utterly, without question. It's the reason for his own vague feelings of dislike, perhaps-- she's too far outside his experience of how the world ought to be, a RAC agent and don't they always tend to get in the way? Too independent. It's not something he can easily comprehend.

Still. When her acerbic words bite into him, he barks out a laugh that's just as abrasive as his tone had been.]

You have such a way with words.

[brickinthewall]

I can speak prettier if you like.

[The sarcastic, sardonic smile she gives him implies anything but.]

I'm off duty, don't bother unless you've got something to say.

[She just. Hated authority. Hated what they did to her. What they wanted of her. Be a weapon, they said. No, she screamed, and still they made her the weapon she never wanted to become.

So she embraced it, as there was no other option outside of denial. Denying would do nothing for the fact that she could never burn.]

[ofobedience]

Off duty. What a privilege.

[The words are wry, vaguely disapproving. A case of opposites colliding against each other because where she abhors authority, hates what they made of her, he accepts it with absolute obedience. Would feel lost without the metaphorical chains that bind him to the Company. The weight of them, there's something to it. A feeling of being grounded and certain of his place in the world. Secure.

He's rarely 'off-duty' himself, and when he is it's spent pacing or blankly staring at the sterile white ceiling of his room at the Kennel, waiting for something to happen again. Downtime-- it's not something he relishes.]

If you have nothing of importance to be doing, it's all the more insulting that you don't want to stop for a chat.

[brickinthewall]

[Hanna gives him the most dead-eyed stare she could muster. Her green eyes still shone with an undercurrent of... something. Malevolence. Exhaustion. Probably both.

The Company protected the Nine. Her parents were desperate to be a part of that world.

It comes as no surprise that she begins to question his presence, wonder if this is the work of her parents, or those that made her like this. If her parents knew she was alive, she doesn't doubt they'd find a way to kill her.

But she'd be dead by a Killjoy, wouldn't she?

She holds up right hand. Her middle finger shoots up, the word bye inked across the knuckle. A moment later, her index finger comes up, the word good tattooed in the same place. The script is clean cursive, in all lowercase.]

[ofobedience]

What class.

[His voice is a slow sardonic drawl followed by the bark of his laughter, but then he shrugs, shoulders shifting beneath the nondescript black of his 'blending in' clothes-- no Cerberus Unit uniform in evidence tonight. He's here to 'maintain the peace' in the wake of the extra bodies brought in by Harvest Week, yes, but there's no point in causing fear and unwanted attention, despite all that.

His kind-- they're not generally brought out for anything so mundane as rowdy drunks. All this waiting around, it leaves him antsy. Bored.

Still-- much as he'd like to stop and play, create trouble for the RAC for no other reason than the swift ascending animal joy that comes with a fight, it's against his orders, and there are too many people watching for him to get away with that. His Handler, carrying the Dog Bite blade, would put a stop to any extra-curricular activity before he'd even really got started.

And so he turns his back on her. means to walk away.]

Suit yourself, then. Ms King.

[brickinthewall]

You're gonna get tired of it, you know.

[She calls after him, not really bothering to actually look at him. They're all caged animals.

One day, when the beast's had enough, it's going to bite back. It's going to destroy, to give into the instinct. Domestication was really just a nice way of saying "you're tolerable enough to not maul on sight."]

You're gonna run out of excuses called The Company. [The bartend slides her a green glass bottle.] Real convenient, 'til it's not.

[Hanna takes a swig of her beer, far less pensive and graceful compared to the words coming out of her mouth.] You're no better than the rest of us.

[ofobedience]

[He's already a few paces away but her words make him pause, standing amidst the steady stream of bodies vying for a drink or in the midst of Harvest Week revelry. There's nothing in them that hasn't been expressed before, and still facing away from her, he smiles his crookedpin smile.

Because that's all well and good, isn't it? Saying that. Thinking those things. But he's not like her-- he hadn't begun as something else, has always been a Dog, has never known what freedom tastes like and in all honesty, he doesn't want it. Doesn't know what he'd do with it if he had it. That kind of space, that openness-- it frightens him.

Besides, for all that his kind are known for their volatility, for their propensity to bite back, as far as he's concerned to let lose and rip and tear and maim at the hand that wields would mean only death. They'd put him down. Never allow him to leave.

His cage has bars that will not bend. Can't break.

He half-turns, then, a glance over his shoulder back in her direction. Smile still sharp across his face.]

I'm not claiming to be better. Only more realistic. I know what I am, Ms King, and to whom I belong. It must be a strange thing, not being able to say the same.

[brickinthewall]

[Bars might not break.

But they do melt.

And how Hanna knows the duality of fire, the cleansing, the destruction.]

At least I'm no one's thing anymore.

[The dog tags prove that she was just a thing, once. Property, turned over from her own family, renamed to just a series of letters and numbers, eventually a fake designation. Prometheus was, is, her. She's just taken the placid name and turned it into soldier's name.

And, some day, a name of fear.

None of this she voices.]

King. Just King. Besides. [She stares him down, grins not sharply like him, but predatory, sharklike, almost cruel.] It's more fun belonging to me.

[ofobedience]

King it is, then.

[Whereas he still goes by a collection of letters and numbers, Unit 68, and while he's been given a name to go with it it's one that's rarely used. More often than not he's dog or mutt or just hey, you and he responds to all those things as readily as he does 'Giovanni'. Because unlike her, he's still property. Always has been, probably always will be.

He turns back towards her a little more fully, smile widening enough to give her a flash of his too-sharp teeth.]

I suppose that's the difference between you and I. For as long as I wear the collar I'll always be a Dog, and dogs are loyal things. They'll always bow down and obey their masters, and tear apart their enemies with their fangs.

[And there's no removing his collar, that semicircle of metal bolted down through flesh and muscle into bone, a part of the Spine that makes him what he is. Not without killing him, first.]

[brickinthewall]

[It's funny, because to her, that sounds like it's supposed to be some kind of insult.

Instead? She laughs. Outright. That sort of incredulous laugh that comes after being told a lie about yourself.]

Dogs are conditioned for loyalty. But see. Dogs aren't the only loyal ones.

[She was supposed to be a beast. She was supposed to be a trained monster. She was supposed to battle the natural elements that mankind could never overcome.]

I had a husband once, 68. I was loyal to him. To the death. Even after death. So don't come at me with your loyalty bullshit. You just don't know the difference between choosing it and being told that's all you have and accepting it.

[ofobedience]

[If he feels any level of offense or irritation in the face of her laughter, her continued sharp tongue, it doesn't show in either his bearing or the expression he wears. Instead he shrugs, shoulders cutting at the air as they rise and fall, his smile a seemingly permanent fixture for all that there's nothing pleasant in it. A strange smile, as though it's something he learned how to do through theoretical knowledge alone, not something that comes naturally, not learned behaviour.

Perhaps that's exactly what it is.

Whatever the case, her response means little to him. Can't touch him, because it's simply too far removed from his own experience for him to fully comprehend. That kind of commitment to one other person, shared affection, love. He knows nothing of any of that. Or at least, what he did know of it happened so long ago that it hardly matters now, and the ultimate betrayal that came along with it means he'll never look for it again.

What he has-- it's certain and sure. Unfailing.]

And why should choice make the act of loyalty any more real? If anything I'd say it makes it more precarious. Your husband died, and because of that your loyalty is something frozen in place, unchanging because it can't change. Who knows what would have happened if he'd lived. Love and affection are fickle things. What I have goes deeper than that.

[He laughs, quick and hard.]

And this is what I have. There's no trick to it. It's what I've always been and there is nothing else outside of it.

[Not for him.]

[brickinthewall]

What you have is brain washing.

[Simple as that. She'd seen some in passing, going through the same exact thing, swear loyalty to Ouranos. Hanna could never understand it. The pain, the torture, the screaming, the violence, the breaking, the clawing, the burning, the crying, the...

She pulls herself out of that.]

Shit kinda life if all you have is a cage and you're happy with it.

[No wonder her parents hated her. The cage was a lie, it always was. The cage was never an option for her or her brother. At times, there was a raging jealousy over her brother, over leaving of his own volition anyway, and dying doing something better than himself.

Sometimes, she was just jealous of him being dead. So tired was she of all of this, and so unable to learn another way of life. No, he wasn't wrong, her life became frozen the moment he was assassinated.

The only way forward was violence.]

Must be nice not knowing anything but the cage and the leash.

[ofobedience]

[There's a moment of silence, a brief pause, before he decides to close up the distance between them again, move over to stand beside her at the bar. There's nothing immediately pressing for him to be doing-- it's rowdy and cloying in here and there's a deep thrum of waiting violence beneath it all that suggests maybe - maybe - the tension will eventually break and the noisy crowd will come undone, descend into brawling, give him something to do. For now though, that tension holds, and he needs something to pass the time, to keep him focused and poised. It's a difficult thing, sometimes, holding onto that. Not giving in to the impulses that push and gnaw at his insides, whisper yesyesyes to the thought of tearing those around him apart with his nails and teeth and--

--this is why he leans back, loose and boneless, against the bar behind him, close enough to reach out and touch her should he wish to. From further off in the crowd his Handler catches his eye, raises a warning brow, but subtly Giovanni shakes his head. He's all right. He's behaving. No cause for concern. His Handler stares at him intently a moment longer before frowning and looking away.

Unit 68 turns back towards her then, flashes his smile, the teeth like little razorblades, inhuman.]

I was made for the leash, Ms King. [Because apparently dropping polite honorifics is a difficult thing for him to do even when he's asked to, just another signifier of his conditioning.] And it's a good thing, too. I'm not sure you'd want to see me released from it.

[He, too, shares her history of violence and torture and terror, but it's a thing that has been happening to him since the very first moment he opened his eyes and as such, it's inside him now, irrevocable. Branded down into his bones, and that means there's something of stability in it, of certainty. He isn't happy, it isn't nice, but it's full of a crushing restraint he finds a certain kind of cold comfort in.]

Free will isn't for everyone.

[brickinthewall]

Whatever helps you sleep at night.

[Is honestly all she can say. She couldn't relate to the crushing weight of control, of being told what to do and being okay with it.

As much as she looks for violence, like him, she also wants to run from it. Hanna recognizes the need to break the tension in 68, recognizes that he's just waiting for something to happen and to have a half-ass reason to start moving and throwing punches. The thrill of the contract was in the fight, after all, the chase, the enforcement of her own cruel tendencies.

She sighs. The beast was her, too. But the beast wanted to be left alone, to die. There was nothing but vengeance for her, the same way there was nothing but the leash for him. The singular focus of spite and anger is the only reason why she's alive.

Sometimes she hated who she'd become. Not enough to change it, though.]

I don't care if you cut loose. [She finishes the beer now, in several gulps.] Just keep me out of your shit or regret it.

[ofobedience]

[He's still smiling his cold twisted smile, that empty gash across his face that has nothing of real mirth in it, just something he does with his mouth. There's the eerie red flash of his eyes as he looks at her now. Shrugs.]

I don't sleep at night, Ms King.

[Which is a half-truth-- he sleeps a little, sometimes, less than most, the need for it not quite there in him thanks to what he is. And besides, when he does, his dreams are whiteredblack, blood-stained, full of screaming. Nothing he wants or would ever admit to. But it's hardly relevant here. He watches her finish her beer with a detached kind of interest, wonders what it might be like to hurt her, to be hurt by her.

Fun, he thinks. An interesting game.

But he's behaving, for now at least, will continue to do so up until the moment that the thrum and press of violence spills out of the minds of those around them and into the world at large. Until then--]

And I doubt that. I never regret a good fight. Go hard or go home, hahah. But alas, it doesn't look like we'll have a chance to play this evening, you and I.

[brickinthewall]

Guess you haven't heard much about me then.

[This one was no walk in the park, she'd found that much out, but when a young woman, still without a true identity to call her own, with a family willing to abandon her, is given the ability to never burn but to burn all?

The shred of sanity she had wished she could go back to undo this life.

She could hurt. She could burn. She could kill.

How many times had she left behind a smoking handprint on the face of a pain in the ass in her way? How many times had she melted and warped skin on contact?

Hanna could think of the things she'd done, but if she thought too hard, she'd break down into disgusting sobbing and weeping. So she pushes the thoughts of the immediate past out. If he kept it up, Company Fucker Number 8000 would just be in the long list of people she's destroyed.]

If you're feeling lucky, try going to some cage fights.

[ofobedience]

Perhaps I don't need to.

[Because she could do those things to him, leave a smoking handprint on his face, warp and crackle his skin with the intensity of the heat in her, but nothing sticks. Not for him, wounds healing in a hiss of acrid smoke caused by the kinetic energy of his body sealing itself shut, severed limbs regrowing in a matter of hours. As such, there are only a few things he fears, and few of them involve injury or pain or even death.

His fears, such as they are, lie elsewhere.

Again, there's the short abrasive sound of his laughter.]

I go where I'm needed, not where I want. But as it happens, I wind up in such places now and again. They're generally a good time.

[Unscrupulous Handlers or Company execs have been known, on occasion, to use the Dogs for such things, cage fights, or the pit during deep space transit, looking to make a little extra Joy or have a bit of fun whilst they have an interesting weapon in their possession. It's a misuse of Company equipment, yes, but Unit 68 isn't complaining. Never does, when there'd flesh to sink his teeth into, bones to shatter and break.]

Perhaps we'll run into each other.

[brickinthewall]

Better have bandages handy.

[She doesn't know the particulars of 68, nor is she sure if she wants to know. Something about him unnerves her.

Maybe it was that fact that she could be him one day. Maybe that day is tomorrow.

Maybe it was that she could've been him, had she not been given free reign from Ouranos proper. Nothing of her was pleasant, and she suspects she would've been sold and peddled as the next soldier or enforcer for profit. Not a mercenary, a thing, a product.

At the very least she was making her own terrible decisions, even if it meant feeding the very thing they thought of her.]

Guessing you don't have hobbies outside of do as you're told.

[ofobedience]

[He only smiles his slick, sliding smile in reference to the bandages, says nothing. If she doesn't know the particular specifications he'd been created to, he sees no reason to enlighten her. Perhaps she'll find out one of these days, but he suspects it's unlikely to be today. The bar around them, it's still thrumming with unreleased tension, but the likelihood of things reaching the kind of crescendo that would require his particular services seems - alas and alack - a distant thing.

Instead he relaxes back a little further against the bar. Stretches sinuously. Laughs his quick, barking laugh.]

Weapons don't have hobbies, Ms King. It isn't encouraged.

[Because her fears of what she could have been or might still become, they're present in him, he sees himself as exactly that. A product. Something to be used. And yes there are things he likes outside of what he's meant for, but speaking of it seems wrong and perverse and he pretends, for the most part, that they don't exist at all because to recognise them too openly would be to call into question for himself the reality he's been pressed into.

Acknowledging something like that-- it'd be enough to drive one mad.]

[brickinthewall]

[She sucks in air, grimacing a bit. Things for people. People for things.

Call her Prometheus.

Why they chose the Titan of utter defiance, of enlightenment, she would never know. She's a rebel through and through, but never one enlightened. Prometheus.

It's her own name now.

How would it be to be so damned brainwashed to think yourself as nothing more than a thing to be used? If she were any younger, she would've felt pity. Instead, Hanna only feels exhausted by the overthinking. She was created for battle tactics and elemental survival, not existentialism.

Even if her name said otherwise.]

Let me guess, there's some weird euphemism from sharpening your sword somewhere in there.

[Joke it off King, joke it off.]

[ofobedience]

[There's a moment's pause before his laughter pierces the smokey air around them again, taking it in, the joke there, processing it.]

I don't really go in for innuendo, but whatever floats your boat I suppose.

[There's movement from somewhere amidst the crowd, a small hand-gesture, the cut of dark eyes, and Giovanni's focus catches on his Handler, motioning for him to come. Good Dog. Heel.

Slowly, with unnatural grace, he peels himself away from the bar. Turns back to her briefly, smiling flashing white.]

But it looks like I'm needed elsewhere. Take care, Ms King. Perhaps we'll meet under more interesting circumstances, next time.

[And just like that, he begins to move away.]