Daycycle 18 [ JAN 26-30]

[computerized]

DAYCYCLE 18

[ JAN 26-30]

MORNING

Matt Farrell will be woken up at 0400 when a squad of Internal Security Gray Ops come to arrest Jason Wilcox for treason.  He is led away at gunpoint and any requests for information will be denied by higher level officers, claiming it’s classified.  Any digging done outside of sanctioned channels will reveal that he was believed to have been stealing medical equipment and supplies.

There is a new briefing officer in place this morning.  She speaks in a sugary sweet voice and smiles often.  Rumor has it she was on the execution squad that finished of the worst traitors in Death Leopard.

Troubleshooter Team: Parker and R. Lynch

Mission:  These fine recruits need practice in small unit tactics.  You will each have a team of three recruits and will lead them as they are pitted against each other in small unit tactical skirmishes.  You’re units are to engage in three to five armed skirmishes against each other.  You will take note of each recruit’s accuracy, obedience and courage under fire.  Fill out these forms indicating each recruit’s performance and turn them in, along with surviving recruits, at the nearest Vulture Squadron barracks.  The Troubleshooter with the most survivors will be awarded a credit reward.

All other Troubleshooters:  You are to report to your Service Firm positions for the day, until called on for Troubleshooter duty.

Specials will remain in their temporary quarters until repairs are completed on their RED quarters.

1202 - S. Rogers - G. Maecenas

1203 - A. Hardison  - Parker

1204 - R.Palmer - B. Allen

1205 - D.Grayson - T. Stark

1206 - M. Farrell

1207 - S.Groves - L. Martin

1208 - P. Carter - A. Patterson

1209 - R. Lynch

Intel: Free Enterprise has begun manufacturing weapons for sale to the highest secret society bidders.  Any information about these weapons should be reported immediately.

AFTERNOON

There is a high-level game of PowerGolf being held this afternoon in the Tech Services sub-sector Delta with many BLUE and VIOLET clearance citizens.  The game will be broadcast across the Complex.  Rumor has it that Free Enterprise will offer any citizen the ability to place bets on the outcome.  Increased security is apparent and all RED Troubleshooters will be pulled to work crowd control and police the game.

EVENING

The Alpha City Library is hosting a special reading of it’s high-clearance level novels this evening in a desperate attempt to attract interest and sponsorship from the Alpha Complex masses.  The book chosen is so notoriously racy that it has been forbidden to most clearance levels for nearly a decade.  There is a small fee to attend, but drinks and food will be provided.

Sleep aid gas will be expelled into the barracks this evening at 2100.

Comments

[avemachina]

"I'd make that decision after you taste it."

She chuckles again, moving to the fold-down table. What she puts down onto it ... well. It resembles pizza. Whether it tastes like anything more than cardboard remains to be seen. It's closer to a gelatinous crust with fake ketchup and soy cheese atop it, but hey. You work with what you have, right?

"I'm just hoping it makes settling into this place a little easier." Sure, awful near-pizza doesn't mean Lydia is loyal to Root, but the bond of Specials across the board is that they're out of place here. It's always a good place to start when interrogating people, even casually.

[sanguinescry]

Lydia shakes her head and huffs out a laugh. "Anything's gotta be better than that shit in the cafeteria," she insists, settling herself at the table across from her roommate — shit, what is her name? — and offering a smile. "I don't know that there's a whole lot that could, but it's worth a shot," she agrees. "Thanks."

Lydia pauses then, pressing her lips together for a brief moment before looking back up at her. "...I'm Lydia. I don't...think I ever said," she says apologetically.

[avemachina]

"I should confess -- it would be almost impossible for me not to know your name. Let's start fresh?"

It's not that recognition lights in Root's eyes so much as familiarity she wouldn't have were it not for the whispers about the attack by the anti-Specials. She just nods, small smile in place, and holds out her hand.

"It's nice to formally meet you, Lydia. The Computer calls me Samantha but I'd prefer it if you'd call me Root."

[sanguinescry]

Secretly, Lydia had always wanted to be famous. Not a movie star or a politician, but a renowned scientist known and lauded for a Field's Medal or a Nobel Prize. Never in a million years did she think that she'd be any stretch of famous for being a victim. So, the confession isn't surprising, really, but it still feels like a slap in the face to everything she thought she could be and everything she ever wanted to be. Lydia falters at that. This place has been especially good at perpetually reminding Lydia just how small she really is in the grand scheme.

Her lips press together again — a nervous tick she doesn't realize she has — and she looks down, but she only gives herself a second to appear as vulnerable as she knows she is, and then she looks back up and gives her roommate a small smile that she doesn't really feel. She appreciates the clean slate, even if it's just an illusion.

"Root, then," she agrees. "It's nice to meet you, too."

[avemachina]

"Here." A fresh start with an offering of fake pizza, at least. She takes a seat, sliding the pie to the middle before she cuts in. Or, well. Separates the gelatinous crust.

"I got into it my first day here." She works quickly, out of habit or necessity. A slice comes up with little difficulty to slap down onto one of the plates. "I sort of instigated it, honestly. After watching 4 hours of fake history, I wanted to make sure they knew where I stood, exactly. Got a nice shiner for it."

[sanguinescry]

"Thanks," Lydia says gratefully, appreciative of both the "pizza" which, even if it's awful, will still probably be marginally better than the slop in the cafeteria, and for the fresh start.

Her eyes widen slightly at Root's story. "Are you serious? They hit you?" Lydia's surprised because she gave an awful lot of pushback when she first arrived and spent three days being brainwashed for her efforts, so she wonders what Root could've said that would've been worse.

[avemachina]

"Hmm, they introduced my face to a table." There's a major difference, of course.

"Then again, I sat at their table and asked them how long they were stuck in Infrared before the Computer let them move up." Root takes her own slice, deft fingers twirling the plate until she can get at the thicker part of the foundation. "I know, it sounds crazy. But sometimes finding the first weakness means letting them think you have one of your own, you know?"

Demonstrate an obvious chink in the armor, and direct the attacker where you want. Makes the second strike easier. Made it supremely easy to turn in the RED as a "humanist" anyway.

[sanguinescry]

Shaking her head, Lydia just stares back at her roommate with wide eyes. This place was a nightmare. She couldn't help wondering to herself if, really, it ever got any better. Could you even actually move up the ranks worth a damn as a Special to escape the shit? Why would you even want to? More perks just meant more reason for the other Alphas to want to kill you, Lydia thought.

"There's no winning..." she murmured, mostly to herself in continuing her thoughts. She blinked them, realizing she'd said it out loud, and shook her head, picking up the slice of...pizza. "I mean, in general. In this place," she excused before taking a bite to hide behind chewing for a moment.

It wasn't good. ...but it also wasn't anywhere near as bad as the slop down in the cafeteria, so it was better than nothing.

[avemachina]

"Nothing's impossible. It's just a system." And systems are hackable, changeable. You just had to learn their language and tweak a few lines here and there. Sometimes the most minor changes beget the most major of payoffs.

"Look at it like a game. A rigged one stacked against us, but it's still just a set of rules to play by." Root takes a bite herself, and finds herself chewing a lot longer than she'd like. Talk about unappetizing.

"Have you ever played chess?"

[sanguinescry]

Lydia frowned a little as she considered it. That was one way to look at things, but she wasn't sure how she was supposed to translate that to a worthwhile life in this place. If she was stuck here, then she didn't want to just survive. She wanted to live.

"I'm very good at chess. But I know the rules of chess, already. I know what you have to do to win it, in the end. It's strategic, but at the end of the day, you want the queen and you officially win by taking the king. How's that translate, you know?"

[avemachina]

"I'm not a chess girl myself, but if there's one thing I can appreciate it's the necessity to think 20 moves ahead of the moment you're actually playing."

It's hardly an exact science, but there is no single example that would translate perfectly. This game in Alpha, no matter how long it lasts for them, is going to end messy, that's for sure.

"And we as Specials are already 20 steps behind. It doesn't even seem to me that anyone knows the reason we're here. And ignorance does tend to breed the most vicious hate. I don't think any of it is coincidence, or a mistake."

[sanguinescry]

Like Lydia needs another reason to be hated by the ignorant, she thinks to herself. Not that, she supposes, she's actually a banshee anymore. She hasn't heard any of the voices and it's been quiet since she got here two weeks ago. Maybe she just isn't a banshee. Maybe she never was.

"It's easier to think twenty moves ahead when there's a limited array of things that the other people can choose to do for each of them and you already know what all of those choices, fundamentally, are though..." Lydia points out, frowning slightly.

Which isn't to say it isn't possible. It is; she's a genius, she knows that if she really stops and thinks and gives herself time to make mistakes in the thought process, she can figure out this game of cat and mouse and turn it around in their favor. It's just that, "this is just...so daunting, you know?" she asks.

[avemachina]

Root shakes her head-- it's not often she plays the optimist but in this case, she's up to the task.

"No, it doesn't have to be. This is no different than the infinite moves possible in a single game of chess. And it's exactly the same once you start making moves-- each time you make a choice, the other players' choices decrease."

She leans back in her seat, pulling the plate with her. Even with the improved texture, it's probably better to scarf than prolong the experience of eating this crap.

"We don't deserve to let ourselves feel helpless, Lydia. It's not going to be perfect, but we have to do something and stop waiting for something to be done."

[sanguinescry]

The other woman does have a point. She's looking at it from a big picture perspective; one that Lydia found a lot easier to identify before. But Root is right and Lydia knows she needs to be able to look at the world around her that way again, because if she wallows too long where she is right now, she'll never drag herself back out of the hole.

"I think that the only way we're ever going to be anything other than targets is if we, as a group, show them that we're not the kind of targets they want to hit. The problem is figuring out how to do that, exactly."

[avemachina]

Were she trying to alienate everyone around her, Root would just keep speaking her mind -- in this instance, the problem at hand is more akin to fun than work. But that's Root, and not the person she thinks Lydia will continue brainstorming with, so she sets the thought aside for now.

"I agree. Generally in this kind of situation you have to make an assumption, test, and then adjust." But this isn't the most normal of this kind of situation, is it? Still, Root's already done quite a bit of poking around. Disparate as the systems are, there's always a trail.

"We already know that the Computer is irrationally rational. The only way I can see that happening is decades of competing code entered into it. Someone controls it, but it's had to have changed hands over and over to get this bad."

[sanguinescry]

While Lydia's never been terribly technologically inclined, she can still understand the concept for what it is when Root presents it and she looks thoughtful for a moment before she speaks.

"Well, yeah, but the Computer just controls the environment, right? Not the people...? I mean, beyond the laws." Maybe it's because it's been a long day or maybe it's because the general lack of intellectual stimulation in this place is finally taking its toll on her usually sharp mind, but she's not sure she's making the connection that Root seems to expect her to.

[avemachina]

"Does your PDC control itself?" Root's eyebrows lift, surprised at Lydia's seeming desire to work against herself.

Rooting out the anti-Specials is simply a means to an end at this point. Another obstacle in the way of moving about the Complex freely and without one more issue to keep an eye on. Additionally, the sheer numbers game of turning them in would get some others to back down. Or try harder.

[sanguinescry]

To that point, Lydia tilts her head in a half-nod, chewing her bottom lip again. "Fair enough," she agrees. "...maybe we should have this discussion in the morning when I've slept and I'm not so inexplicably slow to understand. I'm usually so on point and I'm just not tonight..." she sighs, frustrated with herself as she brings a hand up to pinch the bridge of her nose.

[avemachina]

"I think we could both use the rest." Root leans forward to start cleaning up her first failed experiment, edging the chair backwards to stand. She's done a decent job at compartmentalizing and directing her energy where it needs to go. She'd hate to lose that momentum.

"Wouldn't want to disappoint the Computer, right?" She can't help it. Sarcasm is just her favorite coping mechanism.

[sanguinescry]

"I mean it, though. I want to pick your brain more tomorrow when I'm less out of it," she insisted as she started to help Root clean up their not-pizza. She wants to be able to not just process what the other woman is saying, but be the few moves ahead mentally to follow the path of thought.

Lydia just grunts and rolls her eyes in response to that before smiling a little at her roommate. "Yeah, right," she agrees with the same sarcasm, picking up what's left on the table and following Root's lead toward taking care of the mess. She doesn't want to toss it out and be seen as ungrateful or rude if Root intends to save the leftovers of hers, so following the other woman's lead seems like the easiest way to go.