Daycycle 108 [ September 18 - September 24 ]

[computerized]

daycycle 108

[Sept 18 - Sept 24]

Early Morning [0800 - 0900] — All Troubleshooters Report for Duty

There is no Mission assigned to any Specials today.

---

Morning & Afternoon [0900 - 1600] — Service Firm Positions
All Troubleshooters not assigned a mission should report to their Service Firm for their daily duties, unless specifically assigned a different shift.

Death Leopard is back! After nearly having nearly all of it's members hunted down and exterminated after the parade fiasco a few months ago, new leadership has arisen within the secret society and has been secretly recruiting new members hellbent on destruction for destruction's sake. A large number of Death Leopard members work within the Armed Services divison and at approximately 1400 today, a large shipment of weapons will be stolen.

At 1500 Death Leopard members stationed throughout Alpha will cause utter chaos by careening through Alpha in stolen motor cars, blaring loud music and shooting up the place. For the most part, they are not aiming for people, but their goal is to accomplish as much property damage as possible and announce their return. They do not, however, have any qualms at shooting officials clearance level YELLOW or higher. They have several grenades that they will use throughout their reign of terror, tossing them at random store fronts and service firms.

All Troubleshooters will be called on to stop them by any means necessary.

It will later be discovered that during this show of blatant disregard for Alpha Citizen Life, two more shipments of weapons were stolen.

---

Evening [1600 - 2200] — Citizen Improvement
All Alpha citizens are encouraged to better themselves through Alpha’s wide variety of educational, entertainment and cultural opportunities offered each evening. Attending these sanctioned events are not mandatory, but is highly encouraged by The Computer. Citizens choosing not to take advantage of these opportunities, have a growing number of other options available to them in how to spend their hard earned credits and free time.

Tonight’s event will be at 1700 in Meeting Room F, Wagon Wheel Floor 27 and will be hosted by the Volunteer Form Checkers. Help Alpha Complex by volunteering your time to check forms this evening as the scanners in the Housing, Planning & Development sector is down.

---

Alpha Curfew Restrictions
All Alpha citizens should be in their quarters within the Wagon Wheel by 2200, unless they’ve been given permission from a GREEN or higher clearance level citizen. Sleeping Aid gas is dispelled each night in the Wagon Wheel at 2200 to assist citizens in getting a productive sleeping period.

Confession Booths
There are hundreds of confession booths available around Alpha Complex if a citizen would like to communicate directly with the computer. Please use these confession booths to report mission statuses, report treason or terrorist acts, unregistered mutants, confess your trespasses against Alpha Complex, request propaganda or speak with Your Friend, The Computer, at any time.

Comments

Parker [Open]

[whosalicewhite]

1500: Parker's Getaway-From-Death-Leopard Taxi Service.

Parker's looking to take something that Death Leopard has rightfully stolen: a car. It doesn't take too long because 1) obviously these amateurs want to be caught and 2) obviously Parker is a hard woman to thwart.

In her old, old life she would've had a joyride, followed by some light thieving, but today she's offering a chance for one and all to escape the mayhem. Sometimes, she picks up INFRAreds. Other times, she'll pull over and say something dramatic like "come with me if you want to live." (She heard it in a movie.) No matter what she does, she takes her passenger wherever he or she wants to go, but at the speed of Formula One, and like she learned to drive only by watching episodes of Dukes of Hazzard. Motion sickness will result in being turfed from the stolen car. Those who might complain about her driving will be told to "GET OVER IT." Her driving has to be better than grenades, right?

If one needs a ride, flag her down. This ride comes with potential strings: like Uber during a busy season.

1800-2000: Parker wants to read all of your forms

Parker is planning something. She doesn't volunteer. She doesn't go for a normal person's, or a crazy computer's version of personal development. Nope. She wants all the information the forms can provide.

Because she'll have her head down, keenly focusing on each form, as though she's memorizing it (protip: she is), this would be the best worst time to disturb her, so come and do so!

[adamparrish]

Fighting is not Adam Parrish's strong suit. He's wielding a rather large wrench, however, and still losing the fight. He's got a black eye and been knocked to the floor when the car pulls up beside him and the passenger door swings open. He thinks he hears her say something full of dramatics like 'come with me if you want to live'. It's hard to make out amid the chaos.

There's a moment where Adam just looks at the woman in the car as if trying to decide whether or not she's trustworthy or not. But his most recent attacker is coming at him again with a snarl on his lips as if he'd really enjoyed punching on Adam's face and is ready for round two. Decision made, Adam hurries into the passenger side of the vehicle, probably one of the many vehicles he works on in the day-to-day, and slams the door shut.

Blue eyes look frantically to the driver. Clearly, he's shaken up. "Let's get out of here. Please."

[whosalicewhite]

It's understandable if he doesn't hear Parker clearly as she likely says it five times faster than she should. Blame the excitement of being behind the wheel. She's missed the freedom.

"Out of here, coming up." With the enthusiasm of a teenager, or NASCAR driver, Parker floors it, as if tread is a necessity on tires! Who needs it! It only slows things down.

She smells the burning rubber and laughs. There's no warning when she takes a corner, but Parker looks completely unaffected by the centrifugal force.

"Where to? And do you have chocolate?" Hey, nothing's free in this world, so she's seeing what she can get.

[preemptiveforgiveness]

Honestly, this is like hell for Matt, especially with his newly acquired vision implants. Not only is there way too much noise and too many smells, there's too much to see and he's so not used to seeing anything at all. Add to that: he's wearing a YELLOW jumpsuit, which seems to make him a target. He's not trying to hurt anyone, but he sure as hell is going to use all of his combat skills to defend himself. He's actually doing alright as long as no one pulls a gun on him or throws a grenade his way, but he's getting tired fast (he hasn't done this in way too long) and when he notices the car seems to be taking people to safety, he flags it down. He wants to get close to the Specials HQ and make his way there on his own. He won't tell Parker that location though, he'll just give her something vague close enough that he thinks he can make it the rest of the way.

[whosalicewhite]

Sorry if Parker adds to the sounds, as she smashes the brakes. The squeal and the car may sound shrill and look uncontrolled, but she manages to stop right in front of him, throwing the door open.

Saying, nothing, she listens, but as with all things Parker, without the specifics, she will do whatever she wants to do.

This includes scaring a potential grenade thrower into taking a dive to the pavement. "IDIOT!" Anything more offensive is all but bleeped out by the sounds of something exploding.

"That will be one bar of chocolate. You get it and I'll find you."

Who's to define close to HQ? That's not a distance! So she's as far away from the din as possible, but closer to HQ, does that count?

Katniss | open + closed

[stillplaying]

Early Morning | 0800 [closed to tony]

Pain. Her entire world is pain.

It's as if all she's ever known is pain. The pain of fire licking her skin. The pain of loss so deep that it's like a stab to the heart. Her entire body, her entire world is pain.

Pain. It's all she knows. It's all she deserves to know.

Then suddenly it stops. It's all gone as if it's never even been there. She feels groggy as she sits up on the table, confused and lost. All the physical pain is still there but the mental pain... That's harder. There's still a deep ache in her heart, a pain that threatens to tear her from the inside out. A name dances on the tip of her tongue (Prim), or would if she dared to speak. But speaking, that's not something she does anymore. Right?

Wrong. Those memories are wrong. She hadn't been on fire. She hadn't woken to the news of her sister's death. She never had to fight Peeta to gain some semblance of his sanity so that she doesn't lose him to the lizard mutts, too. They're a glitch. That's what the video says. It's a glitch and life is normal. There is no pain.

Just to make certain, she watches the video again. And again. And again. Katniss wants to believe. She wants to believe so badly because the memories in her glitch hurt. They hurt so much and she wants them gone. She's a citizen of Alpha Complex. She has a purpose. And that purpose isn't to mourn the tragedy of her sister's death. It isn't to be the uprising's Mockingjay. It isn't to be anyone all that special or anyone broken and lost. She's just a citizen. Just a cog in the machine.

Still, everything feels numb as she goes through all the paperwork. She keeps running her hands up and down her forearms, feeling for the scars and signs of burn grafts that should be there. They're not. All the more reason to think that the computer is correct. She's still running her hands up and down her forearms when she's led out the door.


Daytime | 0900 - 2200 [ota]

She doesn't know how long she actually bothers to listen to Tony. Not all that long really. Katniss doesn't care to hear what he has to say. She also doesn't care to see the Complex. This is supposed to be home. It's supposed to be her home. But all she can think about are the glitched memories. All she can think about is the pain that still stabs at her heart. Prim's gone. She's gone and won't take Katniss with her. She's gone and never coming back.

Rather than reporting to her assigned job, she wanders aimlessly around the Complex. Katniss doesn't pay all that much attention to where she walks. If she finds herself in someone's way, she doesn't notice. If she finds herself leaving RED-level clearance, she doesn't realize. Her head is down, staring at the ground as she whispers to herself, "My name is Katniss Everdeen. I'm seventeen years old. I should be dead. I'm not dead. I live in the Alpha Complex. Why am I not dead?"


Curfew | 2200 [ota]

Eventually, she gives up wandering the halls. Unlike District 13 (real or not real?), it seems harder to find good places to hide. And there's no bracelet on her wrist designating her as mentally unstable to keep others away. So she gives up (because giving up feels so, so easy) and finds her way to her assigned room. Once there, she curls up in one corner of the bed. Katniss sits with her back to the wall, knees hugged tight to her chest. She starts to rock back and forth a little. Her eyes never move from the door, not unless someone enters.

[im_ironman]

Even if Tony isn't exactly known for his punctuality, he actually arrives early to Technical Services. He still doesn't think that he's the best person for this kind of thing, but after seeing Vision and how disoriented he had seemed, and then remembering his own experience... Well, he wants to help.

As he waits, he drums his fingers idly against the side of his thigh while leaning against a wall. It's not out of impatience at all; he's mentally 'writing' code before the drumming turns into pressing imaginary piano keys. It's an old habit, something that he used to do ever since he was a kid so that he could keep his brain busy while waiting, and it's not until he hears the sound of footsteps that he glances over to find the girl walking out of one of the rooms. It still throws him off to see kids in this place, but he doesn't let that surprise show on his face.

If anything, he looks perfectly pleasant as she walks in his direction. "Hi. New arrival, right? I'm Tony."

[stillplaying]

She stops in the doorway upon seeing the man standing there. Her footsteps had been quiet to begin with, a habit the glitch memories claim stems from all those years of hunting the woods. But there aren't woods in the Alpha Complex. Just another reason to be confused by the memories. Memories that can't be real because as the man continues to play an invisible piano, she continues to rub at her arms searching for burn scars.

Katniss isn't a kid. She's seventeen and she's certain that she should be dead. That she never should have lived to see this age for a number of reasons. But she doesn't think she's been a kid for a long time now. Not since age eleven. The glitches say that's when her father died and all responsibility of a family fell on her shoulders. (Real or not real?) That seems logical enough, be it Panem or Alpha Complex. Still, she doesn't hold herself like a seventeen year old girl. Her eyes reflect a soul that's lived much, much longer than that age. She's seen things, done things, and it's aged her.

As he approaches, she remains in the doorway. Katniss watches him carefully. There's suspicion on her face, brows knitted and eyes narrowed. Her lips are pressed in a weary line and though she feels extremely weary, she also looks ready to bolt at a moment's notice. She doesn't reply, doesn't even nod in response to his question. Her head does tilt a little to the left as she watches him. Waits to see what he'll do next.

Re: Katniss | open + closed

[whattingawhat]

It actually ends up being a pretty busy day for Buffy and she comes upon Katniss after the Death Leopard mess is over and she's just trying to make sure that everyone is okay. She's wearing her jumpsuit and her bullet proof vest. She's got a billy club by her side and she abandoned both the helmet and shield once things calmed down. She stops short, pulling up when she sees Katniss and approaches her carefully. Her body language is soft, concerned.

"Hey," she says softly. "Katniss, right? Are you okay? I'm Buffy. I'm part of the security team here."

[stillplaying]

Katniss notices Buffy as soon as the woman crosses her field of view. As lost as she is in her own thoughts, drowning in those glitched memories, there's a part of her that insists on remaining vigilant to everything occurring around her. It's a persistent part of her that's at war with the part that wants to die. Ignoring it is impossible. She wants to die and she doesn't want to die. She's Katniss Everdeen, seventeen, from District 12, and sisterless. She's Katniss Everdeen, seventeen, a member of Alpha Complex, an instructor. It's confusing. Complicated. Can't she just stay here curled up in a ball instead?

She frowns as Buffy approaches. Her eyes are narrowed and while everything about Buffy might seem friendly, everything about Katniss is cautious and wary. She remains sitting, her arms wrapped around her knees. But give her a second and she'd be ready to run. She wouldn't hesitate. Although Buffy speaks, Katniss doesn't reply. She stares at the woman with a frown. Is she supposed to say something now? Something other than the muttered mantra she's been repeating? Because she doesn't want to. She doesn't see the point in it at all.

Curfew

[fateless]

Allison had done some roaming around herself, trying to get a good lay of the land and giving herself a good chance to at least get a good grasp of what's happening. Every now and then she gets hit with waves of homesickness, and a very real temptation to reach for her phone so she could call someone takes over when she least expects it, but she's trying to not focus on that anymore. Allison had moved away from anything resembling a home for far longer than she cared to count and always adapted well to it. She could do the same now.

By the time curfew rolls around, the emotional exhaustion is heavier than anything else she could be feeling so she immediately goes to her room. Which will be another adjustment, considering the only times she has shared her room with anyone was whenever Lydia, Scott, or Isaac spent the night over. But it would be fine, right? She would have had to share a dorm with someone in college if she would have gotten there, so... This is like starting early. Kind of.

When she walks through the door and sees one of her roommates rocking back and forth, though, Allison pauses for a moment. Concern kicks in right after the momentary surprise, and she takes a step inside the room.

"Hey," she greets, quietly enough to try and not startle her. Living in Beacon Hills had prepared Allison all too well on how to deal with people that experienced trauma, and that's all she can think of as she catches a good glimpse of her roommate. The last thing she wants to do is startle her. "Are you okay?"

[stillplaying]

There are other people in the room. That shouldn't be much of a surprise, not really. The last time Katniss was underground (according to the glitched memories anyway), space was equally as tight. Of course they're sharing rooms. Of course. It shouldn't bother her. She shared a room with Prim growing up. Lost all concept of privacy in the Hunger Games. Couldn't sleep without Peeta next to her for a while. But again that's in the glitched memories. Memories she doesn't want to believe because it's those memories that have hr feeling so broken inside. If those memories aren't real, then maybe she can be someone else. Someone who hasn't lived through such offer tragedy.

But right now, she still isn't sure. And all she really wants is to be left alone. Left alone and allowed to sort through these conflicting thoughts in peace. Or find somewhere to hide so she doesn't have to encounter the possibility that some of this might be real. That isn't how life seems to work though. First, there had been the man that had greeted her. Now, the room that she's been assigned is quickly filling up.

She should be nicer. This is a girl that she'll have to live with. Talking helps. She knows that. The glitched memories say that talking had helped Peeta a lot. Her own actions, not so much. She's not a good person according to those glitched memories. She's not all that smart or all that nice. Why should she start now?

Katniss shrugs in response. Is she okay? She could be if she can just get rid of these glitched memories.

Open | Morning/Daytime

[fateless]

Waking up is rough; Allison scrambles with desperation to breathe, the memory of the Oni's sword piercing through her at the forefront of her mind. Her hand immediately reaches for her abdomen, trying to find the blood, but there's nothing there.

Scott, her memory supplies. Lydia.

Allison looks around, her vision adjusting to the room around her, but she's not where she remembers being last. She remembers dying. She remembers...

She remembers. Her thoughts are sluggish, but she remembers even if she's quickly filled in that those memories aren't her own once she starts asking for her friends. For her father. They're glitches, they explain; she has been re-created. The memories aren't her own.

And... Sadly, it makes sense. The memories may be glitches, but she remembers the Oni. Their sword. She remembers the way it pierced through her, so swiftly and without hesitation. She remembers falling, and Scott rushing to her. She remembers the struggle to breathe, the way her mouth tastes like copper from the blood that kept pooling in her throat.

She remembers.

She remembers dying, and it's the thought that makes her stop struggling. She shouldn't be awake. She shouldn't be alive, yet here she is; she had been given a second chance. Being herded like cattle wearing a jumpsuit isn't exactly her idea of resurrection, but she goes through the motions. She takes in the information they give her, she takes the information that they supply her about her job. For now she just tries to process as much information as possible before she makes her way outside. First she'll do orientation and then, after that...

After that, she'll try to find a way to settle in somehow even if there's a sense of hollowness that she can't seem to get rid of even if she tries to ignore it.

[whattingawhat]

Buffy catches sight of the dazed look girl at breakfast and assumes that she's knew because she knows what that face is all about, or at least she's pretty sure that's what she looked like her first morning here. She makes her way over to the girl with her tray and her 'coffee' smiling gently at her.

"So coffee is bad, breakfast is bad, it's all kind of bad. Hi, I'm Buffy. You look new. I mean the whole--" she does a circle in the air around her own face, "expression you're rocking. I think I looked like that my first day."

[fateless]

Generally Allison is pretty good at being aware of her surroundings, it's just part of being a hunter. Today, though, she stirs her coffee almost numbly. Her mind feels like it's racing, all her senses feel overstimulated, and she doesn't even know where to begin sorting any of it.

That's why, when she realizes she's being spoken to, it comes as a good distraction. A small smile crosses her lips at Buffy's introduction, and she nods. "That obvious, huh? Yeah, I'm new. Just arrived, actually." For a moment she finds herself wondering if Buffy is dead, too, but that's probably a rude thing to ask right after meeting someone.

"I'm Allison," she says instead, straightening up a little. "Have you been here a while?"

[trigeminalheadache]

It isn't a long or far walk from her part of Medical Services to this part of Technical Services. Still, Caitlin doesn't dawdle. When she gets the message that she's needed, she quickly wraps up what she's working on and makes her way down. She doesn't worry that it may make her appear eager to greet someone new; it's a feeling she's used to, from years of being younger and smarter than everyone else in the room.

Besides, being eager is part of this job, isn't it?

She's waiting just beyond the last door they lead Allison through. It's not hard to remember how she felt during this process. Scared, confused. Lost. It's what she remembers before waking up here. Steve helped her sort through it, just by being there and being nice.

And it's good to be able to return the favor. "Hi. I'm Caitlin. I'm here to answer any questions and give you a tour, if you like."

[fateless]

Scared, confused, and lost is a pretty good summary of how Allison is feeling. Not that she would admit it, especially the scared part, but it's very much there, gnawing at her from the inside out. Externalizing those feelings isn't something she really wants, because it almost feels like she has to hold it together otherwise she'll fall apart, so when she's greeted Allison just does her best to smile.

"Hi. I'm Allison." She nods slightly. "Yeah, a tour sounds good."

And she has questions - boy, does she have questions - but she's holding off for now. At least until she can sort out which question she wants to ask first.

"Thank you, for this. Is this done for every new person?"

Evening

[sanguinescry]

The last person Lydia expected to have respond to her encrypted message is Allison. Sure, Tony returned after having been arrested, and he doesn't remember her, but Lydia had resigned herself to the fact that Allison had probably been terminated, because if she hadn't forced herself to believe that; hadn't forced herself to mourn Allison's death again, she wouldn't have been able to function. No one had found Ray. No one had found Tony. It had been too long and Lydia had no other choice if she'd wanted to remain even remotely mentally stable. And now, she's back or released, or whatever happened is over and Lydia suddenly has her best friend back.

...without the memories of this place. It's as frustrating as it is a relief, but all Lydia can think about right now is getting to the Commissary to meet her. She needs to see for herself that Allison is real and present and it isn't all just some computer glitch carrying over from the first time Allison had talked to her on the network months ago.

But when she gets there, there Allison is, looking around and more than likely waiting for Lydia and Lydia's breath catches in her throat before she can force herself to move forward rather than staying rooted to the spot and just staring. "Allison?"

Barry | Throughout the day

[runsonwater]

Morning | Closed to Jack Harkness

He got the text about the newest special after the briefing and headed over to Technical Services immediately. He was grateful to Steve for working out this arrangement for new specials, considering how confusing and disorienting his own arrival was. Or at least he was still thinking of it as an arrival, despite being consistently told otherwise.

He waits outside the processing room, glancing out the window at the artificially lit street below. When the door opens and a man steps through he glances up and then immediately does a double take. He knows this man.

"Malcolm Merlin."

Oliver is definitely not going to be happy.

Afternoon | OTA

Running into the fray without his speed and with a laser barrel that he's only 60% sure will work when it needs to isn't Barry's idea of a good time. But it's pretty clear that the maniacs driving around in stolen jeeps and motor cars shooting the place up are only concerned about their own party.

They have almost no chance of stopping them unless they set up some kind of trap or get a car of their own to chase them. Barry settles on the second and begins making his way towards Motorized Transport. Halfway there he ducks behind a cement wall to avoid being hit by random fire, only to find a grenade rolling to a stop a few feet away from him. Just like in the movies, he thinks to himself before his self-preservation instinct kicks in and he makes a run for it, yelling for the people around him to also run.

He really misses his speed.

Afternoon

[missromanova]

Now this feels like home.

Natasha probably shouldn't find such comfort in the smell of burning rubber and smoke, and yet here she is, feeling more alive than she has in days. Her senses are heightened, her adrenaline is rushing through her veins, and Natasha is in her element, now, chasing down criminals and keeping innocent lives safe. She's a Threat Assessor. This is one hell of a threat, and she's here to assess it.

She's in the middle of guiding a woman to run in the opposite direction of the blasts after falling when she hears the screeching of tires, and Natasha looks over her shoulder to spot a group of maniacs peeling down the road with grenades clenched in their fists. People are running, and she understands why. But to Natasha, live grenades are tools, and she runs toward the vehicle when she finally sees one of them launch the weapon into the street.

What she doesn't count on is almost colliding with a civilian who was apparently hiding behind the cement wall she was rushing towards, and having him there puts him in her direct line of aim which is a Problem. She's counting in her head, there isn't enough time for either of them to turn away from it without losing a limb in the explosion, so Natasha makes a split second decision and wraps her arm around the mans waist. She doesn't stop moving, instead throwing her body down and using the force of her own weight to drag him down with her until they hit the ground, and her free arm reaches out simultaneous to her fall to grab the live bomb. Fingers close around it, she twists her torso to look back at her now clear path, her arm arches, and she swings the grenade to send it scattering across the asphalt until it's stopped by a large chunk of discarded concrete in the middle of the road.

Natasha doesn't see them try to cut the wheel of their vehicle to avoid driving any closer, instead turning her head away to lie flat on her stomach and grabbing the strangers head to pull it into her shoulder. Her natural instinct is to shield his face from the blast behind them, and less than a second later the explosion shakes the ground they're on. She holds him still for a lingering moment, as if she's waiting to see if she hears anything else. The goal is to make them crash, not blow them up with that much live ammunition in their vehicle, but it's possible that her toss was a little off considering the sudden drop she had to make to get the unexpected man out of her way.

No second explosion. She's just about to look back when she hears the sounds of them shooting again, and Natasha rolls back behind the cement wall for cover before reaching out and grabbing the stranger by his collar to drag him behind the wall with her. They crashed, but they're still alive, and now they're shooting from where their Transport collided with a building to avoid driving over the grenade. Natasha's back presses against the cement wall and she looks over at the man for the first time, blinking when she sees his face completely.

The poor thing looks like a choir boy.

"You know how to shoot that thing?" She asks breathlessly, nodding at his blaster, and she gives him a single nod. "Because if not you're gonna learn real quick. Don't worry, it'll be fun." She doesn't sound very convincing as she reaches for her own blaster and waits for a pause in fire to make a quick glance around the corner of the wall and fall back. "Three left, I think the other two are knocked out. I'm Natasha, by the way." She looks at him with an almost ridiculous amount of levity. "Didn't mean to ruin your escape route, I just didn't see you there, my bad. You wanna take first shot or should I?"

[fixedpointintime]

Jack listens patiently to everything the rainbow jumpsuit brigade has to tell him. He smiles, he nods, he looks for things he could possibly use as a weapon until the green jumpsuit shoves a stack of paperwork at him, cause that's new. He takes his time reading everything, looking for clues in the wording. There's not much there. Doesn't stop him. After a certain point, he's doing it just as much to piss off the trout faced man sitting across from him as he is to try and figure out what's really going on. Seems an awfully convoluted scheme for just a little free labour. Still, now he's got a few things to think about as he gets some gear and a weapon dumped into his lap. Well, half a weapon. Better than nothing, he supposes.

The kid waiting for him outside the door is another surprise. He looks even more lost and rattled than Jack does. Still, smile bright and carry on. "Captain Jack Harkness," he says, like it's all one word, like the name and the title are inseparable and define him as completely as anything ever could. He holds out his hand, grinning. "Hell of a name you've got there, kid. Still - nice to meet you, Malcolm Merlin. You'll forgive me if I don't stay to chat." He's got a lot of information to mull over, and some real answers to ferret out. Which is a shame. Malcolm has some amazing bone structure, and there's something about wide-eyed youth, still some new experiences left to bank. It's the only way Jack experiences anything new any more. Vicariously.

Maybe another day. He picks a direction, and starts walking.

Pick a time!

[dorkify]

Gracie is pretty sure her head is going to explode from all the glitching. She tries to keep that at bay with a cup of not coffee and some of the red stuff they serve for breakfast. She has a gander at the market, purchases some eyeliner (necessities okay?) then tries to (re?) acquaint herself with this place. She's checked her job listing (she's actually pretty excited about vid journalist--it feels familiar) and now she's wandering. After all, if she's going to report on anything at all, she's got to know what's going on. It's part of her job.

When Death Leopard (she's pretty sure there's something wrong with that name, but she can't put her finger on it) show up, she's still acquainting. At first the music makes her think there's a party and she walks toward it, turning a hallway into an open space only to realize this definitely isn't a party that she wants to be part of. The music might be nice and the revving motor cars might look like fun, but the party is over when the guns start firing. Gunfire isn't something she ever remembers being a part of. It makes her heart race and her breath come way too fast.She knows she should move, knows that she should find some place to hide, or go to her room, but she's frozen in place, paralyzed by fear. She bites off a scream as a bullet gets too close (and aren't they all too close), finally finding the ability to move. She ends up curled in a ball, tucked against a wall.

By the time dinner and citizen improvement roll around, Gracie is exhausted, but she stops by citizen improvement, choosing not to stay for long before ducking back out into the hallways and corridors to explore. She'll even try getting up to some of the higher floors, but claiming that she's 'with the press' doesn't seem to do anything (and where did she ever hear that phrase? why did she think it would do something?).

It's near curfew when she finally wanders back to room 1106. She's kind of surprised at the knot of nerves in her stomach. She would have thought after the day she's had she wouldn't care if her roommate was Norman Bates (no, she really would), but she finds that she does care. What if they don't like her? And now she sounds like a five year old.

Rough day, man. Rough day.

Death Leopard attack

[namegenerator]

Saying that he was tired of being pulled away from a service position he actually kind of likes in order to help deal with some chaotic bullcrap too many times a week is probably the understatement of the century. Cisco Ramon is used to being in the thick of things in his own way, typically behind a computer and helping Barry navigate his way through kicking ass and taking names because that's just how Team Flash works best. But actually having to go into the fray himself? Not really Cisco's cup of tea.

All the same, when everyone abandons their work stations to try to assess and neutralize the threat at hand, he knows he can't exactly stay behind, because that's just asking to be noticed. One thing Cisco absolutely does not want at the moment is for Friend Computer to notice him. He prefers to stay largely under the radar, bordering invisible to that end for the time being.

One thing he is good at, though, in the midst of chaos, is being able to look at the bigger picture. That's sort of reflexive for him at this point, after so much experience having to sort of the distractions from the real threat for Barry when things go south in Central City. So when Cisco arrives at the scene, he starts doing that.

There's gunfire. People are running. People are screaming. Most importantly, Cisco sees a lot of destruction. There aren't many bodies, but there's a lot of property damage. So what the motive, he thinks, is...is that they want to wreak havoc, but they don't necessarily want to hurt people.

Which leads him to the conclusion that he needs to do a quick visual scan of the area and try to move anyone that thinks they're hiding, only the spot that they've chosen is potentially in the line of fire for something entirely other than themselves as people. Which, is when he spots Taylor Swift tucked against a wall, directly underneath a huge neon sign flashing the several "important" Alpha Complex slogans about how to be the best citizen you can be.

...what. Taylor Swift is here?

Not important. So not important right now. That sign is a beacon for someone wanting to stick it to the man, he thinks, and sure enough, they're firing at it, which he can tell because the lights are starting to flicker out with little jolts of electricity and sparks are raining down around Taylor. The girl. Whatever it doesn't matter that she's Taylor Swift right now! he has to remind himself.

Cisco makes his way over and shouts at her and, yeah, he calls her Taylor, but the important part is that he's trying to get her attention and he makes that pretty clear by pointing at her. Whether or not she sees him, he doesn't know, because there's so much going on around them and he's trying to dodge bullets, quite literally, at the same time as he's moving toward her, ducking and covering as he goes behind whatever he can find in his path. "Hey! You gotta get out of there!"

Orientation

[im_ironman]

After getting pinged for another orientation, Tony had promptly made his way over to Technical Services. The waiting part is always awkward, probably mainly because Tony doesn't know how to wait, but it doesn't last for long. Suddenly the doors open and, when a blonde girl walks through them, Tony's lips quirk slightly into a small smile.

"Hey, I'm Tony. I'm part of the welcoming committee, and I'm here to answer any questions you may have."

He still needs to work on his elevator speech, he thinks. To be fair, this is just his second one and somehow doing orientations seems to be harder than leading meetings with government officials, but hopefully he hasn't butchered up the greeting all that much.

Natasha | Evening

[missromanova]

Her body is sore, and her ears are still ringing. For the first time since her arrival, she's actually fearing tomorrow.

She's had an eventful day, to say the least, and the last thing Natasha want's to do is paperwork. This time, Natasha decides she's going to pass on being a team player, and instead she finds herself wandering through a subsector that she hasn't seen yet. The damage that's been done by Death Leopard hasn't seemed to reach here, and it's no wonder - she can practically smell pretentiousness in the air. The buildings are nicer, the streets are cleaner, and it doesn't take Natasha long to realize that there aren't nearly as many RED clearance suits walking around as there are in the other parts of the Complex.

There's no sign that she's in an area restricted from her clearance so Natasha keeps moving until she finds the waterfront, the surface calm and glass-like in the stale air. It still smells like water in the air, though, and although it's no Atlantic, or Pacific, when Natasha leans against the railing and closes her eyes she can almost pretend like she's somewhere else; somewhere simple. Well... somewhere else, at least. Natasha doesn't really know 'simple'.

With a deep breath she fills her lungs with air that smells cleaner here than it does where she usually spends her time, and her eyes open again to stare out across the waterfront. This place is bad enough to actually make her miss living as a fugitive.