RP: ISC Phoenix [Mission 3] - Rocking the Casbah

[Eistheid]

Fruna Ruica, Deck 3, Main Convention Floor

Working with the material and aid provided by the Fruna Ruica's staff Tamamo hardly noticed who she happened to be working on until she was addressed as 'Blueberry-sama.' Looking blankly at the man her dark jade eyes scanned them impassively oblivious to her hemosynth slicked state and matted hair while her body put itself back together. The question they asked was in her opinion rather silly, however she replied with a simple "Yes." As for the suggestion that she seek medical aid Tamamo merely disregarded the advice deciding that it was hardly worth her time to address what she felt was a waste of her time.

Moving away from the man who had lured her to the present locale Tamamo look about judging that no one required any immediate medical attention from her as the worst had been attended to and those remaining were vocal enough to suggest that they were only mildly injured. Taking a few exploratory steps as tested the extent that her body had re-knitted itself Tamamo was pleased to find that her muscles strained less with the act of simple locomotion.

Looking up to the elevated level where the leader of the group, Luca Pavone seemed to be asking for help Tamamo wondered why no one had addressed the situation and briefly debated investigating before instead moving to the prone form of one of the vanquished pirates deciding that with the amount of damage that she had sustained that acquiring additional sustenance would not go amiss.

 

[Born-On-Board]

Redrick wiped his face, and interesting slurry of white plaster and sweat coming off onto his hand. He regarded it for a second, then shook it off, wiping his hand on his pants and leaving a paint-like streak on his pants.

"Well, I think we'd all benefit from getting the kitchens back up." Redrick aid, after a moment's hesitation. "Nobody's eaten in... what? A day?"

He thought a little more. He snapped his fingers, and and pointed to the waiter who'd asked.

"You." He pointed to the other members of the food prep staff. "You and you and you. Start distributing water. Not the shit from the tap, get the fancy stuff in the square bottles, I think everyone on the ship has earned a fifteen DA bottle of water today, free of charge. And break out the good stuff, all the gourmet champagnes, brandies, etc. Why not turn it into a party? We all lived, didn't we?"

He sent his staff out. In the meantime, there was food to make, but he was going to need help.

He walked out onto the convention floor, passing by former hostages, gingerly stepping over corpses. His leg hurt. His body hurt. His burnt hand needed a bandage. Everything was in pain, but he couldn't stop yet.

There it was. He hobbled over to one of the microphones for the ship's intercom, and keyed it to broadcast in all spaces. He took a deep breath, and then held the mic to his mouth, transmit button pressed down. Every speaker on the ship (except the one in the captain's personal galley) squawked to life.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I do sincerely hope you've enjoyed this evening's enertainment aboard the good ship Fruna Ruica tonight. This is the head chef, Redrick Callahan speaking, and I express my most sincere regrets that our performance has cut our regular meal service." He paused, grinning to himself. "However, dinner tonight will be served, and it will be compliments of the chef, at no charge to you. Our hardworking service staff will be distributing drinks, also free of charge, just be sure to give them your order. Please enjoy your stay onboard the Fruna Ruica."

He paused again, before switching to a much more bland and authoritarian tone.

"Fruna Ruica food service staff, please report to the main galley."

He hung up the mic, and sighed. "Well. That's probably gonna get me fired."

Redrick stretched his arms, then, with great deliberation, limped in the direction of the galley.

 

[OsakanOne]

Sensing the beginnings of calm, Rebeka let the cannon slip from the long fang-like bolts running from her palm like a wet fish of ice: the belt-feed sucking like a seat-belt to holster the weapon to her left thigh. The two long intricate nine inch bolts that formerly had fed the things palm tickled wisps of baby lightning which arced between them to power down before smoothly snapping back into the palm of her suit from where they'd came.

She took careful steps to put the last of the flames out before drawing upon Seiren's position. Standing before the boy's synthetic Goliath, Rebeka watched as the machine rose from the dead up and up onto its proud thick and ordinarily steady feet with a thick wham against the deck.

Ruby eyes stared back at him through the cockpit's displays. A crisp surgical silvery skull polished like metal laid between torn white flesh along her cheekbone, parts of her cheek and jaw on the left side; orange liquid peeling like tears from the seams. He saw her pearly teeth in this moment were not one set but tiered like a fence would be against the ground: One set on one level then the set further back much higher up giving the strange impression that from infront in some way that she was smiling in spite of her almost perfectly neutral expression. She gave a simple nod to settle any worries of her personhood upon him and likewise skimmed the cockpit to assure herself of his condition before turning about to assess the damage.

And then she remembered: There had been a third among them.

Hiding behind the frame before it fell.

More steps followed: feet some strange configuration of both talon and hand gripping the floor through thick leathery covers bound to her bodysuit as she lent over, peeking out from the crater in which Seiren's frame had landed. It was as if a balloon had been burst, filled with milk; a great explosion of snowy liquid, gibs and metallic components rubbed and smeared flat like tinfoil.

She stepped over the gap, over the crater and sifted through it for some evidence of life. Nothing.

"Where's Aiesu?"

Rebeka didn't normally have the habit of thinking out loud but she wanted Seiren to understand her concern -- glancing back at his frame. And then lower. And then lower. And then she saw something that confused her. A smeared crushed mesh of milky guts and organs like an insect stuck into the back of his frame.

Digging a hand in, she reached and withdrew the clump, digging it out of the frame's mechanical joints: Reaching and pulling in sequence with no concern for the possibility of herself being maimed. And then she found something large, round and warm and surprisingly intact.

She soon had it in her hands; stepping back carefully to glance up at Seiren's frame as she rolled it through her hands.

What Rebeka was a synthetic modus skull with cracked doll-like eyes and melted flesh. Doll was the operative word here: resembling the head of a toy that had been run through the microwave along half of its construction, the other half scorched black. Whoever it had been was now beyond recognition. Then she started tapping and patting at it, as she'd seen Seiren do with the television whenever it made him unhappy.

A voice rang through the radio.

"I... I can't see."

It was Aiesu. Speaking with concern.

"How... How bad is it?"

The Sourcian had problems processing what she was dealing with. She could hear the Aiesu person that was both a machine but also not a machine yet also most definitely a machine talking. Technology was not Rebeka's forte and she had no way of understanding the damage or comforting what was now a ball of worried nerves over the comms. She returned her gaze to Seiren through his cockpit monitor again as she had before; like a mother dog overwhelmed with too many puppies and no idea what to do with them.

 

[Luca]

Up on the balcony, approaching the two mechs, the Pudding Lady and the crushed doll was a pair of the convention staff. One of them was a Nepleslian man carrying a medical kit he'd taken from a hole in the wall dressed in a slightly crumpled white shirt and black slacks with a pink name tag, reading 'James'. The other seemed to be a waitress.

Well, it was a Waitress, but it was also a robot standing at about five feet tall in artificial high heels, with long and erect bunny ears, a little button nose, big opaque eyes which hid all of her sensors, very articulate and dextrous fingers and strong arms for carrying not only plates, but also for a very firm back rub if that's what a patron asked for. To back all that up were strong looking thighs, clearly intended accentuate sexuality for the sake of the patrons along with a generous window of cleavage in its chest. The whole look of the thing looked soft, pleasant and smooth to the eye in all the right places. The way it moved, just skipping along to the Phoenix team with such pep, verve and playfulness.

"Holy shit, is she okay?" The man named James asked Rebeka as he popped the first aid box open, but wasn't really sure of what he could do to help Aiesu, at all. They then looked up at Rebeka and asked "Are you okay...?" unable to address them as sir or ma'am.

"You need medical attention~!" The Rabbit-shaped waitress robot observed cheerfully, putting its hands on its cheeks and overplaying the shock of the situation. "Could I take them to Triage please-" There was a mental break in the robot, pausing its pantomime for a moment to asses what Rebeka was. "Ma'am?" It concluded.

Somehow, Rebeka thought that Aiesu was beyond triage.

A voice trickled into Aiesu's ear. "H3Y, 413SU. 1'V3 G0T 3Y3S 0N Y0U V14 TH4T R0B0T. Y0U L00K PR0P3R FUCK3D UP. H3R3."

Aiesu saw a video feed of just how flattened and horizontally redistributed she was via the bunny waitress' eyes. However, the robot wouldn't stop bouncing around in mock shock.

"TH3 FUN3R4L F0R Y0U W0N'T B3 0P3N C4SK3T." Echelon's prognosis was pretty grim. "1'LL S33 1F 1 C4N H1J4CK TH1S B0T F0R Y0U 1N TH3 M34NT1M3." The rabbot was now wiggling its tush as it waited for an answer from Rebeka. "UNL3SS Y0U'VE B33N C0NS1D3R1NG Y0UR 0PT10NS 4S 4 P4NC4K3 1MP3RS0N4T0R, H3H3."

-

Redrick, meanwhile watched as the kitchen staff started buzzing around him like bees, recovering each other and starting to get the food courts on the second deck back to life, passing by Echelon and Melissa, who were enjoying their makeshift meals. They were both given bottles of water, the good stuff.

"Ta mate," Melissa thanked the waiter as she got the cap off the bottle with her thumb. "Oi, mate, can you get the one called Red over 'ere for me? I'd like a word with 'im." She sounded pretty chuffed with the chef's performance in battle. "See if you can get Enzo's ass over 'ere too."

She gave him a tip of a few DA extra and the Waiter skipped along gingerly to Red and relayed. "Mr. Callahan, that lady with the big rifle and the baseball cap sitting next to the Mimicom would like to talk to you. I think she's one of the ones who killed a few of the pirates."

Melissa raised her hand to Red. She recognised him from down below through the scope. Echelon, meanwhile was still communicating to Aiesu, frozen in position as she made preparations to hijack that bunny robot.

"Also, where's the one called Enzo?"

 

[Moogle]

Seiren's frame cracked open with a pneumatic hiss - an ever-satisfying noise - and he peered out.

"Ah, Rebeka! You did some scary stuff!" he complimented with a beaming smile after her cursory inspection of his state was over. "Hey, what's this stuff all over my machine?"

"Where's Aiesu?" He heard her say, and without missing a beat, he responded, "I told her to take cover while I was still up there. She'll be hiding around there somewhere."

A doubt slid into his mind.

"R-right?"

And then Rebeka recovered Aiesu - or at least what remained. The inventor's heart jumped its tracks and went into a ditch, on fire for a brief few seconds before Aiesu's voice finally returned.

"W-well. . . Uh. . . You're a r-robot, right? So we can just fix you, right?" He asked nervously, panic crossing his face.

And throughout this, Luca continued to be ignored.

 

[Eistheid]

Fruna Ruica, Deck 3, Main Convention Floor

Finished with her latest bout of feeding Tamamo felt rather satisfied as she straightened and scrubbed at her mouth wiping the blood away as she looked back up to the elevated level noting that the form of Luca Pavone was still not amongst those standing. Floating into the air Tamamo settled near the group taking little note of the situation that held Seiren, Rebeka, and a couple of the local crew's attention as she observed the pinned man for a few seconds before hooking her small fingers into some grooves of the power armour before flexing and working to lift the heavy prone form off of Luca Pavone.

Hearing wet splattering as she tossed the armoured form aside Tamamo winced and looked down to see that she had torn some of her wounds open once more and was once again standing on trembling legs as hemosynth ran down her azure flesh. Taking a shaky breath she returned her attention to the man she had freed and inquired in a bright and peppy tone, "Do you require medical aid?"

 

[Lamb]

Wherever the hell Enzo is...
The one called Enzo, by the way, had sliced down one of the velvetine ropes and tied a lasso from it-- which he was now twirling over his head as he gauged the distance through some damaged flooring from the lower lever to the upper level where Melissa and Echelon were. After a moment of concentration, he tossed the hoop towards a fixture and gave it a swift yank to tighten. It looked expertly done, but it was primarily a combination of luck and intuition that got the job done. Betraying his apparent expertise, Enzo pumped his fist and cheered to see this feat; surprised to have it so.

"Yeah, see!" He told his surroundings as he wrapped the rope around one arm and began to scale the wall, "I'm a fuckin' cowboy! Checks me out! I'm a fuckin' cowboy, see."

At some point, this brought him to the second level where Melissa and Echelon sat. There, he brought himself to her directly despite not even being around when the waiter showed up to retrieve him.

"So, sweethaht," He greeted her, sliding onto a table and kicking his legs. Enzo leaned towards her and tossed his cigarette behind him before asking, "Yous gets any good kills t'day?"

 

[Luca]

Fruna Ruica, Cafeteria, Deck 2
Melissa raised her bottle to Enzo as his beautifully ugly mug came over the balcony and towards the cafeteria. "Scarn on?" She said in greeting to the Conman as he put his legs on the table and asked about her kill count. "Oh, scored a few dead in the initial 'ssault, then I wos providing overwatch fer ya. Could see you an' the Red guy monkeyin' about an' smokin' shit left and right." Melissa said offhandedly, taking a swig of the good water.

She then leaned in and looked at Enzo, looking at the Waiter who was relaying her message to Red. "Y'think he's in the wrong job 'ere?" She asked Enzo, trying to get at what Red was doing down there, and on this ship. A 'chef' did not bust those sorts of moves out unless they were so strong their shadow could clothesline someone. "Sounded like 'is voice over the comms. a moment ago. I definitely 'eard 'im yelling before."

"Think we can coax 'im to us? We could do with a chef now that we got a lotta people 'ere. Lukes is a good chef, but 'ee's gettin' busier now that he's shoulder deep in th' badass business."


Fruna Ruica, Main Convention Floor, Near a Breaker-shaped Crater on the Balcony
Tamamo could see Luca's armour plates beneath his jacket were singed and blackened with thruster exhaust and thrust. Looking through him, though, she could see a few more broken ribs, his shoulder was still sprained from before and his right hipbone was severely banged up. Still, he stood back up with a bit of a shake and looked down at the supine, unconscious Breaker.

"Thanks. I'm feeling a lot better than she is." He said, trying to be coy and ride out his injuries. "Give me some treatment later, I can recover in peace on the Crimson Kestrel." Luca stretched like he'd gotten up from a long nap and looked over to Tamamo. She could see the little micro-movements in response to pain Luca was sporting, but he moved right through them. "Tamamo, right? Dunno how you got here, but I think you're in the wrong place here on the Fruna Ruica."

Recruitment. It had to dare whoever you were telling that there could be more than what they had now, that they had options and a chance. Tamamo definitely had better options than staying on a half-blown up ship.


Fruna Ruica, Bridge
"Alright alright! Just, just promise I get off scot free and I'll redirect this ship wherever you want!" Wire Head said. Between the threat of having some of the grotesque things he saw in passing in the convention shoved up his exhaust pipe and more EMP therapy, enough was enough. "That's all I want in return for my cooperation, got that?" Wire Head said as he shuffled towards the consoles. He had to unlock the taskbar so the captain of the Fruna Ruica could redirect it.

"Come on." The Captain jostled. "Don't make me call Shareef."

Somewhere outside the Bridge, everyone could hear a drawn out "Aww Yeah~"

 

[Phe0n1x]

Makari smiled with glee at his new toy. Sure, it needed some work but this would give him a project to work on in his spare time rather than polishing and oiling his guns constantly. He scooped up the abused weapon and shoved it beneath his coat and sauntered off to check on the injured and to see if someone finally helped Luca up.

 

[Eistheid]

Fruna Ruica, Deck 3, Main Convention Floor

Watching the man move in spite of his internal injuries and provide a facade or normalcy was rather fascinating to Tamamo, she hadn't expected someone like him to be able to cope so well with injuries. She didn't quite understand what he meant though she supposed that he was conscious as opposed to the one he might have been referring to, content to leave him be as he requested Tamamo was considering wandering off when his question caught her a little off guard.

Rallying mentally Tamamo started putting together her options and constructed an ideal path while simultaneously carefully working out a worst case scenario and how to navigate that optimally. After a minute of silence she replied maintaining her somewhat off sounding peppy and bright tone, "Yes I am Sesshoseki Tamamo, Santô Hei of the Star Army of Yamatai." She paused uncertain for a moment before inquiring, "Are you a Nepleslian?"

 

[Born-On-Board]

It was a little rude to keep someone waiting like that, but he'd had to wash his face, hands, beat some of the plaster dust out of his clothes, supervise the junior chefs, adjust some of the atrociously amateur plating on the dishes going out, show someone how to properly filet a fish, etc. Before he knew, he'd run out of tasks to supervise, and the niggling feeling that he'd been forgetting something turned into realization.

Oh, shit, that's right, the girl had wanted to talk to him.

Redrick finally hobbled over to the sniper girl. He looked haggard, tired - the last day had aged him more than the last 40 years had managed. It was hard to believe this was the same man that had killed so many pirates hours ago - from the exterior, he simply looked like someone's dad, a jobber, a blue collar worker.

"Ah, sorry to keep you waitin, Miss." Redrick said, yawning shortly afterwards. "The galley's a madhouse, you understand. Those junior chefs would cut their thumbs off and serve them if you didn't breathe down their necks 23 out of the 24 hours in a day."

Without asking he sat at their table, massaging his knee. "Anyways, Jeremy, er, the waiter; he said you wanted to talk to me? I can't imagine what for, but, here I am."

 

[Sham]

After Soruk was relieved of watching over the pesky freespacer, thanks to his noisy companion, he immediately returned to the vents without a word, not really interested in what they were trying to do on the bridge. Whatever it was, Zeta could probably manage to complete the task.

Of course, after crawling around for a while, enjoying the relative silence and darkness, he was confronted with the question, 'Where to go?'. Routing the pirates took less time than he expected, though it was done with less grace than he would have done it with. The time would have been better spent forging.

He eventually decided to head back to the ship and wait, if anyone needed him, they could, much to his displeasure, call him. The inevitable, 'We survived pirates' celebration would probably start shortly, if it wasn't already underway, and that wasn't the blademaster's sort of thing.

 

[OsakanOne]

The waitress droid was perfectly still for quite a time; tiny lights like microscopic explosions dancing behind its eyes as the thing was reconfigured. Soon, its distant blank gaze lowered, hands rising as it looked over itself. Hands twisted slowly, attention tracing the shape of knuckles, hips, feet, fingertips that lethargically flexed and then lower still to stare.

"Oh good - I can see." Aiesu's voice came, grumbling "I'm reduced to a utility droid? Remote control, no less? I guess I'll take what I can get."

It sounded as if it had been fed through some complex bank of modulizers and synthesizers -- even the sigh that vibrated beneath that white plastic face-plate seemingly synthetic. Soon, with steps that by design of joints and loud servos that were designed to seduce, it rudely snatched the formerly Aiesu-skull from Rebeka's hands, waving its index finger at her afterwards. In motions comedically exaggerated, it held the skull out at arms length to evaluate its condition, rolling it over to view each side.

A sound like a clicking tongue fed through a hammond organ...

"CPU seems intact. Glad I chose the re-enforced housing. Let's see about getting some resolution."

Then she dropped it with a resounding clunk against the floor. Clop-clop-clop went its legs as it walked, heels then retracting up into its calves as it bent down to rummage through the wreckage.

It found a backpack -- untorn, though its contents had been crushed and the fabric dyed with construct blood in milky white. The droid began removing effects from the bag, evaluating them before discarding them: A packed lunch-box full of flattened sandwiches? Gone. A crushed empty flask? Gone. Glasses? Gone. Papers? Gone. It then fished parts out of a crushed laptop -- ripping the backing off and carefully removing two long strip-like credit-card things each labeled "quantum modem pair" before tucking one of them into the skull and the other into a slot in the jawbone of the droid.

"Ahaaa~ That's so much better."

Then finally, it reached aside, stuffing the skull into the bag.

Rebeka watched, still unsure what to make of this new person-thing, which had shifted its manner from bouncy and chipper to seemingly apologetic and disappointed. Her hands were still in the same position, as if she were still holding the skull in a measure of awe before she finally glanced upward to Seiren and pointed at the emotive droid, unable to form words.

Carefully, it clumsily zipped the bag closed folding the arm of the bag over one of the shoulders. It tried the other but its right arm wouldn't move far enough -- its motion limited by its partially exoskeletal design which didn't intend for it to assume such positions. The bag was dropped as the pale robot began walking back and forth: heavy childish tantrum steps translated through its motion control matrix as fluid motion designed to tittilate as Aiesu huffed, puffed and grumbled in Lorath repeatedly before then freezing like a deer in headlights;

She had seen her own reflection. How she looked. How she moved, through its eyes.

Her instinctive response was to freeze. Then another slight cant of its head, exaggerated by those synthetic bunny-ears.

The full flowing (and frankly impossible) bust and bizzarely wide hips particularly held her attention -- the way they wobbled with flesh-hue pico-jelly. And then she remembered the same material on its palms; finally realizing what the droid's actual purpose was, other than serving drinks.

"WHAAAAAAT!?" the droid screeched -- hands together against the straps as it stamped its feet in a tantrum against the cracked floor, slowly turning and whining as it went.

"THIS is what you found for me? You did THIS?! YOU'RE SERIOUS!?" it screamed through the hall in what it believed to be Echelon's direction, pointing in some exaggerated pantomime posture that it was becoming clear she couldn't control.

"This isn't funny! Stop laughing!"

 

[ShotJon]

Fruna Ruica, Bridge

"You do not get to want things you pirate scum!" Zeta said and grabbed the freespacer by the throat. 'Letting you go free? Are you bloody kidding? Har, har har. Look at me laughing. You will be happy I won't cut off few of your appendaged, I always wondered if freespacers have dicks. But hey, if you unlock the consoles now, I will tell authorities that you co-operated with me and gave up without a fight. How does that sound to you tech head?"

Zeta then could hear a drawn out aww yeaaaah. "Soruk," she called out to the hallway, but with no answer. She peeked in the hallway and saw that Soruk was long gone. "Bloody hell I hate that guy."

"Reese get read, captain you take cover." Zeta said and grabbed the freespacer as living shield. She toook her fatboy in her free hand and decided to wait for the "aww yeah" person to show up.

 

[Luca]

Fruna Ruica, Cafeteria on Deck 2

"THIS is what you found for me? You did THIS?! YOU'RE SERIOUS!?"

As Redrick was sitting down, he saw the woman sitting next to Melissa suddenly grin ear to ear, then fall out of their chair in hysterics, just as though she was remembering something she saw on television last night. Going into giggling fits and kicking their legs in the air. Melissa had an idea of what the big 'joke' was, but she instead kept focussed on Redrick.

"Mr. Red." Melissa said, ignoring Echelon's continued chuckles. "I wos watchin' you earlier from up top 'a the Tongue Slide an' providin' overwatch. I saw you move yer arse not like any 'o the pansies that pass through 'ere." She took a bottle of water, the good stuff, and then passed the bottle to Red, placing it in front of him. He looked like he needed it more than she did. "You, mate, look like you're in the wrong job 'ere, servin' people 'o are too busy tryin' to tunnel into each other in search 'a diamonds 'cos they had a lump 'o coal shoved up their arse an' did some squats."

Colourful metaphor, distinctly Nepleslian. "Methinks me boss would like a word with ya. We're in the market fer a chef, and someone who can hold their own in a fight. Yer both." Melissa reached into her top pocket and produced a business card with the pentagon logo of the ISC Phoenix. Melissa's name was next to it, signed with 'Melissa Jones II'. "Y'might've heard 'uv us, we're in the news a bit."

Echelon, meanwhile, was wiping fake tears from their eyes and thankful that they didn't have to breathe otherwise they would've had an oxygen deprivation headache. "Oh Aiesu's going to K1LL M3, or one of me, when we get back but this was S0 W0RTH 1T." She howled, lapsing into her native accent as she tried to sit back up.

Melissa looked at Echelon and blinked at her. "Oh, that's our head of infrastructure, technology, communications and artificial intelligence." Melissa said. "Echelon, Red. Red, Echelon. She 'as a sense of humour. She doesn't normally look like this either."

"H1!" The Mimicom-occupied-by-a-Freespacer waved from the ground.


Fruna Ruica, Balcony on the Convention Floor
"I'm Luca Pavone." He replied. "And I'm Nepleslian Minded, Minkan Bodied, all badass." It was one of those boasts that could've been written by the marketing team, but Luca seemed to like it enough to say it straight and true. One of the marketing points that came from his brand (not always with his explicit knowledge) was that he was a half-and-half that got the best of both worlds rather than the scorn of both.

"If you'd like to go elsewhere, you can tag along on my ship and head over to Nepleslia Prime." Luca continued making his offer to Tamamo as he walked towards the altercation with the bunny robot and the man with first aid equipment and a squished Aiesu. "And then you can-"

"You-"

He was fortunate enough to have been too busy bragging to Tamamo to watch Aiesu's grissly procedure, but seeing Aiesu throwing a temper tantrum was putting a smile on his face as he heard a familiar voice on the bunny-shaped robot. "Aiesu?" Luca asked as he gave Bunny-Aiesu a slap on the back, then looked at his hand and noticed it was covered in white milky stuff and wiped it on his hip with a frown before beaming at her again. "What's this now?"

Rebeka could see the beginnings of Luca laughing. The rush of dopamine, the surprise of the situation, the sheer strangeness of it which was alien to Rebeka, but familiar to Luca. He clutched his sides, lest they travel out the airlock and into space and tried his best to suppress laughter because it was making his ribs ache.

"How are you alive and bunnies-?" Luca tried to piece a coherent sentence together but just couldn't, and ended up stumbling away from Aiesu and tipping against Seiren's LEAF. "I just can't-" He chuckled and slapped his hand against the side of Seiren's frame, rapidly losing his composure. "OH MY GOD YOU'RE A BOOTY BUNNY! AHAHAHAHA!"

Then he heard a phone call in his ear and tried to calm down, taking deep breaths and getting oxygen back into his system, then tapping his earpiece. "Y-Yes?"

"Luca, it's John here. I'm on my way back in the Big Bird. Get everyone gathered near the entrance."

"Oh-okay, I'll tell the others. I think they're finishing up and getting the ship unlocked." Luca replied back. "We're bringing some people along. That okay with you?"

"Fine by me. Just gather everyone, call back and I'll be over in ten." John then let the line for a little and asked Luca a question. "I can hear you breathing heavy, you sound tired. Did you party while you were there?"

"Oh, someone had a crush on me and broke a few of my ribs. It was rough fun."

"Whatever you say..." John sighed back before closing the call.

Luca then straighted himself and touched his earpiece again to get all friendlies back to squad. "Alright everyone, John's ready to pick us up whenever, so wrap it up!"


Fruna Ruica, Bridge
"Aww Yeah~" The heavy footsteps of a tanned ID-SOL bodybuilder who was naked save for a man thong could be heard, and the source of those strange calls was standing in the doorway, eyeing Wire Head intensely with a grin that stretched across his whole, cloft-chinned, chiselled face. "Aww Yeah~" He said again, pectoral muscles flexing.

"OH NO!" Wire Head squealed as he wiggled in Zeta's grip.

"Aww Yeah~"

"Alright alright! I'll go along just don't let Shareef take me he'll split me in half!" They made a frenzied plea.

"You made the right decision," the Captain of the Fruna Ruica said. "Now fix my ship."

"Okay just plug one of my dreadlocks into any of the ports over there and I'll get this bucket of bolts to wherever you'd like!" Wire Head bargained. Behind Zeta, the console did indeed have a few inputs, and each dreadlock tendril contained a different input. It was quite diverse, including Yamataian, Nepleslian, Lorath, Freespacer and even Abwehran standards for electronic device and electric plugs and sockets.

 

[ShotJon]

Zeta frowned and moved back. She shoved the Freespacer towards the console. "You break it, you pay for it. Got it?" She said and plugged one of the tendrils in. She then grabbed the pistol she stole from the pirate earlier and tossed it to the captain. "Watch him. I got a big heap of muscles to deal with."

Zeta then looked at the Id-Sol. He does not seemed like a fellow she would like to get to know better. So instead she just moved to the first aid cabinet, took the supplies from it and went to treat Reese.

 

[Moogle]

As the events transpired before Seiren, he felt an enormous -albeit short lived- weight lifted from his shoulders.

Phew! So I didn't end up killin' an innocent! He thought, observing the new body with a keen interest.

Many, many insulting phrases suddenly came to Seiren's mind. Optimal ones found their roots in Nepleslian catcalls (Like "Looks like this bunny wants a carrot! How about this one?), while more tactful ones took their meanings from Yamataian avoid-talking-about-the-elephant politeness ("I hope you're not stuck to acting like your namesake. . .")

But, really, only one really managed to work its way out of that thick skull of his.

"Hah, you're a sexbot."

 

[Born-On-Board]

Redrick blinked, taking the the card and turning it over in his hands. He'd never imagined for a second he'd be in this position - the ISC Phoenix was legendary, a ship most people didn't believe actually existed. He hated his job on the Fruna Ruica, absolutely despised it, and to be offered a spot on their roster was almost as good as the NSN calling him back up for a re-enlistment ceremony. He opened his mouth to say something, but was interrupted by his attention being directed to Echelon.

He peered on the ground at the perplexing metal creature, and almost timidly responded, "Hello. Uh. Redrick Callahan. It's a pleasure."

He looked at the card in his hands again. It seemed to radiate some sort of life-changing aura, as if it were some sort of artifact, imbued with ancient, unknowable power.

Dramatic, he thought. That last thought was a little dramatic.

"I don't know what to say." Redrick eventually managed. "I'd be honored."

And that, it seems, was that.

 

[Eistheid]

Fruna Ruica, Deck 3, Balcony on the Convention Floor

As the man reintroduced himself Tamamo was momentarily worried that he was going to misinterpret or ignore her question, however contrary to her expectations she ended up obtaining more information than she had expected from the one known as Luca Pavone.

She found it rather interesting that he was a Nepleslian post-transfer to a Minkan body and many questions surrounding the man's past blossomed in her mind. Ordering her thoughts as he offered to let her tag along on his ship to journey to Nepleslia Prime, Tamamo found that she was a little confused as she had begun to nod in agreement and his speech cut off.

Wanting to ask why he would take her to somewhere where she would be as far as she knew illegally present Tamamo instead watched with mild curiosity as Mr. Pavone's attention was drawn to some form of automaton that seemed to be the centre of the nearby group's attention.

Putting things together as she observed the white carnage and aligned the speech coming from the rabbit-like automaton Tamamo assigned it the provisional name 'Aiesu?' From what she could piece together it seemed likely that the small pale girl had been crushed under the Origin frame, however due to her non-organic body type she had been able to take control of the rabbit-automaton instead of perishing.

Content with her hypothesis Tamamo moved to fall into line a little ways behind Luca Pavone intending to stick close to him and ensure that she made it onto the ship that would take her away from her present location as she had intended over six hours ago.

As she affixed her proximity to the man she idly examined her limbs and body noting that her body was re-assimilating the hemosynth that decorated her dark blue skin the crimson stain slowly receding toward the closing wounds. She shivered a little as she contemplated the pain she had experienced but felt a slight thrill of elation at the prospect of analyzing the experience when she had some down time, she had much to learn about herself, but for the moment she knew that she couldn't risk the disabling vulnerability.

Apart from being unintentionally shredded by shrapnel caused by friendly fire she had also killed several individuals, tasted the blood of another sentient life form twice, and been spurred into combat by an unknown party that seemed to have for the moment vanished into another area of the ship.

Thinking of this she frowned a little as she recalled the unpleasant sensation of starving and the resulting complications as her body failed to function as it should. Deciding that she very much disliked the sensation Tamamo made special note to attempt to remain well supplied with food or to more quickly scavenge a battlefield in the future.

Thinking back even farther she noted that despite the strange location she had been taken to, the occupants of the Fruna Ruica had been for the most part courteous and kind to her which to her signified that it was unwise to judge individuals based on their general affiliation.

Further on this line of thought she identified that her inability to interpret social connotations and read others had led her on a difficult journey that had nearly gotten her killed. This was unacceptable and Tamamo made note to pursue knowledge to avoid a repeat performance in the future. Preferably she would enjoy being able to deeply read those around herself.

Returning to the present, Tamamo looked to Luca Pavone's back and wondered what opportunities the next segment of her journey would provide, and whether or not she could put her new acquaintances to use in escaping her unsettling yoke.

 

[OsakanOne]

Her synthesizer was sufficiently realistic to emulate the sound of a large intake of breath, tickling through vocoders.

"I'm NOT a sex-bot!"

The megaphone echo screeching was almost deafening, with a whir and a click the head of the newly remodelled Rabbot Aiesu shifting to settle its attentions on Seiren's frame. And then hand on hip with a metallic clunk, oily whirring as it shifted, arm out, rolling her wrist as she explained, every step a plastic thud and a bounce of D-Cup picojelly emulated bust;

"This is a temporary body. My intelligence is over there, in that bag, inside the skull? This is... try to think of a client-session. I get to see and move and do things... Though..." she paused, seeing her posture. The word 'teapot' came to mind, tipping her head to one side with another quiet whirr and click; all smoothly as she set her hands on her thighs above her knees and lent forward: back arched presenting when all she'd wanted was a better look.. And then side on from another mirror, realizing now what was happening.

"...Something's wrong with the body language...!" her voice echoed like a megaphone; index finger held to face while a hip moved to one side, hand upon it like some Yamataian cartoon ditz.

"Echelon, is this your doing?"