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RP: 188604 [Adventure Capital] 3 : Not trying too hard this time

Z

Zack

Hope System
Black Syndicate controlled Casino,
The Ice Queen.

A few days after Operation Bright Venom...

----

There were certainly things to do after kicking the NMX out of the I'ee home system.

Important things

But Uso wasn't willing to tackle those right away.

Now was a great time to start a Van Banning sponsored vacation.


The Ice Queen itself was a single large tower right next to an equally massive clear dome that kept the fridgid temperatures out, and the pleasnetly warm air in.

In the center of the dome was a modern collussium, complete with massive ID-Sols trading punches whilte scanitly clad women paraded around with score cards. Further out from that were a series of progressively larger and higher up rings. PLenty of seating was up next to the main ring. Beyond that and higher up was another ring segmented into private areas, complete with hotel rooms and balconies where the fight could be watched directly. Furher out from that were eating areas, food courts, and casion tables, all of which near a balcony that could look down on the fight.

Floating up above them all were giant display screens, some showing the fight below, others towards the edges of the dome were showing other sports events from around the Kyoto sector.

Uso herself had rented out several rooms on the second ring for her crew. They had a large, combined, balcony area that was open to the staircases that led down to the fight floor, as well as up towards the casinos, shops, and food. There was even a waitress who would occationally stop by to check up on them, as well as plenty of bottles in an ice chest next to the balcony. If people wanted to head into the hotel area, they'd find very dark, very soundproof'd rooms that were great for sleeping as well as smart showers that could only really be described as decadant.

Uso had sat herself down in a sun chair near the balcony, watching the fight on the massive overhead screens, clad in Pajama pants, a black T-shirt, and sunglasses.

Running an empire could wait.
 
Alex wasn't sure why he had been asked along. He would have preferred to be out flying in his new mecha, but instead he was stuck in here. Oh well, it wasn't all bad he supposed. After all, there were all sorts of new things to try.

However, today felt like a day for rest, and so Alex found himself cracking a fizzy, fruity drink and leaning over the balcony railing, watching the crowds go by below him.

Taking a sip of his drink, Alex's eyes were drawn toward a family sitting at a table in the food court. There were a mother and a father, as well as a small girl and an older boy, who looked about his age.

They were laughing about some joke one of them had told, and Alex's thoughts drifted towards his parents.

His parents, who had kept on the run all of his life in order to stay under Psychopomp's radar.

His parents, who had brought him up the best they could.

His parents. Who had fallen, shot in their own small apartment home when their luck had finally run out, executed for some crime that he would never know of.

Alex sighed, it might not be any use dwelling on the past, but that didn't change the fact that they were dead. That Psychopomp killed them. That he had no one to talk to about this.

And that now that the whirlwind of new people, missions and construction had ended, that he was afraid and alone.
 
"Alex, you're harshing my very relaxed state right now." Uso said, barely looking over from where she was laying back. "You just saved a planet full of adorable bug people AND that spacer-tank-thing... AND you did it all from inside of a giant robot. You should be thrilled right now. That is the stuff you live for."
 
Alex looked down slightly. "I'm sorry. It's just that whenever the action stops, I always seem to end up thinking about my parents."
 
"Yeah, speaking of. You've got no parents and have basically no idea how to take care of yourself right? I mean you barely know how to dress yourself... much less feed yourself or how to wash your clothing.

No point in dwelling on it. How about you and Jason move into the Queen's Slave? We've got the space." Uso offered.
 
Alex chuckled a little. "You had me move in a while ago. I don't know about Jason though."

Alex then took a more serious tone. "I've never had the luxury of choosing my own clothes before so that's unfamiliar, but where I came from they taught us to do menial tasks early on. We either learned quickly or..."
 
"I mean like... move in move in. Maybe take Tasuki as your last name and let me socialize you. We can't just call you Alex and Jason forever. At some point you'll need proper last names." Uso offered.
 
Alex was taken aback by the offer.
"Um, I'd be honored, thank you." He frowned for a moment. "But I still want to find out who my birth parents were."
 
Uso would get up from her seat, walking up behind Alex and placing her hands on his shoulders, her chin resting ontop of his, "Alex, that is going to be nothing but suck for you. If you want to be happy you need to let go of that and move on. All that baggage just weighs you down.

Not caring is the greatest weapon you have. You could drop that entirely, live a happy life, fly your little robots, and really make something of yourself. Every second you spend tugging at threads that don't help you is a second not spent improving yourself. A second not spent getting what you want."
 
Alex wished he could follow Uso's advice, but he knew that until he uncovered the truth about his parents, the uncertainty would eat away at him.

"I wish it were that easy to let go Uso. But I just know that I'll always come back to this as long as I've still not learned the truth. Sooner or later, I'm going to have to find out what hapened. It's just... something I need to do."

Alex looked up from the milling crowds and turned around to face Uso.

"And make sure that no one else ever has to go through what I did."
 
Uso was now practically standing over him, her hands braced on either side of the railing, forcing Alex to lean back a bit,

"That won't bring them back.

There's an endless wellspring of terrible going on in the world and you can't save everyone. You should focus on you and yours.

Leave the dead in the past where they belong."
 
Alex sighed and slid down against the railing.

"Maybe it is stupid, but I at least want to find out who parents were, so that I can remember them properly. And if I can make sure That no one else has to go through this while I'm at it, so much the better."

He looked up at the artificial sky. " Saving the I'ee felt good, felt right. I want to help people when I can, not just waste my skills on myself and my friends."
 
Arccos is a creeper:

With the increased number of Arccos units active, there was the unfortunate side effect of them just lying around sometimes. It wasn't entirely clear which of them were the real ones, as the Arccos units could just as easily be the real one spacing out in a Polysentience realm, or a fake one waiting for a command signal.

Long story short: Arccos had been sitting perfectly still in the hotel room for a while now. Head tilted down, expressionless. Eyes closed. Legs crossed with hands neatly folded on a knee, propped on a couch. Half empty glass of water nearby, that she would occasionally reach out for and drink a few sips from in a completely mechanical fashion.

But at all this, she did sit up. Blink a few times and look around, before striding out to the balcony where Uso and her child spoke with one another. She wore more casual clothing than usual. A pair of khaki shorts, strappy sandals, with her usual black tank tops and a zippered hoodie that read 'Stay in vegetables, eat your drugs, don't do school'.

"Don't mean to rain on the maternity parade," She said, putting down her water glass on the railing, letting it balance there. "Jason already accepted a place among the Freespacers on Station Doomstar. Designate Automationist Zero-Zero."

She gave a little snort of a laugh, as if the designation was funny somehow.

"That comes with some implications for family stuff..."
 
“Yo, fuck him up, I have 2K riding on this shit!”

A fist pumped into the air at the same time as one of the combatants in the main ring's meatier one collided with the face of another ID-Sol, causing some in the crowd to visibly wince. Out here in the crowd where each individual voice was subsumed into the din of chanting, shouting, and the noises of two giants laying into eachother it was almost like you feel every smack of flesh or crack of bone. Just watching each exchange of blows, from the one sided smackdowns to the stunning reversals, each defeat potentially heralding the gain or loss of a small fortune as people placed their bets with black Syndicate rookies, made his adrenaline start pumping in a way that even the battle that he had not long ago survived didn't.

Compared to the lightning quick skirmish where almost everything he did was facilitated via automatic process with machine-like efficiency, the battle seemed decided within less than a minute, and what few surprises had him too concerned with the near death of his comrades to feel some sort of thrill this all felt more....visceral. More real, even out here in the sidelines.

Even if he wasn't even really there to begin with, just some nigh invisible avatar in a VR realm constructed with real-time footage from the Casino's surveillance, for the discerning patron who didn't want to leave the room in order to be right at the action.

The real Jason had just walked out of the hotel room with some barely touched fruity drink in hand, almost certainly alcoholic given his habits. He had thrown on some casual, black sneakers and the baggy pants the SCSC had sent to him, a white shirt, and a similar colored jacket with gold trimmings reminiscent of the color scheme for the frame he piloted. Their eyes seemed glazed over as if he was drugged, a usual expression for someone whose awareness was largely shunted out of meatspace, but it only took a moment for the blue orbs seemed to regain a bit of life, either because some part of his conscious mind had noticed the three...or because the current bout had just ended with a knockout in the fifth round.

“Yeah, thanks for the room offer Uso, but I'm pretty happy as a freespacer.” He said as he leaned over the railing, drink still in hand. Smiling up at the shipkeeper, he stuck out his tongue, laughing. “What, do you want me to call you sis now? I'm not really sure how families work with you...us.”
 
"I'm not quite from the same culture, but back home, the term of address 'citizen' is most often used for that purpose. Everyone from the same ship is family, though we aren't all from the same ship, there."

Having laid back in her own chair until she could only see the dome and screens above from the balcony, Queenie was relaxed and reserved, and dressed in the her pick of the best fashions produced by her homeworld the past year. This didn't mean new clothes, so much as that her bodysuit was programmed with a dappled altocumulus cloud pattern that rippled with soft waves of light, a work of digital art done in shades of grey, indigo, and pale gold. Her veil matched her outfit, and even her hair carried some of the plays of light to bring the outfit together.

She'd packed light for this trip, taking along little else aside from her toiletries bag. It wasn't so much that she needed a break from work--that was the worst part of the deal, really--but that the culture shock of staying on the ground for the new palace construction project was getting to her. The casino wasn't exactly familiar, but so far it had been much less immersive and chaotic. Aside from that, she felt she'd gained enough perspective not to feel too oppressed by the opulent decadence. It could be worse, was the thought. At least here, the hospitality seeks to help guests relax, not to 'encourage' them to.

"As long as you don't call me 'granny', I'll be alright," she joked.
 
"Well at least we can still think of her as a gilf," Akemi sent Uso and Jason as he chillaxed at the balcony as well. He didn't really have much to say or do. He simply reclined in a sun chair of his own and took it easy. He brought Smithee and Olena along so they could have a good time and take in sights without being in any danger like they might have been during the Lighthouse heist. Sadie had been invited too along with two waitresses. He hoped they'd quite enjoy being served for a change.
 
"Citizen is atypical. Usually we just call each other by whatever we want to be called... In your case, call me Arccos." Arccos said, taking up her glass and downing it. Turning on her heel to head back inside from the balcony, "There's just no such thing as genetic family for us. We're all family, one way or another..."

At that, Arccos returned to the room's kitchen. Filling up the glass again before returning to her inside seat. Once more adopting the position and returning to dormancy. There wasn't much more to add, and if anyone had anything important to say they'd be able to find her on the local polysentience where she was doing something both entertaining and practical.

Meanwhile, the 188604 locals were busy enjoying themselves. Smithee was watching the spectacles outside from a dignified position, taking some notes on what entertainment here was like, even if only mentally. Olena was tapping away at a datapad, slowly and deliberately with the tip of one finger; clearly not impressed with the ID-SOL boxing. Sadie didn't seem to be enjoying herself; it had taken a lot of convincing by Smithee just to get her here and she seemed to be passing the time reading and keeping a close eye on her pocket watch and doing the mental arithmetic to work out what would be going on back home.
 
Queenie added another tidbit as Arccos departed. "Some of us do inherit from previous generations, though. Those who live meritorious lives are often 'reincarnated', or to be more precise, cloned, with the new iteration receiving mementos and other recorded data from their predecessor.

"It's a little more intimate than 'family', though. Some even consider the new Freespacer to be the same person as the old one, and in some cases that includes them, themselves." She didn't seem to judge them too harshly, though she clearly found it remarkable.
 
"Having you and the rest of the people on the doomstar as family? I like the sound of that." The tone of his voice, much like the smile he was sporting, was warm, jovial, even relaxed. Seeing the white-haired woman down her drink and turn to leave, the automationist threw up a peace siggn before he carried on the conversation with Queenie.

"So sort of like Soul transfer, right? And the new version keeps the name but changes around the number, usually?" He asked, thinking back to the other Arccos he had met in her private VR realm. "It's nice you meet you, by the way. I'm guessing your from the spacer fleet who showed up as support in the battle?" As he had become accustomed to doing when meeting new people during his time on the station, his mindware sent out an signal with his identification like an electronic handshake.
 
"Same number. Same genes, same origin, same result. They don't always keep the same tradename, and seldom will have the same alias. Nothing like 'soul transfer' is involved; we don't download minds or personalities, though with the same genes and similar experience, there tend to be similarities.

"Yes, we brought the six gunships, three corvettes, and our flagship to the fight, in return for a share of salvage and 'a ship full of art'." She grimaces. "Arccos hired me, I handled the 'diplomacy' for the alliance. Neither has been working out as intended, but what can you do." It seemed a touchy subject for her.
 
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