RP: 188604 Dead Metal Clubhouse

"It's okay bud," Akemi said in a smooth, comforting voice as he floated alongside the little tank girl. "I'll bring a car over and take you to my place. I'll set everything up for you so you'll have all the pillows, blankets and tasty food safe for Spacer consumption you could possibly want. We can hang out just you and me and when you're feeling up to it we can talk to everyone else. I guarantee you'll have a good time."

Silence, apart from the clunking of metal tracks. Lyco's face was entirely hidden by the gold anti-glare visor.

The compact girl stopped for a moment, and looked like she was going to say something to his face, but it turned out that she was only brave enough to say it whilst driving away once more.

"How long is it going to take you to understand, Neko?" A hollow voice. "I don't trust you because I don't deserve all that. It doesn't matter what you think or feel now... That hole on Freehold was where I chose to be. I chose to be there. I killed people to be there. You talk like I'm so innocent now, but... your thoughts will change... and then you'll think I'm obliged to repay you... But I repay no one. I'm not human like that."

"So, really, you should just leave."

"Pfft. Whatever Trevor," Akemi replied dismissively as he raised a limp hand to shoulder level and weakly flicked it through the air. "You're my friend. I don't care who you killed or whether you're human. I'm not human. I'm a glorious master race Neko. Humans are icky and weak. They need to shit. But not me buddy. NH-29s can just piss out all their waste. Also, I don't have a heart so you can't break it. You just gotta fuckin' chill bro."

Clunking tracks clambered slowly to a halt. Lyco arced her arm and leg units inwards, looking into the floor. It took a few moments to say anything, but the body language was more than a little defeated.

"I'm... I'm jealous..." She looked at her hands, and then up to Akemi's chest. "Spacers live their whole lives hoping for immortal bodies like that... and it seems like only the worst minds make it..."

"A manufacturing bay, not a hotel room." Lyco didn't want to look him in the face again, but offered him a hand. "I want to work. Let me just... build you things... and then you can pay me?... Like an employee, or whatever you call it..."

Alex was oblivious to the more serious conversation going on. He was currently fascinated by all of the figures and comics lying around. They were like nothing he had ever seen before.

"Where do all these come from?" He asked, awestruck.

"Sure. Sure," Akemi agreed in an easy manner. "If that's how you wanna treat things fine but I'm still gonna think of you as my pal even if it's one sided. I bet I could totally get you a body like mine if you want. Heck, maybe we can get our hands on some neato Mishhu technology. I really wish I had access to Polysentience stuff and all sorts of other Freespacer communications. That'd be cool. I'm jelly too."

Corgan looked at Ragna-dog, who had located an interesting scent and was now sniffing out the source. "Sorry, I didn't even think about that. Arccos is the only Freespacer I've spent any time with, and she doesn't really have to worry much about viruses and shit." He said apologetically. A whistle from him got the big dog's attention. "Out." He commanded. The dog whined, but still obeyed, walking outside slowly with his head down.

"You're probably going to be in high demand around here. If you want I can get some guards posted outside. They'll keep out anyone you don't want to talk to." Corgan suggested. "If not, I'm sure you can use those crab tanks. I'll just come back tomorrow. My advice though is to just let one person in at a time. Maybe get a secretary, or build one."

He rolled his eyes at Akemi's Neko superiority schtick. Despite how annoying Corgan thought Akemi was, he didn't like the way the discussion at the Palace had gone. The guy may seem like an idiot sometimes but he's not. "Akemi. I know what I did at the Palace was uncool. That's as close to an apology as you're going to get. I still have plans for Tolmasch, but I'm looking at a few alternatives." He said, trying to offer an olive branch. "I underestimated you at your bar. I don't like you, but I will admit that you are more than you seem to be. Making an enemy of you is not in my best interest. If I abandon my plans for you, then you'll owe me a favor in return. I'm not going to demand you pay for my base or anything, just one favor. Is that a fair deal?"

"Sure I guess," Akemi said reluctantly, "but I'll probably end up helping you out anyway in one sense or another in the future though since I try to be nice to everyone and a team player. I don't wanna owe you a favor you can just name and demand at any time without any limits like suddenly ordering me to go back to my old girl self and suck your dick in front of a bunch of hot chicks."

"You would probably do that sort of thing without needing a favor called in." Arccos' projection re-entered the conversation, still a little distracted from the impromptu reprogramming. "And frankly if you ever got on the Polysentience you'd more or less instantly be brought to the attention of a bunch of SI's who would make it their life's mission to bombard your visual cortex with images of distended, prolapsed anuses day and night until you leave or have a mental breakdown."

"And frankly if she wants an immortal body she could go for one that doesn't need to eat or sleep, and has no waste to dispose of." The voice projected from he monitors just sounded tired at this point, "Really, the nekovalkyrja form is limited simply by its creator's wish that they might stick their dick in their creation... Anyway, I'm almost done here. Name your demands for those gate details and we'll talk when I'm done and you've been left well enough alone in the flesh."

"I wouldn't mind being bombarded night and day with images of a distended, prolapsed anus as long it was yours. In fact if we were an item I'd probably be perpetually bombarding myself with them and doing the same to you," Akemi said nonchalantly.

"3D printer. Downloaded the schematics off of the poly, and you probably could to." Lyco responded to Alex first, albeit still standing in the doorway. "I use that kind of thing to fabricate a lot of my parts. Most wireheads do. Heck, ask a junker to print something for you, if you don't feel up to the task... As for where the schematics come from, the amount of spacers who totally made peace with Yamatai and settled there would surprise you. A lot of them work for Origin Industries, same folks who made the Oban mecha."

It was clear that they were still internally troubled, but the gold sun visor layer was back up, so people could see their face again at least. A sheepish smile was the best they felt like managing.

"Thanks for the concern, Corgan, but what I really need is a building that's not made of dirt and square stones." It might have been filled with technological wizardry, but the shack itself was basically just an old brick farmhouse. Lyco had to concede that staying healthy here was always going to be a loosing battle. "Sorry if I offended your four-legged animal. The spiders were on guard duty until somebody showed up..."

That person was Akemi, who her face slowly arced back towards as she said it. The conversation with Arccos had gotten more than a little weird, so they didn't even know how to add to that one.

-"I know about fourteen, maybe sixteen different backdoor gates. At least half are likely still open."- Lyco booted up a proper mindware connection to the codebreaker finally. This wasn't the kind of thing it would suit either of them to get out. -"You could always tell when Locksmith shadowplayers found something IWL related when they didn't come back. I was never really part of their inner circle, but what they failed to realise was that the one loading the traveller shuttles also knows their operational range and mission profile. Serves them right for being so holier-than-thou, that they couldn't even cart their own damn luggage around."-

"Well like I said I can set you up at my tavern or my ship," Akemi said upon being mentioned. "We can build you something all your own together later. Or maybe we can stay together long term. I'd like to build a giant structure to attract attention to myself and you could always have a chunk of it as I'd like to ask you to help make it."

"You making this... giant structure?..." It wasn't Lyco's voice, but rather something with a dull slumbery digitized tone. Akemi could hear it from the monitors, but the tankish girl heard it coming from underneath the dinner table. "Those are the things which you are built for building?..."

"Erm, Akemi, is this yours?" Lyco was already looking directly underneath with those flexible leg pivots, and perceived a tiny, immaculate yellow mushroom hiding out there. "If so, you're even more full of weird bacteria than I thought..."

"No, Cloudee is not real here... Real, is? Currect. But not real here." The practically microscopic polysentience avatar suddenly began to grow rapidly, before clipping through the table, and becoming visible to all those that had mindware. "This strukkture is... Having many purpose, currect? There is a possbulity of a level having them windows, is?"

"You're... That giant orange automata with the horns? Traffleklob?" Lyco managed to link Akemi a basic video feed from her own POV, perhaps just to make herself look less crazy talking to it. "What are you doing hiding underneath my table?"

"Feeling sorry, them. The orgunic mushrooms."

"You mean the dinner I just gave to the man outside?"

"Them in sauce, is."

"...And, you're even here in the first place... why?..."

"I am strong. I am metal. I am doctur and engineer. Arcuss is thinking you should be friend, and I am thinking you should be friend."

"...And this floor, your end of the bargain, is going to do... what?..."

"Growing the living non-metal plant things. Those houses of green, like on mothership, is. Only planet. Safe garden for non-metal plant friends."

Lyco was just getting more and more confused about what this automata even was, cupping their hands around the projection just to stop it from rambling on. "...Erm... Akemi, do you know this AI?... Can we trust them?..."

"Yeah, that's Truffleclub, the really big metal orange guy that came to Freehold with us and treated Alex," Akemi replied. "You can totally trust him, he's a nice guy." The thought that he was saying the guy was trustworthy despite him listening in on a mental conversation and appearing out of nowhere did cross the Neko's mind. It didn't really surprise him since Arccos had already revealed mere moments ago that she was riding around in Alex's head and had broken into his file storage. His words hadn't been encrypted and Truffleclub naturally had Arccos' resources at his disposal. Maybe she silently hooked him up so he could join in the talk. He did say she thought he should work with Lyco.

"And yeah, sure, we could make a place to grow plants. I already grow Elysian Psomi which is a really fast growing fungus. I do serve it as food to be honest, but there's no reason why we can't have plants to just look at too. My friend Smithee already has a little flower garden. We could also make homes for kids and you could teach them to grow stuff there if you want."

"You can eat them. Would not refuse a metal friend him's spare parts. Would not refuse an orgunic friend him's food." Truffleclub answered frankly, if awkwardly. "I am wanting to grow the things here, to feeding them people, but... Learning to build in one gravity, it is... It is slow, building."

"You ever hear of the grinder, Akemi?" Lyco subtly realized what sentiment the robot felt. "A humanoid body is expensive to make, and spacers waste nothing. We couldn't afford to. So you don't have to worry about that kind of neurosis with us."

"Yeah, I have. I'm interested in Spacer things since I want to make Spacer friends. That's good to know. Aashi, the Iroma, the horned woman could possibly do stuff with us too Truffleclub. I was telling Lycosidae earlier she might think of teaming up with Arccos and Vier to help create a way to stop deadly sand storms. Uso is interested in making this planet a giant resort or vacation or rest area. Aashi wants to make a resort too. You've got more than just me to help you grow and protect plants."

Akemi hoped Arccos might chime in to comment on whether she might work on the storm stopper idea. He continued to speak mentally because of how fast it was and since he figured if Truffleclub could hear him there was surely a chance Arccos was listening too.