Kyoto Aerospace Port, Bay 05, ISC Big Bird
Luca watched as Cass came by with her mech on a floating disk, and it looked so much more beaten up and battleworn than the hologram could do justice to. Melissa helped the cargo disk direct itself up the ramp, and into the cargo storage of the Big Bird. Once the Big Bird touched down back inside the Crimson Kestrel, it'd be unloaded somewhere - their cargo always had enough room.
Luca waved the two new arrivals on board, the Freespacer and the colourfully-haired Cass.
"We'll be heading ourselves over to a bigger ship from here," he nodded as he watched the other stragglers and crew members come aboard too.
Beside him, his daughter watched, too. Vitalia had given up smoking in secret; she had one of them rolled in her mouth, and was watching the onload with him. Luca didn't seem to mind her smoking, knowing what she was - but he was a little concerned for Yamatai's hardline stance against Smoking. He'd rather not his daughter get busted for smoking like that politician did.
As though prophetic, she stated, "I think I liked Nepleslia better, Dad."
"The city in Yamatai sucks," Luca agreed, nodding. "I'd rather have gone home. You've never seen Ralt, have you?"
She flicked a bit of ash onto the deck and scuffed it with a designer boot. "No. Would I be able to go down on the surface, there, either?"
"Ralt's disconnected from the troubles of the world, up in the mountains,
trees and snow keeping us safe and close," he sighed, reciting the last passage in a very un-cosmopolitan accent of Yamatai-go.
He looked across Bay 05, and did a quick headcheck. Everyone had come aboard and was accounted for. "Let's head to Sargasso."
Vitalia seemed annoyed. Perhaps it was the smoking. Perhaps it was the way she looked at the people coming onboard. Or perhaps, strangely enough, Luca had come to know how to read her moods past the bullshit, past the person she became when around everyone else aside from him.
"Closing the ramp, stand clear," John's voice said over the intercom. Luca turned around and walked inside. The trip would take just a couple of minutes.
"Dad?" She hadn't turned away from the ramp immediately, but had instead looked back at him, only moving when it was clear she would be cause by decompression - and then, at a trot.
"Nn?"
"When is it gonna end, anyway?"
Luca didn't know. "Probably when the universe does first," but he seemed content with that answer. Melissa was waiting just ahead of him, and gave the captain a nod. No doubt Vita got acquainted with her, holed up in that ship for a couple of days. "Melissa," he addressed.
"As y' are," she replied as she leant back against the bulkhead. "Who're the new two?"
"Who knows?" Luca replied. "They want in, I can't argue no."
"Like... Ivan?" she replied, making reference to that Para
goon Cyborg who got into very deep trouble with Origin (and by extension, Aerin Tatst) a few years back.
"That was on his head," Luca replied. "Did Vita give you any trouble?"
"Nah," she replied, looking down at the girl. "She's a good girl, didn't think you'd be half a father."
Vitalia shrugged. "We painted some models. I tried talking her into doing her nails."
"Not gan' happen," she chuckled, flexing her fingers to show her nails unmolested. Luca chuckled too, the sort that a dad would when the babysitter had to earn their tip.
"We're leaving in three... two... one... hold onto something."
Luca seemed to cross his arms, Vita knew that he was doing that thing with Yamataian anti-gravity, however limited it was. She grabbed him, mostly for appearance sake.
And partially because between them they wouldn't move an inch.
The ship took off through the various spheres, rattling the whole way up as Luca and Vitalia Pavone remained utterly still. Melissa meanwhile was grabbing onto a rail on the bulkhead.
Once things had stabilised, Melissa was breathing a little, but still unperturbed by the majority of the flight up. Luca and Vita hadn't budged an inch though. They disengaged from each other and Melissa just said, "Just like Dad, eh?"
"Pavone," Vitalia offered as an explination. Her cigarette ashed again, and she hurriedly brushed it off her jacket. "Shit."
Luca assisted and flicked the remaining ash off. "Careful now," he cautioned, though he probably knew the woman beneath the girl knew better. Maybe it was a ruse.
Maybe. But he had to trust that she'd left that behind even though he couldn't know for sure. "You're going to ruin that jacket."
Says the guy who frequently got his jacket ruined with his own blood, bullet holes, scorch marks, fist marks, cuts, concrete dust, gunpowder residue, and the blood of others. There might've been some Nekovalkyrja jam there somewhere too.
"You're one to talk!" Satisfied she hadn't burned herself or her oh-so-precious clothing, she flicked the rest of the cigarette back towards the bay doors and then folded her arms somewhat haughtily. It didn't matter that most of her clothing was 'designer' Neplelisan, and already had a few cigarette marks on it from the factory - Luca knew her well enough to realize how precise she acted about her image. As a teenage girl. His daughter.
Luca sighed and took off his jacket and hung it up, he took off the segmented breastplate and torso protection too, and breathed a sigh of relief. "Shuddup," he teased, clearly having a joke. He moved over to the small Lounge section of the Big Bird and laid down on it, heaving a noise of pure relief from his mouth as he looked at the ceiling. He was just about to close his eyes and doze off when...
He heard something that interspersed between whistling and humming in a tune so
obnoxiously upbeat and catchy, invading his ear and coming around the corner to interrupt his peace. He tried to ignore it, but it was already too late: It was stuck in his ear now.
"LUCA LUCA!" An overly-cheery voice beckoned from across the lounge, piercing like a sabot round. Luca's eyes opened wide and his brow furrowed. Seiren was already at his side and he boggled at the pint-size inventor. The inventor's eyes shined like the candy-coated-crystals that he had probably consumed prior to this, evidenced by the fact that he was practically vibrating in place.
"I HAVE SUCH A COOL IDEA! Y-YOU KNOW HOW LIKE MAGNETS AND STUFF YEAH? WELL THINK MAGNETS AND YOUR PUNCH AND BZZT! JUST THINK! I MEAN, I MADE A MINI MODEL BUT IT MIGHT EXPLODE BUT LOOK AT IT ITS SO COOL!" Seiren torrented, holding out something coiled in wire and tied to a Jacob's Ladder.
Help. Luca thought aloud to Vita. If she heard him, she didn't give any indication. Instead, she sat down on an armchair next to the couch and folded her legs at the knees. Skirt. "Wh-what now?" he peered at the model and tilted his head as his ears rung with Seiren's voice.
He's so loud.
"HEY HEY CHECK IT OUT WATCH WATCH WATCH!"
The inventor gestured at the device, but then-
"SHHH WATCH!"
-as if anybody had actually said anything. Seiren shook his head, forgetting to actually turn on the thing. He corrected that. A little ball of electricity - no larger than a baseball - projected from the wire coil off of the antennae and out into the middle of the room. And then disappated.
"SEE SEE SEE WASN'T THAT AWESOME NOW WE GOTTA MAKE IT BIGGER! MUCH BIGGER!"
Vita clapped a bit. Only a bit. Then, she looked at her father, arching a bit of an eyebrow. Luca watched the ball of lightning move through the air, and the static electricity around him was making his sideburns and hair stand up - and Seiren's hair too, he chuckled at both the novelty of the lightning ball and how Seiren's hair looked like it was about to run from his head.
"NOW JUST IMAGINE THIS, EXCEPT BIG! ISN'T IT COOL COOL COOL?"
"Calm down calm down-" Luca said, now sitting up. "You going to mount this to your LEAF or something? Could be great for fighting robots or something," he said, fingers in his right hand flexing as the Grapple Stunner bolted to his arm (following him everywhere) shook.
Seiren shook his head one too many times. "NONONONO! NOT LIKE THAT THAT'S LAME TOO LAME I WAS THINKING ON YOUR ARM! LIKE SUPER GRAPPLE STUNNER! SUDDENLY NEW THEME MUSIC PLAYS!"
He looked down at his arm. "My arm? Theme music? Did the marketing team slip you something...?" he asked aloud, looking at Vita, expression on his face somewhere between vaguely amused and dour wanting out from Seiren's vocal range.
"JUST THINK, MAGNET PUNCH! OR SOMETHING." Seiren giggled, falling onto the floor with nothing but the power of laughter fighting him. What was so funny about all of this?
Luca grinned and cringed, eyes looking between the boy and Vita. It was like he was taking care of two kids, one of which loved their red cordial and giggled like a chipmunk on twizzlers.
"Stop yelling?" Vitalia was polite. "Please?"
"I don't think that's gonna happen," Luca sighed. Vita shrugged a bit, smoothing her hair back down. Had it raised?
"Hey. Hey. Heeeeeey. Hey Luuuuuuca. Hey hey Luuuuuuca!" Seiren called from his floorbound position, feebly waving an arm. Luca looked down at him, and grabbed his arm and pulled him up to his feet without much effort or a word - he was pretty light after all.
"Luuuuuuca. Guess what? Luuuuuca. Guess guess guesss."
"What?" Luca humoured the kid.
"You gotta smile more, yanno? Like reeaaaaally smile."
"He does, doesn't he?" Vitalia flopped back in the chair, looking to Luca. "Maybe you could use this thing and, I don't know, make a really bad hand-buzzer."
"I am smiling," Luca said, not smiling.
"That's not a smiiiiiile. C'mon. Bigger. Biiiiiiiiigger. I know you can do better. C'mon smiiiiiile!"
He tried. There was plenty to grimace about now but there wasn't much to smile about in the long term with DATASS breathing down his neck. He found Vitalia leaning with both arms on the chair's arm, watching him pleasantly.
"Hey. That's not a smile. This is a smile. C'mon, I'll help-" Seiren said, reaching over to lift Luca's frown upside down with his hand. And then- "Pasha! Picture dooooone!"
Luca could see that Seiren had his communicator in his other hand and heard the sound of a camera going 'click' - or at least a simulation of one anyway.
"Pfictur?" Luca tried to say, lips unable to move around and form the sound properly lest he bite Seiren's fingers. Nearby, he heard Vitalia laughing. She wasn't able to stifle it with her hand. Luca leaned back and got Seiren's sugary fingers out of his mouth, briefly licking his lips and figuring out why he was so hyper right now.
"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand uploaded. Caaaaan't wait for everybody to see thisssss. I made Luca Pavone smiiiile!" Seiren giggled, waving his phone around.
"But
where?" Luca asked as he looked at the phone in Seiren's sugary fingers.
"We're going to be on the Crimson Kestrel soon, stand by for landing and prepare to unwind." John said over the intercom again, "I'm thinking of running a game of Ogres and Oubliettes while we're on our way home, who wants in? I've got character sheets and dice ready."
"1 D0WNL04D3D 4LL TH3 G00D M0DUL3S T00. MY F4V3 1S TH3 L0N3LY K33P 0N TH3 FR0NT13R." Echelon chipped in over intercom too.
"Hell yeah, The Lonely Keep on the Frontier," John said - it was one of the best old-school sorts of modules, "Totally gonna run that tonight."
"I'll play the healer this time." Vitalia chimed in, making her claim before anyone else would have the chance to. "Tired of wiping."
"Good call," John said. The kid played pretty good O&O and even better as a healer.
"D1BS B4RB4R14N TH3N!" Echelon replied over the intercom.
Seiren, interrupted by the announcements, waited for them to finish before grinning at Luca. "
Eeeeeverywhere." Luca groaned as he looked at the picture.
MISSION 2 - COMPLETE!! ... maybe.
"About bloody time," Luca sighed as he saw the letters and wondered if they were edible or why they kept following him around. Maybe whatever was on Seiren's fingers was making him see those floating letters.
Or not. "Wow. Those are reeaaaaaaaaaally obnoxious, huh?" said the inventor who the term could apply to very well.
Luca would find out later that the picture only made it as far as his marketing team.
-
OOC
Start Getting some Side Jobs done with each other or Joint Post and put it up amongst yourselves.
I believe I have Side Jobs to do with the following Players:
@Yoshi - Done, Will Post soon! ![Big Grin :D :D](https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png)
@Moogle - Not Done
@Sham - Not Done
Don't forget that we have the Hoplite in the Hangar to fix, whoever wants to do a JP with me for that is welcome. If you want to come up with a Side Job on the spot to unwind on the Kestrel with, that's all yours.
Picture made by www.katestrife.tumblr.com