The PPC Roleplay Board - Latest posts

"Ach, ja, I am fully recovered from mein untimely demisemmphl." The Doktor's words were promptly muffled as he wrapped himself up in the neon pink towel, winding it around himself with a noise like a backfiring washing machine. "Ah, zat ist beink much better. Und you, Kaitlyn, performed exceptionally vell. Zhere are zhose who vould be makink zer unkind remarks about your affection for your fellow Hobbit, und I am of zer firmest belief zat zuch people have learnt ze error of zheir vays! Echt klasse!"

The Qwilfish bounced towards Kaitlyn, joyous in the anticipation of more hugs. He was a contact-y sort of person, which might perhaps have been the most remarkable thing about a Qwilfish but in this instance didn't even crack the top ten.

Zeb sounded like he thought it should have been obvious. "Which is why he needs people being nice to him. Then he'll want to change and be better."

Across from him, Alex began beating his head against the table.

The Aviator spun her empty glass around, looking blankly at it, and she gave a heavy sigh. "We haven't really talked a whole lot outside of Council meetings, so you don't know what's... going on when it's just me and my partner in the RC. But trust me." She gave a dark smile. "I'm not as put-together as I look." She nodded at her ankle, where the tracker hung like a weight. "If I was, this thing would prolly be going off right now, come to think of it."

"That figures." She stared down at the tabletop for a long moment, then made eye contact again. "But... you're here. You're not curled up in a corner or," she flicked her empty glass with a fingernail, "drowning your sorrows all the time. You contribute at Council meetings, and go on missions, and have," she waved a hand in the general direction of Zeb, "friends and the like, and... how?"

It was a minute before she was able to compose herself. That done, she drained her glass, wiped her mouth, and set the glass down with a thunk. "That's just it," she said. "You don't."

"I guess it always could have been worse. Like I said, death came pretty close, and my original plan didn't ensure that I would survive, so there's always that," she said. "And I guess from the way you say 'bleepfic' that I was also lucky for our first mission. It involved my universe, and the worst thing which happened was me hexing my partner's material, but we did work around it at the end."

"That, and my MP3," Richard said as he handed her one cup of coffee, before adding pure cocoa to his own cup. "But yes, it mainly involved breaking the basic rules from the Dresenverse and bad shipping. The most difficult part was killing three Suvian goblins, but I found a pretty fitting way to kill them."

Kaitlyn practically skipped round the transporter and pulled out the suitably-garish towel. "Though watch it with the spikes this time, y'hear?"

She held out the towel, and looked faintly pensive. "So you're... you're okay? I mean, it was a pretty..." She shivered, took another drink, and brightened up. "But hey! You must've been watching the rest of the games on the console, right? How did I do?"

((I'm having difficulty with Kaitlyn - she's refusing to end sentences with full stops. They're all exclaimed! and questions? and it's like reading Maskerade again. ~hS))

Morgan glanced around. The bar was crowded, of course, but most of the agents were absorbed in their own conversations (or drinks). Still... she leant forwards and lowered her voice. "It's just... how do you do it? How do you go through a warzone like that and not... I mean, and come out still... yourself, and okay, and not unable to sleep because of the nightmares?" She tried to take a drink, realised her glass was still empty, then put it down firmly and pressed her hand to the table to hide the shaking. "Y'know. As an academic interest. As it were."

~

((AKA, 'In which I remember that despite all her aggression, Morgan has never actually been a soldier...'))

" Yeah, you're certain not alone in that regard. I have a similar problem myself. As an uncanon daughter of two canons, I can never go back home or see my parents again outside of a mission in my home continuum, but even then I can't interact with them as I would like for obvious reasons. "

" And what family I had probably vanished from existence when my home fic got deleted, " Henry added, " Anyway, I'm pretty sure that what happened to me was just a result of the RNG messing with me during the simulation. I mean, some agents do go crazy from doing their job, there's a reason why the phrase 'going flamethrower' exists as a reference to that, but I think I'm pretty sane outside of that thing. Well, horrifying first mission aside. I still can't believe they us a Glaurunging bleepfic for that."

It took a moment due to Algie's general wobbliness, but they eventually got it done.

"Nice to properly meet you both," James said. "Even if we had met during the Games, it didn't strike me as the kind of place that fostered too much friendly banterin'.

"As for your initial question, I wasn't from Long War myself. I am familiar with it, though. Had a few Long War-focused missions. Right slice of hell even without the crossover stuff." He paused long enough to take a sip from his bourbon. "No, I was from an alternate version of what my partner refers to as the 'vanilla' timeline. No meld, no EXALT, just us little humans against the universe. I wish we had someone like Buffy on our side. Closest we got was this guy from Germany who thought the aliens sucked human blood." He smiled at the thought, but it faltered a bit as something occurred to him. "I fell out of the 'verse before I could see the end of the war. Found out later that things... didn't go very well."

James paused a moment, but then shook his head. "Ah, but that's the past. This is about the now, about celebratin' your victory and mournin' our failure. If me and my friends couldn't make it, I'm glad to see that someone else from the Com did." He offered his glass in toast. "To the champ."

"I don't see why I should tiptoe around him when he's treating everyone like dirt. So what if he's had a bad ride up to this point? Suck it up. Why should we take his guff and yet still try to humour him? No-- he needs the attitude change." Yakov looked back towards his old table. "A big one at that."

"...that maybe if people were nicer to him he wouldn't be so nasty?" Zeb said, still irritated.

Alex just sank down in his seat, looking around for somewhere he could disappear to.

"Oh wow. You seriously don't have any idea what he does. Listen, man: stay away from him. He's literal poison-- and there's only one way it's gonna end for him."

"I know he's not the nicest but that's not the only thing he ever does!"

"Here we go again," Alex muttered.

"Jus' checkin'." said Yakov. "And, uh, Zeb? Tacitus' sense of humour is just him insulting people. You're... uh... you sure you're on board with that? 'Cause I don't even think Madam is on board with that."

Zeb smiled. "I like him. Fun sense of humor."

"You should hear the Aviator talk about him," Alex muttered, taking a sip from his cold hot chocolate.

Zeb frowned at him but turned his attention back to Yakov. "I'm... fine. Better than my partner, I think, though that's not really saying much. Um. Yeah. I'm fine. Why?"

"Nope. Kid it is." Yakov raised his flask to his lips again, then sighed when nothing came out of the container. He tucked it back into his cloak and drummed his fingers on the table. "So... uh, Zeb. You OK, man? I saw how you got eliminated-- er, on the Lounge's TV, that is. Sorry in advance if you don't wanna talk about it but... I know your story from Tacitus and I just wanted to make sure everything was good."

"It's a lightsaber. Not a wand," he said.

"Just... drop it," Zeb advised, going back to his lemonade. "Kid's got his mind made up."

"I'm not a kid!"

"...the teenager has his mind made up."

Yakov dug around his coat and half-pulled out his wand. "Jus' like a wand, sometimes you just gotta let other people do the work for you. D'you want a 'saber or not? Now that's the question you gotta ask yerself... and unless your blade is some funky colour or something, I don't think anyone is gonna know if you're using a different crystal or something."

Alex put his chin on his hands. "See, the Sith often ended up using synthetic crystals for their lightsabers and the last thing I want is someone thinking I'm an escaped Stu or something. And besides, it's more... I dunno, personal, getting your crystal yourself instead of just asking someone to get it for you. It's about the process, if that makes sense?"

"Is it something about performance of a synthetic replica versus a natural... whatsit?" asked Yakov. "'Cause if you really, really wanna get yer hands onna natural crystal, I'm pretty sure there's something up on the PPC's grey market. Just have to find the right information brokers and they'll spill the beans and such."

Alex shrugged. "DoSAT isn't for everyone. I mean, I'm pretty sure I almost didn't get in."

"I know I wouldn't get in," Zeb said, grinning.

"Anyway..." Alex drummed his fingers on the table, looking back at Yakov. "Thanks for the offer, but it has to be a special kind of crystal. I've been considering growing a synthetic one, but it just wouldn't be the same." He pouted.

"Sorry kid, can't help you there. If I's slightly better at transfiguration I'd give it a shot but... yeah. Maybe someone in your department would know a thing or two 'bout crystals-- I'm sure there are two or three high-tech aliens in there that used stuff like that in their home continuums." The wizard looked ariund the pub. "Uh... Hang on, there was a thing that came to mind... what was it...? Oh! Right! Interns." He pointed at the bar counter. "See that miserable-lookin' guy over there? He actually failed the DoSAT entry test! Ended up going to a coupla diff'rent departments before ending up in DoI. It's kinda hilarious, really. Nothing ever goes his way-- and he ain't jinxed either! At first, I was sure that 'ee had some curse hangin' over his head but no-- nothin'!"

"Not really! Well, not for me, at least. Hornbeam asked a bunch of questions to determine my technical know-how and when it was a bit lacking he decided to make me an intern instead of a tech. I got promoted after a few months, though."

"I wouldn't be able to do it," Zeb said, shaking his head.

"Maybe, maybe not," Alex said. "Anyway," he said, turning to Yakov, "it depends on what you do in the department. I'm kinda a jack of all trades, so I bounce around. Mostly I repair CADs and consoles, just PPC tech agents busted. But sometimes I get to work with canon technology, so that's a lot of fun. I've been trying to build my own lightsaber but I still haven't been able to get my hands on a crystal..."

"'twas all a combat sim anyways. Like the ones those folks over there can use for training," he added, pointing to Lola and Algie. "Still, nice work with the water. I bet your victim didn't know what hit them until it was too late!" Yakov took another sip from his flask and turned to Alex. "So, what's it like for you guys in DoSAT? Is it hard to get in?"