VIDEO | 01

[musclemothers]

[Welcome, imPorts, to a face a sight less pretty than the shounen heroes and superheroes you've grown accustomed to. Instead of a bright, youthful face, you get the dour face of a man who has comfortably hit middle age, skin pale, nose hooked, and brows furrowed behind those thick rimmed glasses of his.

He clears his throat. Once he speaks, his voice is predictably nasal, and not at all happy.] All right, so let me get this straight. They drag us in here to be super-heroes - [he uses airquotes for that, as you do] - and they don't even have a proper set of rules?! Look, I'm no stranger to the whole superhero-supervillain, blah blah blah game, but if you don't get held by a set of standards, there's no telling what will happen.

Oh, wait. There is telling what will happen, and I'd tell you, but instead I have a more immediate, pressing complaint. I am a superscientist. And according to this form, I'm supposed to be... a sex therapist? How the hell am I even supposed to begin with what's wrong with--

[Sorry, anyone who wanted to listen to Doc moan and groan any more than he already has, because a bright blue robot enters the frame, crowding Doc half off of his chair, beeping wildly and flailing his limbs, one of them knocking Doc's glasses off.]

Helper, no, Helper, down. You're not helping! No! You don't know anything about sex!

[Helper beeps very insistently. Doc stares at the screen.]

Well, apparently Helper's going to do my job for me. Come say hi if you want sex advice from a robot. [Helper thrusts his arms up in the air and lets out a high-pitched, ebullient series of beeps that could be accurately translated to yay!]

Oh, for the love of -- I wasn't being seriou--

[And the video cuts off there.]

Comments

video | id reads "karen starr"

[boobwindow]

Uh...

[ Looking less than impressed, though by Rusty or the robot? Who knows. ]

You can change jobs, just so you know.

[musclemothers]

Wouldn't it be easier for them to just assign us jobs we're trained in in the first place? I mean, they have entire documents on us. It's not a stretch for them to match engineers to engineering jobs, now is it?

[boobwindow]

Obviously, but I have no idea how they come up with these jobs placements in the end. Spin the wheel? Who knows at this point.

[musclemothers]

At this point, I'm pretty sure it's one big joke to them. Like it's not bad enough that they've draged us away from our homes and families.

[He's not too fussed about the family thing at this point, because he has a feeling that his boys will show up sooner rather than later - they always do - but he does generally like to know where they are. He has no more back-up clones.]

[boobwindow]

I know this is going to be difficult to believe, but that machine that brought you here is mostly responsible for that. It chooses on its own... somehow.

[musclemothers]

Oh, great. So not only are we stuck here, but we're at the whims of some maaaaagical machine. Please tell me someone's tried to take it apart and see if they can fix it by now.

[boobwindow]

We're not stuck — not permanently, at least. The Porter presumably glitches every now and then and people are sent back to their worlds at random.

[ She sighs though, a bit empathetic. ]

US scientists have been looking at it for years. I'm assuming there's quite a bit of research that hasn't been made public.

[musclemothers]

At random, huh? Sounds like we're pretty stuck to me. Knowing my luck, it'll be months before someone figures out how to come find me, or -- before this thing glitches, or whatever.

Sounds to me as though if US scientists aren't doing the trick, they should be outsourcing. Namely, to us.

[boobwindow]

As logical as that is, I doubt they will. If we ever discovered the way out of here they would lose a lot of us.

[ And the Russians might use it as prime opportunity to strike. ]

[musclemothers]

What, we're not enough of a drain on their resources already? You'd think they'd want us gone. Or if they don't already, that we could just... make a big enough fuss that it's no longer worth their time.

[Maybe he can sic an acid spitting fly on them, or something. That'll show 'em!]

[boobwindow]

Not when Russia's declared war on them, no.

[musclemothers]

And are we really that helpful to them? I'm certainly not interested in being drafted in a godawful war that should have ended thirty years ago, and I seriously doubt that there are many others out there who don't share my opinion.

[boobwindow]

I assume they like waving us around.

[ A good "reminder" they've still got a bunch of super-powered individuals over here. ]

Nobody is really, though I don't think the Russians have gotten that message before.

[musclemothers]

Gotta say, I haven't run into anyone impressive enough to want to wave around quite yet.

[boobwindow]

You summoned the peanut gallery.

[musclemothers]

Do you mean to say they're not always like this? Because I have to admit, I'm not getting a very good impression of this community that I presumably belong to.

[boobwindow]

I'd say it's fifty/fifty.

[musclemothers]

Well, aren't those fantastic odds. Come, see these people from other worlds to save the world! Just ignore the fifty percent that might just sit around and complain instead!

[boobwindow]

Ignoring is always a good option.

[ Says the woman with the temper herself. ]

[musclemothers]

No man is an island! I'll have to start meeting people eventually. It's not as though anyone else from my universe bothered wandering in here with me.

[boobwindow]

ImPorts have a way of running into each other, even in the bigger cities. You'll meet people.

[ It's almost like they're mysteriously drawn together for some reason! ]

[musclemothers]

Perhaps.

[He's still unimpressed... or, rather, his ego's a little bruised, but when is it not?]

Speaking of meeting people, I never did catch your name.

i hope that's the name on the tag. lmk if i have to change it.

[boobwindow]

[ These angry old men and their eccentricities... ]

Karen. Karen Starr.

And you're... [ Reading the ID quickly. ] Thaddeus?

it is, but ty for checking!!

[musclemothers]

Thaddeus, yes, though it's been quite some time since someone's called me that -- most people call me Doc.

[The words of a man who does not have many friends. And he does, in fact, have a smile for the helpful, attractive blonde in front of him.]

A pleasure, Miss Starr.

[boobwindow]

[ But Chilton is Doc! The Doctor doesn't seem to appreciate nicknames. :(

Oh, she knows that look. ]

... nice to meet you as well, Dr. Venture.

What is it that you do?