maskormenace | action || later audio

Entry tags:

action || later audio

ACTION: Maurtia Falls
[Bad enough he wake up surrounded by soldiers again. Bad enough he wake up in a body that isn't his own, missing memories. No one shot at him this time, but it's a small comfort. Very small. As the soldiers are quick to deposit him in a big city.]

[And... surround him with people. Too many people. Way, way too many people.]

[He's not completely comfortable with this strange body yet, so when the young man with mismatched eyes -- one red, one green -- goes sprinting away from the porter, he ends up stumbling a few times. Once he even falls flat on his face.]

[If anyone's around to offer assistance, he just stares wildly at them, startled, awkward.]

[If they don't persist, he takes off running again, somewhere, anywhere away from all these people. Maybe if he runs far enough, Shadowmaru will return and make this nightmare end. He'd been trying to do the right thing -- he'd made a promise, he intended to keep it. Why is he being punished like this?]

[He'll eventually, if un-accosted, seek shelter in a park. Probably under a tree.]

AUDIO;
[Later on, after settling somewhat into realizing this won't change any time soon -- that he really is stuck here, Kagerou sets about poking at his comm device. He doesn't activate the video feed -- no, he's not comfortable with that yet. He just wants to figure out what's happening here.]

[He's almost talking to himself as he speaks.]

I don't understand this...

[That's all there is for a few moments. As if he's trying to determine the right thing to say.]

Why me? I'm nothing like a... like a "Hero". I've never helped a human being. And why should I? None of you have ever done anything for me.

Why should I be a "hero"?

Why should I do anything for human beings?

Whoever decided this -- whoever brought me to this place. You shouldn't have.

[He ends the call abruptly, right there.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Others. How many are here...?

[It's almost an accusation. He almost sounds angry about it. But if there are several AI... then the chances of some of the Brave Police being here increase.]

[And with that, problems.]

Help me leave here. Can you do that? I don't want this body -- It's... wrong.

At least two- Megaman and Magicman. And then there's LACKEY, but they're not an imPort.

[And Sabriel rubs the bridge of her nose.]

Do you mean leave this town? Or leave this world altogether? The first is easily done, but if there was a way back to where we came from, I would have taken it already. But your body...

Have you read your file? One of your powers may be returning to your original form. [Since all the AIs and Cybertronians- though the latter are all gone- she's met have had such abilities, it doesn't seem like an unreasonable guess.]

... Why are they, then?

[He shifts where he sits, but doesn't uncurl himself.]

Leave this whole world. I don't belong here. This... isn't what I wanted.

[His face twists in a scowl, and, childishly, he kicks at the packet of papers dropped on the ground. All printed in English.]

I can't.

I don't know those characters.

They're an AI created by the Russians to monitor us... and kidnap us. But they're currently in American custody.

None of us do. And what we want... doesn't always matter. [It's said softly. He's clearly under enough strain without Sabriel trying to berate him into acting his (apparent) age.] But this world can be... nice... in its own way.

[Sabriel gathers up the papers, politely skipping over most of the files. (She wants to respect his privacy after all) until she gets to what she was looking for- powers, housing, and jobs. Then she hands the whole thing back to Kagerou.]

According to this, your powers do seem to include becoming a robot, as well as controlling stoplights and having a perfect memory. [And after the girl whose bread could heal people and Kaneda's motorcycle, those didn't seem like such odd powers.]

Also, you've been assigned housing in Maurtia Falls house number seven, and have been given a job as a Vice Squad Officer in the Maurtia Falls Police Department. [Which makes Sabriel's eyebrows go up, but given the corruption in Maurtia Falls police force, getting more imPorts involved might not be such a bad thing.]

Do you have any experience with law enforcement?

In custody. You've put an AI in custody. But you haven't erased it. I don't understand.

[Isn't that what happened when AI were captured? When all AI were taken captive... they were deleted for human safety. Weren't they?]

The world isn't nice. [He's seen that much. But he quiets as she looks through the papers. The symbols scribbled there don't make any sense at all to him. He knows Japanese. That's all. He'd never seen any other language before.]

[But he perks up a bit.]

How? How do I become myself again?

[Assuming these papers say as much. He blinks a bit, though, at the question, and shakes his head once. Decisive and dismissive.]

Nothing pleasant.

The people involved chose to take LACKEY back to America instead of destroying it. Hopefully, they'll learn in time that it can make their own choices, instead of just doing what the Russians tell them to do.

[Hopefully, anyway.]

Unfortunately, it doesn't mention that. Just that you can. Perhaps you should try thinking very hard about what it was like to be a robot? [Sabriel has no clue. But his comment about law enforcement makes her expression soften.]

You don't have to work at the job they give you. If you don't like it, I or someone else can help you find another one.

... where is it?

[Some part of him, maybe foolishly, wants to see it. Or, barring that, free it. He remembers that feeling, being free for the first time... every AI should.]

[He makes a face at the papers, as if it's their fault he doesn't know what to do.]

All right. I will.

[In a minute, because the information seems important.]

I was never meant to be a police officer. Why should I be one now?

You should probably ask the Major-General, or one of the others involved in that mission. When it was being taken to Russia, I was working to free those of our number it had kidnapped.

[At the question, Sabriel blinks.]

Do you want to be one? It's your choice in the end, no one else's.

That means... Military. You mean to talk to the military. Don't you?

[And something in that voice makes it sound like the idea of it is horrible.]

... My choice?

[It's like she just told him something impossible.]

She isn't part of the military in this world- she leads RISE. It's a group of imPorts who're sort of like the police, except focused on stopping imPorts who try to hurt each other or people from this world. She's harsh but- I'll talk to her for you, all right? [Sabriel can just see how a conversation between Kagerou and Olivier is likely to end.] More people talking to LACKEY is probably a good thing.

Of course it's your choice here. We can't go home, but what we do here... that's up to us.

Police. Military police... but people not from this world... Why? Why do they care so much what happens here?

[He wouldn't. Probably more reason not to actually do this assigned job.]

... I want to leave this city. There are too many people. I promised I would leave a city back home.

I need to keep that promise.

Because as long as we're in this world, we want to protect it. And some imPorts- like Crane, Lucifer, and Pan- are absolutely horrible people.

Well, I can take you somewhere else, but- this isn't the same city you were asked to leave, is it? You've already left that one.

[But if he thinks there are too many people... Sabriel holds out her hand.]

Do you want to go to Heropa? We can walk out onto the beach- there won't be many people there, and it's warmer than here.

Why do you want to protect it? What's there in this world that deserves to be protected?

[Not the same city... right. Not the place he'd been. He's left it, now. He's kept that much of his promise. He'd just never thought he'd be so far from the one who mattered.]

... Japan. Can I go to Japan?

[He doesn't quite flinch back from her hand, but it's a near thing. Even as he tries to scan her for weapons, without a working scanner.]

Beach. Where the ocean is. Isn't that right?

Isn't the fact that it's alive enough?

The people here didn't ask for a load of people with strange powers to show up and start breaking things, or make the conflict with Russia that much worse. They deserve to be helped when someone decides to rearrange all their memories, or poison them with gas. And most imPorts didn't ask to be here either, or to deal with everything that happens here.

Besides- if it's in my power to help, I want to help. [To Sabriel, that was often what it really boiled down to.]

You can go to Japan, but... the government generally doesn't want imPorts to leave this country for more than two weeks. And because it's another world, the people and places you know might not be there.

Yes- it's by the ocean and there's sand.

... I don't see why it should matter to me, if my life didn't matter to it.

["It" being human life in general. But he doesn't elaborate on that point, whoops.]

You want to help people you don't even know. There you go again, not making sense.

[Altruism from a human being? Doesn't make sense.]

I don't need permission. I just need a direction to fly.

[A pause.] ... Sand. Isn't it uncomfortable?

It does. Maybe, in time, you'll understand.

And sand isn't that bad! You just have to wash your feet off before you put shoes on.

Or maybe go home again.

... why? What happens if you don't?

Perhaps. But people have been here since the Porter was first turned on, and haven't been able to return home.

Then sand gets into your shoes and socks and it's a nuisance- that's all, really.

If it's a machine... maybe I can do something to it.

Then I won't wear shoes.

Perhaps. It's well defended though.

Even if you don't on the beach, sand tends to stick to your feet [Sabriel raises one eyebrow.] Do you want to come with me? We can have lunch there too. [Magicman had understood from the start that humans needed to eat. Sabriel wasn't entirely sure about Kagerou.]

I'm not afraid.

[He'd faced down police before, and how different could these defenders be?]

Lunch? You mean... human food?

Yes? You have a human body now, so you need to eat human food.

[He makes a face. Almost exactly like a kid who's just been told yes, he has to eat his vegetables.]

... I see.

Fine.

[She recognizes that expression. It's just that she's more used to seeing it on eight year old children instead of grown men.

... This is going to be difficult, she suddenly realizes.]

Shall we get going? I promise, some food does taste good.

[There's that old saying about appearance and deception. It's pretty true right now.]

All right. If it's quieter there.

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