ArchivedLogs:Scapegoats

Scapegoats
Dramatis Personae B, Dusk, Isra
In Absentia	2015-05-21 "Progress?" (Part of Future Past TP.)
Location <NYC> The Roost - Harbor Commons - Lower East Side
The second level of this house takes up less floor space than the ground floor, owing largely to the open sweep of balcony that overlooks half the home below. Up here the floors are in natural hardwood, polished and smooth. At one side of the balcony, again, a door leads over to the adjacent unit in the house. One door off the balcony leads to a quiet office space, with a wide metal-and-glass desk, long sofa and armchair opposite a large pair of bookshelves. A tall glass door in the large windows on the back wall leads out to a wide outdoor balcony overlooking the river. The second door leads to Dusk's bedroom, dominated by greens and greys. He has finally actually gotten himself a /proper/ bed to pair with his dresser and bookshelf, king-sized and settled low to the ground onto a solid wood base with a number of drawers built into it. His desk holds the desktop -- somewhat literally. The desk /itself/, with see-through glass body and softly glowing lights inside, has been configured to /be/ the computer case. Closer inspection of a pair of small decorative aquariums sitting to either side of its three monitors finds them to /also/ be computer cases, their inner workings submerged in a pale blue liquid on a bed of aquarium pebbles alongside plastic plants and little plastic castles or fake coral. In this bedroom, too, a door leads out to the same balcony outside. Capping off the balcony at its other end is a guest bedroom, large wood-frame bed with a small end table, dresser, a hammock-chair hanging from the ceiling in a corner, a desk by the window. Spring's attention has wandered this evening, leaving the city to shiver beneath a blanket of drizzle and fog. The commencement crowds have largely gone inside to celebrate, but a frenetic sense of expectation lingers in the streets outside. Isra's claws click softly on the stairs as she ascends. Most of her skin looks more or less her natural gray this week, though with a faint silver sheen added. The membranes of her wings, however, sport chrome vine patterns on a jet black background. The same chrome highlights her horns and talons, which gleam sharp and smooth in the dim light. She carries a black lacquer tray--a recent addition to the house, but familiar to those who visited her often in her dorm room--with three cups. She eases the door open with one wing and starts scanning for a clear spot to set down the tray. B definitely still just looks blue. Save for her claws, which are /also/ gleaming in chrome (nailpolish, not Tagpolish), and a dusting of silver makeup over her eyes. She is sprawled belly-down on Dusk's bed, surrounded by holographic projections -- one panel is just Tumblr, one is an open terminal full of brightly color-coded lines of code, one a video screen playing Steven Universe, one an exploded-apart diagram of the inside of a robotic hand. The hand in question, only slightly damaged, belongs to a mostly-disassembled Sentinel kind of spread in pieces around Dusk's room. B plucks an earbud out of her ear, rolling up onto her side with nose twitching at the cups. Dusk's wings are still in black and silver as well. They've lost their bandaging by now, the tears in their membranes healed back together though faint pinkish lines still show through the chrome circuitry patterned on his wings. He's at his computer, not actually looking at the code displayed on one of his monitors. Just slumping with elbows on his desk and fingers rubbing at the hollows of his eyes. His wing curls out, rubbing gratefully against Isra's when she arrives. Isra picks her way across the room with remarkable delicacy for a six-foot-tall gargoyle, and finally settles the tray on a corner of the bed. One mug contains strong black coffee, another the same brew with milk added, and a third a powerfully spiced masala chai. Beneath the mugs, a minimalistic line drawing in silver shows a man and woman wearing ancient Chinese garb, standing on opposite sides of a river of stars. She stretches out one wing to scritch B's bristly head with a massive thumb talon, then takes up her own cup as she sinks to the floor beside Dusk, her black jersey wrap dress pooling around her. "Progress?" B eels her way up the mattress to reach an arm out and snag her cup of chai. She pushes up into an actual sitting position after this, one leg tucked up beneath herself, looking a little disjointed tucked amid the still-illuminated holograms. "I don't honestly know what progress would even mean right now. I don't -- know what we're looking for anymore. Just. Something. Else." Dusk shakes his head. His wing drapes around Isra's shoulders as he spins on his stool, leaning over so he can reach his mug as well. "No. This is pointless. There's shit-all to find, here. We just need to -- stop looking at the same damn files a hundred times and decide what the hell to do with all this." "Too much data, not enough information?" Isra muses, lifting the mug to her lips and not drinking for a moment, only inhaling the aroma of the coffee. "Had this happened already, I would advocate crowdsourcing via leak. But as it stands..." She shrugs one wing. "Use it as a guide to developing countermeasures, perhaps. Or finding targets." "Plenty of information," B corrects, scowling down into her mug. "I just don't like any of it." Dusk exhales heavily, both hands cupping his mug. "We are /definitely/ not crowdsourcing this shit." There's a low growl in his voice, more agitated than cranky. "You know goddamn Anette threatened to /kill/ B yesterday? Over what /Future/ B did. And I doubt she'll be the only one with this attitude of just -- fucking -- /slaughter/ people now to stop them causing trouble later. If people see the shit on here --" The growl deepens. "If the /government/ sees the shit on here, fff." Isra raises one bare eyebrow ridge as she sips her coffee. "I suppose that ought not surprise me--not about Annette in /particular/, though I do find that troubling." Bright green eyes track over to B, long ears swivel back and press down. "I have seen enough of that future to know better than asking what you don't like in it, but what especially troubling revelations have come of this raid in particular?" "She tried to attack me. /Would/ have if her boyfriend hadn't stopped her." B's gills flutter unhappily. "And then said /I/ was the monster for not apologizing for -- something I never even --" She shakes her head and takes a small sip of tea. "Well. The Brotherhood didn't blow up Westchester." "/Daken/," Dusk clarifies, slightly incredulously. "And you /know/ you've gone off the deep end if /Daken/ is the one keeping you in check." His thumb-claws twitch, foot bouncing restlessly against the rung of his stool. "There was a raid. On the school. I have watched more footage than I would ever want to of robots mowing kids down." The other eyebrow lifts now, too. "Well. Even a stopped clock, as they say." This mildly, without any particular vehemence. One wing stretches out to curl around B's shoulders even as she tilts her head to rub one the base of one horn absently along Dusk's wing. "A government raid, then?" The alto voice with which she speaks remains calm and even, but her other set of vocal chords begin growling, low and soft. Her wing tightens and trembles, and the very tip of her tail twitches. "I don't know how official it was. Was authorized by some -- Senator on some -- crusade of his own I think." B's gills are still fluttering, her voice a little hitched as ze leans into Isra's wing. "But Pa was there. Trying to protect people from the bots while they evacuated. And they /shot/ him and --" Hir words break off into a small growl of hir own. "Turns out getting killed isn't good for control." Dusk's growling has stopped, at least. His voice is pretty flat, really, wings twitching as his eyes turn up towards the ceiling. "And outside on a sunny day in the middle of combat he -- packs. A lot of punch. Like a few hundred thousand deaths' worth." Isra's ears flatten back even lower. "Jax..." Her whisper has a hoarse, quivering edge. She stares down into the dark pool of her coffee, then seems to make a decided effort to take another drink from it. The rumbling in her throat never wholly ceases, but when she speaks again her voice sounds once again solid and equable. "Does he know?" "He nearly didn't come home with us," B answers quietly. "Thought it was safest for the world not -- having him in it." "And if this," one of Dusk's wings twitches to indicate the data around them, "gets out much, how many people out there you imagine will agree? On /both/ sides? He's sure as fuck already a thorn in the government's side and the hell this brings down on /us/ --" The growl in his throat rises again, harsher. Edged with an unhappy-conflicted keen of whine that suggests he might not entirely /dis/agree. "But. Fuck. It's Jax. I'll burn the whole fucking government to the ground first." A wry smile flits across his lips. "... not that that would help." "It seems somewhat counterintuitive, trying to prevent the devastation he might cause in death by killing him." Isra smooths the hem of her dress. "But I suppose he makes an easier scapegoat than the government. Which could probably use some burning down." Her higher voice carries no anger. "At the very least, those elements within it who think it acceptable to murder children--or anyone, really, for the crime of their genes." "Just going to be hard to burn down the whole government without triggering -- the same future we're trying to avoid." B flinches faintly, clear inner eyelids sliding shut and gills fluttering at the rise of Dusk's growl. "It's hard to know who to trust with this, though. When you've already got people literally threatening to kill /me/ over --" Hir head shakes. "Jax and Flicker already know. About the raid, about /him/. So I expect they'll know down at their school before too long. Hard to /hide/ much from a --" Dusk taps a finger against one temple. "Don't expect they'll be much in favour of the burn the government down route, anyway." Isra inclines her head. "Perhaps so." The words come out quiet, but from both sets of vocal chords. Her wing curls tighter around B. "I certainly do not intend to go about advertising this, in either event. Though, as for the Professor--telepathy or no, I do think he ought to know." B sinks back, heavily, settling into Isra's wing and turning hir face in against it. "Forget the government. I just want to burn the /world/ down and start again."