Logs:Root Access

Root Access
Dramatis Personae Charles, Hive, Scott, Ion, Halim, Cerebro	2024-04-21 "On a scale from one to one-zero-one-zero. How murderous are you feeling?" (set after Ion asks for help.)
Location <??> Trail Shelter
<??> Trail Shelter These woods are lovely, dark and deep. Tucked into the leeward side of a gentle ridge is a structure that looks, from the outside, like a simple, humble log cabin. On the inside, it looks like an even simpler and humbler log cabin -- one without furniture or decoration of any sort. It's literally just a single room with a raised wooden platform along three walls. A mattress has been deposited somewhat haphazardly in the center of the room, and an unconscious man deposited somewhat less haphazardly on the mattress. Charles looks a little worse for the jarring electrokinetic journey here, but he is evidently made of sterner stuff than most septuagenarians, and sees to his task at once. He propels his chair up alongside the mattress, studies the man sprawled across it, then closes his eyes. His psionic shields shift and realign, lowering his defenses without needing to actually disassemble them. He reaches out, investigating the periphery of Halim's sleeping mind before welling up around it, deft and gentle. Unconscious, Halim is looking reasonably unmurderous. Kind of limp. Kind of harmless. If he's dreaming, it's particularly loud, a strange flat blankness to the surface of his mind that spills over only an eerie silence at its periphery. Which, maybe, makes it all the more jarring when Charles's mind actually enfolds it. The sudden roar that spills over would be a noticeable pain in any circumstances, but in contrast to the previous silence it's almost drowning; a veritable tsunami of screeching-rasping-jangling chaos. Somewhere in the flood there is an order, neat currents crossing and flowing Just So, but packed so dense and so much it's nigh-impossible to make sense of them. Just very, very, very loud and very, very, very bright. Charles sucks in a sharp breath and flinches, slamming his shields down so fast the room feels noticeably cooler for a moment. He recovers quickly from this embarrassing lapse of composure and tries again, to the same end -- though at least this time he was braced for it. He pivots his chair back to Ion and ventures, somewhat sheepishly, "I'm afraid I must trouble you for a quick trip back. I still believe I can defuse whatever they've done to him, but I will need help infiltrating his mind. I know just the man for it, and I'm confident you'll not object to bringing him aboard..." --- <XS> Phoenix Room "...to help me with a somewhat tricky psionic patient, so to speak." Charles isn't elaborating aloud, but his mind enfolds Hive's with an easy familiarity, many-layered shields unfurling his labyrinth around the solid if presently singular trunk of the banyan (forest). This part of Charles's memory is a forest, too, whose trees look old even if the information in them is new. The sunlight dappling their leaves whispers to Hive in an instant everything relevant to Halim from Joshua and Cerebro's unfortunate DC field trip up to the sharp rebuff Charles found in his mind only a few minutes ago. << I do not think it is a defense, at least not a deliberate one, >> he annotates the last part. << More like...incompatible encoding, perhaps. >> Even though he has completed his infodump, Charles doesn't withdraw just yet. The light in the forest grows subtly, gently warmer. << {Maybe this can be complicated for you.}" This is in Thai -- not with Hive's fluency but Charles's, stilted and clunky but (probably) serviceable. "{You don't have to do. Cere, he should be able to} hack {around it, too. If we are slow.} >> Hive was not, actually, sleeping, when Charles arrived, but he's managing to slouch in his corner of the couch with a kind of you're-waking-me-up-for-'what'-now surliness. He's been digging his knuckles into an eye for the duration of this brief and efficient infodump, and finally drops his hand to his blanketed lap with a quiet whumph. The million (furious) (sick) (heartbroken) questions that were beginning to form in his mind are all just as quickly answered, and he just grinds his teeth, quiet. << Fuck. >> The tree is expanding swift and not at all subtle, a rapid shove of strong roots that bore down into Charles, make Hive's regret and disbelief and anger his own in short order -- but along with them are memories, pulled up clear and strong from several different people's perspectives of the brilliant and difficult technopath who once upon a time his team couldn't imagine functioning without. Now he is slumping back down on the couch, head falling heavy against a pillow at its corner. << (wake me up) (once we find him) >> --- <??> Trail Shelter HOUR 1 For most of Hour One Scott just stood very still, very watchful, leaning up against one of the wooden platforms lining the walls with his arms folded across his chest and, one would assume, a baleful glare, but now as Hour Two dawns with no signs of imminent Charles Death, he has unwound a little bit, now leaning up against the wooden platform more loungily on his elbows; he's collected a decent pile of spare change, neatly stacked and sorted in front of him, and he is very slowly sliding the pot toward himself to start adding to his winnings now, with only a faintly smug lift of his eyebrows, his full house still sitting face-up on the ledge next to him. Is it cheating to play poker with ruby-quartz glasses? Probably that should count as cheating. Scott is already reaching to reshuffle the deck. "Better luck next round," he says. This is incredibly sincere. HOUR 3 Is Ion losing this game, too? Is he winning? It's a little early to tell just at this moment; from the careful arrangement of the hexagonal tiles on the floor it could be anyone's game, now. He's just moved a black-tiled grasshopper over a bit closer to the white queen bee on his opponent's side; in his hand several of his remaining pieces are giving a satisfying clickclickclick as he shakes them lightly. "See now," he's calling this not to Scott but across the shelter, little though Charles is currently attending, "I think more people they'd enjoy chess better if it was full of bees." HOUR 5 They're still set up on the floor now, though the neat arrangement of game pieces has changed from a honeycomb lattice to a fishnet one, and Scott has been sitting with his hands steepled in front of his chin staring down at the available letters on his tile holder with a piqued expression, as if in unconscious imitation of his mentor across the room. He's been like this for a while, sitting cross-legged on the floor, but staring at his letters has not changed them and unfortunately has not changed what he evidently knows he must do; finally Scott shakes his head mournfully and puts down 'PENIS'. (With both the triple-letter and double-word bonuses this is worth twenty-six points.) HOUR 7 The pile of games stacking up in the corner is growing. There's also starting to be some semblance of furniture in here -- scant, but a couple of aged couch cushions are softening some of the wooden floor and off in The Braining Corner an overturned crate that had been packed with Entertainments is now holding the remnants of some Thai takeout. The Newly (Sorta) Comfortable Floor isn't where Ion currently is, though. Way towards the far front of the cabin there's been a dartboard set up -- it may have been yoinked from an Xavier's Kids' common room because it is Magnetic and not Pointy. Ion has adjusted quite quickly to the weirdness of the actual balance of these Safe Darts, his first two throws clustered quite near the center. What he hasn't adjusted to is the Actual Magnets part, just as thrilled now as he was several rounds ago -- he's been (not for the first time) VERY distracted by -- CLINK. CLINK. He's just reattached his third dart to the end of his hook, waggling it up and down in front of his extremely broad smile. "Bruh 50 points if you get the center of Brain Doc's wheels." HOUR 10 Surely Scott and Ion gave up being unobtrusive and quiet a while back, but the clack-CLACK from the pool table now abandoned in the corner was probably a low point and the persistent noise from the foosball table is probably worse. Scott, to be fair, is playing with one hand tucked in his pocket; the primary impact this has had is that the gameplay is pretty slow, but that doesn't seem to have bored Scott at least -- he's poised for action, watching the tiny football creep toward one of his yellow-suited one-legged players and finally whacking the handle to spin it ferociously back at Ion's goal; the player goes around and around and around his axle. He misses. The ball now crawls toward one of Ion's players. HOUR 13 It's gotten dark, but a pair of honest-to-god Real Fire lanterns are providing reasonable illumination. The warm light spills over just past the mouth of the shelter where Ion is standing only a very short distance away from the open front. The fickle shift and flutter of the firelight makes him currently look even more wiggly than he actually is -- which is significant considering the hula hoop whirling around his midsection and a second around his neck. Is: "Hope you ain't flagging, hermano, cuz these hips don't lie," flirtatious or a friendly taunt, at this hour it is Anyone's Guess. HOUR 15 The Real Fire lanterns are still burning inside the shelter, but Scott and Ion have moved a little way away, to a clearing lit not just by the nearly-full moon but, in the total absence of light or electricity for miles around, by the sweep of the Milky Way. And by the glow of Scott's glasses, two pinpoints of red in the bulky silhouette of the sparring match/tussle they've set up out here, which -- after a few seconds of grappling -- is splitting back up into two people. The one that kept the glowing pinpoints bounces up and down on his toes, shaking his hands out -- "Ooh," he says, "Almost had me there." Is this a friendly taunt or straight-up shittalk? Also anybody's guess. HOUR 16 There's only one lantern burning, now. The energy in the cabin has mellowed as the night wears on. Ion hasn't yet strapped his hook back on after the sparring, and as he slumps back down, exhausted but still smiling, this gives him a brief and confused uncertainty about how to handle his current predicament. Only a second, though; he's barely given his discarded hook a glance before he simply tosses the bottle opener to Scott, clinking the neck of his beer to the other man's in thanks once it's opened. HOUR ?? The night has grown chill as it swings back toward morning, but there's a faint uptick in the subjective warmth of the cabin as Charles finally stirs again from where he's been slouched in his chair with a soft Kinross tartan blanket draped around him. His hands lift sluggishly, rubbing index and middle fingers in slow circles over his temples. "Well, gentlemen, I do believe we've --" He's shushing himself even before he's turned around quite far enough to see Scott and Ion fast asleep on the couch cushions across the room. <XS> Medical Lab Charles waits patiently by the bed, his expression placid, his fingers steepled. The man in the bed beside him is also in his mind, though carefully walled off and kept unconscious. Over the last 24 hours, Halim has lost a number of nasty compulsions and gained a new one he might find even nastier: thou shalt not hack. Very gently, Charles allows his patient to wake, the weight of his attention palpable. "Welcome back, Mister -- Halim." Beneath the words, Charles conveys the anonymized context of the compromise with the Brotherhood to spare his life. "We have removed some of the -- malicious code that compelled you to obey your handlers, and the rest of it should not be executable any longer. If you can run some sort of diagnostic to ensure that is the case, we will remove the block we placed on your power --" "On a scale from one to one-zero-one-zero." The somewhat more familiar and less patient voice that cuts across Charles's gentle entreaty is coming from a large robotic praying mantis perched at the foot of the bed. "How murderous are you feeling?" The burst of activity that follows would be Too Much, Too Fast, if Charles were not at this moment sharing Halim's brain. A rapid taking-stock of what the current edges of him comprise, both flesh and mechanical. The odd feeling of other-mind hived to his, at once familiar and yet oddly alien with no concrete memories to explain why it feels natural. A keen appraisal of the many machineries whispering to him all around. An unfurling within him, like a slow stretch upon waking -- though in mind, here, not limbs, flexing out to reach reflexively, hungrily, towards the mantis -- -- and then snapping back in as if stung. In an instant his sleepy wakening tumbles into frustration, clanging hard at the boundaries of this new compulsion in a testing that is no less methodical for its rattling anger. It's no time at all before that same testing is turning inward -- okay, sure, no touching that, but -- The remapping that follows is swift and kind of triumphant, after the Very Long stretch of being denied root access to his own mind. Within his brain things are shifting, a reprogramming that can't quite remove this leash but can stretch its boundaries. Redefine what hacking means, here. When he flexes again it brushes up against Cerebro's systems without that same sharp jerk -- but this time, pulling back more deliberately. No sharp snap, just a quiet easing. It's all over in the span of an instant. Halim exhales a breath that ripples in his mind like relief, like laughter, though his flat expression doesn't change. He props himself up, slight on one elbow, his eyes flicking brief in passing to Charles. Then settling, longer, on the drone. "Towards him, or you?" Though Charles shows no outwardly sign of alarm, the sharp snap of his mind toward a subtler set of hidden instructions (helpfully labeled "#emergency hibernate, in case we fucked it up") is distantly sensible to Halim even through the literal-figurative walls of fire keeping him from the rest of the forest. But when Halim pulls back, so does he. "Ah! I see that the jailbreaking took," he says, just a touch catlike in the implication that letting the technopath circumvent his newfound mental block was all a part of their plan. "I'm afraid we were not able to recover your memories, though I hold out some hope you may yet find them -- with our help or without -- once awake." He arches one eyebrow and looks to the mantis drone, too. "I believe you are already acquainted with Cerebro." The drone -- or whoever is on the other end of the connection controlling it -- bristles when Halim reaches for it. In fact, the entire network around them bristles behind the figurative-figurative firewall that Halim could also circumvent with a mere flex of his power. Cerebro does seem somewhat mollified that his drone didn't get hacked this time, but his tone is still sharp. "Him, me, all mutantkind?" The mantis flexes and resettles its wings primly at Charles's dubious introduction. "If you want to murder the bloody government, have at. Only, not on my network."