GR RP "Adventures in GunRunning" ACT 17
POSTED BY: DireKtorsSmeagol
UPDATED: Sunday, July 4, 2004 13:22
VIEWED: 23313
PAGE 2 of 10
Slights move:
Brink Helsing wakes up screaming, sitting up in his bed and he cries like a madman.
Sucking in a breath, he whipes at himself frantically, whiping away the sweat. Another few deep breaths, and he returns to normal. He stands slowly, dressing with calm precision, and reaches for a bottle of saki.
He's gotten used to the nightmares now. They are never quite the same, no two alike, but he's used to horrors. But dreams will surprise.
He can't even remember the dream anymore, as he pours a glass. Not relevant.
But as he takes a sip, it all snaps back into him.
He's standing alone on the edge of a knife. In his left hand is a red axe. In his right, a white rose. At the far end of the knife, at the hilt, is a bright portal. On his left, a blue sun is burning brightly. On his right, is the girl. The one he raped.
Even he can see the meaning of balance in this. But he runs, trying to go through the portal.
But the sun has gravity, and he can feel himself be pulled down. The axe is heavy in his hand, but the rose is even heavier. Slight tries to drop it, but it grows a chain that wraps itself around his wrist.
He falls. He isn't even sure which way, but he falls.
When he stops, he's landed in a comfortable chair. His glasses are on, and he's in the suit of an operative. It's his fathers office, filled with ancient weapons. Everything from farming scythes to automatic rifles cover the walls.
First Power Helsing never did hold with lasers, though.
He's pouring saki wine. "You've gotten yourself in trouble now, boy."
Slight nods. He's not even doing anything now, just watching himself. "Fallen in with renegades, I know. Like 'em better'n you, though. They may not be classy or rich, but they are an honest people. Something I would like to explore."
His father shrugs. "Curiousity killed the cat."
"No guts, no glory."
"Fools rush in," his father counters.
"I took the road less traveled by, and it has made all the difference."
His father laughs. "Well, boy, what do you expect? That Shepard will bless you, or that Companion will tell you you're handsome, and above all guilt?"
Slight stands, removing his glasses. "I expect to find two things you never taught me, Dad. Hope, and a reason to find it."
With a flash, he's fighting himself. Slight is wearing his normal clothes-black shirt, pants and trenchcoat, holding a vertebrate whip. His counterpart is dressed in a Blue Sun suit, complete with gloves. The two are evenly matched, as the Blue Sun Slight uses a red axe, trying vainly to strike away the whip. Slight cannot seem to get around the axe. Then, both attack each other viciously, blow after blow anding, as skin and muscle are torn away. Slight strips from Slight.
Slight drops the glass, breathing deeply. He closes his eyes, trying to remember who wins. He cannot.
Slight sighs. He needs a cigarette. Suddenly he needs one really badly.
You see I cannot be forsaken/Because I'm not the only one.
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BLENDED POST, INARA, ROWAN AND MERZ
LOCATION – INTERIOR, INARA’S SHUTTLE
The three women spend a moment in a companionable silence, each thinking their own deep thoughts. It is a calming and pleasant interlude. Finally MERZ speaks, finished with the strange path her thoughts have carried her down. Strange. I have had few chances to sit and be with other females. I find there is a certain sense of, oh, what is the *shuddha word completeness in this. I have a theory that in your world, females – no, women need to spend time with other women. This I have observed before.
She looks at INARA and ROWAN in turn, one seated on each side of her, a small smile trying to tug at the edges of her mouth.
MERZ:
I still have the fourth teacup. Was a gift for a hard lesson well learned. I may be the only member of my fam...team who has ever ‘comprehended’ fragile.
Rowan’s smile is more melancholy as she reflects on the conversation she just finished in the shuttle’s cockpit, then nods in agreement.
ROWAN: “I’d forgotten what that was like, sharing girl talk. Aislin and I had a huge blow out when we were kids. We got past it, but never really got over it. I couldn’t forgive her and she couldn’t figure out how to apologize. It got better after she left for Madrassa Academy. I can remember a few times when she visited that we sat up until midnight just talking. Then I went to university and that was it – we never saw each other or so much as sent a virtual wave card. Then the movement started and circumstances were such that she had to send my wedding dress along with my parents. Until just now, and except for one quick time during the war, we hadn't shared words for more than 10 years.”
Interesting, also, that having done so, it was easier for her to open up about it.
Inara winces, her heart breaking for both of these women.
INARA: I've had many a female friend, from my childhood on Sihnon, to my education at the Academy...though the relationships have often shifted from friend to rival, I've always treasured my relationships with women.
INARA glances up from her hands in her lap, meeting both women's eyes in turn.
I would be honored to call you both friend.
From over the intercom, a voice interrupts the tea party.
MAL
Inara, we are having the meeting in the Galley, please bring Rowan with you. If you see Merz, let her know the change in plans.
INARA chuckles: The men will never let us alone for long, will they? Shall we, ladies?
The three women gather their things and exit the shuttle. One of them now pondering the exact meaning of friend.
EOM
*shuddha = correct (Nepali)
If Justice is the dish, then I am your waitress
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Posting, posting. Might add more later...
_____________
River walks up to Thorne, and says:
"Guilty. You're guilty. Now, why are you guilty?"*
She walks out of the room, going to find something.
______________
*Thanks to Decoy. Not my line, but I liked it.
_____________
"Freedom is the Freedom to say that 2 plus 2 make 4. If that is granted, all else follws"-Winston, 1984
Teela Brown, keeper of bad typing.
"No one reads these things any way."- Bart on Blackboard
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Book's Move
LOCATION - BRIDGE
A little bit of space trash floats by the starboard window of the bridge. It catches Book's eye, distracting him for a moment. hmm he thinks ...that doesn't look like our trash.
Looking back at Mal, who seems incredulous that he's staring out the window, Book sets down his mug on the console area, turns to give Mal a contain-your-anger look and says, "Captain, I'm not sure what you have planned for the meeting coming up, but if it can wait a little longer, I can trace that wav... now. It won't take more than ten minutes or so... once the process is set in motion."
Book walks purposefully to the door of the bridge, stops, grabs the handle of the door and pulls it closed. Turning, he quickly walks back to the console area, beginning to fiddle with his shepherd's collar as he comes.
Settling down into a crouch beside Wash at the terminal, his hands still at his collar, Book slowly removes the white Shepherd's collar which shows his station and tears the stitches from one end of it. Pulling the fabric down, Book reveals the end of a flat, shiny, metallic-looking object concealed within the fabric.
Book holds up the object as he slides it out of the now-ruined cloth. "This is a target-defined locator strip. It can only find one thing. The location of a message sent using my card. I need access to the console. He looks meaningfully at Wash and Mal in turn. ...and your word that you won't convey anything of what you see to anyone else."
EM
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Okay, I'll be gone a little trip for a few days, so this is my last post. For a few days.
_________
River leaves the Galley, and goes off to find a Vacc Suit. She finds one, suits up, and grabs a big piece of cloth. She goes to the airlock (?), and ataches a tether. She steps outside, and slowley works her way to the windows, a big grin on her face the entire time.
__________
_____________
"Freedom is the Freedom to say that 2 plus 2 make 4. If that is granted, all else follows"-Winston, 1984
Teela Brown, keeper of bad typing.
"No one reads these things any way."- Bart on Blackboard
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Wash's Move:
Location - Bridge
(Wash gets up from his chair, so that Book can sit down at the console… He then says to both Book and Mal: “I have learned by now to never see anything that might even slightly make trouble for me later, you should know that by now, Mal… you tell him that.” (He points to Book, then we see motion in the cockpit window) “There you see (he points the motion to Mal, a small gloved hand wiping a cloth over the lowest right window) I don’t even notice that. I can explain it, but I don’t see it.”
In a small, dirty town, somewhere in the black, a dirty mudder looks at a restored statue of a great (though possibly misunderstood) man, and exactly then a whistle sounds in the distance that calls for the afternoon break, which is precisely 15:00 AMT (03:00pm) everyday. The nameless man asks himself: “I wonder how many people Jayne Cobb is a helping today?” as he sets off to the local watering hole.
- EOM -
Decoy, they make me go first.
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Book's Move
LOCATION - BRIDGE
Sitting down immediately when Wash stood up, Book pauses in disassembling the strip, when he hears Wash comment to Mal on an unexplained something at which he's pointing. Not being able to see what Wash's pointing at though, because of his vantage point, Book doesn't see River and assumes it's likely Wash is gesturing at the space trash. So he continues to work with the metal locator strip.
"After a while, we begin not to see the little things floating in space. I can't explain it either, Wash. I wonder why we do certain things at all." Book looks up from his work to stare into nothing for a second, his eyes tightening. this may not work he thinks, as he feels the strip in his hands. Hidden too long inside his collar, it's taken a slight bend.
After Book takes the somewhat damaged strip apart, he turns to the monitor and begins to manipulate keys with a previously undisplayed knowledge and adeptness. After quickly rocketing through two levels of flowingencryptiondata, the monitor waits for an input, and Book turns to the disassembled strip and puts it together again into a different shape... the proper shape.
He pauses before he inserts it into a port on the console area, then sliding it in he looks to the monitor and nothing happens. shai de whan shosu he thinks and looks up to Mal and Wash. "It didn't work." They aren't looking at him. They're staring open-mouthed out the window.
EM
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Thorne's Move
Location: Galley
RIVER: "Guilty. You're guilty. Now, why are you guilty?"
As RIVER drifts away, “Guilty, who isn’t?” Thorne thinks.
Colonel Thorne was looking for answers as he burst into the office, a sheaf of papers crumpled in his hand. Behind his desk Lionel Caruthers, the head of Alliance special research projects, looked up in alarm as Thorne slammed the report down on the desktop. “Caruthers, how could you possibly sign off on this abomination? I always figured you were in Blue Sun’s pocket, but this is going too far, even for you!”
“Now calm down, Rosie.” Caruthers replied. “Have a seat. I don’t know why you’re upset. It’s just the logical extension of the enhancement project we’ve been running on you and your troops for years. Not really any new technology and nothing risky.”
“Nothing risky to who?” Thorne retorted, pacing back and forth. “You’re talking about taking children and playing God with their minds and bodies. And you’ll cover it up as a school. The parents won’t even know what they’re sentencing their kids to. These children can’t be intended for a combat role, so you must be planning on using them as spies and assassins. How can you even think I wouldn’t be upset.”
Caruthers tried to be conciliatory. “I told them you’d feel this way, and I have concerns too, but this plan comes from the highest levels. Both in the government and Blue Sun. There’s no way we can stop it. If we protest, they’ll just toss us aside and bring in administrators who are more...pliable. At least we can ameliorate the impact, keep the project small.”
Thorne stood silent for a moment, and then spoke in a low, firm, voice. “No, Lionel, I can’t condone this at all. I’ll fight it all the way up if I have to. If we do this, we’re worse than the rebels…Hell, worse than Reavers. If you have any balls, you’ll fight it too. You better think about it.” And with those words he turned and stalked out the door.
“But you didn’t fight it, did you? When you heard they were coming to arrest you, you ran. Tried to justify it to yourself. Said you could do more if you were free. And they went right ahead and took kids like River, and stole their childhood, and their life, and left them broken. No wonder you drink.”
"Keep the Shiny side up"
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Wash's Move:
Location - Bridge
(Wash is still staring out the lower right hand window, as River wipes it with a cloth)
(Wash, to Mal): “An explanation… hummm, aliens, no ah, ok, truth is good, I suggested that River go outside to wash the windows, Captain. I hope I get a gold star for this, this bit of foresight, as we’ve got a good bit o’ piloting coming up, and you know I hate having dust on the windows…” (Wash turns to Book): “Did what work? Hey, it’s time for the meeting, we’d better get down there before the Captain finds out we’re late, and does something that everyone else sees as hilarious.”
At this very instant in time, an old pocket watch reads 15:01 AMT (03:01pm). The watch, the only recognizable piece of debris from the destruction of an unidentifiable ship, is slowly burning up in the atmosphere of Belleraphon… The reason that this is mentioned here, is that the watch stopped during an attack, which was a meeting or rendezvous (your choice) between two smugglers, one punctual and one slightly less so… so a very small lesson can be learned thusly:
Don’t be late for meetings, because you were winding your watch: others might start referring to you as ‘late’ permanently..
- EOM -
Decoy, they make me go first.
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Rowan’s Move
LOCATION: Inara’s Shuttle
INARA: I've had many a female friend, from my childhood on Sihnon, to my education at the Academy...though the relationships have often shifted from friend to rival, I've always treasured my relationships with women.
Relationships with women are indeed a different animal. Often times if the connection is right, there is no sense of competition – of feeling the need to prove herself, or even defend herself if need be. Rowan remembers never quite fitting in with most of the women around her, being somewhat smarter than the average girl and always more interested in what might lie beneath any outward façade. There are adversarial occasions as well, of course, but the quiet times are infinitely more desirable. More than made up for all the work she had to do to compete in a man’s world.
Speaking of which...
MAL: Inara, we are having the meeting in the Galley, please bring Rowan with you. If you see Merz, let her know the change in plans.
Rowan rolls her eyes the same time that Inara gives a sultry chuckle.
INARA: The men will never let us alone for long, will they? Shall we, ladies?
Taking up the cue stick case she brought with her, Rowan rises first and starts ahead. Could be a good time to get at least one game in, since, in her experience, no staff meeting has ever started on time. Giving both women a smile, she starts out ahead.
ROWAN (absently to herself): Mei mei yo... sister-friend.
EOM
We have art so as not to die of truth ~ Neitzsche
http://www.mnartists.org/artistHome.do?rid=7922
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