ten_fwd | A wandering dingbot

Entry tags:

A wandering dingbot - OTA

Aggie thread crash warning thread

Agatha was working through the night, and her sleep, again. She was Heterodyning as she worked, ordering the dingbots about with vague waves of her tools.

Which meant that she failed to give her usual "Don't steal anything" order, the one she has been giving since her welcome aboard the ship. So the Dingbots are being fairly liberal with parts. Wherever they find what they need that they can easily get to, they're going to take it. They wont dismantle anything, not yet anyway, but if you have a spare screw or wrench, or bit of scrap metal or wire laying around... you might see a diminutive robot trying to haul it away.

If you're in your quarters when this happens, don't ask how they got in there, you probably don't want to know.

The dingbots are each the size of an over large pocket watch and come in many different shapes and sizes, though you? You found Dingbot Prime. (Did I steal that name from my LARP Character sheet? Yes. Yes I did.) The smartest and most well constructed of the Dingbots. Also the most brazen and most ambitious. And the most loyal.

Have fun with that!

And if you'd rather report the theft than confront the thief...

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

If the dingbots were searching Minoru's possessions for spare parts, they weren't going to find much. He had very few possessions, per se, and honestly, didn't care if they went missing. (He apparently cared just as little about where he slept, as tonight, he was hanging face down off the sofa, with one leg over its arm and another up the wall.)

But this particular dingbot had its robotic hand on what looked like a three washers on a string - the necklace a sleeping Minoru had around his neck. The tugging woke him up, but not before the cord snapped.

The groggy Minoru reached for the thing, and ended up sliding right off the sofa and under the table. It wasn't until after the door opened and closed with the dingbot making its escape that Minoru realized just what it had.

"... Oh no." he scrambled to his feet, dashing into the hallway to see which direction it went.

It trotted down the corridor towards Agatha and Tasha's quarters, trailing it's prize behind it. The washers would be useful! Agatha would be pleased!

Happily it kept moving, taking the turns it needed to, unaware it was being followed....

Once Minoru spotted the thing, though, he sprung forward like a coiled snake about to strike. He was a trained ninja, and speed was one of his best assets.

"Oh, no you don't!" He dove for it, intending to grab it as he rolled.

Shouting alerted it, not in time to dive fully away, but enough to JUST muss getting caught. It scrambled away, the propeller in its top emerging slowly as it ran this way and that, trying not to be caught.

Minoru hit the ground and rolled. He was clos. So close!

He made another grab as he regained his footing, but that too missed. The propeller took the little dingbot up and over his hands.

He narrowed his eyes. If it wanted to dart around in the air, two could play at that game. Minoru had no qualms about using the walls, even the ceiling, as traction for another attack.

"You will not get away from me."

It flew off, carrying it's prize, with as much speed as it could manage, to Agatha's rooms.

The doors were already set to let the Dingbots in as of they were people, as if the locks didn't matter for them. The thing flew right in. There would be time to follow it before the doors closed.

Minoru was right on its tail, leaping through the open door with yet another try to catch that shiny gold thing in the air.

It was a good thing the door was still open. If the door closed, it would probably break before Minoru would! Anything to get that necklace back.

It dropped the necklace in front of Agatha, then settled onto a shelf behind her to watch.

Agatha was... fast asleep... in a long night shirt and sleep pants (she learned her lesson, thank you)... and.... currently building a rather large... something. Whatever it is, is about 6 feet tall, bipedal, with eight non-leg limbs, most of which do not yet have ends, but as at least one has a rather sharp blade, the odds that the others shall all be hands is low.

There is an odd off tune, not quite music, humming noise coming from Aggie as she works. A dozen other dingbots are around, dropping things off, fetching her tools, helping with small bits of welding....

He missed, yet again, but slid to a stop at the feet of a woman constructing... wait... What in the world?!

Minoru stopped to stare at it for a moment, not a clue in the world what it was supposed to be. So far, the limits of his technological expertise was that you talk to the box in the wall and it gives you food. He still thought the PADD in his quarters wasn't a glorified shiny coaster. This kind of mechanical monstrosity was well beyond his understanding.

He shook himself to his senses quickly, though, seizing the necklace from the little pile of parts at Agatha's feet.

"You can take anything you want, but you can't take this."

It was hard to tell who he was addressing - Agatha or the dingbots around her. But he clenched it in his hand, lest another one try to pry it loose.

The Dingbots all snapped to, waiting for an order from Agatha to take it back, and the one with the mini-wielding torch even managed to look dangerous.

But she kept working and making that odd noise, so they slowly stood down, letting him have the bauble. One of them took a wrench, put it in his hand, then pointed to Agatha, ordering him to help her, all without words.

Minoru watched them carefully. If that little one with the welding torch wanted to play with fire, it was going to have a very rude awakening very soon. But thankfully, he didn't need to resort to using force.

He barely had time to tie the necklace back around his neck when the dingbot handed him a wrench. He looked at it, and then looked at the other dingbots.

"What do you want me to do with this?" It was a good thing Minoru was as easy-going as he was. "You know, if you needed a hand, you could have asked. You didn't have to lure me in by stealing something."

It just pointed to Agatha again, who was patting the work table. trying to find a wrench.

Minoru got the hint, and slid the wrench into her hand.

"...Is she... sleeping?"

No, maybe she was just in a trance of some kind... Could someone sleep-build?

The dingbots had no necks. They shouldn't have been able to nod. But the sense of them nodding was very real.

She took the tool and got to work again, still making that odd humming noise. In her dream she could see the device, see the parts, it was all so.... so beautiful. And it all made sense!

He actually stood back a minute to watch her work.

Perfect stillness and deep meditation was the cornerstone of a sage's study, and yet, Minoru made most of his breakthroughs and epiphanies while moving at breakneck speed. This wasn't all that strange, really, but it wasn't something he often got a chance to witness in someone else.

Still with that odd tuneless sound. she held her hand out for another tool, the remaining hand still using the wrench. A dingbot pointed out the tool she wanted to him, a large screwdriver.

Yes. Even asleep, apparently Aggie gains temporary minions.

It took Minoru a moment to respond, but soon, he was following the directions of the dingbot and handing Agatha the next tool she needed.

And so they would work for hours as the beast slowly took shape. It was tall, the top of its brass head brushing the ceiling. Instead of a face it had... well an oblong head with a trilobite on the front, taking up the whole surface.

The feet, which she did go back to work on some more, were broad and wide and had lifts that took the top of the feet up along the legs, so that someone could get to the upper portions with ease.

The other limbs ended in a number of tools, including something that looked disturbingly like a hypo from the sickbay, something that looked like a scalpel, and something that looked waaaay too much like a miniature saw.

There were feet and feet of coiled... something... that was metallic that he saw her shoving into the accessible chest cavity, and running down it's back was something that looked suspiciously like a lightning rod, hinged so that if there were enough space it could rest atop the head.

The whole thing was done in brass, copper, and gold, and shone in the lights of the room.

Finished, Aggie stumbled towards the desk chair, as the thing started up with a low whirring noise.

Minoru wasn't sure what he was helping her make, but he had a surprising amount of trust in its benevolence - even with the sharp, pointy appendages. He had far too much trust in people in general.

When it started up, though, he literally leapt backwards, and onto the desk, dropping into a fighting stance.

The machine rolled its many... would you call those shoulders? He bounced down on its knee joints. Then it slowly backed up. It seemed aware of the bed and all the junk behind it, because it stepped on nothing but floor. It came to a stop against the wall, bent it's knees.... and powered down.

And Agatha.... began to snore.

That was unexpected. Granted, Minoru had no idea what he was expecting.

When the creature powered down, he leapt back off the desk, feet lightly coming to rest on the floor. He wasn't wearing shoes (he rarely did), so his landing didn't make much noise. There were a few wary moments before he let his guard down entirely.

He watched Agatha for another moment. This time, she really was asleep. Well, all was well that ended well, right? He pulled a blanket from the bed in her quarters, and lightly draped it over her shoulders.

Pulling the blanket from her bed sent fears and tools and bits of metal flying, since she used the bed as another workshop bench most of the time, and the noise of that started her awake. The dingbots scattered.

"Huh?" she asked blearily, feeling around blindly for her glasses, which were on the desk just out of reach.

"... now you wake up?" Minoru shook his head with a bit of a laugh. Which meant an explanation was probably in order. "Yeah... After the little uh, thing, made off with my necklace, I've been here for a few hours handing you tools while you built that."

He pointed to the large shiny thing against the wall.

"I'm Minoru, by the way."

She looked back and forth blearily, then asked, "Glasses?" she couldn't see him or the thing he was pointing to.

Then confused. "I something in my sleep...and it's still here...?"

And then, a bit more awake... "My dingbots... stole your necklace?"

Minoru jumped forward, quickly finding the glasses on her desk and handing them to her.

"Well, it's definitely a something." Minoru scratched his head. "And they did. Chased them all the way here to get it back."

His hands went up to tighten the knot he made in the string again, just in case.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

If it is okay to say he was there for hours? If not let me know, and I'll edit.

nah, it's all good!

Cool

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject