BackDated - New (Year's) Cycle's Solar Day

[do_your_duty]

[Morning after John's New Years Party]



Aeryn is awake, and upright. This might be all that can be said for it.

She is awake. Upright. Also, there is a cup in front of her.

She didn't even argue when Guinan looked at her, walked away and then brought it back. The women speaking in low, soothing tones, that would have annoyed Aeryn if the world would stop pulsing so violently for her to be annoyed longer than the half-micron of trying to think about being annoyed. But the pain was ruthless.

Which is why her eyes are half-closed and she's barely touch the drink.
It is morning. The room hurts her eyes. She is upright, awake, sitting.




And nothing happened last night. Nothing.
Definitely not any kissing. Nothing. Nothing at all.

Comments

You and me both. Just. Guh. Yes, ma'am. Your self and your character.

[do_your_duty]

She approved of the first, but not the last.

That term, again, which gets a winced look.
One that tinges toward annoyance more than pain.

A hoarse twist to a point "And what are you under all of that?"

I should mention I tossed Daniel Jackson and Scorpius into the meme thread because of you :P

[redarmorhunter]

"Explanation: I am HK-47, combat and protocol droid. I was constructed by the Jedi Revan as the ultimate tool in his combat against, and then later in the name of, the Galactic Republic."

He paused for a moment.

"Addendum: Truthfully, it was more fun to fight against the Sith. The Republic may be high-minded and naive, but the Sith were much more fun to hurt."

Awwwwwwwww! You are the best. I love both of those characters. Sorry, I'm been gone a while. D:

[do_your_duty]

"HK-47." It's sounds like a storage lot. Or a planet sector designation. But then everything being frelled was normal here. Like the fact she was frowning as she was trying to parse anything that his rambling just spit out. She appreciated, or at least could identify logically with his last comments, but they didn't entirely clarify the earlier ones.

"What is a drah-hoyed?"

Well, both could do with tags if you have anybody for 'em :P No chance of a spare Vala? :P

[redarmorhunter]

"Clarification: Droid. An artificial being with no organic parts whatsoever, with fully autonomous processors, a certain degree of free will, and in my case quite a lot of it."

Alas, I belong whole heartedly to Aeryn. Though maybe out of time tags might go to Scorpy.

[do_your_duty]

Aeryn's eyes narrowed and her head tilted a small bit to the side. Or maybe meant to go a small ways and then lolled a little under the weight of her head, feeling like it was five times the weight of itself. Even though it did not stop her words, "Like a DRD? Only bigger."

Beat. "Why?"

Though he had mentioned the fighitng part.

She is a WHOLE lot of character, yeah.

[redarmorhunter]

"Explanation: Though I have no conception what one of these DRDs is, the answer is likely yes. Also quite likely more impressive. As for your query, imagine an electronic being tasked with bettering communication and also stomping flat any threat. You couldn't have them requiring input or instructions. You might as well try to defend yourself with a desk."

Isn't she just.

[do_your_duty]

Aeryn's thoughts process are, perhaps, not much like many others he'd find there. She turns it on its head, with the first thoughts that come to mind. The best traits of the best contenders, displaced entirely, and the threat that could present to even a battlefield on larger terms, even if her own people were to go against many of them.

"Without need for sustenance or sleep, a large number could make a formidable enemy."


Which makes her wonder why they aren't. Or if they might be somewhere.

[redarmorhunter]

"Proud statement: Yes, we could. It is for that reason that most droids are, I believe, kept stupid by the meatbags. However..."

And she'll have no idea how painful this last part is for him.

"In some cases they have good reason. Droid armies can be either incredibly stupid or, alternatively, pervert far more noble aims into wanton slaughter."

[do_your_duty]

Again. Meatbags. It translates, and it doesn't take a genius to figure out.

There are several things she could respond to in that one, but Aeryn continues to take the narrow road.
The only one she knows, and the one to which war is as normal and natural as breathing, birth and death.

"You think of war as noble?" It's a careful question, and she doesn't let her voice side with any opinion.

[redarmorhunter]

"Response: Usually? No. It is a test of my skills, and comes with a sense of accomplishment when a task is completed with particular skill. But...in service to my Master, there is a certain nobility of purpose. Our task was, and is, to save the Republic from the Sith."

He paused.

"I can assure you," he said, in explanation, "that the Sith are not noble under at least six hundred different species definitions."

[do_your_duty]

There is something in what he says that rings far too close to home. Close enough she doesn't know whether to lean into the familiarity or lean away to spite it, still at war with who she is, who she isn't, what Crais has done to her, and what she's done to herself. A tangle far more complicated than it feels like any part of her life was before these last few cycles. It mixes up in her head. In the pounding. In the pain. Too sharp, too clear somehow in stark relief to it.

"Are you still with these-" Aeryn purses her mouth, trying the word and hating it, as she always hates trying to make words that make no sense and don't translate at all across her microbes, fit into it. "Seeth?"

[redarmorhunter]

"Correction: I believe your organic auditory organs misheard me - I fight against the Sith. Worthy opponents, but also egotistical, capricious and prone to unnecessary war crimes."

He pauses.

"Sloppy, really. Far too emotional. But challenging to kill." The last being said with some pride.

[do_your_duty]

She’d frown. She’d berate herself. But her head hurts.
Nothing about missing something falls out wrong right now

She’s missing everything happening in the room, too, and she hates to even think about that. She’s a solider. She hates anything behind her back, but even thinking about twisting to survey the room at that thought, it hurts.

“And you don’t want to do that now?” Her brow crinkled.

[redarmorhunter]

"Emphatic statement: I am designed for efficient and impressive execution, assassination, and translation - I could no more decide against my purpose as I could develop an organic stomach and consume whatever it is you actually eat."

[do_your_duty]

“I thought that, too.” Aeryn frowned. She hadn’t really meant to say that, while wincing toward the table, maybe more for the fact they came out. At least John

[redarmorhunter]

His head tilts, slowly.

"Surprised statement: Really? You are organic. Most organics view exceeding their initial programming or assigned tasks as inherent to making them organic."

[do_your_duty]

It's strangely human, that movement, isn't it?

What he said and what she meant weren't exactly the same.
At least organic was better than meat bag in translation.


"That's not the Peacekeeper way." She's frowning at John in her head. John saying, You can be more. More was not a word she understood. It was treason. It was death. More than that it was profane and everything she did not want. She liked her life. She liked her job. She loved being a prowler pilot. She wanted to live and die flying, a soldier, one among many.

She'd dreamed of promotion, retirement, in a fuzy way. But it didn't matter more than the sky. "It wasn't my way."

[redarmorhunter]

"Statement: You are speaking of warfare, but use the word 'Peacekeeper'. These are incompatible options. Warriors do not keep peace, they actively destroy it. How can your people try to make you function as combat droids when you are organic? Unless you are cloned, of course."

[do_your_duty]

Aeryn bristled at the words he'd said, except that it was more deep annoyance because everything else hurt too much to make a lot bigger. It did not keep her from scowling a dark look in his direction. They might want to kill her, but they were very much still her people. "We are not cloned. We are bred. Soldiers without equal, who keep the peace of Peacekeeper Space."