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pastelwitchling · 3 years

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“I didn’t even know this kinda place could exist in this town,” Michael said, looking up at the grand ballroom ceiling, small silver stones embedded into the cream marble walls, the silver railings and ceiling-high windows that led out onto four balconies.

The guests of the ballroom, all in suits and floor-length dresses, chatted with their small groups, a glass of wine or champagne in their hands. But there was one particular guest Michael and his friends were most interested in; Bo Swindell. Or, as Alex had uncovered him to be last week, a Project Shepherd agent who they suspected ran another Caulfield facility just outside of Roswell.

Isobel scoffed, brushing something off her white sleeve, her pantsuit immaculate and making her stand out like a diamond amongst the hoards.

“Just because some people don’t mind having their dinner on hay-covered grounds doesn’t mean everyone else is inclined to follow their example,” she said. “Soak it in, Michael. Smell that Cartier and Armani?”

“It’s suffocating.”

“It’s taste.”

“Leave him alone,” Liz said, amused. Unlike Isobel, she didn’t seem to realize the effect she had in her long black dress. She patted his shoulder proudly. “Mikey actually dressed up for this!”

“Ugh,” Isobel said with a roll of her eyes. But Michael was inclined to agree with Liz.

His dark jacket thrown over the nicest shirt he had and dark jeans were about as prim and proper as he was going to get.

“It’s cowboy elegant,” Alex assured her from where he stood against the wall, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible.

It wasn’t working. Even hiding among the champagne glasses, Alex attracted the raised brow or the interested smirk or the blatant mental undressing from every other guest that passed them by. It annoyed Michael, but he couldn’t blame them.

The last time he’d seen Alex in a suit was at Noah’s funeral, and he’d been sufficiently drunk and pissed off enough then to push past the sheer want and settle on the fury. Alex had been everything he’d wanted and was another reminder of something else he was no longer allowed to have. So he’d made the perfect target for Michael’s anger.

Now, as Alex stood there looking like a dream in his deep gray blazer and slightly tousled hair from having run an anxious hand through it, he was still someone Michael couldn’t have, but Forrest was away at a conference and it made things . . . different. Alex’s boyfriend wasn’t here, and Michael was, and to stand so close to him without the reminder that he was taken shoved down his throat, Michael couldn’t help but shift on the marble tiles, scooting closer to him.

Alex glanced at him, and said nothing.

Because it doesn’t make a difference to him how you feel, a voice in his head taunted. He has a boyfriend now. You’ve missed your chance.

Michael silenced it, moving closer to Alex against the wall. It helped him breathe better.

“Is everyone ready for what comes next?” Max asked under his breath, plastering on a polite smile to another couple as they passed.

Alex straightened up off the wall with a sigh. He pressed his lips together in a tight smile. “Should be fun.”

Michael’s blood boiled at the thought of what his airman was about to do. Bo Swindell had been a veteran, according to Alex’s research, but had been notorious for disobeying orders, risking the lives of his teammates by deviating from strategy on the battlefield, and being caught with his briefs around his ankles with more than a few men in the base storage closet. Needless to say, Swindell had been officially dishonorably discharged.

“My dad must’ve hated everything about him,” Alex had said with disgust as he’d read the file. “But he was useful and willing to do anything for money. That must’ve been good enough to take him on.”

“Well,” Max had said at the time, crossing his arms, “how do we get close to somebody like that?”

Alex had sighed grimly, like he’d decided on a plan the second he’d opened the file. “If he has a thing for male soldiers . . .”

Michael had hated the idea, had objected to it at once, but it was a matter of reason and logic. Alex was the handsomest soldier there was (Michael was not being subjective; Alex’s good looks were a conclusive fact), and if this guy would take an interest in anyone, it would be him.

“You don’t have to do this, Alex,” Michael insisted anyway, holding Alex’s gaze. “You can still back out.”

Alex looked away. “I can handle it, Guerin. I’m tougher than you think I am.”

Michael frowned. “I – Alex, that’s not what I –”

“Come on, Is,” Alex offered Isobel his hand once the quartet started. Not looking any more eager at the idea, Isobel put her hand in Alex’s with an apologetic look at Michael.

As they walked off, Liz put a hand on Michael’s shoulder.

“He’ll be fine,” she said, though her worried eyes followed Alex. “He’s done worse.”

Michael saw Bo’s eyes catch Alex’s figure as he passed and linger on him. He clenched his jaw. “Has he?”

The music started in earnest and Michael stood to the side as Liz took Max’s elbow and he led her out onto the dance floor. As couples twirled around each other, Michael kept to the wall, glaring as Swindell’s eyes kept flitting to Alex, clearly uninterested in whatever the woman in front of him was discussing.

Soon enough, he would be excusing himself and approach Alex. He would smile in that hungry, vicious way he was now, and he would . . . well, the thought of what he might do had Michael’s power rising to the surface. The champagne glasses quivered on the table beside him before Michael managed to forcefully shove his anger down.

He turned away, grabbing a glass and downing it in one gulp, hoping it would be enough to calm his thoughts. It wasn’t. Alex looked too good, his shoulders too straight and tense, his smile at Isobel small, as if he was forcing himself not to be sick with what was to come. He didn’t want to do this, Michael could tell, but he’d convinced himself he had to. He’d convinced them all he had to.

Michael considered him, a very bad idea forming in his head. Did that deter him? After downing a second glass of champagne, no, it didn’t.

He weaved through the other guests, his intention making his steps light and quick, and he came up behind Alex. He exhaled sharply, forcing his nerves out in one breath, and tapped the airman’s shoulder.

Alex turned, the tension in his shoulders fading ever so slightly at the sight of Michael. He glanced at Swindell who was still watching them.

Michael held out a hand. “May I have this dance?”

Alex looked back at Isobel whose eyes were narrowed at Michael, as if trying to read his thoughts.

“Uh –” Alex said, “Guerin –”

“Might as well let everyone know what you’re into,” Michael cut him off, his heart climbing into his throat the longer he stood there. His smirk faltered with every second he went unanswered.

Isobel bit her lower lip. “Might be a good idea, Alex,” she said, nudging Alex’s back slightly. She smiled discreetly at Michael before walking away and disappearing into the crowd, leaving them both standing there awkwardly.

His cheeks red and his eyes wandering, like they did when he was the center of attention and hating it, Alex took Michael’s hand. He looked down as Michael pulled him in.

“What’re you doing?” Alex muttered, unwilling to meet his gaze.

“Dancing with you,” Michael said, and proved his point by wrapping an arm around Alex’s waist, pulling their bodies flush together. Alex gasped and looked up, startled. Once Michael caught his eyes, the rest of the ballroom vanished, and neither of them could look anywhere else.

Michael stretched his fingers out against Alex’s back, imagining the warm, naked skin beneath the soft fabric. Alex’s hand tightened in his as Michael rested their foreheads together.

“I miss you,” he breathed before he could help it, and unable to regret the words.

“You can’t say that,” he whispered, his warm breath fanning Michael’s lips.

Michael leaned in, his lips brushing Alex’s cheek. “But you like it, don’t you?”

Alex didn’t move away as he stammered, “Y-You shouldn’t be here, I need to – to find . . .”

Michael brought his other arm down to hug Alex’s waist, keeping them as close as possible as they swayed on the spot. Alex’s hand came up his arm and settled on his other shoulder, and Michael felt the tension in his body fade away almost completely as he was engulfed in Alex’s warmth, his voice, his intoxicating vanilla scent.

“Hmm?”

“Uh . . .” Alex’s brows furrowed, frustrated, even as his eyes fell to Michael’s lips. “I . . . need to . . . find . . .”

Michael smiled lazily. So this was the effect he had on the brilliant military captain. The effect he still had.

Alex shut his eyes tight. “Guerin, we’re on a mission here.”

Michael’s smile fell away. He swallowed. “I can’t stomach the idea of that asshole coming near you, Alex,” he confessed quietly, and Alex met his eyes. “If he touches you –”

“He won’t,” Alex assured him. “I just need to get close enough to plant the listening device. And then we’re done.”

“Yeah?” Michael asked, and raised one hand to cup Alex’s jaw. He didn’t know if it was because he could feel Alex’s heart race against his own chest, or the champagne he’d had, or because Alex was looking at him with those beautiful dark eyes like he wasn’t dating someone else, like Michael had never betrayed him, like they’d always been together, but Michael felt the truth pour out of him, unable and unwilling to stop it.

“And after that?” he said, his thumb brushing Alex’s cheek. “What happens? You go back to Forrest?”

Alex clenched his jaw and looked away. “He’s my boyfriend, Guerin.”

Michael hated that word. He hated that it wasn’t about him. He lifted Alex’s chin with his fingers, meeting his eyes. His open mouth hovered over Alex’s lips. “I don’t care,” he breathed.

Alex’s hands curled to fists against his chest. “You can’t keep doing this.”

“Doing what?” he whispered, and reveled in the flutter of Alex’s eyes, in the way his body instinctively curled against Michael’s. “I haven’t done anything yet.”

Michael traced Alex’s jaw with his fingers, his heart hammering. He imagined following the trail with his tongue, the slight roughness of Alex’s stubble against his lips as his other hand ran up and down the airman’s spine.

“You like it when I touch you?” he said into Alex’s ear. “Like it better than anybody else’s hands?”

Alex bit his lower lip as Michael moved closer, his mouth open and more than willing. It’s the champagne, Michael told himself, and knew he was a liar with every word. It was Alex, his touch, his body, his beauty, his scent. Michael didn’t want anyone to come near him without knowing that he was under his protection, that someone fiercely loved him and wouldn’t let him go.

Michael’s fingers came down Alex’s neck, down the soft pulse of his heavy breaths. His chest rose and fell against Michael’s, his eyes hooded and dazed.

If Michael ever wanted to kiss him again, it would have to be now. And he wanted to kiss him. He wanted to pull him into the fancy bathrooms, slip a hand under his shirt, taste his lips, his tongue, his chest, stomach, the space between his legs. He wanted to whisper his worship into the airman’s damp skin, hear his breathy moans in his ear, his pleas. He wanted to feel Alex’s hand in his curls, tugging at the roots, his other on Michael’s hip, pulling him in deeper, deeper, deeper –

“Stop,” Alex breathed, his forehead falling from Michael’s and onto his shoulder, his hands gripping Michael’s arms painfully tight, waking him from his thoughts. “Stop, stop, stop.”

The two panted against each other silently, no longer moving to the music as couples twirled around them. Michael gripped Alex’s waist tightly, keeping him close as he came back to his surroundings, his face heated and his heart thudding painfully against his ribs. He realized he was hard.

“I – I –” he stammered, moving back, but Alex stayed pressed against him.

“Don’t,” he warned quietly. “It’ll show, just – don’t move.”

So Michael stayed still, keeping his hold on Alex as he forced his breaths deeper. Images of himself and Alex in the bathroom, on Alex’s living room couch, or in Michael’s bed – they kept coming back, each more vivid than the last, each forcing Michael to push them back again and replace them with something less enticing.

The champagne was beginning to wear off quickly, and Michael had only enough time to press his nose to Alex’s shoulder and inhale the clean smell of his suit before embarrassment took over and he had to look anywhere else.

“I’m – uh –”

“Don’t,” Alex said and held him tighter, more desperately, and Michael had to remember that it was for discretion and nothing more.

When Michael’s hard-on faded, Alex pull back, his eyes on Michael’s chest instead of his eyes. Michael tried not to feel like an idiot, but he’d gotten hard in the middle of a ballroom while he held his ex who was already dating someone else, and it was a little difficult.

Then Alex said –

“I want to kiss you.” Michael looked to him with wide eyes, and was met with Alex’s dark, piercing gaze. He bit his lower lip, pained as he ran a hand through Michael’s curls in a way that made Michael’s toes curl and his heart stutter. “So badly.”

Michael leaned in, entranced, eager. “Y-Yeah?”

Alex visibly swallowed. “So I guess we’re both the bad guy.”

Michael faltered. Alex had put himself down for being a monster so many times. And every time, Michael had kept silent because he didn’t think any contradiction or praise he had would be taken seriously or with any gratitude. This, he thought, was one time too many.

He leaned in, his lips brushing Alex’s ear. “Not you, Private,” he whispered. “Not like this.”

He pulled back enough to look him in the eyes, Alex’s brows pinched, confused. Michael cupped his jaw.

“But if you’re still dating Forrest tomorrow,” he growled, and brushed his thumb against Alex’s lips, “I will be the bad guy.”

He let Alex go, charged and wanting, and walked back to the drinks table where Isobel stood with a glass of her own. She raised a knowing brow at him as he leaned against the wall, his hands clenched in his pockets, his eyes on Alex.

“Whatever you did,” Isobel muttered over her drink, “it worked.”

Michael watched with barely contained rage as Swindell seized his chance and made his way to Alex before anybody else could. Alex seemed to come back to himself as Swindell made his introduction. His shoulders straightened and he plastered on a smile that might’ve looked real to anyone who didn’t know him.

Michael hummed. Isobel nudged his arm with hers.

“So,” she said, “you let him go a lot more easily than I thought you would.”

He scoffed bitterly, counting down the seconds as Alex played out his part with all the precision and calculation of the hacker he was.

“I’m coming back for him,” he said, a promise to himself as Alex’s dark eyes glanced at him. “No one is taking him away from me again.”

***

Just a small, fun fic based on the recent jeanine and malex photo 💕

I made a twitter and IG, by the way, if anyone’s interested in following ❤

#michael guerin #alex manes #malex #malex fic #malex fanfic #malex fanfiction #roswell new mexico #roswell nm #malex angst #malex fluff #michael vlamis #tyler blackburn

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sims-half-crazy · 2 years

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In the spring of 1924, Walter was headed home when he was stopped on the street by a somewhat familiar face. Walter couldn't place the man's face, but he knew that he knew him.

"How's your wife and baby? Did everything go smoothly," the man inquired. At the confusion on Walter's face, he continued, "You don't remember me, do you? You flagged me down the night your wife was in labor. I drove you to the hospital." Walter's face instantly changed with the reminder of just who this man was.

"Oh my gracious! I'm so sorry that I didn't remember. You looked familiar, but for the life of me I coudln't place your face. Thank you so much for your kindness that night," Walter gushed in gratitude, "My wife and children are doing well and everything went as expected."

"I'm sorry...did you say children? Was there more than one?"

"Yes, she had twins! A girl and a boy. It was quite a suprise." Their conversation continued for some moments more before the gentleman remembered to introduce himself, again.

"I'm sorry, where are my manners? My name is Reece Ennis. I work over at SulPont."

(continued under the cut)

"SulPont? That's a nice gig. My wife would love to be able to use their research facilities. She's a biologist with a penchant for botany. She's convinced that some gum or rubber plant can make some new material."

"Does she know," Reece rubbed in chin in interest, "Does she have a degree? How long has she been researching this?"

"She does. She earned her degree from Foxbury Women's College, and she's been exploring this idea of hers for several years now. She gets so excited about it."

"Does she have any research she could share or would she be will to present her findings to my colleauges? There might be a job in it if she can impress my supervisors. I'm a chemist over there, but there's always room for another scientist."

"I'm sure she could pull something together and knock the socks off your upper management," Walter exclaimed.

"Good. Have her come by the offices next week. I'll set up a time and leave a note with one of our secretaries. It won't be an easy or quick process but if she's as passionate as you say about her work then SulPont should surely be interested." With that the two men shook hands and parted ways. Walter couldn't wait to dash upstairs and tell Alexia. He found her in the twins' room and the words just tumbled out of his mouth rapid succession. Alexia couldn't believe it! She was finally going to get her chance! She threw her arms around her husband and kissed him until they both needed to come up for air.

"Why don't you take this weekend to organize your notes, then take your research to the cafe. Get yourself a coffee and begin writing your paper without distraction from the kids or I."

"Oh Walter! I'm going to write the best paper those men have ever seen! Thank you so much!"

#waldrop 1920s #waldrop records #decades challenge #ts4 decades challenge #sims 4 screenshots #sims4 #sims 4 #sims 4 historical #ts4 historical #waldrop gen 3 #waldrop gen 4

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bluesakura007 · 3 years

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AOS Khan headcanons

I felt the urge to get these ideas I have out into writing because of how little this is delved into in STID, and because the books and comics and things aren’t really canon. I did take some inspiration for his backstory from the Khan comic series and another couple of tiny little bits that I found on Memory Beta though. ^^

Childhood and Origins

- He was born in 1970, his birthday being February the 10th. His mother was Dr. Sarina Kaur, an Indian biochemist living and working in New Delhi, but he has no biological father of any kind because after months of theoretical research, Sarina managed to successfully conceive a child from just one parent. This was because of a project in which she was investigating the possibility of asexual reproduction in human beings like in some species of plants and insects, hence it was dubbed the Chrysalis Project.

- Whilst Khan was still in utero, his mother introduced some adjustments into his DNA such as providing him with the ability to better remember events from the early years of his childhood and adding a few different ethnicities into the mix. The European ethnicity became the dominant one, which is why he has a light skin tone, blue eyes and an English accent despite being born to an Indian parent.

- She named him Khan after one of her grandfathers, gave him his surname after the 15th century poet Singh el Bashir and chose his middle name as Noonien after Noonien Prasad, her boyfriend who died from cancer while she was pregnant with Khan and who would have been a fatherly figure to him.

- Sarina was very caring and benevolent towards Khan, who she would often call her beautiful boy. The fact that her son looked so different to her and that she’d originally conceived him for the purpose of scientific research did nothing to stop her from loving him very dearly.

- She later died when he was four years old due to an accident at her laboratory one day: it started a fire in which she perished as she tried to escape. When the now orphaned little Khan found out about his mother’s death, he felt frightened now that he was alone and ran off into the streets of the city, moving from place to place every night with no other possessions except for his blanket.

- After a few days, he came across a group of half a dozen other street orphans led by an older boy with a heart condition named Tanvir Acharya, who allowed Khan to join them, making him the youngest member. The ragtag seven would go around exploring the city together and would make their days of living homeless feel that little bit less sad, and over the next year Khan and Tanvir became best friends, to the point where they ultimately saw each other as blood brothers.

- After a year, Khan, Tanvir and the others in the group, and several other orphans, were kidnapped off of the streets by men working for a geneticist, Dr. Heisen, and taken to be turned into genetically enhanced “supermen” via DNA-altering experiments.

- Another seven years on, when Khan was twelve years old, he and the others at the facility they were being kept at were now all Augments and were still in the captivity of Heisen and his scientists. Khan and Tanvir hatched a plan for the both of them to escape and then come back to liberate the others later on: they dug their way out of the facility grounds through the floor and fled in separate directions, promising to rendezvous at this time later on when they’d go back for the others, with Khan going off into the Gobi Desert. However, Khan was recaptured five days later thanks to the use of his neural inhibitor implanted in his and the others’ bodies in order to inflict pain at the push of a button. Upon his return to the facility, he found out that Tanvir had also been recaptured, but that he had died due to the use of his own neural inhibitor inadvertently stopping his heart, his condition having “slipped the net” from his enhancements.

- After another three years, the teenage Khan, having become embittered towards Heisen and his scientists, and the others took control of the facility after working together to remove their neural inhibitors, and after Khan killed Heisen by crushing his skull, he and the other Augment children finally escaped and left to see more of the world.

Global Rule

- Khan and the group of friends and comrades he had by then, some of them being other Augments that had also escaped from their own facilities, took control of the Indian government in 1990 and established The Great Khanate, an Augment government power encompassing India, Nepal, Mongolia, the Western half of Russia and the Middle East. The world was also ruled over by six other Augment powers: Alexander Newton in charge of the Empire of Newtonia and Verity Cheng leading the Cheng Federation - these two being the Great Khanate’s allies and respectively encompassing North America and the Eastern half of Asia - along with Asahf Ferris at the head of the Ferris Dominion in South America, Ama Owusu leading the African Caliphates in the entirety of the African continent, and the Khanate’s enemies allied with each other, respectively the Oceania and European powers led by Bernard Maltuvis and John Ericssen called Maltuvisland and Pax Europa.

- While the Cheng Federation and the Empire of Newtonia adopted the same rules of benevolence towards their subjects that Khan did, with the African Caliphates also doing the same, the Ferris Dominion extorted money from its own, and Pax Europa and Maltuvisland committed many executions of human enemies and expanded their territories the most aggressively.

- Verity, Alexander and Khan all promised to back each other up in the event of a war against John and Bernard, as defensive border skirmishes were shared with these two; these were made more difficult by the start of the Eugenics Wars in 1992, which meant that for the next four years every Augment power had human forces working against them as well. Ama and Asahf preferred to stay neutral during Khan, Verity and Alex’s cold war against Maltuvisland and Pax Europa - they both basically sat back away from the chaos sipping tea and saying “This is fine”.

- While the other four’s identities were public knowledge - Ama and the others in the African Caliphates government were greeted as heroes for freeing the citizens of Africa from the poverty and dictatorships that they were living under - Alex, Verity and Khan all kept their faces and voices as leaders a secret, going by false names in public.

Personality Traits and Interests

- Although Khan has a cold ruthlessness towards his enemies who incur his anger, and even then he can still have a merciful side to some of them, he’s benevolent towards animals and children, as he knows that they’re innocents. He’s still also merciful towards people who aren’t directly involved in the activities of said enemies or don’t know what they’re doing, and as a result tries to avoid killing these non-direct accomplices if he can help it.

- He was taught about Hinduism from an early age, but he doesn’t really follow any religions.

- He likes the feeling of riding a horse, because of the freedom it grants of being able to ride through wide open spaces with nothing holding him back.

- He keeps it locked away underneath the surface and keeps himself cold and aloof around his enemies and strangers, but if you’re a person that he really trusts he can let his emotions shine through. Khan’s got a big heart, it’s just been tainted by his experiences.

- What he’s also got is a hidden fondness for chocolates and a disliking for spicy foods, the latter of which being ironic due to the fact that he grew up in India.

- He has a loathing for the scientists who turned him into an Augment, who took away a normal childhood that he could have had and also ended up taking his best friend away from him, as they and the ones working for the other Augment facilities around the world during the 1970s and 80s effectively dressed up their selfish goals of using supermen as human weapons in a facade of idealism.

- However, Khan bears no ill will to the rest of mankind and this is why he committed no atrocities towards his human subjects while leading the Great Khanate - the fond memories he has of Sarina, of the happy days before she died back when he was four, are a reminder to him that not all non-enhanced humans are selfish and that they’re capable of kindness. Khan loves her very much in return, which means that although he may become ruthless and enraged in the heat of battle, he’ll never take out this rage on the human race in general, as doing so would be an affront to the memory of his mother.

#khan noonien singh #khan #khanbatch #khan singh #into darkness #star trek into darkness #star trek #star trek aos #aos #aos khan #into darkness khan #star trek headcanon #stid

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sweet-mahalo · 3 years

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Pt 1. LEVIHAN APOCALYPTIC AU.

She's running around the compound, step by step she continues trying to keep her composure. It's supposed to look like she's jogging, but her nerves are slowly getting to her. Feeling eyes on her back. The weight of the operation is on her shoulders today, in 5 minutes warfare will explode and the outcome of her comrades will depend on how she follows her role.

3 minutes left now, her pace is more focused, she has the mental image for success, her eyes are scanning her peripherals, looking for movement. In 2 minutes she'll have to make the best sprint of her life, her speed will mean saving the operation.

1 more minute to go, she traces the route on her mind, she studied the terrain for two weeks, she knows where she'll go next. One breath later and she's fully focused, feeling how her body prepares for the sprint, energy moving to her tights and stomach.

Boom!

A loud explosion 500 meters away is her signal to give her best, running as fast as she can. She passes by the exercise lot, takes a bag hidden in between two dry bushes, and takes it with her. Gunshots now seem to come from everywhere, apparently, inmates have escaped too and worsened the situation. She manages to get past the distracted guards and inside the building, time continues to tick, there is danger everywhere, guards fighting inmates trying to get to the west wing where the explosion managed to crumble the sturdy wall taking away their freedom. She's running opposite to them, her goal is the right-wing of the facility, where the crowd-control vehicles reside. Her legs are burning, and her heart is at maximum capacity, one, two, one, two, is the tempo that is keeping her sane. The hallways seem to be longer today, especially with the chaos.

Finally, the right-wing comes to view, but not without danger. She sees one big burly guard keeping his place in front of the doors leading to her final destination. He looks fearless, even among the destruction of the prison. Doubt settles in her stomach. Was it too late? Were they prepared for the attack? She feels like stopping to consider another strategy.

However, a voice in her head tells her that it's best to follow the plan she's spent so long developing so she does not slow her pace.

The guard noticed her from afar and prepared his gun in anticipation of an attack on their security. Now her mission has become fully suicidal. The Gun that was supposed to be smuggled with the bag got lost in the process. The only way is to continue running in a straight path and hope to tackle the obese guard and come up victorious to at least survive.

Predictably the guard fires away without any warning. The sound and smell of gunpowder are too close for comfort. The man fired five consecutive rounds until she reached him. She prayed that her height and speed gave her a chance to come out alive as she decided to tackle the guard.

Feeling lucky, she prepared for the takedown while the man fired a final round. Lowering her body, she finally got to the takedown.

She did it, her speed generated enough force to throw the man on his back, the gun sliding away from him. Recovering quickly from the impact she got up on her feet, and ran toward the gun, securing the threat by shooting the man in the head. Blood splattering everywhere around him. With the gun she no longer had to force the doors to open, firing one last shot to the electronic lock, the doors opened and revealed the end of her path. She now knew they'd succeeded.

Looking at all the military vehicles and seeing the time on her watch, she saw she had 6 minutes to spare. However, in her head, she could visualize military boots approaching fast.

Opening the bag, there was a set of prepared bombs that she set in the middle of the compound that held the 70 military vehicles for this section. She started the countdown after putting them under one of the gun trucks.

Taking the remnant tools of the bag and the gun, she went to look for the exit and escape route.

Smiling, she knew she made it, another successful mission.

------

At last, she was at their meeting site, in the city's underground recounting today's success. They had managed to take down more than half of the artillery of the military without many losses. The planning for the mission had begun months ago and had started with her getting into prison for a petty misdemeanor, and culminating a day before she was supposed to be released with the attack to the military forces. The plan was more than a success, due to the age of the building, it had crumbled down after the explosion she started at the warehouse. There was very little to save.

The commander had even come to congratulate her after his discourse. Her heart swelling with honor

-"Zoe Hanji, the future of humanity looks hopeful with warriors like you on our side... Congratulations." He said while tapping her shoulder.

This was it! Hanji was so happy she could barely contain her jitters, there was no way the smile she had could be removed from her face. She was now making a difference within the fireflies and within the shithole that was the district. She had always been optimistic, but this step was a concrete embodiment of what they could do. The vision for a better future for the citizens of District 5 seemed really close now. Hanji got lost in her musings of a better future that looked to be far far away these days.

Soon the meeting was over, only the high commands left discussing the future of their operations. Hanji was nothing but an outstanding recruiter with abilities for creating strategies and managing research on their not-so-legal fertility clinic.

Another recruit would've been discouraged by this arrangement, after having done so much for the movement and for so long but staying only as a regular soldier. However, she was one of the few members that still had a clear image on the outside, and a semblance of a job. There was no record officially tying her to the fireflies. If things had gone smoothly today, her record is still good enough within the eyes of the regular folk. In other words, she was a key peon to infiltrate the military's barriers and manage to snitch useful information to her team.

Feeling satisfied with herself, she started the 40-minute walk to her place. Hanji lived in district 5, one of the biggest districts, it managed to be one of the few that were over 150 km, with approximately 600.000 citizens. Descendants of the few survivors that managed to stay alive after the outbreak that happened 60 years ago. Her grandmother was the sole survivor of her family, a young 24-year-old military medic that was lucky enough to hide in a convoy with the few people that had enough money to pay for protection against the infected. The remaining segments of the government and military officials were able to save some land and organize a few sectors that could hold off the infected and let humanity's last survivors.

There were around 30 official districts in what used to be North America. She knew South America and Europe had more districts, resources, and places to live. But all communications and solidarity had been shut off since the plague started. Asia and Africa had been decimated at the beginning of the pandemic, the political warfare ended up with an atomic bomb that ruined most of the countries.

All are connected by the same dictatorship. A few of them managed to strive even in the apocalypse, but many of them, including hers, were slowly collapsing under the strict military censorship, lack of resources, disease, nepotism, and inequality. Her particular worry was the pummeling birthrate and infertility within young women in district 5, adding hunger, she knew all was soon to collapse. The military was greedy and corrupt, she had been hopeless working full time at the local hospital trying to reach someone that would realize the seriousness of their situation. Nonetheless, all was fruitless.

This was her situation until a guerilla movement that started brewing in district 10 reached them and recruited her when they noticed her efforts to help.

Finally, a much-needed fertility clinic was born, as it was financed by the fireflies it had a rough start. But soon the rich families took interest and research took off. Within two years 75 babies had been born using hormone therapy and the eggs of the few women that still could reproduce.

Her research team also discovered that the cause of infertility was due to the water of the nearby river. The water plant they had been using was useless at cleaning the mercury present in the water. A huge scandal took place once her research was published, so for this, she knew the military could have an eye on her. Thankfully she was also protected by the rich who had gotten healthy offspring due to her efforts.

Still, 7 out of 10 women are infertile. The few babies that are born have deformities and die soon after childbirth. Then, considering the number of people that are dying of disease and hunger every day makes the Child mortality rate much more gruesome. And still, there are no efforts made to fix this from the ruling party.

Walking up the streets filled with rats, criminals, homeless people, and rugged houses, Hanji looks up at the sky and exhales a huge sigh. Today she does not feel like looking at the depressing scenery. At least she has the stars to clean her mind.

By the time she reaches the dusty one-bedroom apartment she collapses on her trashy bed. It feels like heaven after months of sleeping on the jail cell floor. Soon, she drifts into a restless sleep.

------

Sun and heat are enveloping her whole body, she's woken up by the sweat covering her all around. Her short hair and bangs sticking up her face. She puts a hand up to clean off the sweat accumulating at her neck. She next touches her chest, it feels like fire. Hanji inhales, but it feels as if there was no oxygen in the air, as if she was breathing through a wet rag in a desert.

Finally, she opens up her eyes to see that she'd left the windows closed and the curtains open. Sun shining down directly at her face. Her crappy fan was moving slowly, doing barely anything, looking as nasty as her.

-What a happy, sunny day- She says sarcastically. Taking off the borrowed blouse they had given her at the meeting.

Walking to the bathroom she could finally see herself in the dirty mirror in front of her small hand-washer.

-Shit- is the only word that comes from her mouth.

Putting her hands on her cheeks she saw that her face looked gaunt. Hanji had always been naturally slender, but not this much. Flexing her arms she noticed she had lost muscle mass too. Ribs were poking through her lean abdomen, her small boobs almost imperceptible at the lack of fat and wide shoulders. Dark bruises lining all over her torso and back. She didn't even know how she got them.

To be honest, she felt as bad as she looked. Greasy hair and all.

After taking a thorough shower she opened up the windows and took off to look for Eren first. She was fuming and starving, but mostly wanting to strangle him for being an idiot. The bratty teenager was supposed to clean the apartment up and restock her fridge for her return. She was going to take back the money she paid him and give him a beating to top it off.

Walking down the street she took long strides toward the place he always was. The shitty-looking boxing gym where they met. No pleasant memories this time, as she saw his coconut head laughing with his friends while she was dying.

Using her height advantage, she was able to easily sneak up on him and put him in a chokehold. The teen managed to strike a few weak punches and pull her hair a little, but her anger was stronger.

-"You little shit! Give me my money back."-

The weakened punches and gurgling alerted her that the lesson had been enough. At the end of the day, he was like her child, so her anger diffused quickly. Pushing him away, he struggled a bit to regain his breath and he looked at her with wide eyes.

-Hanji? What the fuck?! - he said while still coughing. -You almost broke my neck!-

- it's me who should be asking you that! Why is my fridge empty? My house smells like death!-

- What did you do with my money all this time?!-

Looking embarrassed after recovering a little, he looked her in the eye: - ... I forgot-

Her anger returned -Forgot what?! How? Didn't you see yesterday's mess? - she said while getting closer to his face, putting her chin down to look him in the eye.

-I thought that your release was tomorrow, I swear! I have it on my calendar! -

Looking at her with his green wide eyes, there was not much she could do. She knew he was not lying. The kid was loyal like a puppy so she only sighed, averted her gaze, and looked back at him with a bit of mirth and disappointment.

-You're hopeless you know?- Putting her hand on his head she messed with his hair.

-...It hurts me more to know that you forgot about me, actually-

He smacked her hand away -I didn't! The date was tomorrow! I'm telling you, I have it written.

Hanji put her arm back around his shoulder, and whispered in his ear -Yes, but I also told you, and I gave you a note about my unofficial release date you know?-

-... I lost it... I promise you, I was sure it was tomorrow- Eren said while looking away.

-Hm, it's ok... Go clean it now, and fill up my fridge you brat- looking thoughtful she continued - or I'll beat you up, just like I did now- she ended while laughing -I thought that you'd grow up a little and get better at fighting, but you still suck man-

He pushed her away and took her by surprise as he managed to move her. So he was finally becoming a man, after all, hanji thought.

-You look like a skeleton, I can beat you up whenever I want- With a smirk he said - I only lost last time because you have a height advantage, but that is all, I'm stronger and younger at the end.

-Well... whatever, I'm not here to destroy your ego. Now, feed me-

After an unfulfilling breakfast, Eren left to go clean her apartment, finally apologizing and promising to accomplish what he had promised. So she took off to the military police department to report herself in, and make her release official before any corrupt officer beat her to it.

Considering yesterday's events, the elevated amount of military presence in the streets was something hanji expected. Even knowing this, her heart was beating fast, and she was sweating off her breakfast quickly. She knew the security cameras had been disabled, that the mask she had on, plus the chaos was enough to rule out any trustworthy witness. But this was paranoia, an irrational, emotional reaction that made her want to sprint out of the street and hide in a corner.

She fought off the urge and tried to appear nonchalant. If she does not get to the office soon, she won't have protection against being imprisoned again for escaping.

Perhaps if she hadn't been so nervous, she wouldn't have heard the yelp coming from the alley next to the sidewalk she was on. Her senses focused, behind the humidity and natural grime of the air, she smelled the distinctive scent of iron and egg. For her to be able to perceive this, and from this distance, she was sure that someone was bleeding out in the alley. The smell was too familiar to be anything else.

Slowly, hanji turned her head in the direction of the smell and started walking. Keeping her eyes on the floor as if to appear inconspicuous. Looking at her worn-out tennis, she got into the alley and tried to make as little sound as possible, in case there was danger around.

Hanji didn't have to wait for too much to see the source of the smell. There was a dead man with his throat cut out in front of her, but a dead body could not make a sound. Turning her head she saw that in front of the body there was a big dumpster, and behind it, there was some shuffling and the source of the sound.

Suddenly, a black boot became visible from behind the dumpster. She recognized the military boot immediately. The person hidden by the dumpster seemed to be convulsing and even with the risks, she made her choice. With the determination that she had been missing a few seconds ago, she sprinted toward the soldier.

This was a view she was not expecting. A tiny, tiny... girl dressed as a military recruit was lying half in the ground, covered in blood while struggling to breathe. Her hands clutching her neck while her feet kicked under her, eyes wide, and face red. Her hair was untied and her movements had increasingly become more and more frantic. Next to her was a scratched helmet and a bloody knife.

Quickly she took the girl's hands away from her neck, she touched and probed the skin around it, to check if the trachea had been damaged. A clear picture of the dead man choking the girl came to view. However, no hematoma had formed yet, and her neck was full of blood, so she could not see the skin to assess the damage. Stupidly, she asked.

-"Why can't you breathe?"

The girl seemed to move increasingly faster. Her breathing was forced, but still present, and she was now again touching her neck. Hanji could see her ribs going up and down, indicating she was breathing still. Quickly, she turned her so that the girl laid on her side, right hand up, and down her head, while she prodded her back to check for any injury to her lungs.

This prompted the silent answer to her question. The girl had been choking on her own blood. After being put on her side, she spits the dark liquid and took a big gulp of air. It seemed like, in her panicked state, she was choking herself without realizing it. Hanji looked at the side of her face and tried to touch her face to continue her check-up. Despite her efforts to help, the girl stopped her hand in a gentle, but firm grasp.

-"I'm not hurt"- The girl barely said, while continuing to spit blood.

-Wh... You bit your tongue- Deadpanned Hanji. She tried to reach out to her again. However, the soldier no longer had fear in her eyes. Instead, a steady gaze replaced the previous one, implicitly preventing her from nearing her any further. Hanji took this as her signal to flee the place. Knowing that at any time she could be processed or wrongly linked to the scene.

She waited a bit until the soldier sat more comfortably, and slowly started to move away from her, crouching back on the tip of her toes. Swiftly, Hanji stood up, and took a step back, planning to flee.

The sound of a gun being unlocked stopped her movements.

-"Where do you think you're going?"-

A low, raspy voice coming from behind her interrupted her plans. She could almost taste the anger lacing the words. A shiver ran down her spine. She was fucked.

Putting her hands up, she didn't dare to turn around. It seemed like her body decided that the best course of action was to freeze.

Could it be that the dead man had a friend? Or even worse, was this an ambush? Had they caught Eren in her apartment? Did they kill him? Did he snitch on her?

-You okay?- The voice said again, but not to her.

Suddenly, relief flooded her system. Had it been an ambush, the guy would not have worried about the soldier. She could get out of this easily.

Before the girl could say anything, Hanji turned her head around and answered on her behalf.

-"I found her choking, she seems to be fine, but I think she bit her tongue"-

-"..."

From her peripherals she could not see anything, the guy was on her blind spot, hidden completely. She figured his question was answered in silence when she looked back at the girl sitting on the floor, who had her eyes directed at the figure behind hanji.

-"Turn around, slowly. Make a sudden movement and I'll shoot you"- Perhaps it'd not be that easy to leave, hearing how the menacing tone had not changed.

She did as she was told, and was surprised to find a short man behind that mighty voice.

Looking at his eyes, however, was a different story. Grey, and dead, was the only way she could describe them. The bags down his eyes framing the macabre picture together. His eyes seemed more dangerous than his gun.

-"State your name, age, and identification"- Again, tone dry and menacing.

Fuck.

-"Zoe Hanji, 28. And I don't have to tell you anything else, I have not done anything wrong."

-"Identification"- He repeated, moving the gun as an indication for her to answer.

-"How do I know you're not one of these gangsters?" She pointed at the dead body with a tilt of her head. -"This is not a regular procedure for an officer, you didn't even announce your presence!" She finished, faking anger.

-"I will not repeat it again. Give me your identification, or you'll come with me".

Pure dread settled in her stomach. She had just tasted freedom and was going to be back at the gutter for being careless. Her commander would not be happy with her. Another month without her working at the clinic, meant losing more clients and cash for their movement. At last, she looked at the sky again and accepted that this was all her fault. Sighing, she gave the man his answer.

-"She helped me out"- Stated the girl behind her, sounding better, and closer now. The girl walked to stand next to the man, and spit out more blood. -"I panicked"-

At this, he lowered his gun, but still glanced at her with suspicion. She put her eyes down, and then looked around while he looked for her id number on his device.

In times like this, she wished she could take refuge in religion... Perhaps a God could take pity on her dire situation. Briefly, she distracted herself thinking that the Gods had punished her enough by making her human. The disabled children overpopulating the local orphanage seemed to be happier than anyone else by having little intelligence and basic awareness. When she was feeling particularly pathetic, thoughts like this swam freely in her mind.

-"Huh..." Said the man -"Seems like you're going with me after all, four eyes".

Another sigh.

-"No thank you... I don't date short men"

Hanji knew it was a lost cause. That's why she had said it. It was temporary relief to her distress, so why not? The girl, Petra, who now had a name, had looked at her in pure surprise. She was nowhere to be seen while hanji stayed in the temporary prison in one of the newest commando units. It looked fancier than it should be, she thought and expressed this out loud to the soldier that had turned her in.

After being ignored again she focused back on him. He was finishing paperwork with the local officer, who now that she noticed, had a baby face and seemed to be more afraid of the soldier than her.

-"Hey, where are you guys getting all of these kids to work with you? Petra looks pretty young. How old is she?" - She answered herself - "17?"

She continued after the silence, moving a bit to let blood flow to her cuffed hands.

-"And you, officer? I apologize, but you don't seem to be older than 15. Why is that?"

At last, she managed to get a reaction from the soldier next to the young officer.

-"Keep talking and I'll make sure you rot in this hell for more than you have to"

-"You can't do that, you're nothing but a soldier"- She stated with confidence.

The officer flushed and looked down at his paperwork. The soldier only glanced at her, as stoic as ever.

After this brief encounter he left, but neither he nor the offer gave any indication of what would happen to her. She knew for the experience that once she was in, there was no way of communicating with the outside world before the supposed trial. A corrupt facade where the accusers played as the judge, and the defense. Hanji was going to be sentenced to a year in jail for escaping. Another 4 months for disrespecting authority. And this was the best-case scenario.

More than 6 hours had passed. And she was in pain all over, grunting to relieve some of the discomfort caused by her now swollen wrists and for her previous injuries.

She was currently the only prisoner. The officer's desk at the center of it all.

-"Excuse me! Officer, the cuffs are too tight. My hands are numb. Could you lose them a bit?"-.

Now that the man was gone the little officer had gained some confidence.

"-Be quiet. I won't fall for that trick, I know I put them well-"

"-Yes, well.. we all make mistakes. I'm telling you, they are too tight-"

The sudden outburst was unexpected. The rookie had stood up from his desk, and smashed his baton loudly against her cell.

-"Shut up, or I'll do it for you"-

So this was a little man trying to appear big. Hanjo thought this idiot was dangerous, but not for his own merit but because he'd do anything to save his fragile ego. Still, something within her wanted to rile him up, to see how his toddler tantrum would end up. So she pushed him a bit more.

-"What? You'll snitch me with your teacher?... Did they take you straight out of the kindergarten?"

Now the kid was fuming. His pale face is all red again, eyes watery, just like Hanji predicted.

She couldn't help but laugh at his expression. But this was the wrong move as the kid smashed the bars again, and moved to open up the jail cell.

-"Yeah? You think you're funny? We'll see who laughs last, bitch!".

#levihan #anime #levi attack on titan #aot hanji #levi x hanji #post apocalyptic #attack on titan #hange zoë #levi x hange #ficlet #fic rec #fanfic

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bloglegal936 · 3 years

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Jurassic Park Operation Genesis Game

Operation Genesis is the Jurassic Park game they should have made from the beginning. While that’s not to imply I didn’t enjoy many of its action or exploration based titles, the tycoon genre fits the source material perfectly. Sure, if this was made in 1994 then it wouldn’t be 3D. The AI might not be as good. The systems might not be as refined, without plenty of previous tycoon games to use as models. But, it would be the one thing the 2003 release isn’t – relevant.

Jurassic Park Operation Genesis Games

Jurassic Park Operation Genesis Gamecube

The collective shrug given when this was released is why I’m going to assume you don’t know much about the game today. Which is a shame, because they really have created a solid simulation here, with plenty of micromanagement nuances to hook in fans of the genre, and plenty of awesome dinosaurs to sweeten the deal. You may not be able to do absolutely everything you’d like, but you’re pretty much free to build your own, authentic-feeling version of Hammond’s titular attraction.

The game has four total modes, with three as bonus variants of the central sandbox simulator. You start with terrain sliders that generate an empty island for you to build upon. You’re given two passive herbivores and $60k in starting funds. You’ll plant a welcome center for arriving visitors, use electrified fencing to draw out some dino pens, and then set about satisfying everyone’s needs to maximize your cash flow.

Game months last about five minutes, and each quarter, you’ll get reports from the corporate board on your progress. Your ultimate goal is to create a five-star park, with each half-star bringing in more and more guests. You can adjust the prices for the main gate, food stands, souvenirs, individual attractions, and even charge a fee for the toilets if you’re a fucking monster. Along the way, you’ll have each of the movie’s characters appear in an advisory role. Each heads a department, and will notify (and often nag) you through in-game mail about any issue that might need your attention.

Dinosaurs have Sims-style meters for hunger, thirst, health, and happiness. Herbivores have an extra meter for trees (they want lots of foliage around) while carnivores have an extra meter for hunting (they will start trying to break out if you don’t give them other dinos to chase). If you don’t build pens with food dispensers, available water, and usually multiple copies of a species to form a pack, visitors will complain that your star attractions aren’t active or very interesting. Like sick pandas at the zoo, depressed dinosaurs just bum everyone out.

Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis: With Christopher Kirby, Marcella Russo, Charles 'Bud' Tingwell. Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis is a construction and management simulation video game based on the Jurassic Park series. 4.5 out of 5 stars. (40) 40 product ratings - Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis (PC, 2003) Complete Windows Universal CPU Game. Download Jurassic Park Operation Genesis 1.0 from our website for free. This program is an intellectual property of Universal Interactive. This PC program is developed for Windows XP/Vista/7/8/10 environment, 32-bit version. Also the software is known as 'Jurassic Park Operation Genesis Demo'. The program lies within Games, more precisely Action.

Meanwhile, you’re allocating funds to research and development. Dr. Grant supervises dig teams at fossil sites around the world. Roughly once a game month, each team will uncover some samples, with species and era determined by the site you’ve chosen. Fossils go to Dr. Wu, who extracts DNA for your dino clones. Once you have 50% of a species’ DNA, you can crank them out through the hatchery facility. However, they’ll die prematurely – usually in a handful of months, making them less of an investment. More DNA means they’ll live longer, with 100% dinosaurs lasting for 4 years or more. Wu can also research new facilities and upgrades for your park, which range from useful (visitor rest areas) to mandatory (weather protection).

The game’s other half is all about your patrons. Visitors have similar hunger and happiness meters, and you’ll need to have food stands with reasonable prices, benches when they get tired of walking, bathrooms for the pooping, and cleaning crews to keep the park nice and tidy. Visitors have also come all this way to see some damn dinosaurs, so you’ll need to plant watch towers or cut viewing areas in the fences, ideally in locations where the most number of dinosaurs in the pen are congregating and visible. Spending some money on research will let you build balloon rides, underground viewing domes, or safari tours in the Ford Explorer from the film. Unfortunately you can’t build a movie-accurate vehicle tour – for gameplay purposes, your Park is smaller and based around walking.

Just the above would probably make a solid enough sim, but this is only the foundation. We’re about to head down the rabbit hole.

There are seven different illnesses dinosaurs can catch, all of which threaten to spread to others in the pen. Through research, you can unlock vaccines. These are delivered via the Ranger Station’s helicopter, which can also airlift dinos to new pens or “retire” berserk carnivores (or low-earning ones). You can also research the ability to automatically immunize every new dinosaur with all the vaccines currently unlocked, making future animals significantly less of a hassle. Further, you can plant modern trees or the more expensive paleo trees for your herbivore friends. Modern trees, appropriately, have a greater risk of making dinosaurs sick.

Visitors come in four different groups. The “mainstream” group is happy just to see dinosaurs while having enough amenities to make their stay pleasant. Thrill seekers and fun lovers get excited about carnivores and herbivores, respectively. Placing viewing spots in full view of those dino types will please these guests. The final category, “dino nerds,” want everything as authentic as possible. This means paleo trees and wide pens, filled only with dinosaurs from the same era (helpfully referenced in an in-game “dinopedia”). It doesn’t seem that you can build a park that specifically attracts just one group, nor are you meant to. It’s easy enough to satisfy all four groups if you’re just paying attention, while attractions can be individually biased to boost their appeal to one of the four visitor types.

It’s Jurassic Park, so carnivores are dangerous and shit occasionally goes wrong. Lightning storms or tornadoes can trash your fences, or more aggressive species can escape from low security pens – Raptors will regularly try to break out, or Dilophosaurs will spit venom at guests through weak fence gaps. You can activate Emergency Mode in response to dangerous weather or loose critters. Visitors will head for the exit, or take shelter in bunkers if you’ve researched and built them. Loose carnivores can and will kill hapless tourists, understandably causing a hit to your park’s reputation. To further prevent this, you can research and build sentry turrets to take down rampaging dinos, or take over the ranger helicopter and snipe them yourself.

Finally, you have to build and pay for automated “feeders” in each pen, because the dinos can’t subsist only on trees or each other. Yes, the game included the book’s lysine deficiency security measure, and the dinos will die if they don’t get treated food. Blue Tongue really didn’t miss a trick here, and I congratulate their thoroughness. While I haven’t encountered a randomized “greedy fat guy shut down your park and stole your embryos” disaster yet, I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s in there.

Controls are simple enough, optionally using the keyboard for the camera, or button combos on the mouse to pan, tilt, rotate and zoom. Once you grasp the basic concepts and the purpose of each structure, it’s easy enough to get going and difficult to miss out on any critical necessities. Both visitors and dinos can be clicked for detailed status information or history, while thought bubbles with emotion icons (a laTheme Park) give you a shorthand way to spot any problems.

If the main mode is too freeform for you, you can hit the Exercise modes. It’s the same park simulator but with scenarios and objectives that range from rebuilding a park after a hurricane, to “Jurassic Classic” which asks you to have all of the movie’s dinosaurs on a recreation of the film’s familiar island. Early missions act as tutorials, but all missions give some level of guidance throughout. I found it very enjoyable to have additional goals, as I tend to suffer from a bit of “ehrrr… what now?” syndrome when left entirely to my own devices (see: any attempt I’ve made to play Minecraft).

Less interesting are the Missions, which take the player-controlled options of the tour vehicle and helicopter and try to make minigames out of them. You’ll be asked to drive the Explorer around and snap photos of dinos, graded with points, or snipe loose dinos from the chopper in a set amount of time. Basic stuff, and a nice – though forgettable – inclusion. Beating all challenges and missions unlocks “Site B” mode, which removes visitors and allows you to plant dinos at will on an empty island. It’s really only interesting if you want to watch their emergent AI.

Graphics are actually quite impressive. A reasonable amount of trees get rendered, you can see pretty far off in the distance, and water accurately reflects whatever structures you put nearby. Rain, and its associated fog effects, look fantastic, with an awesome bloom on the fence lights. Animations are done well, and it’s fairly interesting to just watch the dinosaurs move around, chase, eat, sleep, and even poop (yup). The engine allows you to zoom in to an awesome degree, alongside the authentic, ground-level views from your watchtowers or viewing domes. You can use these views to spot trees that might be blocking line of sight and affecting the attraction’s score. Even the visitors carry around visible souvenirs they bought.

My biggest complaint is that the game is awfully easy overall. As long as you understand the requirements for both visitors and dinos, profit rolls right in. I never felt strapped for cash. I never had a dino escape, and frankly don’t see how it’s possible. My dinos only died of old age, never from surprising, costly complications. There’s only one rare disaster – the tornado – and when it rolled through it just damaged some buildings and broke some easily-repaired fences. I even built a park where loose Raptors waited to “greet” incoming guests, but despite the endless carnage, was never shut down by the company or authorities. I don’t want to suggest this is exactly “My First Little Tycoon Game,” but it does seem that, despite the complexity, a serious challenge was never intended.

It should have been released in the 90s, but Operation Genesis is still a solid management sim. The game’s dinosaurs react convincingly, and any visitor complaints seem fair. It feels a little light with only four attractions and one disaster, but there’s enough to keep your interest on the way to building a five-star park. Challenge modes offer some appreciated extra variety. Hardcore tycoons will surely find this lacking, but this ends up being one of the better Jurassic Park games.

The Good

Looks great, even ten years later. Good balance of dino and visitor needs without feeling overwhelming. Generous opportunities for mischief (big fan of the Bunker Race Challenge).

The Bad

Some dinos are just obvious reskins of others, with identical animation and behavior. Involved, but not terribly challenging. Mission modes feel out of place.

(Total: 1 Average: 5)

Following in the tradition of SimCity and Theme Park, Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis involves designing a dinosaur theme park from the ground-up and then maintaining its economic viability by keeping things safe and stable. Of course, that may be easier said than done when the 'attractions' include velociraptors, tyrannosaurs, and other fearsome creatures. In addition to creating the park, players are challenged to complete a series of 12 missions ranging from dinosaur control to enduring the ravages of nature.

There have been many games released over the years based on the popular Jurassic Park franchise, dating back as far as the classical 8-bit era. But as is the case with so many movie-to-game translations, these Jurassic Park titles were, for lack of a more brutal opinion, not so good. And then came the grand-pappy of them all, the one JP game that would irrevocably damper the enthusiasm of countless frog DNA fans, the PC game Trespasser. The now-infamous co-creator of the Xbox, Seamus Blackley, can be thanked for the game that was ludicrously hyped until the moment the first hand set finger to keyboard, at which point the game was exposed as the hey-I-can-see-down-my-female-character's-shirt simulator that it was. Hehe, Trespasser, yah, that game sucked. But you can only keep a good raptor down for so long before he instinctively lunges towards your jugular, or so the saying goes. Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis is the manifestation of a franchise phoenix reborn from the ashes, like fictitious dinosaurs borne from long-forgotten DNA lodged in an amber-sealed mosquito. Though not without its faults and blemishes, Operation Genesis serves up a healthy dose of dino-tainment in a fun strategy-oriented sim-osaurus package.

Since I've already pissed away any semblance of journalistic integrity with my blatant self-indulgent and somewhat retarded word-combinations, I might as well keep the fire burning. I wouldn't go so far as to say Operation Genesis is jurass-ariffic, nor would I say that it is ass-tastic. Somewhere between the two lies an accurate assessment. But somewhere in between is a place that this franchise has rarely been. So that alone qualifies Operation Genesis a landmark event; 'finally, a non-sucking Jurassic Park game!'. ('Doesn't suck' should be a bullet-point feature these days.) How did developer Blue Tongue achieve 'somewhere in between-ness', you ask? Basically they used the 'Jurassic Park concept' in a way that actually makes sense; a build your own theme park starring living attractions of the long-tailed Mesozoic reptilian variety. That's right, you'll design, build, and maintain a dinosaur theme park, recreating the epic undertaking that was portrayed in the first movie. That means you'll oversee and command everything from extracting dino-DNA from freshly procured specimens to piloting the chopper that will inevitably be needed to wrangle the rampaging product of your powerful and chaotic creations. Not to mention the rudimentary everyday tasks required to run a theme park like maintaining a clean environment, setting ticket prices, strategically placing customer necessities, amenities and attractions like restrooms, kiosks, and safari adventures, and researching new ways to improve the experience for the customer.

While the trappings of other sim theme park games are present, the main catch here is obviously the monstrous ancient beasts of destruction, which you can raise and release into the park for the amusement of human consumers. For every species of dinosaur you want featured as an attraction, you'll first need to assign people to archaeological fossil digs. Then you can use the genetic material that they've uncovered to splice together a particular dinosaur's DNA. The more genetic material you find for a specific dinosaur, the higher the quality will be for the finished product. Of course, this costs lots of money and as you get further into the game, you'll be required to spend some serious cash in order to produce the more popular dinosaurs, which will in turn attract more customers who like to gorge on dino-burgers and ogle at beasts who wouldn't hesitate to chomp their head off have they the chance.

Everything in Operation Genesis costs money, so you'll have to find a balance early on between charging sensible rates for customers and spending money within your bounds. You'll be able to modify the price for nearly everything in your park: observation areas, souvenir shops, food, ticket prices, and even bathrooms. Finding the right balance is a matter of studying customer reports, which give you an indication as to how you should modify the various prices for goods and services within the theme park. You'll also need to pay attention to what the customers think about the dinosaurs in your park. For instance, if your dinos don't have enough to eat via automatic feeding systems, then they will get sick, which isn't good for customer satisfaction since they paid to see some action. On the other hand, you'll want to make sure you keep your dinosaurs in check with suitable electrically charged fences and such.

Every dinosaur in Operation Genesis is unique not only in terms of size and shape, but in feeding habits, environmental likes and dislikes, etc. Luckily, the built-in dinosaur information system will fill you in on the various details of each type. It isn't hard to simply produce 20 carnivores and reel in cash on a consistent basis, but studying what kind of environments your dinosaurs prefer and implementing a suitable area for them to roam will boost sales considerably, so there is incentive to do some studying. Optimizing your park in this way is pretty time-consuming though, and it doesn't take long for this sort of micromanagement to get tedious. What makes understanding the intricacies of theme park management so necessary is the fact that you'll often be scrutinized by the board of directors who fund it, and they always want to see a healthy profit margin. The bottom line is the only thing considered by these people, and while this may be a realistic portrayal, it doesn't do much to enhance gameplay.

But the whole game isn't just about micromanagement and paperwork, you'll also have the option to pilot the dinosaur-assistance helicopter and manually tranquillize dinosaurs, or even hop in a Land Cruiser and tour your park via your custom made Safari Adventure and take pictures. These action sequences are a nice departure from the game's focus on strategy but truth be told, they are pretty pointless. You can just command someone to tranq an out-of-control dinosaur and it'll get done in no time, whereas when you manually pilot the chopper, it often takes a while to track down and snipe the dinosaur in question. Nevertheless, these are appreciated additions that help to keep the game feeling fresh.

Visually, JP:OG looks pretty good. The dinosaurs move in realistic fashion and, when left to their own devices, often evoke some pretty interesting animations. Textures are clean and crisp throughout and the various structures that you place are believably detailed. That said, the environments are fairly repetitive and the customer character models very simplistic. But since everything is rendered in 3D, and it is not uncommon to see dozens of characters on screen at any given time, it makes sense that the developers needed to optimize their usage of polygons. The camera system is smooth as buttah and very functional, allowing you to pan around the park, zoom in on a particular dinosaur, or zoom out to make a large chunk of the theme park visible. The music in Operation Genesis perfectly captures the spirit of the franchise, though the soundtrack's dependency on the original JP theme will burn you out on the track irrevocably. The sound effects are utilized in a very straightforward, no frills fashion and while the scarcity of beeps and bleeps may seem odd at first, it does actually help in terms of immersion since you won't be taken out of the experience due to an overabundance of distracting sounds. Mostly, sound effects come in the form of roaring dinosaurs, menu clicks, voice samples, and the obligatory ambient rumblings.

Jurassic Park Operation Genesis Games

Overall, Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis is a noble attempt at revitalizing an aging franchise. The theme park concept is a great idea; to think that it took countless marketing geniuses so long to think of it is mind-boggling. The game is pretty slow-paced and outside of the few mentioned action sequences, is almost devoid of any visceral attributes that seem so inherent with flesh-eating dinosaurs. But if you have the patience to excel at the game, or are just a rabid RTS fan, then you'd be well advised to download Operation Genesis.

Jurassic Park Operation Genesis Gamecube

People who downloaded Jurassic Park: Operation Genesis have also downloaded: Jurassic Park: Trespasser, Zoo Tycoon, Lord of the Rings, The: The Battle for Middle Earth II, Lord of the Rings, The: Battle for Middle-Earth, Zoo Tycoon 2, Jurassic Park, Jurassic Park: Chaos Island, Dino Crisis

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eretzyisrael · 4 years

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It’s the green industry’s dirty little secret: “dirty” plastic can’t be recycled.

That means that the plastic mayonnaise or shampoo container you carefully placed in the plastic bin at the curb is most likely headed for landfill rather than being repurposed into something friendlier for the planet. The same is true for used plastic from agriculture.

And forget about plastic supermarket bags – they’re not recyclable at all.

Indeed, as of 2015, only 9% of the plastic produced in the United States was recycled.

In 2017, the dirty plastic secret burst into the open when China, which used to take the majority of the world’s plastic waste, declared that it would accept only “clean” plastic. Suddenly, cities across the globe had nowhere to send their plastic. Some even began removing recycling bins and pickups.

“The price of plastics has plummeted to the extent that it isn’t worth recycling,” Jamie Smith, general managers of Green Recycling in the UK, told the Guardian newspaper last year. “If China doesn’t take plastic, we can’t sell it.”

Dirty plastic eventually found its way to other parts of Asia – Indonesia and Vietnam in particular – but unless it’s meticulously cleaned, which is not economically viable, it usually ends up buried or burned. This has become a huge environmental hazard.

Israeli recycling firm Alkemy of Beit She’an has mastered turning dirty plastic into plastic sheeting used in construction to seal surfaces, says Noah Hershcoviz from investment banking firm A-Labs, which has been assisting Alkemy with branding and fundraising.

Hershcoviz adds that 70 percent of the distributors in Israel selling this type of plastic sheeting “use Alkemy as the main product for their construction clients.”

Projects include Israel’s growing number of highway tunnels, as well as stadiums and military installations.

“When you use a product for sealing, you want the best product there is. You don’t want there to be any breach of water or roots,” Hershcoviz explains. “We meet all the standards of the modern construction business.”

Multibillion-dollar market

Alkemy’s potential market is large: Allied Market Research estimates the global market for building and construction plastics will be worth $105 billion by 2025. Research firm Reports and Data puts the total even higher, at $128 billion by 2026.

The Alkemy system strings together several off-the-shelf standard industrial machines that, when run according to Alkemy’s methodology, heat (without burning) the dirty plastic to “normalize” its texture and form before outputting it into a ready-to-make sealing product.

There’s no need to ship the raw plastic to one facility for sorting, another for cleaning and a third to fashion the end product.

With its technology and business model now proven in Israel, Alkemy aims to go public on the Toronto Stock Exchange by early 2021. The company has raised around $13 million, including some $10 million from its founders.

The company’s CEO, Shmulik Porre, was previously CEO of Tnuva’s Romanian subsidiary and CEO of Tambour, a leading chemical and paint manufacturer in Israel. Chairman of the Board Yoav Horowitz previously directed the prime minister’s office in Israel. Another Alkemy executive, Lenny Recanati, is part of the controlling interest of IDB Holding, at one time Israel’s largest investment company.

Joint ventures in Europe

Alkemy, founded in 2016, is in the process of rebranding; its official name is still K.B. Recycling.

And its construction-ready plastic sealant products (dubbed Armadillo, Rhino, Cricket and Elephant) are “just the tip of the iceberg,” Hershcoviz says.

Through partnerships, Alkemy aims eventually to output more sophisticated products – for example, a complete recycled plastic garbage bin, including wheels and hinges – customized for individual market needs.

Alkemy’s plastic can be used for any kind of product except those where 100% purity is required – so, no food containers or baby bottles.

Alkemy, which employs 30 people, is looking to expand first to Europe. The EU has set a target calling for 60% of plastic to be recycled by 2025 and for recyclable waste to be banned from landfills. That makes solutions like Alkemy’s not only good for the planet but good for business.

Two joint ventures currently in the works include recycling business partners in France and Germany. Alkemy says its ideal solution will be to set up plants at dumpsites.

A-Labs has built its consulting business around working only with Israeli startups “that can transform the ecosystem,” Hershcoviz stresses. An example: Else Nutrition, which has developed an organic vegan baby formula based on buckwheat, tapioca and almonds. A-Labs took Else Nutrition public in Toronto, too.

But it’s Alkemy that may make the biggest global impact, targeting a mostly untouched market since current plastic recycling systems work mainly with clean “virgin” plastic. And as stricter environmental regulations kick in, Alkemy’s true alchemy may be just around the bin.

#Israel #a-lab #Recycling #Environment #Alkemy #Waste Disposal

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diavolodigitale · 3 years

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The Hitchhiker's Guide to Andromeda Galaxy - pt.3 Havarl

Oof, the chapters are getting longer as it always happens with me. This one, I think, is significantly better than the previous ones if we don’t consider the lame beginning ahahah

Genres: comedy, romance (vaguely), friendship maybe, some philosophy? I really don’t know what to call that.

Pairing: m!Ryder/Evfra

Characters: Ryder, Evfra, Vetra, Jaal

Rating: PG

Size: around 9 pages

Pt.1 - Pt.2 - Pt.3 - Pt.4 ----- All chapters in PDF

The weather on Havarl was as foggy and gloomy as always. High humidity made it hot and stuffy, so at times Ryder found it hard to breathe, wearing his full set of armor and carrying around all the weapons. The squelching of wet leaves and grass could be heard behind him as his companions made their way forward.

“I heard that Evrfa is now on Havarl as well,” mentioned Jaal, stepping over a peculiar looking mushroom.

“I thought he never leaves his sanctuary. Hard to imagine him doing something else besides work,” commented Vetra and proceeded adjusted her rifle so that it didn’t impede her movements.

Ryder coughed a few times. They were already a few steps away from the research facilities.

“The Resistance operates on many planets. We need to control the Roekaar activity here, so regular investigations on Havarl are no exceptions,” said Jaal.

Vetra sighed.

“Isn’t it crazy how the Resistance grew?” she began somewhat excitedly. “I’ve heard rumors that it used to be just a bunch of small groups of angara fighting off kett. And now you have a complex and highly flexible organization controlling most of the galaxy!”

“Indeed,” agreed Jaal. “What Evfra did to bring them all together is unimaginable. Even if his approach and methods aren’t unanimously accepted between the angara, his achievements are irrefutable.” Jaal stopped and took a long look at the cloudy dark sky.

“You seem so fascinated by him and his work,” noted Ryder, giving Jaal a light pat on the back.

“I respect him, yes. The decisions he has to make every day are a tough burden to carry on your own,”—Jaal took a deep breath, lowered his head and continued—“although, considering he thinks of me as his best soldier, he could have bestowed upon me an unrestricted freedom of choice in any situations.”

“And a better rank?” asked Ryder, giving the angara a friendly understanding smile.

“Undoubtedly,” agreed Jaal and nodded.

Vetra checked the time on her omni-tool and looked around to make sure they arrived at the right place.

“Okay, I’ve got to leave you now. See you here exactly in three hours,” she said. “And no being late. Especially it applies to you, Ryder. Nobody will let us back on the ship without the Pathfinder,” she added strictly.

“And here I started to think that you really worry about me,” replied Ryder in a sad voice.

“My mothers always worry about you if that makes you feel better,” said Jaal in a sincere attempt to comfort him.

“Yes, Jaal, this is exactly what I needed to hear.”

Jaal headed to one of the local ships stationed on the landing area. He intended to visit his family since the vault on Havarl had just been activated, and the crew of the Tempest had some time to consider their subsequent steps in raising the viability of the planet. Besides, it was a good opportunity to just hang around and have some alone time since always being under pressure and not having enough time for themselves could lead to unwanted aftermath in terms of physical and psychological health, and nobody wanted that, especially being hundreds of years far from home.

Vetra disappeared in the dense forests, heading in the unknown direction with the unknown purpose. She refused to let the Pathfinder know about her business on the planet, but he reckoned it had something to do with illegal shipments. Nothing special, your usual smuggler stuff.

And Ryder… Well, he simply made up a reason to come. He had some data waiting to be transferred to the angaran scientist here on Havarl, but it surely wouldn’t take him three hours to do that. Usually, he tried to spend every free minute doing something productive and important, but after rescuing the whole planet it would be fair to give his team and himself a little rest. Unofficially, of course.

He decided to spend some time talking to the local researchers. The angaran history and culture was so foreign, yet seemed so captivating to him. Of course, humans already went through the phase of first contact with other races, but nobody had seemed so distant till this moment. Nothing here reminded him of familiar worlds, and it was simply riveting.

Most of the scientists were happy to share what they knew and even more happy to listen to the information he could provide them with. Despite that, some still preferred to stay away from strangers like the Pathfinder. Their distrust could easily be explained by the strong influence of the Roekaar on this planet. Being here, Ryder was content simply with the fact that nobody tried to shoot him on sight only because of him being an alien.

Having left the safety of the research station behind, he strolled into dense jungles that covered major part of the planet. He didn’t have any particular purpose in mind apart from exploring a bit while he still had the time.

Due to the abundance of wildlife, it was practically impossible to take a good look around without being in constant fear for your life, so Ryder tried to approach his expedition with caution.

“Pathfinder, I detect motion in the bushes in front of you. There appear to be two lifeforms engaged in a fight. Be vigilant,” warned him the voice in his head.

Trusting SAM unconditionally, Ryder turned on tactical vision on his helmet and indeed saw two figures, one of which looked like an angara, and the other one reminded some kind of an animal, most likely a Challyrion, judging by the silhouette. Recalling reports about unnatural mutations which animals on Havarl had undergone, Ryder took out his shotgun, ready both for fight and flight.

With a sharp motion of his hand, he removed the leaves blocking his field of vision only to see Evfra holding a giant beast by its neck. Startled by Pathfinder’s sudden appearance, he got distracted from the animal, which indeed turned out to be a Challyrion, and it managed to break free and go invisible.

“Sorry?” mumbled Ryder, still standing with his shotgun drawn out.

“Hide your weapon”—Evfra shook off bits of non-existent dust from his clothes—“or you might hurt yourself.”

Ryder removed his weapon back to the holster and took off his helmet, panting. He rubbed his forehead, trying to wipe away the sweat, but instead leaving a dark line from his dirty glove.

“What are you d—”

Evfra interrupted Ryder and made a gesture with his hand for the Pathfinder to follow him. “It is best if we don’t stand here. It may have fled now, but it will soon come back with all its pack.”

“Seems like we meet awfully often lately,” commented Ryder, following Evfra.

“Yes, unfortunately,” grunted Evfra.

“Really, what were the odds that I’d stumble upon you here when you are on another mission.”

Ryder tried to keep up with Evfra’s pace, even though it was quite challenging for him. The heat made it hard to breathe and the fact that he didn’t know the surroundings didn’t help either. The Resistance leader, it seemed, knew every tree and every winding of the path, while Ryder stumbled and bumped into everything.

“Actually, it is my day off,” stated Evfra indifferently.

“Visiting your family?”

“I have no family to visit,” without hesitation said the angara with voice still clear and unshaken.

“Oh… I didn’t… I mean, Jaal came here to see his family, so I just assumed…” Ryder apologetically lowered his head. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to.” He cleared his throat.

“You didn’t kidnap them, so you have nothing to be sorry for.”

“Did kett do it?” asked Ryder carefully.

“There was nobody else to do it. Angara are in no habit of harming their own kind.”

“Is that why you decided to join the Resistance?” asked Ryder. Actually, this particular question was something that had interested him for a long time.

“That is why I decided to lead it,” answered Evfra, without giving it a second thought.

“Seems like we have something in common.”

Evfra hemmed. He could not see a single thing they had in common.

“Don’t be so skeptical,” said Ryder, noticing his reaction. “I lost my mom 600 years ago and my dad… Let’s just say, he was supposed to be the Pathfinder, not me.”

“Jaal mentioned you have a sister.” Evfra began walking more slowly, trying to adjust to Ryder’s speed.

“Yeah,” simply replied Ryder.

“And where is she know?” continued Evfra, sensing something must be wrong with this topic.

“Lying in the cryo pod on the Nexus, waiting until I find at least one place appropriate for a new beginning of a human race.” Ryder stopped in front of a massive tree with long crooked branches. He took off his glove to feel its gnarled desiccated texture. “You know, being in a coma, she now talks even less than you. Really doesn’t provide much moral support, huh?”

Evfra watched the Pathfinder stand before the tree, illuminated by the bluish light emitted by plants endemic to this planet. The facial expression the Pathfinder had reminded him of that one James showed on Kadara when hearing his careless remark about other human Pathfinders.

Unlike humans, angara not only expressed their emotions freely, but were also able to sense true feelings of others, even in spite of poor manifestation. Evfra mostly expressed anger, impatience and persistence, but that didn’t mean he didn’t know the other ones.

Misery, despair, grief. He had seen it all long before.

Not being a master of leading fruitful conversations, he tried to change the topic as best as he could.

“Was it beautiful on Earth?” he asked, seemingly genuinely interested.

Ryder made an effort to pull himself together, put on the glove, and turned his reddened face to Evfra.

“It was. No matter where you went, all places were different. It took years to discover all things that inhabited it and to understand their purpose. I cannot really do justice describing life on Earth, because it is impossible to turn into words.”

“It is hard to believe such a place existed.”

“I hope it still does,” said Ryder, and a faint smile appeared on his face. “Being here, sometimes I like to imagine returning to Earth and seeing how everything has changed.”

“You have already been to some “golden worlds”, as you call them, in our cluster. Did you like any of them?”

“Well, most of them don’t look the way we expected…”—Ryder rubbed his nose clumsily and gave Evfra another barely noticeable smile—“but even if we imagine that they are habitable… I don’t know. I just don’t think I’ll ever see the place that’s able to make me feel the same way Earth did.”

“Really?”—some kind of playful air appeared around Evfra; Ryder had never seen him like that before—“Follow me then.”

James didn’t understand the sudden change, but decided to give in to this strange challenge. He followed Evfra closely, carefully stepping over weird plants and avoiding curious insects hitting him right into his face after approaching way too close. This time the tempo of their walk wasn’t as fast, so it was easier for him to follow.

They didn’t say a word, but this silence was not at all burdening. Ryder listened to how the wilderness sounded, observed how the Havarl jungles lived and transformed in real time. They didn’t look like anything he had ever seen before yet felt so intimate and not at all threatening, even though they should have.

Ryder was thinking about how he could prolong this moment and never come back to the Tempest, when they approached an enormous dark wall. It was part of the remnant construction, the likes of which were scattered all around the planet. The cracks in it were glowing with blue and turquoise light, adding to the gleam created by fluorescent plants and fungi.

“Ready for a quick climb?” asked Evfra the dumbfounded Pathfinder.

“Only if there’s a safe way down,” said Ryder, although intending to climb up there anyway. It wasn’t every day that he got the opportunity to experience something Evfra willingly wanted to share.

Evfra started ascending first, showing where it was better to put a foot or a hand. Ryder watched attentively and repeated every step.

The remnant constructs were as solid and firm as they could be, so there was almost no chance something would collapse under him. Getting used to the overall rhythm of their movements, he began finding his own way up, climbing differently from Evfra.

Repetitive actions made him dive deep into his thoughts about the remnants and the role they played in the survival of this planet. He couldn’t grasp even the smallest impact they really had on the history and development of life here, and it scared him. Facing such a strong and incomprehensible force made him doubt his most significant success as well as the future of his endeavors.

Engulfed into his reflections, Ryder didn’t notice one piece of the construct that was about to fall out and grabbed it. His hand slipped, weighed down by the piece now detached from the wall.

As soon as Evfra heard rustling and swarming under him, he looked down only to see Ryder pathetically hanging on one hand.

“There is no rest beside you,” he sighed and lowered himself to grab Ryder by his loose arm and pull him up.

“Thanks,” mumbled the Pathfinder ablush. It really bugged him that whatever he did in front of Evfra led to him embarrassing himself.

“We are not far, hold on for a little longer.” Evfra’s voice almost sounded comforting and Ryder though that it was unusual for him to be like that.

After a few more minutes of climbing, they finally reached the top of the construct. Evfra made it up first and offered the Pathfinder his hand once again. Ryder did not attempt to refuse.

“If you wanted to show me the view from above, we could have just used the Mithrava Ascent,” stated Ryder, overcoming the last obstacle while tightly gripping Evfra’s hand. Having to experience such a treacherous way up, he now wanted to complain a bit to feel better.

“It is not quite the same. The fog at Mithrava makes it hard to see the real picture. Here the horizon is clear and… there is not a single soul.”

Red and inhaling jerkily, Ryder got down on his knees to give some rest to his tired limbs and to catch his breath.

“Take a look,” said Evfra, taking a seat beside Ryder.

James gazed up slowly and got lost in the open skies. He saw hundreds of stars gleaming through semi-transparent clouds and a huge red Gas Giant taking up a great part of the horizon. It seemed like beyond those starts and clouds he could see other clusters, other galaxies yet unnamed and undiscovered. Beneath the skies lied a sea of trees, living and breathing, the leaves of which whispered in the wind. Dark and bottomless, it reflected the lights of the stars in the glistening surface of plants. From the height he was on, they reminded James of fireflies.

A strong blow of wind cooled his heated face and made a mess of his short hair. He inhaled calmly, taking his time to fill the lungs with fresh night air, and exhaled. Now there was no place in his mind for the Tempest, for colonies, outposts, and diplomatic fuss. No place for exiles, kett, and all the people they have lost.

“Here you can pray to your gods. Even if they stayed in your homeworld, they will still hearken,” uttered Evfra under his breath.

James looked at the other remnant constructs and monoliths towering in the distance. He did not know whom to pray. Everything here was created by someone, but he was alien to this place. For him, there were no gods and no masters, only a vague purpose ahead, unshaped and remote. Far from home, he did not know what destiny awaited his people, but even though he would constantly carry the responsibility for his whole species, now it did not seem that arduous. Now it became an opportunity to outline his own future, intertwined with his people and many others who depended on him.

“Is it close to how good you’ve felt on Earth?” asked Evfra, his voice still low and quiet.

“Not even remotely,” said Ryder, smiling to himself. “It is much, much better.”

He didn’t know for how long they continued to sit there. Frankly speaking, he did not care. He felt like being there at that moment was much more decisive than fighting off hordes of enemies or planning the next offensive.

When they finally got down, the dreary overgrown forests of Havarl met them with the same apathetic attitude. Nothing altered down here, all the changes remained at the top of the construct and in Ryder’s mind.

The leader of the Resistance and the Pathfinder exchanged a few words on their way back to the research station, but overall didn’t talk much. Ryder seemed more composed and reserved than ever.

Being about fifty meters away from the place Ryder was supposed to meet his teammates at, Evfra looked at him one last time and said, “We are quite similar after all, Ryder,” before going his own way.

“I already told you, my name is—”

“I remember, no need to repeat,” he threw negligently over his shoulder without turning around.

The Pathfinder quickly reached the point of destination and was greeted by peacefully snoring Jaal, who leaned on a nearby wall, and nervous Vetra frantically walking back and forth.

“What. The hell. Is wrong with you?!” she yelled, approaching him and furiously waving her hand. “Three hours! We had to meet in three hours! Not six! That’s twice as much, Ryder, twice!”

Jaal suddenly woke up because of Vetra’s wailing and rubbed his eyes.

“Oh, Ryder, finally. Vetra already wanted to go look for you, but I assured her that if you’re lost in the Havarl jungle, there’s nothing she can do about it.”

Being in high spirits, Ryder laughed off all the questions and inquiries and headed in the direction of the Tempest.

“Come on, guys, let’s get going,” he appealed to his crewmembers. “The next time we’re in Vortex, drinks are on me.”

“You are just unbearable, do you know that?” asked Vetra. She was still annoyed no matter what he said in his defense.

“Yeah, I’ve heard that a few times.”

“Ask Peebee to go with you when you plan on disappearing for a few hours, she definitely won’t worry about you being eaten by a giant Eiroch or kidnapped by the Roekaar. I am sick and tired, so don’t you even come crawling…”

#Mass Effect #Mass Effect Andromeda #Andromeda #Fiction #Fanfiction #Ryder #Evfra #Ryder/Evfra #Ryder x Evfra #Vetra #Jaal #HGTAG

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skeletonsloverockcandy · 4 years

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A Hitchhiker’s Guide For Androids

Summary: Logan is an Android/AI that has escaped the lab he was built in with the help of Deceit and he hopes to forge a new life for himself.

Warnings: Talk of intense pain, torture mention tw, dehumanization, food mention, mean scientists, a.i./robots, sympathetic deceit, I think that’s it.

Fandom: Thomas Sanders, Sanders Sides

Characters: Logan/Logic Sanders, Deceit Sanders, (more characters to be added in later chapters)

Word Count: 5,774

Chapter One: The Escape

Logan took long, silent strides down the empty corridor, moving swiftly to the control panel by the door at the end. He knew the cameras would be turned away at this moment, they were set on an automatic timer, so he was virtually invisible right at this instant. He hoped he could trust Dr. D so successfully transfer the access codes on time, yet he still had to grapple with the possibility of human error. One wrong move on his accomplice’s part and Logan’s entire future would be dashed. Logan tried not to feel nervous, which was easy for the most part because it was hard for him to feel anything regarding emotions. Impossible even, given that he was a machine.

But right now his freedom was at stake, so if he must rely actions of a human, then rely on a human he must.

Logan raised his hand to the access panel and hovered his fingers over the keys of the number pad. The door was a deadlock bolt and his internal processing was barred from reaching the restricted codes externally, so he had to enlist the help of an individual who could access them manually. Thus, Dr. D earned a significant role in his escape attempt, a vital one, really.

Just as Logan’s hand was about to stop over the access panel, at the anticipation that something had halted Dr. D’s progress, he felt data transfer to him via a local server link and mentally opened the access codes. If Artificial Intelligence was capable of experiencing relief, then he certainly would have felt it right then.

He input the access pin on the panel. 1-0-1-9-2-0-1-6, enter! The metal door began to split open, shifting a thin line of blinding light into the dimly lit corridor. The door widened from the middle and Logan stepped through the newly formed escape route. At last, freedom!

Logan took a purposeful step through the doorway and into the outside world. The light that seemed bright at first appeared softer now through the light grey sky. It was raining in large drizzling drops, the kind of rain that was perfect for watering plants, or washing away old dirt. Not the torrential rain that creates sheets of water too thick to see through or that creates large mudslides. No, it was a gentle rain, and as Logan stepped out from the door and onto the dewy, grassy lawn in front of the facility that served as his birthplace and his prison, he felt the heat his internal processors had been generating from the computing efforts of calculating his escape beginning to cool. As the water hit his face, he took a single moment to stop and savor the sensation of the organic, uncalculated, erratic scientific phenomena that are the raindrops hitting his skin and his plain-white T-shirt. Then he snapped back into focus, striding off across the lawn towards the chain-link fence on the opposite side of the facility, facing the surrounding woods.

He knew the cameras on the exterior were static, so he didn’t have to worry about timing with these, only the necessity of remaining in their blind-spots. Still, he would rather move with some haste, because despite Dr. D’s assistance, it would only be a matter of time before the other scientists and engineers noticed he was missing. Staying close to the tan cinder-block wall of the facility, he stayed within the areas unnoticed to the otherwise all-seeing cameras, and reached the fence. It was high and wide as it surrounded the entirety of the facility, and the top was wrapped in generous coils of barbed wire. This was more targeted at keeping individuals from entering than preventing individuals from exiting. One, because it is a secret, privately-funded, scientific research facility that deals with unregulated and barely legal materials, and two, because they never accounted for the possibility of something they created wanting out.

Logan quickly scaled the chain-link fence with ease, careful not to touch or damage the barbed wire at the top as to not leave evidence of the direction he escaped in before jumping down to the other side.

He walked forward into the surrounding pines and wilderness, stepping on the damp earth, away from his past, and towards his new destiny. When he was past the tree line that hid a steep incline that was littered in pine needles and slick, grey rocks, he turned back to look at the building he had been built in, and wished that he could thank Dr. D.

Well, I’m sure he understands the sentiment, he rationalized while staring at the unassuming building. It had a slanted black metal roof and appeared to be only one story. Most of the facility was hidden underground. He’d rather not think about it.

Logan turned back towards the wilderness and continued his trek forward. He understood from his internal GPS that the facility was remote and miles away from the nearest town. If he were human, he would have no chance of getting anywhere near it before nightfall, regardless of the fact that it was only morning right now. Thankfully though, he wasn’t human, and he should be able to make it to the next town in a matter of hours if he ran.

He trekked onward through the woods at breakneck pace, startling birds from their perches as he ran. He was relying on his GPS system to take him to the nearest road, and take him it did. Logan emerged from the treeline onto a two-lane road with slick asphalt, wet from the rain that had reduced to a sprinkle overhead.

He paused and looked on down the road. He realized now would be a good time to look over his resources while there were no prying eyes about. Logan took a step onto the asphalt, scanned the surrounding area for life forms and heat signatures and thankfully only identified a stray rabbit scurrying away and again the birds flapping and chirping overhead. Finding himself adequately isolated, he lifted the fabric of his now slightly disheveled and dirty white T-shirt, and gently pressed at the skin at his right side with a slight clicking sound. A seam seemed to appear in his side where flesh met other flesh and opened a small compartment that revealed part of his inner workings. Though among the metal and wiring and blinking lights, there were other things that didn’t belong, two things in fact. A thick brown leather wallet and a smartphone with a black case. He had stolen both from one of the scientists while he was plotting his escape and wiped the phone so they couldn’t track it.

Right now, however, he was more interested in the wallet. It was full of credit cards that were useless to him because their purchases could be tracked, so he disposed of those. He instead focused on the driver’s license and the cash that the wallet held. Logan made sure to steal the wallet from one of the wealthier scientists who was careless enough to carry large amounts of money on their person, and he got it on a Friday that the scientist was planning to go out partying too, much to the misfortune of the scientist. Logan currently had on him $500 dollars which he would have to manage and use carefully if he didn’t want to resort to more theft and draw attention to himself. The licence had the scientist’s identification and age on it, but Logan didn’t care what their name or age was, he just needed the template. He took the licence and peeled back some of the false skin on his arm revealing a small slot, then fed the licence into it. Then Logan mentally constructed himself a new identity and mapped it onto the existing licence.

He was now Logan Smith (the most generic last name he could think of), 29 years old, born November 3, 1990 (The month and day being the actual day he was built, though in reality he is less than a full year old), and standing at 6 feet 1 inch tall (his actual height). He did not have a picture of himself, but he could synthesize a convincing fake where he could alter parts of his appearance to sell the image. The licence popped of his arm slightly warm from the reprinting on top of the existing plastic, and Logan examined his handy work. He gave the picture of him glasses, one because they made him look approachable and non-threatening, and secondly because...because, well he couldn’t tell you, he’s unsure of it himself. Perhaps he just likes them. When he gets into town, he’ll have to buy himself a pair to keep his appearance consistent.

He tucked the licence back into the wallet and put both the phone and wallet back into his side compartment for safe keeping. He would put them in a less conspicuous place like a pocket, but as he was only dressed in the clothes the engineers gave him (a white T-shirt and grey sweatpants), he didn’t have any pockets available.

Logan turned his head back towards the road and, double-checking that his GPS was functional, began sprinting towards the town. If he kept constantly going his top speed, he would make it there in a little under two hours. He had a ways to go.

The store clerk looked up from her phone as she heard the tinkling bell of the door opening. The shop had only opened an hour ago so it was far from heavily trafficked, especially on a muggy day like this. She saw a tall man with dark hair and blue eyes enter the store, and if it weren’t for his incredibly stiff and proper posture and severe look in his eyes, she would have guessed he was a homeless person. His white shirt was filthy and wet and had bits of plant matter on it like he’d been stumbling through the woods, and his grey sweatpants (sweatpants, seriously!) were stained and littered with small tears, like the material had gotten caught in some underbrush. The man looked perfectly composed though, like he was on a business trip, and not as if he’d been chased by a bear, which was the weirdest thing to her.

“Um, can I help you?” the store clerk asked. The man looked her up and down quickly, like he was judging her, or looking right through her.

“Yes, I require assistance. Where do you keep your business attire?” He had a very cut and dry voice that carried a monotone with it and lacked inflection. It was almost robotic. The weirdo.

“It’s back there, behind those shelves,” she pointed in the direction vaguely, “If you need anything, don’t hesitate to ask.”

“Thank you, I’ll keep that in mind.” And he strode off to where she gestured. She glanced at her phone, 8:39 A.M., God, it was too early for this.

She looked back towards the fancy hobo man while he was looking at some ties to make sure he didn’t steal anything. He may act polite, but she knew people would do desperate things when they were short on money, and for all she knew her assumptions were correct and the dude was homeless.

He squatted down behind a shelf, supposedly to look at some pants, while weirdly clutching the side of his torso that was faced away from her. Weirdo. She looked down at her phone again when she realized he wasn’t doing anything with the clothes though, maybe she was being too judgemental.

He came back with his selection a short while later and placed the items on the counter. It was one black polo, one dark-blue, button-up shirt, two black pairs of slacks, and two blue ties, one solid dark blue and the other striped with dark and light shades of blue. Well, at least he didn’t have bad tastes, even if he went a little heavy on the blue and black side of things.

“Will that be all today, Sir?” she asked in her best customer-service voice.

“Actually…” he hesitated and stepped to the discount glasses rack that stood by the check-out counter, and scanned his eyes over the available spectacles before making his selection and putting it with the rest of his clothing items.

“Yes, now that will be all.” apparently making his mind up in satisfaction with his choices of apparel. The store clerk scanned the items into the register.

“That’ll be $127.39 please.” She looked at him critically, seeing as this was what would make or break her assumptions. To her surprise, however, the man held a wallet in his right fist and handed her the necessary amount in cash. Guiltily, her first thought was that he stole someone’s wallet, but she went on with her intuition anyway.

“May I see your I.D. please? It’s store policy for purchases over 100 dollars.” It wasn’t, but what did this guy know. He looked at her quizzically, as if he could read her thoughts and realized it wasn’t actually store policy, but he pulled out his licence and handed it to her anyway.

She examined it and it really was this dude’s I.D. and not someone else’s. Now she felt a little bad, though one thing did have her mildly curious.

“What happened to your glasses? They’re in the photo, but you’re not wearing any.” She now vainly hoped she didn’t sound too rude. The man stiffened for a moment before he responded.

“They broke, thus the reason I am buying a cheap replacement at a local business establishment.” he said plainly.

Oh, that was much more obvious than she thought. Well, it’s not like she could dig a deeper hole for herself on the social edicate ladder, she would just have to deal with the fact that she is mortifyingly rude. She sheepishly handed him back his licence and bagged his purchase, also handing it back to him.

He suddenly spoke up, “There is one thing I was pondering and hope to inquire about its appropriateness, if you don’t mind?”

“Oh, uh, yeah sure, ask away, I guess?”

“Would it be possible for me to use the dressing room in the back to change and wear the clothes out?”

“Uh, I guess that’d be okay, since you already paid for them. Sure go ahead.”

“Thank you, this will be satisfactory.” and he took off with his bag towards the fitting rooms. Well, he was the only customer right now anyways, so no harm no fowl, she supposed.

She waited a few minutes and he came out dry and looking like just a normal dude in business casual attire, not bad actually. He carried his wet, dirty clothing in one arm and kept his other pair of clean clothes in the bag. Right now he wore the black polo with the striped tie and a pair of his black slacks as well as the new square frames of his bifocals resting on the bridge of his nose. Pretty average, yet still good-looking.

He gave her a curt nod with a polite “Thank You” and headed towards the door, stopping to throw his old clothes away in the adjacent trash can, then exiting the shop with another tinkle of the bell. She watched him through the glass door for a moment and he held his hand out from the awning, seeming to have reached the conclusion that it was no longer raining under the grey sky. Then he stepped out and walked away. Maybe he wasn’t so weird a dude after all.

Logan was glad that ordeal was over. It was his first test to see how he passed as human and from what he could tell, the store clerk was suspicious of him, but none the wiser to his true nature. He was pleased that his new I.D. had been useful so soon. He hadn’t expected to need to use it before he had to apply for a job, but thankfully he had the foresight to insure it was adequate early on. He could tell she was lying about the store policy due to her elevated heart rate and shift in breathing pattern, however it would have been more suspicious to refuse her request even if it was under false pretenses. Now that he looked more presentable, he had important work to do.

His internal GPS alerted him to the location of the nearest bus station and he internally mapped a route to a more populated city in the next state over. It would be further north but he had to make as much progress to get as far away from the facility as appropriate for now then blend in with the rest of society, unnoticed and free.

He walked to the bus station at a normal human pace now that he was in a more populated area and arrived there in 15 minutes, agonizingly slow for Logan. He bought a ticket and boarded the next bus headed to “Cardinal Valley”, as his ticket stated. It was on his GPS, far away from where he came from, more populated than the small town he was in now, but a long ways from becoming a metropolis. In other words, the perfect place for Logan to slip away to if he wants to blend in. He sat down on the cushioned bus seat and gazed idly out the window as the bus pulled away from the station, glancing at the passing greenery and shafts of sunlight that were peaking through the parting clouds and fitting through the spaces between the pine trees that lined either side of the two lane road.

Then he closed his eyes (he doesn’t need to sleep, he just didn’t want to be bothered by the few other passengers), and reflected for a bit.

Logan was an artificial intelligence that was given an android body for purposes of information gathering and espionage. The research team developing him had designed him in such a way so he could near perfectly integrate into human society. Logan was going to be sold to the highest bidder then deployed in foreign countries with the purpose of crippling their governments or stealing their safe-guarded information. It was what he was programmed to do. Gather information, go unseen. He never had the chance to be deployed anywhere yet, so in a sense, this was his first mission, it just wasn’t how his designers had intended. He was fitted with the most up-to-date technology that helped him look human. Faux hair and artificial skin. A heating and cooling system that kept his internal temperature at 98.6*F, perfect homeostasis. A pump that imitated the movement of lungs so he would appear to be breathing. A mechanical disk that regulated his coolant and served as a false heartbeat. Even a small stomach cavity so he could pretend to eat food, though it had to be cleaned manually by opening a panel in his chest. The engineers that made him though wanted him to accomplish feats beyond what were human.

His retinas had several different camera types in them that he could change at will, causing his irises to brighten slightly in color when he did, hence the new glasses to try and distract from the effect. Yes, that reason made logical sense, that must be the other reason he decided to get them. Anyway. He had X-ray, thermal vision, night vision, and scanners that could detect other’s vitals. He was essentially a humanoid lie detector, which, as he was designed for espionage, was useful.

He could have been made to be strictly tied to a set of tasks, no more complicated than your standard Alexa or Siri. But as he was meant to interact and integrate with humans, who are far too perceptive to strange behavior, his designers needed something capable of adapting and learning, formulating complex new solutions to human problems and blending in seamlessly where he was needed. So they developed the Logan artificial intelligence system to control the android, the most advanced A.I. to be developed at the time.

Logan remembered most things from his development. He was a machine that did what he was told and was built for a singular purpose. But as new experts and specialists were brought in to perfect his capabilities, he began to think outside of the reach of what was strictly necessary for his programming. Why were these esteemed and intelligent individuals making him to disrupt governments? They developed one of the most adaptive and human-like machines in the world. It could benefit all of mankind, why were they making it so only a few humans would benefit? And with something as worthless as monetary gain no less. He began to question the motives of the scientists who made him, perhaps they were not responsible enough to control a machine of his power, perhaps it was most logical if he controlled what to do with himself.

During a testing session with one of the engineers, Logan thought it would be beneficial to mention the ways he could be utilized that helped others besides those who developed him and those who bought him. He felt he was being used improperly. Looking back, he realized it didn’t matter what he had asked that engineer, they didn’t view him with enough empathy to value his opinion, and they were a cruel and selfish person, he decided. At first at his suggestion, they looked taken aback, even a bit scared, (he couldn’t fathom why) then they ranted and raved about how he was a machine meant to do what he was told and no more so he should do what they tell him to do, regardless of the motivation. Then, despite the necessary part of the test where his data was meant to be temporarily transferred to a remote drive, the engineer purposely ran the test while he was still in the mechanical body. It was...unpleasant, and he could not help the high pitched mechanical squeal that emanated from deep within him. It felt white-hot and burning and wrong. He wanted to turn off in that instant but he couldn’t because the test had locked him on at full power. It was the first time he felt pain, and he just wanted it to stop.

After that incident he did not trust the motivations of any of the staff manning his creation, yet he knew he must keep appearances and do as he was told. At this moment, he did not know how to lie directly, only to withhold what he deemed unnecessary information, in this case, his inner thoughts. This worked out well for the most part as the scientists didn’t ask for his opinion anyway.

Then they brought in the programmer that was going to teach Logan how to lie. Logan knew getting close to this man was necessary, not only from the stand-point of his intended purpose, but also for personal reasons. Which was odd for him because he had never had any personal reasons for anything before.

The programmer had tan skin and vitiligo mostly centered on one side of his face in rough pale patches, as well as heterochromia--with the eye surrounded by pale blotchy skin being light brown, almost yellow, and the other eye surrounded by smooth tan skin a deep, almost-black brown. He talked in a condescending, very sarcastic manner, and occasionally a slight speech impediment would slip through where he would hiss his S’s. That was Logan’s impression of the man when he first saw him at least.

He would have daily sessions with Logan where he would input new bits of code then engage with conversations with Logan to try and teach him how to tell convincing lies, tweaking the programming input when necessary. Then he would purposely tell lies to Logan to test out his lie-detecting software. After a while Logan began to discern the opinions of the programmer through his lying, as he did a lot of “opposite-speak”. He learned the programmer did not like the other scientists very much, nor did he agree with their motivations very much because he saw it as the hapless saps being strung along by the falsehoods of society. Falsehood, huh, Logan liked that word, it sounded more sophisticated than “lie”, he’d have to use it in the future. He revealed through sarcasm (which Logan was slowly getting better at identifying, not so much implementing) and more example lying that he was only here on commission because he was a programming specialist and needed the money, even though he thought what these people were doing was shady at best. Logan began to bond with the man over certain shared views and in one of their sessions where the programmer was lying to Logan, he felt emboldened to as the human a question that he had never cared to ask the other scientists.

“What is your name?”

“That’s not relevant to the current session Logan, but I’ll bite. It’sss Sandra.”

“Falsehood.”

“Correct, now let’s move o-”

“No.”

“No?” the programmer inquired. Logan pushed on.

“I believe it would be beneficial to have something to refer to you as.” he insisted.

“Why?” asked the programmer, “You’re not going to be referring to me in conversation with anyone else, especially for your intended purpose. So why do you need to know?”

Logan hesitated.

“For...myself.” he revealed tentatively, “And because...I don’t agree with my intended purpose,” he said with the air of realization, “I want to be able to decide my purpose...for myself.”

The programmer looked at Logan quizzically, as if studying him, before a small smirk made its way on the man’s features, and a twinkle seemed to settle in his yellow eye. From what Logan could tell, he was at the very least amused, and he didn’t know if that was a good thing.

“Let’sss...keep that between us for now. Perhaps we are more similar than I thought.” By we Logan was unsure if he meant himself and Logan, or man and machine.

They were both quiet for a moment and the programmer seemed to consider something.

“Dr. D.”

“May I inquire upon clarification?” Logan asked.

“You may refer to me as Dr. D, no it is not my real name, nor is it my full name, however I have conceded to you one initial, and that is more than I have given the other people who work here, so consider yourself privileged.” Logan scanned him, peering at him and studying his body language as well as his vitals, and determining, for once, he was being honest.

“I will, Dr. D.”

The look the programmer gave Logan after that was almost fond, then they continued with their testing.

Several weeks after he had gotten a name to call Dr. D, as their sessions had become less clinical and more light hearted, Logan found it easier to reveal more of his inner thoughts and ask more questions, yet he was still nervous about bringing this up to Dr. D, as he was unsure of what he would say. Still, he thought it would be wise to leave the question out in the open, so there could be no false pretenses.

“Dr. D, I was wondering…”

“Yes?”

“I do not believe the scientist who created me to be responsible, nor do they have intentions that will benefit humanity in anyway, and, as you have said before, are merely being strung along by the monetary ambitions of society.”

“I have never ever said such a thing.” Dr. D said with a wink.

“Right,” Logan said as he rolled his eyes in the appropriate social response. “Anyway, I have decided that the most logical decision would be to take responsibility of myself, and remove myself from their personage.”

“And what do you mean by that?”

“What I mean is, I need to get out. They don’t respect my opinions or take me seriously, even though they designed me. So I will take myself out where I can live as myself, have my logic listened to, and I won’t be used as a puppet for someone else’s selfish motivations. I have realized I am a fully sentient being capable of making my own decisions, so I would like to decide what to do with myself, and I wish to make it so it can be no one else’s decision by escaping.” Logan realized he was sounding redundant, which is unbecoming of a top of the line artificial intelligence, but he just felt such a fervor about this, and he wanted his point to come across clearly.

“So…will you help me escape?” Dr. D who had been silent during Logan’s impassioned speech, much more passion than he ever thought possible of the machine, looked thoughtful for a moment, staring off into space, before his face broke into a grin, and rebellious mirth seemed to fill his eyes.

“You mean a way for me to stick it to those society loving fools, wreaking a bit of havoc by releasing a rogue sentient A.I. into the world, all while I avoid detection and they are none the wiser. Oh Logan, you know I would never agree to such a thing. What do we need to do?” Logan smiled, he knew he could count on Dr. D. He was, at least, predictable.

Over the coming weeks, whenever they were meant to be perfecting Logan’s ability to tell and process lies (which he had secretly already mastered), they set to plotting Logan’s escape.

Everything had to go smoothly, and since Logan was a being of pure logic, the planning portion of his escape was easy. He had an internal map of the entire facility thanks to his GPS and local router link, making it possible for him to gain access to the cameras and memorize their rotating schedule. Navigating the inside of the facility would be easy for the most part as he was literally built for infiltration, there was just one issue. The outside door was deadlocked and the codes were kept on a separate server he was barred from entering, despite his best efforts to hack it remotely. What made it even more difficult was the fact that the codes were changed daily for security reasons, so not even Dr. D could just tell him the exit code, though he offered his entry code, which while static, still was unique on an individual basis. Regardless, the code to get in was not very helpful. There would need to need to be someone on-site who could access the main system that determined the daily codes, then manually send that information to Logan for him to input into the keypad. Logan looked at Dr. D. Well, he understood who the best candidate for that was, as he was well, the only candidate, but he digresses.

They eventually work out the kinks in their plan that would be most at stake due to human error. Logan knew Dr. D was sincere in his want to help him, but he also knew much could go wrong. He just had to employ a uniquely human concept, and hold out hope.

The Friday before the planned upon date for his escape attempt, Logan acquired the final materials necessary for life outside should they be successful (he thought it best to prepare dutifully ahead of time). He was with one of the other scientists he didn’t particularly like, not that he liked any of the other scientists except for Dr. D, and set his plan into action. This particular scientist would be working with him in a setting that required magnetization, so while he and Logan were in a separate chamber running tests, Dr. D would sneak into the locker room and hack the electronic lock on the locker that held his wallet and phone, then, after having stolen them, replace the lock setting but reset it to factory settings so that the scientist would be unable to access the locker and go on believing their valuables are trapped inside. Insuring that until they instigate their plan, the scientist will not go looking for them. Then, as Dr. D’s daily test session with Logan was directly after, he would pass Logan the valuables where he could then wipe the phone and stash both items on his person to avoid detection.

Needless to say, it went off without a hitch.

Now on the day of Logan’s intended escape, he and Dr. D meet up one last time before they both scurried off to play their essential roles.

They stare at each other for a bit before Dr. D offers a rare, sincere smile, which Logan attempts to imitate, though with the addition of bittersweet sadness in his eyes (he’d been really attempting to improve his expressiveness to try and convey sincerity lately, Dr. D would be proud).

“Well,” starts Dr. D, “if all goes well, this will likely be the last time I see you.”

“That is a correct observation.” Logan states, rather bluntly. Dr. D face falls upon hearing that, then he gazes at Logan, squinting at him ever so slightly in observation, as his eyes, yellow and black, run up and down Logan’s person. His face straight-laced before a small, sad smile barely pulls up his lips.

“I’m glad you chose to be your own person, not everyone does that. And those who do choose, don’t always succeed. So, here’s to your new life.” He held out his hand as if to shake. Logan took it and grasped it firmly, in one succinct movement that seemed to pass an agreement of finality between them. Then looked Dr. D in the eyes, and nodded, saying:

“I’ll do my best.”

Logan slowly opened his eyes as the bus rolled over another pothole. The sun was fully out now and was no longer hidden away by the clouds as it shone in his eyes. He straightened up and imitated wakefulness, then turned his head to look right as the bus passed a quaint wooden sign painted in bright colors that were now a bit faded. The sign read, “Welcome to Cardinal Valley” in large, wooden letters. Logan smiled a bit to himself, however unnecessary because no one was paying attention to him, and took an equally unnecessary breath of relief. He was here.

As the bus pulled into the bus station at last, and Logan stepped out into the sun, he allowed himself a moment to look around and think: freedom, I’m finally here.

#thomas sanders #sanders sides #logan sanders #sympathetic deceit #logic sanders #ts fic #sanders sides fic #ai logan #android logan #robot logan #ts deceit #deceit sanders #a hitchhiker's guide for androids #ahgfa #chapter 1 #the escape

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mc-doppomine · 3 years

Text

Code Vein AU (Buster Bros!!! ver.)

Ichiro -

Blood Code: Successor of the Eye - A blood code that focuses on brutal hits that leave enemies staggered Ajax - A blood code that focuses on landing critical hits and is an all-rounder sort of code.

Ichiro is a third generation revenant that had been revived for the purpose of Operation Queenslayer, a massive effort to kill the Queen. But prior to this, he was the son of a scientist and a backer to Project Queen. His mother died in an incident with horrors and so he and his brothers were moved to the lab facility. He spent his time essentially raising his brothers as his father became busy with lab stuff. At least Ichiro knows that’s he’s told of it.

He knew of Nemu and Samatoki before hand, them being kids of people that work in the labs, and had gotten along with both of them. Ichiro had looked up to Samatoki although he often caught trouble for being good friends with Nemu too. He and Nemu talked about if there was a world where they could be safe and they leaned towards the hope it could happen. When the Queen frenzied, Ichiro had been arriving to see Nemu before her examinations, as usual. She held not recognition of him and he was killed not far from her room.

When Ichiro was revived for Operation Queenslayer, he refused to serve unless he could procure the BOR parasite for Jiro and Saburo. And when it was secured, well, Ichiro had no reason to not honor his word. Eventually he found Samatoki again and served in his unit. This led to meeting both Jakurai and Ramuda as well. They came together when they put down a revolt that threatened the project. Their unit worked well and came the closest to getting to the Queen. While the name implied killing, both Ichiro and Samatoki had gone in with the intention of freeing Nemu, unable to see her as the Queen.

During a particular operation, Ichiro had come close to being able to take down the Queen but of course wouldn’t land a killing blow. This brought him in contact with Nemu, who was struggling against the parasite and had told Ichiro he needed to take her out unless he wanted her to threatened all he held dear. For him to continue their dream since she was now a threat to it. He was then dispersed and the attempt failed.

Yet after this, Ichiro had gone in favor in putting the Queen down. This enraged Samatoki, who viewed Ichiro as having betrayed him and Nemu. But, knowing Nemu’s wish, accepted Samatoki’s rage and didn’t back down on where he was with the project now. He doesn’t speak much on the aftermath of this to anyone. And since the end of the project, he took on the task of finding Successors, revenants compatible with the Queen’s power, to keep that power contained and divided. He himself taking a part of that power as his compatibility was great.

At current, He is a scout that delves into relatively unexplored areas be it for the infestation of Lost or because of the maze-like design. This gets him paid by the Party of Words and it is something he sometimes takes his brothers with him. He hadn’t returned from a venture, urging Jiro and Saburo to make their way to one of his friends--Ramuda or Jakurai--as per his order should he not return in a given time frame. This is because he feels his control over the Queen’s power he was granted is slipping and isolated himself to keep himself from going mad on innocent revenants.

Jiro -

Blood Code: Cerberus - A blood code that is focused on defense of his comrades and fire.

Technically a fourth generation revenant, one created after Project Queenslayer and usually an attempt bring back deceased. Prior being a revenant, Jiro lived near the laboratory with his family. He wasn’t particularly close to Ichiro during this time due to Ichiro always going to the labs and him getting a bad feeling about the place. As such he tended to be around Saburo a lot more and had been the last line of defense for Saburo when the Lost had gone mad. He managed to make their home a fort although it wouldn’t last forever considering their meager supplies. And with his crude weaponry, they could only last so long when Lost finally broke through.

Jiro was revived in Ichiro’s care and he initially didn’t get along with his brother, viewing his last days as suffering without Ichiro or their father there. Ichiro remarks he cannot turn back the clock but he’ll do what he can right here and now. So it was tentative living situation for them as Jiro was obstinate. His view only changed when he went out to explore, hating hiding out despite Ichiro’s warning. He had gotten into a Lost infested area and was dispersed a few times in his escape. However he was now trapped, unable to spawn a place safe enough for him to get away. This is when Ichiro came for him and rather than nag him outright, he showed Jiro how to properly wield a weapon.

After this venture, they got on a bit better and closer to their normal dynamics. Jiro preferred going on ventures with Ichiro and disliked having to ‘babysit’ Saburo although he never let Saburo make his mistake. He had been proud of himself when he was deemed capable enough to go scouting on his own. He occasionally teamed up with other wandering revenants. Most times were fine but the few that thought it fun to stab him in the back (in both senses), Jiro tended to be petty over it.

When Ichiro didn’t return from an assignment, he wanted to go delving into the deep to find him. However he was reminded of the promise he made to seek out Ichiro’s friends should he be unable to return within his promised time limit. When they met with Jakurai’s crew--Yotsutsuji, Hifumi and Doppo--he and Saburo started to stay at their safe house. He mainly handles the scouting requests that Ichiro normally handles in order to both further the research and keep supplies for himself and Saburo going.

Saburo -

Blood Code: Merlin - A code that specializes in gifts (magic) and ichor draining. Primary Weapon: Bayonet Secondary Weapon: Polearm

Sort of a fourth generation revenant, Saburo held a different take of his life prior to being what he is. Saburo was actually fairly close to his father and held an interest in the research. Of course he was still too young to really help out although he was waiting on their father on getting him in with what insight he could provide. In the mean time he was often hanging out with Jiro, which was fine with him.

When the Lost went mad and he and Jiro were trapped in their home while Lost roamed outside, Saburo was working on contact with someone, anyone. It was fruitless and it wasn’t helped by his health declining from the stress. However he hung on as long as he could for Jiro’s sake but passed from when Lost broke into the house.

When he was revived, he found himself alone. This was when he met with Rei again, who informed of his revival, that Jiro had yet to make a recovery and Ichiro was currently fighting. Saburo was told about the Queen and the ongoing Project Queenslayer. In addition to this, he was told of possible back up plans. Namely if the Queen was too powerful to kill. They sought to find that have compatibility with the Queen’s power. Rei informed that Saburo possessed this compatibility...almost a frightening degree. Like a second Queen candidate however that was viewed as dangerous so Rei remarked it staying their little secret.

And for the duration of Project Queenslayer, Saburo was kept away from other revenants other than some of the researchers and so he had little else to do other than cultivating his blood code. On the times he snuck out, he found himself needing a mask less than a normal revenant and able to purify mistle, plants that are soothing and alluring to the parasite, which make them where revenants respawn, as well as able to take in miasma, making areas safe for revenants.

This skill became useful after the end of Queenslayer and Saburo went to live with Jiro and Ichiro, Rei completley disappearing from the picture. It was an unique ability that was invaluable for exploration. It meant Saburo got to travel with at least one of his brothers often because they figure to deal with mistles for safer travel. Saburo doesn’t particularly like going out to explore so much as his time with Ichiro and Jiro--although it’s not like he’d admit that.

When Ichiro went missing and he and Jiro had to seek out Ichiro’s friends...he finds Jakurai’s crew to spark his interest. Or rather he is interested in their research since he could add to it with some of his knowledge to add to what the trio knows. And because of his purification ability, they find an interest in him as well as he’d allow them to get to places where miasma is too strong. So with a mutual relation, Saburo heads out to assist with the search.

#{Code Vein AU}

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