Scene Listing || Scene Schedule || Scene Schedule RSS
Owner Pose
Forte Scilab is dark, today.

Not because of anything anyone's done - today is, conveniently enough, a local national holiday (St. Babbage's Day) and so most of the governmental departments here are out - and along with them, the usual steady stream of people visiting the building. It's the perfect time to sneak back in...

... but the Watch doesn't have to sneak back in, this time. They have an invitation, from Dr. Hikari.

An invitation, and a set of keycards, one for each person - and strict instructions on how to head inside (side entrance, through the cafeteria kitchen, stairs down to basement one, first hallway on the left, stairs down to basement seven) and head directly to the Advanced Digital Treatment Theater - which is a operating room, despite the name. There, the group can observe the treatment of Bass.EXE from the observation room...

... If you go.

The information and data from the Gospel base was securely passed on to Dr. Hikari, who's confident in the treatment plan now. The group isn't *strictly* needed, but it might be nice to have them on hand in case something goes wrong - and, of course, to talk to Bass.EXE if/when he wakes back up and is himself again.

On the other hand, Forte has expressed, vocally and vociferously, his issues with SciLab - and how he wouldn't trust it as far as he could throw it. Going in is a risk. The group could just as easily assemble somewhere and call Dr. Hikari on the phone. Forte is along for the ride, though - and he's deferring to the group on the decision, which ever way they choose to approach this.

Or, to put it another way, how much trust do you extend?
Gareth Gareth is the sort of person that, unless she's led to believe otherwise from personal experience, goes full throttle MAXIMUM TRUST.

That's why, regardless of whether the rest of the group wants to actually go or not, she volunteers to be the boots on the ground even if it ends p just being her heading in. Understanding the danger, however, she does opt for a slightly different disguise from last time. Whereas she had gray hair and a wolf-ear headset on while she was leaving all those forum posts up, this time she...

Left the headset at home. She actually kind of likes the look of that thing, even if she hasn't figured out how to connect it to her phone yet. Still, that's probably for the best as she won't have time to listen to anything even if she wanted to.

She needs to pay attention to what's going on in the observation room, after all.
Rita Ma      Pursuant to her heart-to-heart with Forte, Rita is inclined to treat SciLab as an organization with distinct distrust, regardless of her feelings towards Dr. Hikari himself.

     But... if they really are bad people, and we don't go, then we'll just be leaving Bass in their hands. I don't know if I could stand to do that.

     Accordingly, her vote has been cast in favor of going to SciLab in person, though she still firmly extends the offer to Forte himself for him alone to stay behind and communicate via teleconference. "I don't need to know what happened back then, but I know you have a right to be suspicious. If you're not there with us, then they don't have any motive to come after us, right?"

     She arrives in the observation room wearing a white sundress and broad-brimmed hat, exactly the same as her first trip. The worry is clear to read on her face, and she naturally gravitates near any present allies for silent comfort.
Shotaro Hidari Shotaro does not dismiss Forte's reservations out of hand.  If someone really wanted a Bass, Forte would be a good substitute.  They'd also be at a disadvantage of being on Scilab's turf.  Shotaro does not intend to force Forte to come, and in fact, notes that Forte staying back to bail them out should the worst happen is a good idea.  

Shotaro is going, because as he says it, 'He has to see this case through to the end.'  In this whole situation, he is sure Dr. Hikari is at least not going to betray them, but it also does not mean that Forte is wrong with his gut.  As a detective, Shotaro respects that feeling.  If that feeling comes from what happened in Forte's past, or because someone in Scilab will betray them...well he can't say.

What he can say is that they're the most likely to make their move at this moment.  So Shotaro is here, hat on head, suit, and tie.  Philip has been quiet, for some reason.  Perhaps he's been drawn into another of his obsessions?  Who can say...
Forte "... Staying back to bail you out, then. Your words, not mine," says Forte.

The trip into Scilab goes...

... entirely without a hitch.

"Just on time," says Dr. Hikari, looking up from his terminal. The Advanced Digital Treatment Theater is two parts - the 'operating floor', which is a wide open room currently containing one (1) Bass.EXE, in the stasis tube moved here from storage (there's a cargo dolly against one wall, maybe Hikari moved the tube himself?) with wires running down into a floor panel nearby.

"I've switched from the antiviral treatments to running a debugger, using a best-match regex algorithm between Bass.EXE's original checksum and his current checksum while doing a comparison on the Gospel data's hashmaps for..."

He trails off, sensing he's getting into the weeds, and tries again. "I'm running a new treatment plan, looking at how Bass *should* look when he's healthy, and the data you found for how he *shouldn't* look, and adjusting him from there." He waits a moment to see if that landed.

"This will take a bit, though, since I have to make a lot of the adjustments by hand - make yourself comfortable. There's some couches, and there's a vending machine here... and the water fountain's over there... and there's a TV connected to the web, if you wanna watch something."

He glances around. "Did - you get a chance to talk to... your Bass?"
Shotaro Hidari "You're comparing two pictures of him, and attempting to find where they don't agree," Shotaro says, easily enough.  He gets the idea of what is going on, because it's not too far off from detective work, though it's closer to doctors' work.  

He also very pointedly doesn't answer anything to do about their Forte.  That's something he leaves up to Rita, because she had the talk with him.  Instead, he's taking his time to watch the various screens and to try and look around where he can.  

"I'm fine.  When I'm not on the case, I do a lot of sitting anyway."
Gareth Depsite reading up and studying a bit of computer stuff prior to coming here the last time, Doctor Hikari's talk of debuggers and hashmaps still has Gareth just sort of staring at him blankly. Eventually, though, she raises her hand to chest level and gives him a firm thumbs up of approval!

"Very good, doctor! We're leaving him in your capable hands, then." With that vote of confidence given, the knight proceeds to shake her head. "I have not! Personally, that is. He's..." She furrows her brow slightly while pacing around the room to get a better look at all the weird tech she's still not familiar with.

"He's been hurt before, I think. It's better that I not pry into those things until he's ready to speak about them freely."
Rita Ma      Rita's wide, attentive eyes are turned on Dr. Hikari, and promptly glaze over as he launches into his technical explanation. She perks right back up at the simplified version, though, smiling and nodding her head eagerly.

     "You said... this one didn't remember 'the incident' that made the original leave. Right? Do you think he'll want to stay here, Dr. Hikari?" A little pause. "Do you think SciLab will be a good home for him? After all... won't everyone just associate him with the bad thing that happened?"

     In response to his final question, Rita nods and pulls the cell phone out of her satchel. "I talked to him. He said... he still doesn't trust SciLab, but he thought your father was a good person, Dr. Hikari. He won't be here in person, but when you're ready to talk to him, I can put him on the phone, okay?"

     If that isn't in the cards immediately, she'll lay herself down on a couch and happily pull a book and lunchbox out of her satchel. The former is a wildlife guide with lots of pictures of flowers and birds, and the latter is something like sashimi.
Forte Hikari nods to Shotaro's understanding of the explanation. "Well - if you don't mind, could you grab me a soda from the machine? I could use the caffeine boost. Diet - not zero sugar, please."

The soda machine, however, is flashing a <UNABLE TO CONNECT TO PRICING SERVER> error if Shotaro goes to try it.

"I read the files. I was still in school when all of that happened," he says to Gareth next, as his fingers fly over the keyboard. "Finding information from that era is... frustrating, since much of the early work Scilab did was classified later on, and even with security clearance..."

"... But I have a pretty good picture of what went on, I think..."

And then to Rita. "I can't say. That's up to him. It was determined when he was brought in that he's an entirely new person - he can't be blamed for what anyone else did, or for his actions while he was..."

He glances down at Bass. "Not well."

The progress meter ticks over to 15 percent.

"... And it was my father that I wanted to talk to him about, really. It's selfish of me, but..."

He takes the phone. "I didn't get to see too much of dad towards the end of things. He was at work, a lot. So - since Forte was around back then, maybe he knows some things... that was my thought, anyway. Thank you."

"I'll call him in a minute here, as soon as I start the next batch of fixes..."
Gareth "So they would hide it instead of letting people learn from the mistakes of the past... That's a shame." Gareth wrinkles her nose briefly as she considers Hikari's replies to herself and Rita, going quiet for a while as she listens to that continued explanation of Bass.EXE's past.

"People can do strange things when they're unwell. They can act like completely different people, hurting those they'd care about while being unable to stop it. Like... Like they're trapped in their own bodies." She comments, keeping her eyes closed for a few moments and rubbing her head absentmindedly.

Or probably entirely on purpose.

"Or they might even act without realizing they're doing anything at all. Whatever the case is, though, you..." She opens her eyes, grinning at Hikari after a few moments. "You'll be able to help him through it, I'm sure! And once he recovers, maybe he really will feel better enough to explain what happened."
Shotaro Hidari "Mm?  Sure," Shotaro says, making his way over to the machine, but before he can do anything, he notices the error.  "Doctor, the machine isn't working, unable to connect to the pricing server.."

"Which is odd, because I thought everything in this world was online and connected...a connection issue is a big deal, wouldn't it be?" he asks, not ACCUSING, but in a way that says to others that he thinks something is suddenly up.  

"Also, with that much security clearance, and files restricted to someone even of your access..." he says, flipping through a few things.  Checking his phone to see if Beetle can get an internet signal, looking for other items that might be out.

Like the TV.
Rita Ma      Rita nods from the couch, lunchbox in her lap. She's got funny little flat chopsticks, metal instead of wood, and her smile's adorably contented as she munches on a piece of salmon. "It's up to him," she affirms. Her expression only darkens a little when the topic turns back to responsibility.

     "Just because you know better than to blame him, does that mean other people will? If he doesn't change his identity... won't he live in the shadow of something he had nothing to do with? Do you think you can protect him from that?" Her tone isn't accusatory, but curious and downcast.

     She pauses for a little while to focus on her food. Hikari talking about his deceased father, though, stirs her to look back up at him with renewed interest.

     "What kind of person was your dad, Dr. Hikari? ... Or is that what you're hoping to find out?"
Forte "It's a hardwired signal - it shouldn't be out..." says Hikari.

The TV, likewise, is now displaying a <Searching for channel signal> error.

The cell signal is a *bit* weak down here, but - entirely possibly that's just because they're seven floors underground. There isn't any wifi, though, which - there was some last time... right?

"Trapped in their own bodies... Ah, I suppose so. I'll certainly help him out in any way that I can."

Twenty five percent, says the progress bar on Bass's tube.

"I don't know how other people will react - if need be, it's a big multiverse, I'll find somewhere he'll be happy at. As far as my father - nothing sinister. I fully believe he was a good man! Just one a bit too devoted to his work. And one the world took far too early. I'd like to hope he'd be proud about how I'm doing - and how the grandchildren he never got to meet are doing."

Around this point, a faint smell wafts under the door to the observation room, the door leading out into the hall... is... someone barbequing something?
Rita Ma      "Good," Rita says brightly. "If you're even willing to send him somewhere else so he'll be happy... I think he really will be alright."

     Halfway through putting the next piece of sashimi in her mouth, she freezes up. Her eyes go wide. Her chopsticks drop to the floor with a clattering clink, and in the next eyeblink she's across the room, yanking the door open without any explanation.

     The television- fire- Bass is in danger!!

     If the source of the smell isn't immediately obvious in the hall, she'll check in both directions, then break out into a dead sprint towards its source.
Shotaro Hidari "Gareth, go with her," Shotaro says, but he himself doesn't leave.  Something is up, and Shotaro doesn't like it one bit.  Why would the hard-lined signal in a world that can't live or operate without the internet go down?  

"Doctor, if anything were to happen, could this process be stopped without hurting Bass?" he asks, making sure he knows exactly what he needs to do in case the worst was to come.  

"Be careful," he says towards Rita's back.  He knows she'll be fine, especially with backup.
Gareth "Everyone will react differently, but I'm sure he'll find people that understand what he's going through once he comes out of all this! If there's one thing I've learned from modern media, it's that people love redemption stories." Gareth tries to reassure Hikari with another confident noise, going quiet as he speaks of his father. She..

Actually doesn't have much input there, alas. She's distracted by the scent hitting her nose, and she glances over at the door roughly around the same time Rita does, and she approaches it at a brisk pace before breaking into a run once the door's open.

"On it! We'll leave the doctor in your capable hands!" She calls out before shifting into an outright sprint, following her nose while her arms trail behind her. It's not to do some kind of vaguely ninja-esque run, thankfully, but to get her shield ready should there be a need to throw herself right into harm's way.
Forte "Yes - I'm doing transaction-based batches with a full backup model and onboard transaction logs with a raid-striped - yes, yes nothing bad would happen if we had to stop suddenly," says Hikari, dumbing down the full explanation once again. The source of the smell isn't that hard to find.

There's a fire navi, coming down the hall. He's one of a trio of navis - pilot-light flames are visible on his head and the end of his arms, while a second navi is short with an eskimo-esque look. And in the lead is a red swordsman with long white flowing hair (one that looks vaguely familiar to Rita).

"Oh look," says the swordsman, neutrally. "We didn't have to go far to find them."

"Halt, evildoers!" pipes up the short eskimo. "You are under arrest for destruction of governmental property, assault of governmental personnel, trespass into a governmental facility, and - and a bunch of other stuff! Submit and face justice!"

"They won't submit," predicts the red swordsman.

The fire navi, in the back of the trio, doesn't speak up.
Shotaro Hidari "Good, because we'll probably be doing that unless you think you can deal with it while someone attacks us," Shotaro says.  He listens to the radio, still waiting for something to happen more near him.  The fact that there were three of them...

"So where are you..?" he asks, eyeing his surroundings.  The three are the distraction, so where is the culprit?  "Who is Protoman.EXE?" he asks the doctor.
Forte "Eugene Chaud's netnavi, S-rank Official Netbattler, very hard to strike up a conversation with...? Why do you ask?" asks Hikari, focused on his work.
Shotaro Hidari "Because he's here and about to fight Rita and Gareth," Shotaro says, "With two other Navi's from the sound of it."
Rita Ma      Rita's eyes go wide and wild. She'd nearly dropped to all fours coming out of the break room; seeing the navis in the hallway jolts her back upright. After a half-second to process the sitation, she...

     Surrenders, of course. Both of her hands rise above her head, palms open and empty.

     The fake Rita does, anyway. The real Rita slips out of her decoy-skin, invisible, and crosses the distance between them in a fraction of a second.

     Out of a jarring tackle aiming to take Protoman to the floor, one of her hands grabs the red navi's forearm and holds it off to the side, straining with superhuman might to keep him from bringing that sword to bear. She fades back into visibility with her legs straddling his chest, and her other hand is held at his neck, glowing purple with a monstrous energy that steadily drains his life energy on contact.

     Behind her, four tentacles unravel from around her body to try and ward off the frost and fire navis from interfering in the grapple. But she's counting on Gareth to do most of the work there.

     Straining, with teeth gritted and eyes wide, she says: "This is- how you are, after all. I should've listened..."
Gareth The suspects have been found! Gareth skids to a stop as she whips her shield around to her front, although her lance remains unmaterialized for the time being as she takes up a defensive stance (hopefully somewhere in front of Rita).

"Evildoers? We've done no such things! What reason would we have to destroy...!" She pauses, recalling that time she stole that computer. And also that time she entered Scilab in disguise. And that time those cameras got messed with...

"... But those actions were most certainly not in the service of evil as you claim! Besides, what of your arson of this same building?" She retorts, visibly shaken at realizing she really did break so many laws in the span of a week and trying to deflect.

Rita moves into action, and Gareth joins her after only a moment to process. With Protoman being the target of her tentacles, the knight hurls her shield at the fire navi with a great deal of force before dashing right into it to stagger out the potential impacts. Once she catches her shield, meanwhile, she whips it around in a wide arc to aim a big slam right at the ice navi before diving at them to try and keep at least one of the two pinned down.

"So you surrender, and we can talk this out like rational people!" She says after committing a violence.
Forte "That's - not good?" says Hikari, who sounds like he has programmer brain, and is trying to convert Shotaro's statement to a floating point value.

The progress bar ticks up to 45 percent...

Outside, Rita's plan goes off without a hitch, she crosses the divide unseen and tackles the red navi, sending both her and the wooden ninja dummy to the floor.

... Wait...

There's a sharp sound as the swordsman points his sword at her back. "Resistance confirmed. Proceeding to deletion. Thank you for making this easy."

"Arson? Where!?" The eskimo looks around frantically - and gets blindsided by Gareth smashing into her. "Ugh - a foul lie! You and your foul lies will face inevitable justice! We have the building surrounded, and more backup on the way, and there is no escape!"

Meanwhile, the fire navi staggers back from the shield hit - and doesn't do much of anything else.

"Hey, FireMan!" calls the eskimo. "You want to help take down the evildoers or what?"

"Yeah, just a sec," says the fire navi, who has one of his lighter-hands to the side of his head, in the manner of one talking on a radio.
Rita Ma      Rita stiffens up in alarm in response to the voice behind her. Teleportation? Swapped in with something else? An illusion in the first place? I can't guarantee anything will land. But if he's a sword-user, the real Protoman can't be far.

     "You're wrong, Protoman. We're here to help. But I don't expect you to hear it."

     Of course, then she pulls the Uno reverse card. Visibly, Rita stays in the same place. Invisibly, she drops low, performs a blindingly swift leg sweep, and then aims a crushing straight kick at Protoman's torso before he can hit the ground.

     No playing fair, then.

     Not waiting to see whether Protoman will find a way out of that one, Rita's tentacles weave together and calcify into walls on either side of the hallway, sealing the two of them off into a smaller area. Water gushes out of seemingly nowhere at high pressures, filling the space to the ceiling in an eyeblink. The walls themselves are reinforced with the innate durability of Rita's flesh, making them more than a match for steel.

     Underwater, her maneuverability exceeds a skilled flier's in open air, to say nothing of how her opponent's likely to be bogged down. Swooshing backwards to gain distance, she shifts and mutates her body with a shuddering arch of her spine: bioelectric organs develop along her tentacles, and sparking plates sprout from her back.

     That momentary change is all the warning Protoman gets before the entire saltwater chamber is lit up with flesh-searing electricity. This time there's no escape.
Shotaro Hidari Shotaro is trying to puzzle this out.  The puppet master hasn't made their move yet.  The fact that there are three navi's in here, calling them evil doers...and confirmation that one of them works for Scilab, causes him to think.  The progress bar climbing up too is important, and really the important thing is that it gets to one hundred percent.

Shotaro can't rule out that they know what they're doing, and that Rita is right to thrash them.  He also can't rule out that they're NOT here knowing the full story either.  

"Do you know Chaud's phone number?" he asks, keeping the beetle phone out.  "I have a feeling someone is playing at something dirty."
Gareth "Don't you smell that?" Gareth asks as she maintains her position on top of the eskimo navi, shield and body used to weigh her down without realizing that her own sense of smell might ust be better than the average person's. "That smell of barbeque .. Or arson! As if someone's trying to burn this entire place down while we're inside and none the wiser!" She explains, sniffing the air again to try and track that scent down without once realizing that there might be a connection between the fire navi and that smell.

"But we won't meet our ends here, servants of the evil Gospel! Our friends are counting on us!" She proclaims proudly while finally materializing that massive lance of hers and...

Waiting. FireMan's still on the phone or radio or something presumably, and she just sort of stares at him awkwardly while he's talking to whoever. There's enough of an awkward pause, even, that she just looks down at the eskimo, then ProtoMan, then Rita (and also Rita's wall), and then back at FireMan and the eskimo Navi.

"... While we're waiting. Explain yourself! What makes you believe you're on the side of justice?" Gareth asks, sounding less accusing and more actually-questioning. "And why are you here? Did you come only to slay us?"
Forte "Um -" Hikari gets his phone out, navigates to his contact list, and holds Chaud's number out for Shotaro.

Out in the hall, Protoman staggers back a half step as he's kicked, and holds off a moment as he observes Rita's actions, bringing his sword up to guard warily.

"... Ah. A water field..."

"Electricity, then. Zapring B, Ex-"

He doesn't get that far before Rita beats him to the punch, flooding the flooded chamber with her own electricity.

"!!!"

Outside, the eskimo struggles. "We're Scilab! Of course we're servants of justice! This is like asking why water is wet! YOU are the servants of Gospel, or - something like that! You're definitely guilty of things! We'll work that out after we arrest you!"

"Oh! And speaking of water!"

He manages to turn his head towards the section of the corridor where Rita is fighting Protoman, and breathes out - sending a wave of frost towards that section, and causing Rita's blockade and the water to start freezing, just as Protoman slots in an AreaSteal and manages to short-range teleport out of the flooded section.

"Hey, just got new orders from the boss," says Fireman, looking up from his radio-ing finally.

"New orders from the boss?" says Protoman. "Lord Chaud is leading this operation, and communicates directly to me."

"Yeah, about that," says Fireman, and aims both fire cannons at Protoman.
Shotaro Hidari The call is ended as quickly as it started.  

"Oh, so he's that type.." Shotaro mutters to himself.  Gareth tells him what's going on, and that was the last piece he needed.  From the behavior of the Red one, he could figure out Chaud was many things...impatient, an asshole, likely single...but someone who compromises on his morals.

"Partner, you're up," he says and pulls out the Joker memory.  He won't be in time to help Protoman, but he can at least...

A door behind the group opens.  Philip stands out.  

The Joker Gaia memory slides into his version of the belt.  A tiny dinosaur that looks like a T-Rex jumps into his hand, and with a quick flip, turns into a USB stick with a dinosaur head on it.  He slams it down, "FANG."

FANG JOKER

This time, it's Philip who's transformed, the wind that blows does a similar transformation to Philip than what usually happens to Shotaro.  This time, half of W is silver with bladed bits, the other is the dark purple that is Joker.  Kamen Rider W aims to close the distance between Fireman and himself.

He aims down, aiming a kick that cuts straight for the center of mass on the Navi.  "Are you alright?" Philip asks Gareth and Rita.

Meanwhile, in the room with Hikari, Shotaro has fallen unconscious on a couch.  
Rita Ma      Rita doesn't speak in response, but exhales the last of her air in a focusing breath visible as a rush of bubbles. Her hair and clothes swirl around her with elegant menace. The tentacles that were unwound from around her body angle and point towards the stunned Protoman, entirely ready for an underwater duel.

     The sword-wielding hero, come to put an end to the monster. I know how this story goes. But it won't work out for you like you think.

     Her eyes go wide as he disappears- so it really is teleportation. And the tricks I used against Lilian won't work- but she's unconcerned by the freezing. The bioelectric fins disappear. Instead her body turns purple and ghostly-translucent, and she simply swooshes through the ice and her own wall as if they weren't even there, magnetically drawn towards Protoman. She reaches out with hands like claws, dealing life-draining contact damage "per pixel per frame" like a hungry wraith, and passes out the other side before dismissing the power and falling into a crouch.

     Rita's gaze then darts between Protoman and Fireman, incomprehension obvious on her face. To Philip: "Huh? I'm-" A brief pause as she expels a gallon of water from her lungs. "-not hurt, Mr. Philip. What's going on?"
Gareth "You're Scilab? then... Wait, no, that doesn't make sense, either! We're opposed to Gospel's crimes as well!" Gareth replies with a confused, yet determined and forceful rebuttal. "And if we were guilty of anything, it would only be in service of the common man! Not...!"

She's actually sounding even more confused now than before. "But... You're sure you aren't with Gospel?" She asks the eskimo, looking from the blue navi to the red one as he comes out of Rita's wall. More confusion is apparent on Gareth's face as Fireman turns his flames upon Protoman, and she looks over at W as Sho-no, as Philip speaks up.

"We're fine! But... Um." She looks over at Rita to see if she gets what's going on, then back at Fireman blasting Protoman with flames. She closes her eyes for a moment to nod with renewed determination, then leaps off the eskimo navi and rushes for Protoman!

Not with her lance, though, but with her shield. She's aiming to full-body tackle him out of the path of those flames, then turns a rather fierce gaze on Fireman himself. "You! Why would you turn your attacks on a comrade? Where's your honor?!"
Forte "Match - so much for being rehabilitated," says Protoman, turning to this new threat - and getting blindsided by Rita grabbing him with her draining claws.

Fireman holds his attack as Rita comes in. "World Three sends its regards. I would-" he says, this directed towards Rita, and the rest gets cut off by Phillip coming in with a kick that sends *him* flying next.

"I've lost track! What are we doing!" complains Iceman, who's finally not pinned beneath Gareth anymore.

"Everyone but you or I in this room is a criminal or a traitor," says Protoman, struggling out of Rita's tentacles. "Delete."

"Oh! Okay!"

The two certainly don't look all that happy to be rescued - and while Protoman's on his last health bar and Iceman isn't measuring up, there's still some fight in them.

"They - aren't kidding," calls Fireman, getting back up from being kicked further down the hall. "They have SciLab surrounded. And we're just the vanguard."

"And I was never on their side."

"That much is certain," mutters Protoman, who resumes attacking, along with Iceman. Fireman, meanwhile, does not - though he raises his hands to defend himself.
Shotaro Hidari "Shotaro had a hunch something like this might happen, so I came with but didn't enter the main room.  I...also might have gotten distracted by what was on the screen in there.." Shotaro's side of W just sighs witheringly.  

"The short story is, you're being misled, Protoman, so is your user.  Unless you're ready to call Dr. Hikari a terrorist too?" Shotaro side asks both Ice man and Protoman.  "Don't delete Fireman, at least not yet.  He will likely know someone who will lead us to the real culprit.  He's unlikely to know who really is the person in the shadows."

"I bet he doesn't even know Gospel was involved in all of this," Philip adds.  Though right after engaging fire man with his fists.  Aiming to keep him on the defensive, while his blade continues to cut through his armor.  
Rita Ma      Rita's eyes dance from Fireman, to Iceman, to Protoman with evident confusion. It sets into resolve a moment later. "Rotten," she pronounces simply.

     They can't hold me. I can move through walls; look like anything or nothing. But everyone else... we could take Protoman hostage, since he's important. I could make disguises for them, maybe. Wait, no: that's it. It's me they want, right? For what I did to the Virus Breeding program.

     For a few moments, she does her best to simply duel with Protoman without leaning on her illusions or invisibility; she can't possibly land a decisive hit on him without the majority of her toolkit, but she's still remarkably slippery and difficult to inflict more than superficial cuts on even when she's visible. That's because her invisible tentacles are doing work elsewhere.

     In an adjoining room, her tentacles weave disguises; wearable faces, labcoats, fake ID badges. Once that's done, she exhales sharply, shuts her eyes, and steps forward, hands by her sides to signal the fight is over. Her expression is exhausted.

     "Yeah. I'm the one who did it. We really are surrounded, so... even if I win this fight, there's no point. Just take me, okay? Please. They didn't do anything wrong."

     But they won't accept that. Policemen like them, there's no way.

     An invisible organic wall weaves itself behind her, then shifts subtly to an illusory display; visually nothing seems different, but the real Philip and the real Gareth are now concealed behind it. 'Philip' and 'Gareth' step forward as tentacle-woven perfect decoys to be arrested, in turn.

     Rita hangs her head, going a little limp with a deep, tired sigh. "Let's go."
Gareth "World Three? What does that..?" Gareth's grimaces as she's finding herself growing more confused, chalking most of it up to weird internet things rather than actual allegiance juggling that has her uncertain of who to attack besides Fireman. He's an easy enough target, at least, but Protoman and Iceman?

Philip isn't going after them, and it sounds as though they might not necessarily be enemies in this situation. That's good enough for Gareth already, and Rita's request to trust here is met with her usual enthusiastic noises of affirmation. Thus, she waits for Rita's lead while settling into a low stance with her shield and lance lowered, prepared to spring forward at a moment's notice. At who is unclear, but once the signal is given, Gareth...

She stays right where she is. She watches the decoys moving forward at first, gripping her lance tightly as that discomfort gnaws at her chest and she suppresses her urge to just charge right in and try to make a break for it with Rita. She gave Rita her word, and she's not going to break it so easily.

Instead, she starts stepping backwards gingerly, being careful not to bump into anyone or anything as she seeks out a less obvious spot to let the lance and shield fade away. Once they're gone, she regroups with Philip to start looking for an exit that isn't covered. She's still ready to charge back in anyway, but..

Rita's trusting her here.
Forte Fireman brings up his handless dukes to attempt blocks on Fang's attacks - mostly unsuccessfully. "I'm on - your side - if you'd just hold off on attacking for long enough for me to explain-"

And then he gives up, and turns and runs for the stairs. It's that or get beaten down by Fang - or by Protoman and Iceman, who certainly aren't discriminating in their onslaught.

"Proto! He's making a break for it!" calls Iceman, pointing unnecessarily.

"Damn it - the outer lines wouldn't have been told yet, he might slip away..."

Protoman glances at the stairs, then at the surrendering(?) Watch party. "If you're really confessing and surrendering - stay there," he demands. "Otherwise we're adding resisting arrest to your charges *again*."

And the two take off for the stairs, leaving the group alone in the hallway.

"... Is... everything okay?" asks Hikari, who's poked his head out of the observation room.
Rita Ma      Rita perks up from her half-feigned exhaustion as the Navis turn to leave, making a small noise of shock. "W-Wait! You can't just..."

     ". . ."

     A little sigh escapes her as her illusion-wall comes down, and her mimicked Philip and Gareth simultaneously disappear. She turns to look back over her shoulder with a wavery smile that's more brave than she really feels.

     "Everything's okay, Dr. Hikari," she says. The hallway in front of her is drenched, frozen, and probably carved up with slashes and burn-marks too. It does not look okay. "Change of plans. Put on the disguises and we'll go."

     Rita herself transforms into the shape of a perfectly nondescript woman in a labcoat in front of his eyes. "We really don't know how long we have. I don't think we can stick around for Bass to finish, so hurry, please."

     "Though, doctor... what's World Three?"
Shotaro Hidari W isn't responding very well to being included with turning on a man of the law, despite being in the Watch.  He's about to continue, but Rita asks a very important question...and then tells him something else.

Fang Joker jumps back, just in time for the illusion to be set up.  Though it looks like that was moot due to the policemen going upstairs after the traitor.  Philip pulls the USB sticks out after closing the belt.  Shotaro is back on his feet a few moments later when people are piling back in.  

Rita asks a question but doesn't say the whole truth.  Shotaro and Philip give her a knowing nod.  That's something to investigate later.  "Yes Doctor, let's make sure this works...otherwise the mess that was made due to misunderstandings is looking to overflow.."
Gareth Gareth doesn't speak up right away even as the hallway appears to be cleared. She's still looking out for other paths and signs of leftover stuff on the off chance anything's been left behind to observe the area. It's only when the wall drops and Rita announces a change of plans that she finally speaks up again.

"We're okay now. For now, perhaps, but we'll be okay." She replies with a quick thumbs-up and confident grin directed at Rita, looking towards the exits before heading into the adjoining room to get a disguise for herself. Perhaps not quite realizing how they were made, she just slips one of those lab coats on and throws a fake ID around her neck before getting the matching face on.

"We'll be out of here before you know it. If either of you need a lift..." Gareth gets on one knee briefly, then recalls the lab coat before getting back up. "... Ah, we should be fine to walk out. Briskly! I don't know how to feel about all of this going on, but this whole situation seems to be getting more complicated by the moment."

She's not sure where to gesture, so she gestures in the direction that the navis left in. "Do you think they'll... Any of them can be trusted? It doesn't sound like all of them were on the same page, either."
Forte "... Oh, well, um... good?"

(Rita's question about W3 is answered on the radio.)

"Yeah - I... am not sure what was going on here, but I don't think I can help you get out, but..."

"... It looks like you have things well in hand there," he says, glancing at Rita's disguise.

"As far as Bass..."

He gestures for them to come back into the lab - and there's Bass, comatose, but out of the stasis tube, lying on the couch in the observation room.

"Once I got past 51% progress, it all went very quickly, since I had a majority checksum that - since it's easier to clear the sickness when it's small, and he's got a clean bill of health by all the scans" he says, foregoing the technical explanation for time. "If you'd like to take him with you - you all seem invested enough in his well being, and I trust you'll let him go if he doesn't want to stay with you."
Rita Ma      Rita the Very Ordinary Scientist wipes her forehead with her arm. "They tried to hurt us while doing a good thing. Of course we can't trust them," she says to Gareth with a note of bitterness. "The other one, maybe, but I can't be sure."

     It's a little strange to hear her Cute Imouto Voice coming out of a different person's mouth.

     Her eyebrows lift when she peeks into the other room, and a hand covers her mouth in surprise. "Really?! You'd let us... I mean, you won't keep him here? I..." A little pause. "I guess it's easier to come back to SciLab than it is to leave, right? So... taking him is probably the right idea."

     She takes a moment to rub her face with both hands, obviously still ratcheting herself down from the crisis mode of the last few minutes. "Right. We'll bring him with us, then. I can disguise him too if we need to."

     She also, very purposefully, grabs her lunchbox. I'm starving now. It's a good thing none of them had real blood...