Scene #8404:

Owner	Pose
Candy	Candy's little farm is doing well. A chorus of clucking chickens rises up from within and around the wooden coop off ot the side of the house, where a scattering of corn has been spread. Meanwhile, the afternoon sun bears down on neat rows of amaranth and tomato plants, a week or two from harvest at most. Towards the opposite side of the property from the coop is a wooden shed. It's inside this shed that Candy has fabricated a wide array of industrial tools--all of them with bulky power cables, heavy steel construction and archaic shapes indicative of a world in the early stages of industrialization. Thick, rough leather work gloves run up to his elbows, and a pair of circular safety goggles rests across his collarbone. A table large enough for a person to lay on has been prepared, a simple thing of steel construction with adjustable ratches manipulated by a few pedals on the floor. It's here that Ishirou will find him, sitting on a stool with his gloved fingers interlaced and frowning thoughtfully.
Ishirou	While Candy has been working on the project for him, Ishirou has done what he could to help. Sharing his ability to get as much information, see the most minuscule parts of things, and also provide his own thoughts. It was his body after all. He also put in work on the farm, trying to help keep it maintained while Candy worked on things he could only do. Right now, Ishirou has walked into the barn with a pitcher of lemonade, with ice in it. He places the pitcher and glass down near Candy and fills up the glass for him. "Something I can help with?" he asks, noticing the thoughtful frown, and pulls up a stool to sit with Candy, offering him the glass of lemonade.
Candy	"Thanks, little handsome," says the farmer, hopping off of the stool to rest his forehead against Ishirou's screen and close his eyes. "But no," says Candy, pulling away to pick up the lemonade. "You've been plenty of help. I'm just... wondering if you're sure this is what you want." He nods to a corkboard, where various paper schematics have been drawn and pinned. "It's your decision," he says. "I know you talked to Phony about it. And if this is what you want, I'll do it for you. 'Cause I love you, and I want you to be happy." He stares into the lemonade, then sets it on a wooden worktable against the wall, opposite the corkboard. "It's just that... you was happy before, and then..." He lets out a sharp sigh. "I dunno. I feel weird about it. How you throw yourself ass-first at Ms. Ahuizotl, and you come back wanting to be a robot again. Maybe I'm stupid and I don't get it." Candy shrugs. "All I'm saying is, if you want a human body, it's harder, but that's doable, too. So, before I get started... is this what you want?" He turns and motions to the blueprints, with a sweep of his gloved hand.
Ishirou	Ishirou smiles at Candy, though the smile turns into a more thoughtful expression as Candy reveals his concern. It's a fair one, it's a reasonable concern, one that might happen if someone wonders if their reason is because of the trauma they just faced, or some other reason. And he was right, he /was/ happy. "I won't lie, and say that I haven't considered abandoning my body because.." he pauses, "Because of her. Because of the ugliness, I saw in her. In Eggman. In just so many things I have let myself be blind to," he remembers NAZCA, and a shudder goes through him. Though his expression turns into a smile. "Your concern isn't unfounded or unwarranted...I've been through a lot, made a lot of realizations..." he says, frowning a little. "This isn't going to make me any /less/ fragile, or any harder to kill than I would be as a person." "But I had been considering something like this for a while...though my initial plan was perhaps going with something cybernetic to work with what was already in my head," he admits, "Maybe gradually work up to it," he comments. "But no, this happened and it's an opportunity. I also saw something in humanity that..." he pauses, sighing. "I hated. It doesn't belong there.." "It's gross and stifling. The idea that there is a /purity/ of form to humanity, that there is some right think..." he continues, "That based on these things we can divide people, separate ourselves from them. When Lilian told me I had too much of INDUS in me..." he pauses, thinking. "I realized that it was in me too. That because of how someone I considered a sister different...made me afraid." "It made me feel like /her/. Especially after Nephra's fight...I feel like I was playing at something I was not. I got the body because I thought it was what I wanted but..." he says, sitting down. "What I wanted was autonomy. The /right/ to make my own decisions, and chose how I express myself." "Those ideas festered in me, the bad ones, and once I saw that..." he says, with a pause, "I needed to embrace something different. Though at the time we talked about it, I didn't have the right thoughts about it. Now..? No, I want to be this, I want to express myself better...I want to show others what it is to be a human." "And this...this is what it is. Shaping yourself to show others what you are...to show others how you're shaped."
Candy	Candy leans on the worktable, listening to Ishirou with his eyes focused on the scattered tools, hands spaced evenly apart. His dark hair would spill out to either side of his soft face, were it not for the canvas work cap keeping his bound locks in place. "Okay," he says, after a long, contemplative moment. "If it's something that's coming from you... yeah. As long as it's coming from you and not from her. Then I can do this for you, and not feel like she ruined somebody else, too." He pauses, glancing over to the lemonade thus-far essentially untouched, with condensation beading on the glass. Candy takes a sip. Then a gulp. "Let's get started, then, ah?" He opens the windows of the shed. It's necessary, because the cacophony of sounds that follows, packed into a second or two, is more bearable for it. It's difficult to distinguish any one particular sound, in that ephemeral noise. Maybe the power drill had whirred, maybe the hammer had struck a hundred times, maybe the saw had whined. It's a little warmer in the shed, too, for just a moment. A heavy trunk is simply present, tucked against one wall, where it wasn't before. Its lid is open, revealing its contents--raw materials. Lightweight, durable metals, silicone, fiberglass, conductors, insulators. Candy stretches, rotating his arm and pacing around the room.
Ishirou	"You're very sweet for asking," he says, he would hug him right now, but his body right now is not very comfortable. Instead, he simply smiles warmly and nods. "There are things I learned from this, but...no not this one," he comments. Between pauses, Ishirou just fills the glass back up, making sure the accelerated Candy doesn't drive himself into dehydration. It was a very warm day, in a shed, that only has open windows. It makes him think about the house they wanted to build. Maybe it's not too late for that, but he'd have to ask about that later. With the trunk there, he leans down to look at the supplies. Wow, that's...very fast and wasn't there before. His eyes and scanners look over everything, trying to get a list together and compare it to his own plans to try and see it complete.
Candy	Candy smiles at Ishirou. "They don't call me Candy for no reason, ah?" Mostly 'they' are yankees, from the Thirteen, and the 'reason' is that they don't pronounce the 'e' in 'Cande' correctly. But he's enjoyed it, enough to claim it. Ishirou's scanning finds that the trunk contains his body's nervous system and skin, in neat, machined little stacks. "There's a 'puter out back," says Candy, nodding in the direction of his house. "Can't miss it. There should be enough gas for what we need. I left the can right by where you fill it up. If you wanna help, go get it filled up, turn it on, and start shaping all that shit," he adds, nodding towards the trunk. "Use the dolly if you need it," says the farmer after a moment's thought, motioning with a jerk of his thumb towards a cart that'll make the heavy thing easier to get outside.
Ishirou	"Mm? Oh alright!" Ishirou says after filling up the glass again. He reaches over to the dolly to drag it to him. From across the room. POD and Ishirou leave, to get the computer while Candy continues working. He's actually really impressed with what he's done in just that short time...nervous system and skin, are easily the hardest part of the build itself. Walking out back to the computer, he looks for the canister and the pump, and together the duo makes sure to top off the fuel for the generator that powers the computer, before, loading it on the dolly and moving it back towards the workshop. He only briefly stops when he scans a pest near the tomatoes and tosses it away from the plants. Not to hurt it, but just to scare it away. Now pulling it back into the workshop, he goes through the setup parts and pulls up a stool. Turning it on, he goes through the boot process and starts work on the construction. He has POD deploy the holo image as he works from that. Let's see... The ears are important, hiding his enhanced sensory equipment and being a point of contact for POD. They point up, though are placed on either side of his head. He hasn't thought of color, though perhaps they'd want to be the same color as his hair..? Mmm..." No, he decides to change that. His skin was already going to be pale white...so he needs to change that to a blue to offset that. The tail, similarly blue is important. both because it's a combination of an extra appendage and a universal adaptor. Able to plug into anything so that he can hack directly should he not be able to do it through POD or his own hacking systems. He's careful with his form. He keeps the same height, he looks at keeping his features softer, instead of more chiseled and defined. He's not chubby, but he's definitely looking like he needs some time at the gym. His eyes are a bit of a glowing blue, and his lips are similarly blue (though not glowing.) Black would be the majority of his clothing, so he doesn't worry about that too much. He also programs the secondary arms, having them deploy from either side of his main arms. They're more robotic, made with more of a functional design instead of an aesthetic one. He'll also need to consider where the brain will sit...The center of mass would be the most protected, but the head is an old favorite..hmm! Eventually, it comes down to finalizing and customization. This is where he pauses and is thinking. He slowly messes with placing a mark on his right eye, similar to a scar, but then erases it...only to try it again but slightly differently.
Candy	It quickly becomes evident that Ishirou would need something like a front-end loader to move the computer itself. It's massive, spanning the entire backside of Candy's house, with a little corrugated metal awning and gutter in place to keep it from getting wet. Cement has been poured to serve as a foundation. It is a monstrosity of vacuum tubes, criss-crossed wires, and weathered steel bones that would surely take a finger from an incautious or otherwise overly curious user. Its power supply comes from a generator with a ripcord. In essence, the dolly is for moving the raw materials to this behemoth, not the other way around. Either way, once Ishirou has brought the materials to it, it's remarkably straightforward to use. Candy is outside shortly, with a little tin box. Opening it with a creak, he offers it to Ishirou. "Here," he says, his voice raised to be heard over the generator. "These are like, ah... instructions. For this thing." Candy nods towards the computer. There are over a hundred little punchcards inside the box. One end of the computer has a slot which can accept the cards and punch instructions into them, and a different slot for reading entered instructions. The other end contains the 'printer,' which accepts raw materials and stamps, cuts, folds or otherwise shapes them according to the instructions given. A 'screen' on the computer is, in effect, a backlit piece of glass, across which some sort of needle glides, from within, displaying the end result of his actions and audibly scribbling in updates every few seconds, erasing the previous iteration as it goes. It's easy enough to use after a few minutes of getting accustomed to its clunkiness (and its tendency to make concerning noises, by the standards of someone used to much more elegant and refined machines). "You should have everything you need for the fine details, ah? I'm gonna work on the bones, and the spot to put your noggin in. Come get me when you're done, and we put them together, and then put you in it. Okay?"
Ishirou	Ishirou quickly figures out that it's not about getting the computer to the shop but getting the chest to the computer. He takes the punch cards, and after a moment of staring at this like it's some sort of caveman tool, he nods once and tries to get to work. He pauses, then, and reaches to grab Candy's arm before he leaves. His voice is raised because of the generator, as he seems to move towards the holoprojector's image, specifically the face. "I'm not sure what I want to do with this.." he motions towards the scar. "I don't want to make it look like it's disrespectful...but honoring. You know?" he asks, with a frown. He's obviously talking about Lilian. The marks of others are on this body. Or rather, how others influenced him...but this one he wants to be special.
Candy	Candy stops short, looking over his shoulder with a curious expression. "Huh? The scar?" He takes a look at the monitor, gloved thumb and index stroking his chin. "Oh, that. Okay." Candy nods, then taps his finger on the screen. "Make it an actual scar, kinda. Fill it in with gold, since you're going with the white and the blue. It stands out a little that way, don't leave much to the imagination." Candy pulls Ishirou into a hug--it doesn't matter to him, if the chassis makes it uncomfortable. He then disappears into the shed, where there follows another cacophonous, vanishingly brief industrial symphony. Clanging metal, sparking contacts, hissing flame. By the time Ishirou is done, and ready to start carting the finished details--synthetic skin, fibrous musculature, copper nerve endings, all the curves and shapes and angles that make up his new image--so is Candy. A sturdy metal skeleton rests on the metal worktable in the center of the shed, held in place by leather straps and angled forty-five degrees from the ground. Candy angles his safety glasses up and runs a glove across his forehead, wiping the sweat from it. "Soldering iron, welder, drill, pneumatic hammer," he says, pointing out each bulky tool in turn. "Should be all we need to put it together. Get you a pair of goggles," he then says, nodding to a spot where a new pair hangs from a hook screwed into the wall. "And let's get to it. After this, all we gotta do is put you in it."
Ishirou	Ishirou frowns for a moment, not in a bad way, but in a contemplative way. After a moment screen eyes light up as if struck by an idea. "Thanks! That's a great idea!" he says, hugging Candy. Despite his form, it still feels nice to Ishirou to be here and be in Candy's arms like this. They both have their parts to do, and he turns back to the computer to finish. On the holo screen, he tries a few designs. Eventually settling on a small scar that would 'cut' through the eye itself. Visible fully if he closed his eyes, but also partially visible when they're open with the eye breaking it up. Then fill that in with gold...and that should make it stand out just enough. He's happy with this. Eventually finishing up with the various adjustments, he sets it up and places the material in as needed until he gets his part of his body 'finished'. Packing it back, he walks back to deliver what he has and looks at the skeleton created. He's excited the more he sees and smiles at Candy. Goggles..? He looks at the goggles and then back at Candy and looks slightly surprised at being asked to put them on...buuuut... He places the pair over the screen, where his eyes should be. It looks...very ridiculous. "Alright, ready on this end, just tell me what I need to do!"
Candy	The goggles don't fit, but perhaps it's the thought that counts. He doesn't really know how vision works with that chassis. Either way, with Candy's guidance, things go fairly smoothly. The skeletal frame has hardpoints meant for mounting screws in some places and welding in others, which makes the first layer--a combination of interwoven musculature and nerve endings--straightforward, if not easy to attach. In between the first layer come things like the eyes, the oxidant fluid pump and its circulatory network, the nutrient processor. With the organs, circulatory system and nervous system in place (excepting, notably, Ishirou's brain), next comes affixing the skin. It's a reactive material, which, exposed to electrical impulses and oxidant fluid, can mimic the softness and warmth of human skin, yet harden in response to trauma. It only needs to be slipped over the frame, and the seams are closed easily enough with a special paste that encourages it to bond with itself. The process, though straightforward, is long, and at the end of it, at least two hours have passed, given the position of the sun. "Phew." "Okay, little handsome. This is probably gonna be weird for you, so I'm gonna explain it first. I'm gonna do my thing," he says, procuring a pocketwatch from his leather apron. It's either several hours behind, or several ahead. "For you, it's gonna be like you blinked, and then you'll be over there." He motions to the new, completed body, strapped onto the table. "You ready?"
Ishirou	There are a lot of technical parts that come into this, and this was beyond Ishirou's experience. Ishirou could only simulate his body, or rather, what he wanted, but it was Candy that took his imagination and breathed life into it. He smiles as the completed work stares him in the face. Though he just first notices that time might have been played with a little. Blinking, he pours Candy another glass of lemonade. During this Candy explains what's going to happen. "Alright...just one more thing..." he says and looks to POD. "There, POD will take commands from you while I'm out and will reconnect to me once the process is over. It'll share with you my body's status and condition, as...well PODs were designed with this in mind first." "If any complications come up, it'll be able to diagnose them with you. Also, it'll have a copy of my memory should anything go wrong," Ishirou says, with a smile. "I trust you, but...well...no need to be reckless, as you and...well everyone's told me, haha.." He gives Candy one more hug and then closes his eyes as if to blink.
Candy	The moment Ishirou blinks, time stops. It isn't perceptible to anyone here but Candy... and, because he's willed it so, POD. There is no birdsong from outside, nor does the distant rush of the river Amacuzac filter through the open windows of the shed. Any hint of movement from the hanging power tools is gone. "Alright, POD. Open him up, and let's get his thinker put in." Ishirou's screen doesn't reflect the loss of signal. His blinking face is still displayed on it, as electrons are frozen in their paths, even when his brain is transferred, with exacting care, into its new vessel, via a sliding latch on the underside of the metal worktable. POD has empirical evidence to suggest that Ishirou's vitals should be flatlining, but in this egregiously stretched-out instant, there is no glaring alarm, and there won't be. When time resumes, Ishirou's eyes open to see Candy's face, inches from his own. POD will then report several systems coming online at once. Something like a heartbeat, a normal body temperature. Ishirou's arms and legs are still bound by the leather straps holding his new body to the table, which is reclined from its original upright position--so that Candy can straddle him, gloves off, with his palms caressing Ishirou's face. He dips forward and steals a kiss, before leaning back and flicking him in the forehead with a petulant expression. "You go and piss another lady off, and come back in pieces, I put you back together just to break your ass again. You understand?"
Ishirou	POD acknowledges the request, aiding Candy by having access to Ishirou's body and being able to keep him up to date on his status. For Ishirou it's like no time has passed at all, one moment he's in that mechanical body, and now he's in a body that feels /right/ for him. His eyes open, and he's staring into Candy's own. It takes time for things to come to life fully... And he's kissing Candy again, but he can't do anything else, the body still strapped down. He laughs a little at Candy's reminder, "Consider my ass on notice..." he says, with a sigh. "Though I promise I am not going to go out looking for it like before..." He smiles, "I promise."
Candy	"Good." Candy unfastens the straps, sliding off of Ishirou and allowing him to hop down from the table himself. He removes the work cap, his goggles, and the thick apron, hanging each up on little hooks mounted along the wall of the shed. "I'm gonna go get cleaned up," he says. "And you're staying for dinner."