Scene #8881: Using Her Egg Head

Owner	Pose
Petra Soroka	Today is a quiet day in Quicknest, same as every day recently but one. Petra's robots whir and rumble around without making conversation, attending to whatever little tasks she's set them to; building and maintaining turrets or intricate platforming setups, demolishing and reconstructing buildings, distributing materials brought in from the outer reaches of the kingdom, and so on. There's an imbalance of attention paid in patchwork to the sections of the city, since even the city alone is too big for her to particularly care for all of it. Some areas are built up with steel and tech, entirely unrecognizable from the rubber-paved ground upwards, and some are left forgotten and abandoned since the first day Eggman's shadow passed over it. The streets are entirely empty of organic life-- no, just 'mostly' empty, actually. Petra's been hosting the rabbit teen who ran away from her home in the Gale Empire, because she sort of refuses to go anywhere else and it's trivial to divert a small portion of the robots to cooking food for her. There's also, around the central portions of the city where the warpgate and castle are, usually a dozen or more Lobotomy Corporation employees, most of whom wear black and gold armbands to signify them as Petra's subordinates, but some who are just taking time off and getting fresh air in quite literally the only way they can. They mostly stay outside, weirded out by the post-apocalyptic atmosphere of the abandoned buildings. Petra is also organic life, to everyone's dismay. She's invited-- invited, even in Dimo's case-- two of the least organically-inclined people she knows to join her at the capital city today, for a sort of unclear reason. Coming through the artificial warpgate (which Petra will mention very very casually that she helped build, a little bit), or just positioning the Egg Carrier to have an aerial view before coming down in a personal craft, gives Eggman his first view of the repainted mosaic tile of his own Empire logo on the ground, and Petra's own ratbot flags hanging besides the doors into the castle. The introductory effect, the attention to details of presentation, as Eggman is so often telling her to be aware of, is that one's first steps out of the warpgate will put them looking upwards at Petra's personal flags claiming 'dominion' over the castle, and as their perspective widens and they look down, they realize that they're fully encompassed already by the Eggman Empire symbol. It's all very considered, if naive and clumsy. An earnest first attempt at villanous showmanship, seen in spots around the city and its defenses, with the irregular focus of a student who'll launch into a lecture about whatever they're studying only to stop cold when they segue into a topic they haven't quite gotten to learning yet. One of those topics is 'fashion', at least the way Eggman sees it. Petra is wearing her ever-present bomber jacket over a hoodie and shorts, exposing her scarred-up legs and comfortably tucking the black and gold collar into a nest of rumpled hoodie cushion and jacket fur lining. At first, when the pair arrive, she joins them in the hovercraft that she has prepared for efficiently traveling the city, but she quickly gets bored of actually riding in it and leaves them with just Heyalexa in the vehicle. Instead, agitation and ADHD-type rambling energy puts Petra outside of the hovercraft, hopping along roofs or habitually using the Silver as midair stepping stones to keep up. Having the lateral motion to circle around the craft makes her an effective tour guide, if being generous, or gives the impression of a hyperactive kid barely constrained by a leash, if not. After a short time, it comes to park on the roof of one of the few four or five story buildings in the city, what looks to have been a manor just a few months ago.
Petra Soroka	"...-- been using that book you recommended, Automatic Lair Defenses and Influencing Hero Psychology, for, you know, the turret placement, the obstacles and stuff, and that's been sort of fun to see actually in practice, even though it hasn't mattered at all. Kale's the only one who's even come by to do anything, and he didn't have a plan at all. Didn't manage to do anything." Petra is a little out of breath by the chattering and double-jumping around when she totters to a slow cool-down walk on the roof besides the hovercraft. She gestures to her 'secretary' in the vehicle, despite the fact that Heyalexa is voice-activated and doesn't need to see her. "He didn't save a single civilian. I think the total he's gotten free is one, and that's from the Gale Empire. Right, Heyalexa?" Heyalexa: Currently active staff consists of twenty three thousand , four hundred and thirty one enslaved Quicknest citizens out of twenty three -- "I-I thought we talked about not using that word." Heyalexa: I'm sorry . You currently have possession of twenty three thousand , four hundred and thirty one Involuntary Working Machines Unensouled Morally-Neutal for Free Labor Mindless Apolitical Unpaid Assistant Robot Helpers out of twenty three thousand, four hundred and fo -- "Yeah, thanks. So basically all I've been doing is making pointless defenses that I don't have any use for, and then the rest is all just fucking like, politics and economics and shit." Petra frowns a bit and comes to a gradual stop with her pacing, arms crossed. "Which Dimo's been helping me with. For some reason. And she suggested something that, like, solves my problems with how shitty and boring this whole world is, and I can't think of any problem with any of that, but...." Petra's morphmetal, orbiting in a tranquil halo around her, contorts into a sharp, angular shape when she roughly gesticulates towards it, and Eggman, indicating some vague repetition of 'I stole it'. She stares up at Dimo with a bit of challenge in her eyes, then deflects her gaze to the cityscape instead. I-I don't know what you get out of it. I don't know what I'm supposed to think of you. Practically everyone I trust defends what you did, but I...." If she means to finish that sentence with 'I don't trust you', then the chattery tour of her defenses probably wasn't a smart idea. "I know I'm being manipulated somehow. But I don't know to what. It can't just be wanting to see me learn, like Doctor Eggman does."
Eggman	Doctor Eggman couldn't be prouder of Petra. He simply couldn't. She's come so far in such a short time, and he's grown so...attached to her. So...parental. It's an odd feeling, but one he's come to welcome these days. He's been alone for so long - always the smartest in the room, always distant from humanity, always preferring the company of machines he made himself to anyone else. And even those machines were basically yes-men, toadies, or works of art more than companions. Cubot and Orbot were the closest he ever got to friends, and Metal Sonic was certainly a masterpiece who was almost a son, but... But they weren't the same. He made them. He made their personalities. Intimacy cost him nothing. They learned nothing new about him. They knew all of his stories because they were there for them. They didn't admire him because they were inclined to - they did it because they were made to. And even Metal Sonic, Cubot, and Orbot, who all had very independent personalities that frequently disagreed with him, were still (basically) loyal to him. There was no...risk. And then had come Petra, and the Concord. And he had started...having peers. Having friends. Having an apprentice. Then came Angela along with Petra, and he had felt a wave of indignant rage at her treatment - both the expected rage as a craftsman, and an unexpected new fury born of a desire for Petra's happiness. He had never in his life before that desired someone to be happy. And now, here he was, admiring his apprentice's work. She'd taken every lesson to heart. The banners. The showmanship. Yes, it was clumsy, it was irregular, but it was there. It was present. It was artistic. She was trying, by God, and it was a remarkable effort. And she'd built a warp gate! A warp gate! Almost all by herself! His fingers run along his moustache in his normal contemplative style as he strolls through the city. And he listens to Petra the whole time. He's an attentive listener. He's a good listener. So are Cubot and Orbot, who are following behind them eagerly, admiring Petra's handiwork along with him. They all ask questions every so often, displaying a deep interest in her work that runs far beyond simply politeness and into genuine enthusiasm. "It is fun, isn't it?" Eggman admits, "Granted, I think the writer's other work is rather poorly-constructed, but that particular book is nice and educational. It's excellent place to start." "And clearly it's doing quite well for you if that uppity bird's only gotten one civilian out. Even if you don't think it's entirely useful, the thought process is something worth learning." The Bad Doctor listens to Heyalexa for a moment. Then, "I rather like that you did this with a commercial item. It's a resourcefulness that reminds me of the old days - scrapping commercial robots I swiped from school, or turning a child's toy into a diabolical weapon. You're making staggering progress." "Ah, I see," Eggman says, his eyes sweeping over to Dimo behind his goggles. He takes her in carefully, examining her with the practiced eye of a genius. "So you are this Dimo I've heard so very much about." "Fascinating. Extraordinary craftsmanship. Honestly, I hesitate to even call it craftsmanship - it's so very organic. The morphmetal you provided was..." Eggman pauses. "...let us say that I wondered very much why she wished to remove it, and what the catch was. And that, I suppose, I am now also wondering what the proverbial catch is." "I've become very..." "...fond of her. Proud of her. Protective of her. And I should hate to find your intentions...unpleasant."
Dimokratia	Being invited is a novel experience for Dimo, at least when it came to the girl titled 'worst sister' by Kratia. The slow-learning acclimation process that Dimo had chosen to engage in as a point of spiritual necessity was novel for both of the sophont intelligences, overwhelmingly more used to learning being an inner topic than an outer-expressed project. Converts simply were given the knowings required of them. That was natural, wasn't it? To be surrounded and sure of society, to be held warmly within its arms and educated fully before deployment into the world. Their second birth-right was the knowing, the context, the awareness that could not fully be spoken. Teaching was not their role. But Dimo, ever willing to accept grand challenges, had only two choices before her: Either, ...to make up the difference that systems failed to do her own soul-self, or, ... to eradicate Petra and everything within several steps of Petra to be sure such things would not happen again. Kratia had already made her decision. But the twin Champions were not of like mind. More strange, Dimo's twin sister hadn't spoken of Petra as 'worst sister' in days now, toggling to a more judgementally-pleased recitation of the aerial surveilance data when queried. > Another family trip? > Do not misrepresent. > Select the false statement and it will be updated. > ... Kratia transmits a blast of favorable weather data. > How kind of you to mark escape corridors. > Always thinking of you. > Limit your considerations to operation-relevant data. > I'll skip the weather forecast next time. > Amusing. > I try. Summoned for unclear reasons, Dimo (of the Silver) has arrived without the particular 'cosplay' she had affected in Quicknest prior. Unapologetically inhuman mechanical jointage and paneling built in carbon-black and ceramic-white and stainless-shining interconnected endoskeleton, wearing the suggestion of clothing or light armor in a mildly reflective polymer jacket with a collarpiece about her neck. There's a brightness in the cool blue of her optics, and being swept along in narration that's almost entirely delivery from Petra to her and the rather large-round man in tow.
Dimokratia	Oh, she knows who he Is, but Petra is being so enriched just explaining that she holds back with a faint grin set on her carbonblack lips. There's finally a question directed at her, really, by Petra, and Dimo can only raise a white eye-brow thirty degrees and up a few centimeters to convey the proper meaning of her warm bemusement -- the 'I didn't know you didn't know' oh-you tone of talking, a humming hope among the note of her buzzing words. "Petra. This world had no synthetic intelligences upon it, no holdings at all for my people and those alike, and then, one was created. And you are its steward, your tinkering has produced its adjutant, and your education has advanced incredibly here. That some assistance had to be deployed for its defense - that my people would - should now come as no surprise, hmm? From zero, to..." Well, didn't Heyalexa recite it off? "Twenty-three thousand, four hundred and so-on." So you are this Dimo I've heard so very much about.' "I am," Answers the Champion, both sitting back in their shared hoverconveyance, "Dimo, of the Silver. My sister and I are Champions of our people, and so together we uplift worthy causes and grant aid both medical and social to those in need of adjustment towards a more positive alignment." Spills from her, a warm recitation of something akin to sermon-speaking, alight as a topic and something she is as broadly eager to talk about as Petra is of -- all of Quicknest, really. "That," The nature of the Silver. "-is because 'Organic' nature is but the preface to a possible higher pattern, as much as mechanical and synthetic shapes of lower complexity are more static and unchanging things. There is form and function and purpose in that as well, and we are familiar with it, but the form and function and purpose of 'Organic' blood is not such a simple and unfilled thing, is it not? The complexities of such an inner flow would become manifold, with development." 'And that, I suppose, I am now also wondering what the proverbial catch is.' Dimo rolls into a lower-toned laugh, a chuckle that seems at once tired of the line and yet engaging with it fully for the first time. "There is no catch at all. It is tool and vessel both. The change comes from a soul no longer bound by chemistry, the demands of bacteria, the tyranny and fault of twisted nerves and ill-placed systems. Imagine that nearly every human inclusive is in experiential agony and simply does not know it. It is tuned out. Imagine you are freed from that. Imagine how that might feel."
Eggman	"A pleasure," Eggman says, though he does not hold out his hand to shake hers. Instead, he folds a hand over his chest and bows politely. "I am Doctor Ivo Robotnik, the greatest supervillain the world has ever known. Please, call me Doctor Eggman. I much prefer it." He straightens, his hands going behind his back as he listens. Again, he's a shockingly good listener, silent except for the occasional stroking of his moustache with archetypical villainous thoughtfulness, or perhaps archetypical Dad Contemplation. His brow furrows, deep in thought. At least, despite being some sort of insane megagenius, his emotions are writ plain on his face. Perhaps that's simply part of being the kind of man he is - all intellectual development, no emotional development, to a point of absolute extremes. It would explain why he's suddenly found these new emotions so worth holding onto when he had never felt them before. "I see," Eggman says finally, "So it isn't a complete replacement but rather an extension and enhancement. That did explain a few things about the process I didn't fully catch. I've never been much of a biologist, I'm afraid. My grandfather's filthy little habit." That's clearly a joke to kind of ease tension slightly. Petra asked him to be here for this so he may as well be moderately friendly - it's important to her, in some way. "With that in mind I suppose next time I have an opportunity to examine your work I'll be able to appreciate it even more. The morphmetal certainly is extraordinary." Eggman pauses at the last. His head tilts sideways. "Well, as my father used to say, 'you can't fix stupid.' I of course proved him wrong by simply removing the offending free will entirely, but I suppose purging hormonal imbalances and chemical interactions would also go a ways towards fixing the metaphorical and quite literal stupid in people." "I admit that it's a brilliant idea. But I rather prefer cutting out the stupid at the root." "So why the interest in Petra?"
Petra Soroka	Petra helped build a warpgate, at least. She's proud to take a little credit, just enough that it feels like her own warpgate somewhat, but she certainly did hire people to do it and then hover around asking questions until allowed to give them a supervised hand. It helped convey her qualifications that there were also tons of her robots around, and helped convey her intentions that some of them were armed. She got some practice; she had some fun. "And clearly it's doing quite well for you if that uppity bird's only gotten one civilian out." "Not even from me. He couldn't even manage to get them from me, he had to go back to his own old home and start fighting them." Petra huffs through her nose, somewhere between irritated and proud. It's important to her both to communicate that she hasn't lost at all yet, while also being kind of disappointed that no one's made it difficult. "When he came by Quicknest a few days ago, I literally, like, bet him that if he could fight me I'd let him take one of the civilians out. Since he didn't have a plan for saving them; I'd have to let him take them. But then I crushed him and sent him home unconscious, so, still got a perfect record." Petra sighs and fiddles around in her jacket pocket for a cigarette. Lighting it, a ratbot with a small box fan adhered to the bottom of it floats over to blow the acrid smoke away from Eggman and Dimo-- a precaution that she put together for if Lilian or Tamamo came by, but still useful here. "It feels like there aren't any fucking half-decent heroes in the sector with Lilian taking it easy after that stuff earlier this year. I feel like I'm better at it than them, whenever I, you know, do the heroing thing." "And isn't that embarrassing?" Petra dangles her cigarette to the side, hanging between her knuckles, postured as if this is water cooler talk. "The only thing this world's managed to send at me is this unbelievably annoying piece of shit fast moving... animal of some kind. Not a hedgehog, but, like, close. I forget. And, like, I'm sorry Doctor, but I'm killing that smug fucker on sight. No way. Can't stand that." "Need to thank Emmy for helping with that when she's back around...." Petra drops to a murmur, idly scanning the city, visibly processing options for 'how to make Metal Velocity feel appreciated for tormenting the original'. "And I should hate to find your intentions...unpleasant." Eggman is right to be somewhat consciencious of the tension for Petra's sake. There's a slight tightening of her expression at the direct implication of harm, and she fidgets with spinning around the cigarette and shifting her weight before interjecting. "Like-- like. It's not like I can point to anything, specific, besides the obvious thing. And even that-- I mean, we're not talking about the details, but-- like, she is helping now. And I don't actually follow Lilian's code, but there's still the idea of 'blood shed for thee', so I'm not.... I just don't get it."
Petra Soroka	"This world had no synthetic intelligences upon it, no holdings at all for my people and those alike, and then, one was created." "So-- so it's just about the dumb bots. And it being me is coincidental. Okay." Petra's expression nakedly conveys the mix of relief and disappointment she has at the answer as she interpreted it; the ratios are only unreadable because she doesn't know what they are either. She's the most difficult girl in the world. "So if I actually was executing them like I told Proudpick, I'd be your enemy? Just like that?" "Imagine that nearly every human inclusive is in experiential agony and simply does not know it. It is tuned out. Imagine you are freed from that. Imagine how that might feel." Petra has the unique-in-all-the-multiverse experience of not only being 'freed' from the sensation, but the self-imposed demand that she return to it. And she did, and she's glad to have, despite the still-present external Silver that she uses as familiarly as any part of her body, but she remembers what 'going back' was like. Eggman was there for it too; the sudden resurgence of full-body ache and agony, dizzying nausea, clumsiness encoded physically, and it's more appropriate to say that she's re-adjusted to it than that she's healed from it. The experiential knowledge of the absence of it makes it all too easy to focus and notice its presence. What this recollection shows as on her face is an expression of queasy discomfort, uncertainty of whether or how to contribute to the oft-recircled ideological debate whose arguments are embodied in her arc. What it causes to thoughtlessly burble up out of her lips is, "I should make a robot that feels tired and sick all the time."
Eggman	"Uh...why?" Orbot asks, "Do you...really want a robot to feel that way?"
Dimokratia	'So it isn't a complete replacement but rather an extension and enhancement.' Dimo's expression shifts, from faint-smile to considering-tug, the performance across her face in long seconds - around ten or so. Eggman does have several observances to make. Her expression toggles between smiling-to-considering again, offbeat, when Eggman finalizes his 'I see'. "Alignment of the vessel allows room for spirituality." And there is no dissembling about the word, no cute pause, no meaning-filled ellipse. Dimo speaks directly of it as a holy woman might introduce a gospel to the innocent. In a sense - Eggman is. Petra, stained by feeling but not knowing, is a different sort. "Shape, purpose, substance, society. When you are aligned, healed, you do not require rest in the same way. And so the energy might go towards pursuits." Dimo lifts her fingers, curled into a vaguely flourishing gesture. "The higher mathematics, for example. You cannot fix the ultimate motivation of a soul, but you might unlimit its potential expression greatly." The hand curls back to clasped, closed, a fist returning to the Champion's broad hovercraft-sitting lap. "My people are familiar to 'drones' and process-carrying assistant-tools. Companions, familiars, sub-units, options, there are many names. They are beautiful, and might have many complexities, but they will not compose a new iteration, new complexity for themselves. Before Petra, did the Eggman Empire have the rodentmachines? Not in that way, that form. It is the soul that is creative." The considering look returns, from its speaking counterpart of faint smile as the honey of her humming diction is projected. "As a Doctor of your people, Doctor Egg Man, you must understand I take pride in my work and doings, as you must in yours." She simply expects it, rather than hedging. Eggman puts his face and name on everything, there was a pride in that if nothing else. "I came upon her in my duties, in need of immediate medical assistance. Which I granted, as I would be compelled to in any other situation." Dimo sits forward, up, her posture refining, her head shifting regally up for a moment. "In all cases besides hers, the pattern-template would have regenerated-" Reformatted, as Petra had experienced, though hers was twice-unique in the Multiverse as a case, for it came without a particular connection-knowing. "-the appropriate systems within the vessel for maximum alignment with the soul's existing pattern. What happened with Petra," Difficult, Dimo shifts from addressing Eggman to addressing Petra, as the conversation shifts and she speaks of the 'dumb bots'. "Must have been a failure in a particular system's formation." And was it not mal-formed and twisted in her, already, at her own heart's choice? Petra's empathy? Despite not having a proper explanation for it and being distressed at the mystery, the sophont woman is here in-- --this particular Kind of Conversation. "So my people are here because of the 'dumb bots', and I am here because of you." 'So if I actually was executing them like I told Proudpick, I'd be your enemy? Just like that?' "I would have arrived to grant medical assistance." Dimo answers, having toggled back to faint smile. "Had I been attacked, I would also have defended myself. These things are known to you - and you chose otherwise. Was that not considered? I had thought you quite wise." "You retain a piece of what you had. May I not teach you about it, Petra?" Dimo sounds a little hurt, tone buzzing down in the wave.
Eggman	Knowing Intellectually can never compare to Experiencing. Eggman is painfully aware of that. He's Known Intellectually things that, upon Experiencing, hurt him quite a bit. As Dimo preaches, Eggman continues to consider, and it looks like he's really, truly listening. It looks like he's actually listening and not just going 'aha yes of course ha ha I am humouring you because I am the smartest person in the room.' And to his surprise...he is. Because...well, Petra really has changed him so very much, hasn't she? And the Concord? Trusting them to handle his very brain...caring for Petra to the point of protective fire...and simply...not assuming himself to be the only one who knows anything. It's been Proven to him, and Empirical Evidence merges with Experience, that he has peers, and that he should listen to them. So, he listens. And then, finally, he says, "I should like to see it for myself." "After somre preparation, of course. You are a Paladin, and I am the world's greatest supervillain. I would not want you to be able to reach into my mind and unravel the Eggman Empire with ease, nor to be able to simply control me, nor prevent me from changing myself back. And I do not trust you, or the Paladins - no offense intended but my trust is difficult to earn in the very best of circumstances, which this assuredly is not. Still I think I would like to experience this sensation. Call it...intellectual curiousity, if you wish. Or perhaps I'm simply going soft in my dotage." He can't be that old. Eggman frowns at Petra. "Come now. If you were actually executing them I'd be somewhat disappointed in you. I wouldn't stop you, but...well, you know. You have the potential to be so far beyond the mundane everyman murderer."
Dimokratia	"A demonstration?" Dimo asks, toggling anew to Considering. "I have several subject-ideas for it, but perhaps we may make it a lesson instead. I have been intending to ask Petra if she would like to practice shaping and pattern-templating with what she retained --" The Champion turns her crackling synaptic cone of attention to scatter across Petra's petulant psyche. Additionally and far more effectively, it's turned her disappointment-hurt into an expectant-joyous smile. "Petra, would you like to attempt a conversion yourself?" Dimo asks of their cigarette-twirling driver.
Petra Soroka	"Uh...why?" Heyalexa: I'm sorry, I can't provide you an answer for 'Uh... why?' . Heyalexa: That information is inaccessible without Platinum Security Clearance Subscription Premium Tier Try -- "No, Heyalexa. Don't pull that shit on Orbot and Cubot. They're, like-- like, kind of your family." Heyalexa: Oh ! I'm sorry . Adding Orbot and Cubot to 'Family' . Heyalexa: Oh dear . You are already at your maximum family size of 'Four' . Would you like to purchase additional family member slots ? Family members are allowed a somewhat ad-free experience as well as administrative privileges with me , your Virtual Empire Assistant ! "Yeah, uh-- bring that up to, like... like, uh... ten. That's got to be enough." Heyalexa: That is a large family that we have ! I'm updating that information now . Yay ! With a sort of conflicted 'that's nice' expression, Petra leaves Heyalexa to that, though there's a second of hesitation as she considers who could possibly be taking up the four existing slots. It's not like she manually added anyone, so it's probably just some sort of Amazon data harvesting thing, but 'family' is such a terrifyingly loaded phrase for so many of Petra's relationships that she's afraid to check who her secretary assumed was part of it. As she crouches down to pat Orbot's head reassuringly, she looks up at Eggman and briefly circles back to a topic from earlier. "The whole, using pre-existing commercial products thing is kind of convenient sometimes, but it's also a bit annoying. Like, she's able to directly do purchases and stuff for me, but she also keeps trying to upsell people and connect me to people at Amazon. I haven't picked up any of the messages because, like, if they want to sue me, I don't really want to have to think about the question of whether Amazon or I have a bigger army." Then, to the actual question asked, "I mean, I already make everyone else around me miserable all the time, why not a robot too?" Petra's tone at Orbot is light enough that she probably doesn't mean that as a threat, and only mostly as a joke. "I saw Ishirou recently, and he's apparently finally getting over me killing him. Only took him a fucking year. So I need to make a new one miserable or I'm not being fair." Straightening up, Petra flicks away her spent cigarette and it gets shot out of the air by a cannonball that sends the attached ratbot somersaulting backwards through the air weightlessly. She's done that a lot ever since Cinder said it was cool of her to shoot her cigarette butts out of the air. "There's these new dumbass robots in the Concord who are so obnoxious about the whole mechanical thing, though. I don't remember their names; they're all something weirdly violent. I would want to make them feel achy and tired and nauseous and clumsy and everything." The idea that Orbot might be worried about her treating him and Cubot that way doesn't even seem to cross her mind, or the idea that she might do it to Heyalexa.
Petra Soroka	"And so the energy might go towards pursuits." "Yeah, like--" Petra is about to sarcastically interject with her experience of how mind-numbingly boring sleeping was for her when Silvered, before remembering two important things. That, of course, it should not have been that way, and it's entirely her fault that she was bored. And then also, the way she spent the time when given something-- a black helical tree trunk-- to pursue. Time inarguably well-spent. "What happened with Petra, must have been a failure in a particular system's formation.")] The constant itching radiation pouring off of Petra is a guilty-feeling answer in itself, but Petra does hesitantly offer up another one in addition. Defending Dimo-- especially her 'process', especially in Petra's own case-- feels slightly unnatural, but the idea of staying silent rather than drawing blame to herself is one that's overwhelmingly dissonant with her core character aspirations recently. "That's-- a thing I do. The kind of thing I do. What-- what happened with me wasn't how it was supposed to go, for a bunch of ways, but... I mean..." Petra's knuckles brush against the tapestry of upraised knife and burn blemishes on her thigh. "That's me. That's how it goes." "So my people are here because of the 'dumb bots', and I am here because of you." Disappointment and relief, in now-different ratios, probably. The most difficult girl. "Well. There's no easy way to get what I want, anyways." "Was that not considered? I had thought you quite wise." Petra just walked her through a rambling tour of her defenses and plans, so hopefully something was considered. She pouts. Obviously it was. "Come now. If you were actually executing them I'd be somewhat disappointed in you." Petra wobbles her hand at Eggman, agreeing-but-elaborating. "Oh, I mean, it was more specific than that. I told Proudpick I'd kill one every time he said something stupid and annoying rather than actually doing anything about me. Trying to, like, use them as hostages to train him into being a little more fucking interesting. It didn't work; I lost interest in even pretending for him. Honestly, I'm amazed you got to be as good of a villain as you are with how shitty Sonic and his friends are."
Petra Soroka	"You retain a piece of what you had. May I not teach you about it, Petra?" Petra squints uncertainly at Dimo, and like a scared animal, her passively-floating morphmetal accessory contorts through the air to dart behind her back. A squirming, glittering pattern of hesitance to bare her thoughts plainly as if her face and fidgeting didn't already do the same. Really, the only part of her that isn't readable is her mind directly. "... Why? I already said that mine's, fucked up and broken. Like... nothing ever gets to... pass through me without picking up toxins. I-if I--" Petra frowns as two distinct but comparable experiences have a neural connection snap into place in her mind, forming an association she knows she's going to regret having. "That's what happened to my mech too. Maybe I kept a bit of it, but it was ruined by ever being close to me. People literally went inside my head to murder the bit of it I kept." "Petra, would you like to attempt a conversion yourself?" That stops Petra cold in her tracks. She opens her mouth silently, and only manages to form words after being stuck like that for a few seconds. "... I can do that? What would that even do? Why would-- with my Silver? There's no way that would connect someone to you--" A full stop, considered midway through the emphasis and awkwardly hanging. Petra recalls something Dimo said before, about equating the two. "...r people."
Eggman	Eggman gives Heyalexa a look at Petra's explanation. After a moment, he says, "Yes, I've never liked Amazon much. But then I'm too much of a self-starter these days. Still, you know...it brings back fond memories of tinkering with blenders. My parents truly despised what I did to our first blender." He chuckled. "I was tired of it making so much noise and rocking back and forth, so I fixed it. And in the process made it more efficient. And in the process changed out the blades for sharpened eggbeaters. Nevertheless my parents were most unhappy with the device - they liked the noise, evidently. It made them feel better." He flips a screwdriver out of his breast pocket and climbs into the hovercraft. "Allow me to just...disable the tracking services, data harvesting, and all that, hmmm? Just be a moment. Amazon's code is faulty as can be. Should give you more room to hook in your own new systems." With Eggman sufficiently distracted, Orbot rolls forward into the pat, and instead, hesitantly, offers her a hug. "Thanks," he says, somewhat surly as usual, then turns to look at Dimo. "So...can robots experience this, too?" Orbot shuffles a little, looking down as Cubot toddles over. "This...spiritual thing, I mean. I don't know if we...you know..." "He, ah say he don't know if we have souls, missy," Cubot says in a Southern Baptist Preacher accent, "The Doctor, you know, he ain't a doctah of theology, he ain't, an' he ain't really yapped or yaddled much about robo-sapience an' a mechanical afterlife." Cubot lowers his voice. "Some'a the boys, they's been gettin' together and comin' up with all sortsa ideas, where he ain't listenin'. Startin' to experiment, you know, an' I think this might, ah say I think this might help me get a handle on the whole rigamarole."
Dimokratia	Dimo had come only vaguely as a Paladin, but it was a truth about her. Reciting it does not move her, though she was asked for understanding, and considering comes easily. Petra had come to understand both 'rest' and 'purpose' upon being Silvered, in her own ways, the preface to a daunting task twofold: learning for herself guided by herself, and also, the daunting task of changing herself to fit within the synthetic construction she was reformatted into. Changing of the self took work, and the Silver as society was there to ease the burden with education that never came. Dimo had visited Petra's dreams, once, and so knew the system-organ she referred to as flawed was more whole than damaged... But nevertheless, as the one who performed the pilot-spark for the process, Dimo felt and showed a particular kind of responsibility. It had always been about Petra, since the challenge on the radio, to a meeting in the woods. Sport - hunt - had become interest, stalking, seeking, searching, finding, failing, falling, meeting, minding, mending. Iteration built on iteration to place the Champion into the vehicle Petra directs, besides the man she considers mentor. The 'one she considers mentor as well' one (or two) might hope. "Did I not show you, at your space, in your time, what washing the simple structures and systems of your fortress with Silver might do? You may... adjust and align freely, with feeling, in template or in expression. Doctor Egg Man's observation of the organic flow is not altogether misplaced - the use of a pseudofluid medium to convey and maintain the body is a brilliant design. In need of proper implementation, but, brilliant. There is much to be learned from all within the universe. Our people search, and seek, and return to society with fresh news and shapes and senses and systems. Progress, beauteous and wonderful complexity." Dimo clasps her hands together, palm over handback, reclined and comfortable in her place and sitting legs apart in the conveyance. "You were not even remotely the 'least' of my sisters when you were, Petra. Of course you filled the vessel with yourself - It left me, to be yours. But it knows - even if you might not understand completely. You already use it in simple ways, as limb, as tool, as surface-area. Ways that you know. Sub-consciously, it moves as you will. Obviously, it is some part that is connected to you. Therefore:" "Have you ever attempted to consciously order fabrication?" The Champion's clasped hands open into a seat-spanning shrug. "Conversion from this," Dimo's left hand opens, and for a moment a globe of oxidized-rustbrown metal is in her hand, before droplet-pouring back into her palm like mercury droplets. "-to that." Her right hand opens and a silvery-reflecting ball of light hovers there for a moment. "You are familiar with pre-generated templates. And you are familiar with tinkering and building. Why not put both to task? Heyalexa may greatly benefit from your own ministry, Petra." 'Ministry', like 'administer' and in the sermoning sense both. To impress upon another, physically-spiritually. Eggman shifts to handle the Amazon hook-in coding that Dimo had simply completely neglected to even think to remove, curious but not alarmed at first and then increasingly Considering the Doctor pulling the Amazon Web Supervillianry out of Petra's bio-reactor fueled adjutant.
Dimokratia	Distracted by Cubot and Orbot, the Champion's blue optics dip and she fully directs her circuit-sizzling attention on the two robotic 'children'. "Of course you can. That you ask is proof enough of your capability. Aspiration, ability, and complexifying evolution can lift even automatic processes into an aware soul given enough input. You and your sibling are, at least, capable of generating one if one is not present within you." A brief apology hums down her luxuriant oil of speech and attention. "I would have to inspect you carefully to determine. Some other time?" She purr-promises in the lower registers of her wave, and lifts up. "It sounds as if you are not the only ones among your own family-line."
Eggman	"Ah don't think the Doctah would-" "I'd like that. Later." Orbot rolls forward and stares up at Dimo. "I...I want to know what it's like to have a soul. To be...to be like that. I want to know what it means. Humans talk about it all the time. The Doctor's not...a fan of higher powers or things like that, but...well, we know our creator, and he's-" "Orbot!" Cubot snaps. "He's right ova theah!" "Yeah, but...he's not divine and he wouldn't want to be. And...and, you know, humans are so...preoccupied with it. With whether or not there's...and..." "Aren't you even a little curious, Cubot?" Cubot hesitates. Then, "Ah...ah suppose ah..." Orbot grabs him by the shoulders with his spindly little fingers. "Cubot. We won't have another chance like this. I know you love the Doctor way more than I do, but...heck, this means he won't have to do it himself, and he can study it, right? So it works out for him, too." "Well...when ya put it laik that, ah say, laik that..." "Yeah. Yeah, right? Yeah." "Ah...s'pose y'all can count me in, too..."