Scene #3252: Knockoff: Questions and Answers

Owner	Pose
Rory White	A stunning view of Earth drifts past through what isn't really a window but will sure seem to be. Drones shuffle about, cleaning dust and examining experiments or components on automated schedules. The Fabbers thrum with activity, extruding... well, thankfully, not some tasteless, nutritious gruel. Some foods randomly chosen by Rory's muse based on the apparent nationalities of the hostages. It's a chamber that isn't often used, with some empty worktables and tight, sealable shelves and a bench against a wall... Rory's seated near the Cornucopia Machine, half watching the food assemble from flurries of tiny nano-scale motions visible like motes of dust at this scale... and much of her attention on the rescued hostages. "Well, that was an exciting extraction!"
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone was there, she had been very quiet after the raid the night before. The five women and two men that had been rescued were starting to recover. Some had issues but the biggest ones were the need for proper food and water. Though it seems the issues with food may have been existing before the Mafia snatched them all up. "Maybe but this rabbit hole keeps going deeper and deeper. I don't like where this is going, if this is true that I and everyone else from my world is able to use an ego bridge? This could cause a social upheaval and who knows what other problems. Aside from the undying one percent which would likely happen. Worse yet is the human misery I think I know what they were doing with ... the people they were getting. I also suspect Miho was thrown into it, to get rid of her."
Staren	Staren's beamed up to the ship and makes his way to where the others are meeting. Hearing Kotone's comment as he comes in, he replies, "Ego bridges don't work on cyberbrains. At least... not without some modification from someone who understands both technologies." Staren considers this for a brief moment, staring down at Earth. "Ah. I see. That explains it. They /do/ have access to ego bridges, or even if they do, they don't quite work. The forks of Miho... are probably the result of their best attempt up to that point." Staren starts to turn towards Kotone, then thinks better of it, staring out at Earth again and trying to hold his tone steady as he has to say such things about an... acquaintances's dear friend and relative. "To get rid of her? It would be far simpler and wiser to simply kill her and leave not a trace left. Using her as a test subject risks /exactly/ what happened. I suppose they might be that stupid. Or there might be another reason."
Rory White	Rory stares sharply at Staren. "Even I have better understanding of human manners than to speak in that way to someone's relative." Says the AGI in a bristly tone. VERY disapproving. "But the more overt we are in following the trail, the more likely they are to cut their losses and run. Casualties on their end does not help us, nor does wanton destruction or vengeance. Our goal is to rescue Miho and whoever else has been dragged into this and reveal the operation to world-wide authorities. And right now... our best leads are some of those who've already suffered for some time..." Her attention turns towards the rescued folk.
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa says "We almost scourged the earth of life in my life time staren with one technology we were not ready for. My world would be like Johnny's without the mutants had it not been for dumb luck with japanese nanotech resarch lab. This world has already been turned on it's head, old empires dying or changing, rapidly altering technology. If they do perfect this? It's from contimation from off world. Heh this could be an X risk in and of it self." Kotone halts looks at Staren for a moment as he speaks and Rory says something on it. "Tact zero, I see." She looks to Rory nodding in agreement. "Smashing an operation making a group money can cause problems leaving a trail of carnage makes it personal." The rescued people have been mostly just enjoying being the hell out of where they were, having food and feeling generally safe. Two of the younger girls are distracted watching the earth for the moment however the older man who was more talkative the night before looks up at them. "I'm Lei and thank you for pulling us out of that hell hole. The Russians are not to be taken lightly. Before you ask we're all refugees, they'd been preying on us." He looks at the girls. "I didn't get why some of us were taken, none of us had any cybernetics worth stealing."
Rory White	Rory offers a smile to the refugees! "Rory White of the Argonauts. You're most welcome... and may stay aboard as long as you like. I have enough supplies to last years. But if you have any destination on Earth or elsewhere in mind, that's also quite fine. But given the trouble you were just resued from, it might be best to not return to where you were kidnapped from just yet. Refugees, you say?" She looks to Kotone. <<Refugees from where?>> Well, with that question over with, she folds both hands in front of her lap. "Your account of what happened would be very appreciated. It will help us rescue others sharing a similar fate."
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa looks back to Rory <<Main Land Asia, the pacific, a number of countries collapsed and stopped existing after the third world war. Hell there's a problem with military remants of dead nations having gone merc in the aftermath of the war. Lot of people fled to Japan but have no where to go back to now. Some have intergrated others are not and ... people are turning thier fears against them.>> "I won't lie I think I might just want to wait here a bit. I haven't eaten this well in a long time, a very long time. "It's different for a lot of us me? I was Looking for work. Lot of people turned to less savory means as there's little choice if you can't get a work visa from the Japanese government. I thought I finally had a legit lead on a job a way out maybe get a few other people out with me once I got settled in to working. Was said to be a heavy construction job, with a Physical labour part to it. I think that was just a filter to get a mark who was in good shape and health. I was a idiot to dare to hope there. Got the job thought it was legit went to go for my first day and that's when I was snatched. They didn't sya much other than I was valuable merchandise...I had wanted to build something for a change too."
Rory White	"Only slightly better than being literally grabbed off the streets." Rory remarks, disdain for the perpetrators more than clear in her tone. "You will not like hearing this, but we have reason to suspect that the kidnappings are to acquire test subjects for experiments involving extremely advanced... what your nations call 'ghost dubbing.' Technologies similar to them. Or related technologies, perhaps. We don't know who exactly is behind this..." She glance again at Kotone. Puzzled. "This doesn't establish the actual company responsible as Russian... or Japanese... I'm not sure what the politics are. Are you?" But back to the older man, "Feel free! Please, eat as much as you want. All of you could use it. So.. did anything at all stand out about your kidnappers? Did they say anything about plans, speak any names?"
Staren	Staren turns his head towards Rory and quirks and eyebrow, then at Kotone. "Indeed. Tact is not one of my strong points, but I'm sure you remember that." His stone-faced expression breaks with a flash of an apologetic look. "...Sorry about that. Again." Staren looks out the window and scratches his head, but his ears rotate as the refugees speak. His fists clench and his tail lashes when one of them mentions being called 'valuable merchandise.' "...I'm not good at tact and subtlety. I want to make them /pay/... No." He shakes his head. "I don't care if they pay. I want to make sure they can /never harm anyone again/. With extreme power. If they're dead they can harm noone. Wanton destruction sends a message." His voice quavers a bit. "And that message is: 'Anyone, ever, who does this, will have the full force of good brought down on their head and be crushed out of existance.'" He occasionally turns his head slightly, looking at the others out of the corner of his eye. "Let them come for me. I've faced worse. People who've gone this far aren't going to be talked down. They're not going to be persuaded by a cause, or regret their actions and turn from their path. I'd say the only thing they can respect is /power/, but I don't care if they respect it. Once they're all removed, the people they would have hurt will be safe." Staren stares down at Earth again. "It's that simple. I'm no good at tact and politics and talking. If you don't want me to take the initiative..." Staren turns around with rage on his face, "Then just TELL ME WHAT TO DO that will save them more quickly!"
Rory White	"How foolish. So focused on your own intention to punish and crusade you forgot that our goal is to rescue. There will be nobody to rescue if we press too hard, too violently. What, then, has your show of crushing power accomplished? There may be a time for such, but it is too early now." Rory chides, tone rather harsh.
Kotone Yamakawa	Lei pauses for a moment, the man was one oft he ones who did have some cyberware and he taps the net quickly to check what Rory was talking about. "Wait but that process was banned every nation on the planet. Even the failed states won't touch that who would be so insane to do that. Wait so they were looking to dub us all?!" The man pales and understably so. "It was the Russian mafia, I do know they spoke mostly Russian unless they were adressing us. We were just refered to as ... high value product and nothing else." <<The ones doing this I hate to say this but it's pretty clear it's the company my cousin worked for Rory. The problem...wait the ship hold on let me run a net search if I might.>> Kontone watches Staren for a moment. "You just want to sate your blood lust." Kotone looks right at hinm. Lei is just backing the hell off from this, he seems to not rather be near Staren the other former hostages are also backing off from Staren. Kotone does not have a happy look on her face her tone is level but harsh. "You seem to be more interested in sating blood lust than actually helping people. You are not judge, you are not the jury and you are not the exuctioner. An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind." Lei is politely no commenting on this as he makes ready to contiune. "They seemed to think we were a very big pay day and woth alot. I know the big cyborg didn't let anyone man handled any of us. There were no beatings, just threats it's like they wanted to keep us in good condition for the buyers."
Staren	Staren looks angrier at the accusations of the two elites. "Is that how you see it? Because what I see is a hole in the world, a crack that needs to be fixed. And one worse than death because /people put it there/. Looking at it hurts. Thinking about it hurts. I /just want to fix it/." Staren glares at each of them. "In the Multiverse, people can turn that feeling into power. Into /action/! If I were Psyber I could fly down there and fight until noone's hurting those people anymore. If I were Yuri I could fix the world by /warping reality/ to make it better. But I'm not. I-I don't even get a magical talking animal that tells me how I can use this heart that /hurts/ every time it sees something like this as power to purify and heal and protect. I just have my own skills, just like you two, and the powers I desperately search for and gather and hoard from the Multiverse and I hope it'll be enough and it's STILL NOT!" Staren hangs his head. "B-because I don't know how to manipulate people, only objects. I can't even communicate to /allies/ and make them feel nice when there's an unpleasant thing they need to deal with." He glares at Kotone, then looks between them. "And I can't build a machine that will talk to the people behind this, or make some political move influencing the police to end their corruption or influence the underworld to make them lose their support. I can't build a machine that will find every slaver and make them a nice person. I can't build a machine that will magically detect everyone who's been kidnapped and teleport them to safety and then watch forever and protect them from the slavers' retribution. Maybe it's because I'm not clever enough. I'm just a thick-headed idiot who wants to help people even though I can't understand them. And I just can't see how, the subtle ways I could apply a little force here, a little word there, and make things come out the way I want without violence and everyone's happy thinking they did what they wanted the whole time -- I can't make things come out the way I want where /everyone/ is safe and not suffering and I can rest knowing I saved everyone and everyone is headed for the brightest future, even the people who were hurting others before. But I /can/ build machines that apply energy and force to problems until they stop. Stop hurting people, because they've ceased to exist, or are too weak to break the things I've made strong. I can use overwhelming force. It's not the first choice, but it's /all I can do/ to make it stop, to make the suffering stop, to FIX THE BROKEN WORLD BY SHOOTING THE PEOPLE BREAKING IT!" Staren glares at them, shaking, then sort of slumps his posture. "It's all I can do..." Staren sort of... crumples to the floor and turns away. "Hmph. Look at me." He waves a hand at the refugees, "/There/ are people who were /actually/ enslaved and I've made this about /me/." Tears come to his eyes. "I'm just making a m... a mess of things..." He gets to his feet and wipes his sleeve across his eyes and turns to the refugees. "I'm sorry." He bows. "They'll help you and make you safe. I'll just..." He wipes another tear from his eye and walks out of the room. "I can't see the path." And then he sort of awkwardly stands there while powering up his teleporter because you can't really walk out of an orbiting spaceship.
Rory White	"We have much to talk about, Staren." Rory answers gently, as the teleporter starts powering up. "But not just now. Stay and listen quietly. THEN we will plan. Without terrifying the people we're here to help... I am extremely sorry. There has been a lot of stress on everyone for our front too." The apology is aimed at the refugees, along with a deep bow of Rory's head for emphasis. Perhaps overly formal and odd, but it's all she can manage in a hurry. "So they wanted exceptional physical specimens. And a Japanese company working with the Russian mafia. Also... I am not wholly certain, but they appear to be experimenting with mind copying technology from another world. Mine, in fact. My society has advanced to a point where bodies are treated as commodities and immortality is achievable through mental backups. But the technology is not compatible with most other societies. Except possibly yours. We have seen evidence of it, although I suspect that their research teams are having a difficult time adapting it completely. The results are as inhumane as you suspect." Rory sounds increasingly ANGRY the more she talks on this subject, but somehow manages to inject anger without changing the pacing of her speech. It's rather odd. But then, she's an AGI.
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa had not been happy with Staren to be sure he was getting what she seemd to be bloody minded. She now gets a bit more information out of it. She looks at Staren she goes quiet and is listening to what he says. She's not ignoring him so that's a plus, right? The cyborg is clearly listening to what Staren has to say here. He feels powerless about things and it's funny she always saw him as a bigger fish than she was. "This sounds like something we need to talk about later, Staren." She's not hostile and her tone's shifted a fair bit from behind. Lei just well these people are Elites, the net is full of all sorts of stories about them. He's just not going to try to set someone off like this. "The Anti cyberists mut be freaking out if they know your society exits but ..." HE trails off for a moment thining about the technology he's just a regular guy really but even he can start to see where the tech could go. "That could start another world war...and they are ripping apart people's Ghosts to perfect this?!" He shudders, he thought death was a possiblity of his fate btu this sounds like it would have been worse. "Look I'm not certain the guys who had us knew what was going on. Just they were getting pay for it, in that business you don't ask questions. The less you know the better it is for you." Lei has noticed something's strange about Rory but he's too polite to ask. "Also I understand you have a lot to deal with. It seems fortune was with all of us when your band rescued us." <<I got some data with them being on a ship they are in international waters most likely where no nation on the planet has any legal say.>>
Staren	It's Staren's teleporter he's using, so Rory can't stop him... but when she asks him to stay and listen, he hesitates, shutting it off and waiting and not saying anything for a bit.. After the refugees speak, he peeks in the doorway. "The large one either knew or really didn't care." Staren states flatly, a bit quietly. "He was not the least bit surprised or unnerved by a team of extradimensional elites trying to kill him. But if you think some of them would desert if they knew they were protecting a ghost dubbing experiment, we can use that." <<Sounds like that makes things easier for us, then.>>
Rory White	<<Actually, any ship operating in international waters still must abide the laws of its home port, and incidents between ships are tried according to the laws of the victim's home part. The main advantage being in international waters is... there's no inspections.>> Rory feels compelled to say, having studied various laws. <<Unless the laws of this age differ from the mirror Earths.>> She nods at Lei, expression a bit grim... but answers shortly enough. "Indeed. Which is why, while I would like to... pull the rug out from this clandestine operation by offering the technology free, it would cause more problems than it would solve." Whoah. "Chances are those being experimented on should be alright, physically. The Ego Bridge technology - IF that is what's being used - is not destructive. A read operation alone should not cause harm. But I cannot say how it would react with Cyberbrain technology, and there is the danger. Of course, copying people against their will is unfathomably cruel, and I -will- stop them." She faces Staren. "It's possible. Some might. Good idea."
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa <<I'm not full up on it I admit but I will be soon enough Rory, I promise you this. Though I think some things changed eithe wya ya no inspections and you'd have to find them to inspect them there are counter measures to it. I don't think we're going to like what we find on this ship, Rory. As for that the trick would be to get them into say Japanese waters and expose their actions there.>> Lei is just sitting back for the moment downing some more food while he waits fo thing to come back to him. "Your right they might not have any idea, that's such bad candy they might just cut ties with the company to not get caught in that. Even the most dirty cop can't ignore that. Exactly we make it toxic to deal with the company." Lei pauses at the mention of the big guy. "He was not the musle alone I think he was incharge of the operation that got us, nasty bit of work loaded with military hardware too. Look Elites are not unknown to our world it's been unified for a while right? You should see the net sites about... then again you might not want to."
Staren	"So the big guy's in charge, huh? Wonder what he was doing there... and if he's so heavily augmented because he likes fighting?" Staren shrugs to Lei. "I'm curious. How bad can it be? But that guy wasn't just tough and strong, but fast. He cut one of my missiles in half! I wonder, though... if we expose them the wrong way, wouldn't it be an opportunity for the other sites to go underground, and the company to deny all ties to this?"
Rory White	"That's why it must be a thorough job." Rory states affirmingly. "And why care must be taken to not make them think that the situation is hopeless or too costly. Now do you understand, Staren?" Her tone's soft and cautious as always. "So it seems our next step will be questioning who we can. Thank you very much, Mr. Lei!"
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa says "That's why we can't rush in but I rather deal with hunting them and save Miho from whatever they have done to her. Also anyone else they are holding they likely have other people they are intending to use." <<They prey on those who'd not be missed...>> Mr Lei nods slightly to Rory and says "Your wlecome is there anything else? I have some thinking to do about what to do next."
Staren	"Nnnngh." Staren looks at Rory. "That's the thing. I dunno how to handle that."
Rory White	"The current operations were working fine until the violence started. We're lucky that the Russian group is probably only a vague business partner so the main corporation will not care much what happens to them." ALthough Rory definitely cares from the sound of it, and the way her mouth twitches a little. Even if they're criminals "I did track the route their escape ship took over the seas. It may provide clues. And then there is a final contingency plan that is not ready yet.... but hopefully will be soon. One step at a time. We ask the guards who can be asked anything what they know and explain things." The bluenette swings around in her seat to face Lei politely again. "Yes? What did you have in mind?"
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa looks to Lei curious about what he had to say as well. "I'm not sure I want to go back as I said it's a life in a refugee camp. Once I recover a buit I might look into other options, though I doubt yout Argonauts need a construction worker." He seems to be good natured about it but he's seen the tech here and is able to understand the concepts of a lot of what he's seen. Kotone nods to Lei. "Take your time, you should rest like the others you been through hell." She's also likely bene tyring to line up some mental help too for any who wants it.
Rory White	"They might be. I'll put in a query." Rory answers helpfully, almost on reflex. She's quite used to that sort of thing. "In the meantime... yes, just focus on rest and recovery."