Scene #808:

Owner	Pose
Zwei	Brockton Bay was a nice distraction, but the status quo is apparently too firmly entrenched there to do anything with. At least, the Protectorate is. The idea of siding with an exceptionally powerful supervillain just to see what happens is vaguely enticing, but at the moment, Zwei has more interesting multiversal leads. Specifically, the space manipulating boy named Arthur and his promised neutral nexus of 'Afterus'. Flying the modest transport ship obtained from Schwarzchild Orbital Facility 16875 back through the warpgate, Zwei performs a number of gate jumps to arrive at the coordinates left to it, only to encounter a rather abrupt transition from the void of space to some kind of public transit building. Settling down the sleek, bladelike, carbon grey craft down outside, Weiss is the first to uplug from the cockpit, and Asche follows after disengaging from the reactor, both of them taking opposite 180 degree views to begin thoroughly scanning and logging the immediate surroundings.
Staren	Staren steps through the warpgate. He's been to Afterus before, so he doesn't stop to admire the scenery this time. His HUD has a minimap with the meeting location on it, and an arrow to follow, so he skates along -- his shoes have hoverjets that, while not powerful enough for full flight, basically act as hoverskates. Once he finds Weiss and Asche waiting, he looks between them curiously. "You're Arthur's friends?"
Arthur Lowell	ARTHUR LOWELL is here. Which is to say, he's lounging on one of the benches already. "YEP!" Arthur calls out, to Staren, right from behind. He can't have been there before! "She - or, I guess, THEY - are some folks I met. JUST met them, so more, you know ACQUAINTANCES, but seemed like the kinda dudes you'd like MEETING, what with your SCIENCE OBSESSION and all, since I guess the dudes that made them SOLVED SCIENCE or something?" Then there's a quick wave to Weiss. "HEYA! Good to see BOTH of ONE of you again! Welcome to AFTERUS. Place is great. Shouldn't have any PROBLEMS here." Around them, the prospitan, dersite, troll, elf, and human populations are going to make a diverse crowd, all of which are entirely used to their literal god hanging out near them. "Just, you know, WATCH YOUR STEP. You know who I'm TALKING about, yo."
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa as curious as she traveld she came to and from Afterus on several client orders, who knew the locals liked custom mechanic work. Though the Trolls seemed to love post apoc combat style craft for some reason. Who was she to aruge about it really, right?. "Humm I see so just new people you ment." It was hard for Kotone to think of Arthur as a god, he just was like people she'd known. "Your world is pretty crazy, you know?"
Arthur Lowell	"EVERYONE new is my FRIEND, 'till they're an ASSHOLE." Arthur says pointing to Kotone and giving her a wink. "But YEAH, more LOOSE ACQUAINTANCES or something like that. Met 'em in a BLACK HOLE! Anyone you meet inside a SPATIAL SINGULARITY is worth KNOWING, yo. That's how you know they're SO FUCKIN' TIGHT the UNIVERSE acknolwedged it. Y'know, theoretically. Haven't actually talked to these guys that much, dunno how rad they are." He's remaining lounging, grinning, and calling out from his seat, with a sort of casual wave to go along with it.
Zwei	Asche and Weiss manage to catch both Kotone and Staren at once, immediately blasting both of them with the full extent of the Mossbauer effect for some nice, harmless, deep penetrating tissue scans. The fact that both of them are mechanically augmented to a (relatively) impressive degree is actually reassuring. A couple of people outside of early twenty first century earth or some kind of magical fantasy kingdom is a welcome change. Just for the effect, Zwei responds to both the catboy and the techie simultaneously with both units, overlapping the sounds of pleasant female tones and the rumbling sounds of a nuclear bomb attempting to speak. "Actually, I am the same person." Since Weiss is the dedicated 'face' unit and neither of these people look like they came to fight, Asche sits on one of the transport craft's wings, produces what appears to be a shell of some kind, tugs a spool of what looks like chord made of pure light, and plugs the latter into the former, busying himself with the process of machining ammunition for his heaviest weapon; leaving Weiss to chat on Zwei's behalf. "I am an Exodus class planetary subjugation Armiger, designation: Zwei. You can use she, he, they, it. I don't mind. The unit I'm speaking through here is Weiss, so you can pretend I'm just her if that makes it easy for you!" There is a pause only for the purpose of simulating human conversation. "I'm familiar with Arthur Lowell here, but I'm afraid I don't know either of you! Do you live here? I'm already picking up a degree of genetic diversity from the rest of these people that indicates they didn't evolve on the same planet."
Arthur Lowell	Arthur stops reclining on the bench and sort of just starts floating away from it, as if he just turned off gravity. "LADY, trust ME, you are talking to a GUY who knows ALL ABOUT being ONE PERSON distributed over TWO MINDS AND BODIES, I spent like SIXTEEN YEARS being MULTIPLIED AS ALL FUCK yo. TWICE AS RAD as the LEGAL LIMIT, motherfucker." Despite floating, he retains that reclining position. "I'm seriously just gonna call you WHATEVER, PRONOUN-WISE. You say the words 'ZWEISELF' and all bets are OFF though, I'll seriously get SHITSLAPPY."
Staren	Staren blinks at Arthur. Was he there before? He looks skeptical. "Solved science? You can't 'solve' all of science..." Kotone gets an uncertain glance. It's been awhile, maybe things can be better now? Staren's not actively scanning for radiation -- while his pimped out robot body has radiation detectors built in along with tons of other things, Staren considers his normal body's augmentation to be pretty minimal. Really, the only 'unessential' thing there is the forearm multitool, but it is pretty convenient. Since he has to get the implants enchanted before they can be installed, though, he has reason not to go too far with it. Staren looks between the two bodies. "Where is your mental substrate housed?" Then he holds up his hand. "Wait, no, that doesn't really matter, does it? What do you see yourself as?" He cocks his head. "I am Staren, researcher of problems for the Union. I'm from turn-of-the-25th-century Earth, and I'm half genetically altered human and half alien." Staren looks around at the Alternians. "...Alternia is kind of a special case, but those species are all native to it. Sort of. Did, uh," Staren looks to Arther. "Did Summer use evolution, or what?"
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa pauses for a moment as the woman? Speaks she stares at them for a lng moment there's a blank look on her face at this point. She got scanned she knows that much, she boots up a web search mentally for any images which might lead to information on this Zwei if there even is anything about. It's method of behving already screams hive mind, and given her encounters with the Borg and her own fears about back home. She's slightly on edge for a moment. "Let us not decend into the relm of blogs long gone, hummm? I'm Kotone, Kotone Yamakawa, I'm from a earth that's about 2029, and I'm just a mechanic who falls into things too much." Wait with that level of cyberware?
Arthur Lowell	"HAHA, RIGHT. 'Can't solve science'." Arthur gives Staren a little knowing wink, which is entirely intended to make Staren think Arthur thinks Staren knows something that Staren actually doesn't. It's also possibly one of the more worrisome things a god can say, besides maybe putting airquotes around 'afterlife'. "Did SOME evolving, SOME shit was based on some IMPORTED GENETIC MATERIALS we got from OUTSIDE. So, y'know, LITTLE OF COLUMN A, LITTLE OF COLUMN B." Then he turns to Kotone a little...
Arthur Lowell	Arthur makes dismissive waves. "Long gone for YOU, maybe. Remember, I'm stuck in 2009 POP CULTURE, yo." He says, simply. "Anyway, don't be so MODEST! You RUN INTO things a lot too, not just FALL!" A big, broad grin. "Best thing to DO there too."
Zwei	Weiss looks utterly baffled by the fact that the fictional word 'zweiself' had somehow come up here. Apparently, all that internet diving hadn't reached the deep bowels of the more cancerous social justice movements yet. It's only a matter of time now. "Oh good! That makes things a lot easier!" She also laughs about as loud as is polite. "I told you before, but I love the way you turn everything you say into some kind of deeply cultural joke! It's so amusing to listen to!" Furious use of half a million search engines ensues. "Nice to meet you Staren. Kotone. That's a pretty wide time period difference. From what I'm familiar of Earth's history, Staren's augmentations are behind the curve while Kotone's are well ahead of it. I guess there's no accounting for divergent timelines after all." She holds for a moment to figure out how to best phrase her reply to Staren's question. "This is my first set of physical bodies. Before, I was purely what you would call a quantum observer state, but in order to better interact with the physical realm at the macro scale, I am currently interlaced with the entanglement of each mainframe inside both of these units. Think of it as having twice the number of sensory organs that can be placed independantly of one another. I don't actually 'inhabit' either one of them, or even entirely physical space itself." A steady whine seems to be rising from Asche as the cable connected to his wrist grows steadily brighter. "So, to what do I owe the pleasure?"
Staren	Staren nods to Arthur, then looks back to Zwei, clasping his hands behind his back. His tail twitches. "Perceptive. My implants are not from my world, but in any case we suffered a three hundred year dark age after the apocalypse and we've only recently started really developing new technology again." Staren frowns slightly. "Wait, how did you know?" Zwei's explanation of Zweir state of being confuses him further. "Wait, hold on. Since you've told me that much... What's the nature of your brain? Or... What /are/ you? A being of magic?"
Zwei	"A few indicators. You have brain implants but still have organic brain tissue. There are nanomachines in your bloodstream but I didn't detect any nanomaterials, meaning they must be strictly medical in nature. By the 25th century in my universe, humans had already transferred over to entirely synthetic bodies, before transitioning back to the organic in the 26th century and staying there due to a major shift in their culture. Three hundred years is so long that it's a miracle anyone has any recollection of science at all! Not a lot of data storage can survive that long!" Staren may be full of questions, but Weiss is apparently all to happy to answer them. Maybe Zwei just likes being interesting. "I belong to a species that never existed in an especially tangible state. The basis of quantum theory is that a particle exhibits all possible states simultaneously until it is observed, but the definition of what 'observed' means is extremely tricky. We are, more or less, the bare minimum conscious presence that is required to observe quantum space, and thus collapse virtual particles. My 'brain' was originally an error in sub-hadron colour confinement stretched over an indeterminate area. You could think of it like a computer program using an arrangement of quantum states rather than electron charges. It's difficult to compare it to a brain because the technology it would take to actually kill one of us isn't possessed by any other species in our universe. Before any of us are regarded as independant adults though, we have to take a tour of service in a body made of matter. It's a requirement of my social caste."
Arthur Lowell	"Cultured as ALL HELL, yo." Arthur says, a fresh smile plastered wide over his face. "You listen to my WORDS, I'll get you ONE HUNDRED PERCENT EXPERIENCE on motherfucking HUMAN CULTURE CIRCA 2009. Plus BURNS SO SICK I'd make a ROBOT need some ASPRIN." He drifts over, his body whirling around to set him upright as he goes off on this tangent. "'To what do you owe the honor'? Bitch please." He says. His voice is good-natured enough that it doesn't really sound terribly offensive, just really RUDE. "These two run HEADFIRST into like HALF the interesting problems goin on up in this fuckin' UNIVERSE MOSH PIT. Figured you might have QUESTIONS you'd like someone who wasn't like me, fuckin' MAGIC and all, answering 'em, yeah? The kinda shit you get from SURVIVOR TESTIMONY, y'know?" He links his hands behind his head in a relaxed way. "Plus you like talkin'. Don't say you're not social, 'cause that'd be BULLSHIT. Meetin' dudes like this in PERSON is gonna do you a WORLD OF GOOD, and do THEM a world of good TOO most the time Like, see this shit with Staren? Watch, he's gonna go APESHIT FUCKING BANANAS happy to start EXCHANGING some TALKS about this shit. So let's figure it OUT, huh? What sorta things are you guys INTO INVESTIGATIN'?" Not even waiting for answers from them! He just kinda fast-talks.
Staren	Staren listens intently, then scratches his head as Zwei explains what e is. "Huh. That's an interesting set of physical laws." Then he smiles. "There's so much neat stuff to see in the Multiverse!" He moves his hands from behind his back to his pockets. "Technically, serious rebuilding efforts started after about 200-250 years, but..." he nods. "Civilization is not nearly so connected or widespread as before, it's true. Some stuff did survive, though... especially military stuff that was designed to last, and the archaologists of my city have done a lot of work recovering what they can. But... aside from a few sparse centers of learning, most of the world is..." he shrugs a bit sadly.
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa says "All it takes is one person having insight that changes the world on given subject." E She shrugs a bti there's no sign of pride about her own cyberware really. She gets the idea of how this thing is networked for the moment. She weems to clearly unederstand at this point. "Remote operation? I see." She litens tiling her head those issues seem imporant to her not that szhe says anything on them. "So Schorndiger's cat almost? You seem to have a scorn for those that favour a lower level of technology." She shakers her head a little bit. "No this seems sociakl to me. No your world's kinda a shit hole infested with madmen, monsters, demons and worse from what I seen of it. It's generally on the no travel list back home."
Staren	Staren blinks. "Well... those who favor less technology are only hurting themselves, most of the time." He looks to Kotone, frowning a bit at his world being called a 'shithole', even if it is true. "That is apt. Lazlo and the immediate surroundings are safe though... As are New Lazlo and some other cities, but getting to them from the warpgate could be a problem."
Zwei	Zwei stops entirely to fully consider an answer to what Arthur wants to hear. So far it'd just been flying on whim, trying to find something interesting, but with the universe suddenly multiplying in size to such a degree that it could only be scientifically expressed as 'a fucktillion times', it's clear that wandering around at random would possibly involve years of boring nonsense between happening upon things worthy of attention. "Well . . . currently I don't have the access codes to enact the expectations set on me when these bodies were developed. It kind of sucks, but I think I might need to start everything from scratch. I don't have any especially pressing need of money or raw materials as far as I know, so what I'd be interested in specifically relates to the two largest civilizations present here. The Union and the Confederacy specifically." Atmospheric pressure drops a little as Asche's atomic recombination generates a steady vacuum. "One of my directives is to catalogue all sapient species of interest. Interest meaning that they possess some unique technological or cultural asset that would enrich the Collective as a whole. Another is to select which species are possible candidates for interstellar coexistence and resolving the issues that face their civilization to the point that they are able to focus on developing space travel and achieving galactic relevance. Populating the stars with people worth consideration, rather than having a whole bunch of nobodies blowing up each other's planets. My last directive is technically to start start eliminating unsuitable civilizations to free up their resources for others, but due to unfortunate circumstances, I no longer have the power to do that with any expediency." Okay time to pay attention to the other two again. "For example, Staren's world sounds like a perfect fit. My goal there would be to isolate cultures focused on the advancement of science and leaving his iteration of Earth, and then neutralize all obstructions to that objective." Weiss stops as soon as she realizes she's sounding far too formal and robotic. "I guess my hobby is nurturing civilizations with potential!" Perfectly innocent smile. "And I don't have any scorn for you at all Kotone! It's not your fault your world is further back in history! In fact you're doing exceptionally well for your time period!
Staren	Staren listens. "...I see. A couple of notes here: 1. A lot of civilizations don't like being meddled with that way, and a lot of powerful people frown on doing such things nonconsensually, although of course you can /ask/, there are probably /some/ people eager for more. 2. Eliminating civilizations is /usually/ also a problem, although on the flip side, the Multiverse is so big that resource scarcity isn't really an issue on that scale." Staren looks between the others. "As for my world specifically... Well, I'm hesitant. I barely know you. You say all this, but you /could/ have ulterior motives. People in charge will be even more hesitant. From where we're sitting, this sounds like an easy way for your civilization to subjugate ours and tell us we should be happy that we were elevated to pet." Staren looks towards Kotone. "Also, even /I/ can tell that when you word it that way, you're coming across as insulting and patronizing. Maybe, uh, maybe..." he shrugs and shakes his head. "I don't know how to communicate that without risking insult, either."
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa listens to their directives for a moment for lack of a better expression her blood runs cold. This thing's been made to purge civilizations it deems unfit? Okay that is setting off alarm bells and even Staren sees this is an issue. Good there will be no giving out the location of Staren's world. She may have issues with staren but she's not like wanting him dead or anything. "So you interfer with civilizations? You best be careful in some regions there are space fairing powers that have laws to let younger races develop on thier own without interferance and will take diplomatic or even armed action. Just a heads up." "I see Miss." "I'm sorry poor choice of worlds Staren and mine would be a radioactive shithole if not for one lucky breakthrough in nanotechnology or as they are more commonly called Micromachines."
Arthur Lowell	Arthur points to Weiss. "SEE," He says, "THIS is what I mean. THAT's what we can work with here. PRIORITIES! I mean, MAD DYSFUNCTIONAL ones made by, like, ANCIENT EVIL SPACE ASSHOLES, but whatever! You know, I can work with that. Got a few SITUATIONS you'd get INVOLVED in myself. Like, that shit about SPYRIX? Pickin' a NATION and getting this shit STRAIGHTENED OUT. You'd probably get into MIZUKI'S shit too, that's more for the CATALOGUING. Basically, just 'cause you don't got the COLLECTIVE around doens't mean you can't still DO what you DO, yeah? Not just kinda DRIFT AROUND USELESS." He makes little dismissive, wavy gestures.
Zwei	"I knew as much. The Collective has never really cared about being well liked by other species. They took their goals at managing the galaxy very seriously. The operative word here is 'took'. Past tense. For reasons I don't yet know, I've been in stasis for a thousand and twelve years since apparently every last member of my entire race disappeared all at the same time, while I was still in the middle of development." Weiss sounds more than a little bit gloomy before abruptly perking up, pointedly oblivious or ignorant to the subtext she's creating. "Now you see my exact problem! There's nobody left for me to impress, nobody to work for, and nobody to tell me what to do, so I'm at a bit of a loss here! To make matters worse, I haven't been personally given access to the kind of resources that would make conquering a world possible, limiting me to whatever I can do with these two units alone. The superfactions are too big for me to just take over one, and there are too many worlds connected in barely any way whatsoever to affect any kind of cohesive effort other than on a case by case basis. There's basically nothing for me to /do/ unless I start really, really small." She brightens up considerably more at Arthur. "See! That's useful information!" No comment on the 'ancient evil space assholes' part. "I don't know who 'Mizuki' is, but an individual nation is something I could try my hand at! Just to see how much I can do at least. And it /is/ better than drifting."
Arthur Lowell	Then Arthur kinda shakes his head at Staren and flips around, since he'd wound up partway upside down by the drifting. "NAH NAH. That's what went on WITH the Collective. What we're lookin' at NOW is some PRIORITIES built WITH that in mind, but you gotta fit it into what they can do NOW. Which is pro'lly STANDARD ADVENTURIN', otherwise a FUTURE ME or FUTURE VRUASA would have come back and SLAPPED ME before this MEETING." He gives a grin and a thumbs up. "IF A TIME TRAVELEVER DOESN'T COME BACK TO STOP YOU FROM DOING SOMETHING, HOW BAD CAN IT BE?"
Staren	Staren tilts his head to the side. "...You didn't respond to my points. However, if you wish to /ethically/ improve people's lives, we are in the same boat. Small starts are required. And I doubt you have the social and political acumen to properly shape societies in any case. I don't either."
Arthur Lowell	Arthur then just kinda makes little conversation-is-progressing circular motions with his hands. "See, the way I SEE IT, you guys are probably pretty much FIGHTING ELITES right now. Now see, KOTONE is right, not only do you got some BIG CIVS here to handle that, you're back down to TWO DUDES. But! That DOESN'T mean you can't still have a HUGE IMPACT on some civilizations. Just, you know, not the USUAL way. Gotta be CLEVER, yeah?" He gestures now to Staren again. "THIS guy is a little tiny example, especially on THIS PLANET. Don't explain it yet, Star, I'm gonna MAKE A POINT. Okay, we're still at the ARRIVALS place. But it's a LOT easier if I show you dudes something at the TEMPLE DISTRICT. You guys wanna TAKE A WALK?" He beckons, gesturing out of the arrivals area and further into the City of Home.
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa says "I see and perhaps their managment ended up being why something happened? Generally forcing your will upon a number of other species isn't going to end well in the long run form my experiance here in the multiverse." She pauses so no bosses only two nations the talk of taking over. Man who'd want to dela with that she wouldn't to be honest. "I must agree with STaren on the points about running either, and sure why not?"
Staren	Staren nods to Arthur, but he's still kind of hoping that Zwei will clarify whether she's amenable to keeping to /ethical/ society manipulation from now on.
Zwei	"Points? You mean about people not liking those directives? I'm not really concerned. If there's a problem with doing it openly, I can do it covertly. If they insist on being that resilient to change, then obviously they aren't an applicable candidate and I can safely discard them and move on to the next effort. Being popular is nice and all, but if all I wanted to do was make friends, I'd put Asche away in a box somewhere and have Weiss attend a bunch of parties and matchmakers instead." Yes she just referred to herself in the third person. It gets confusing like that. "From what I'm hearing though, you don't sound like you're really advocating that. You sound to me like someone who really tried once to get people to improve, they didn't want to, and you only got burned as a result. It comes across as if you're passing on second hand knowledge you learned yourself the hard way. Am I wrong?" Finally, Asche decides to speak up, taking over with that furnace voice of his. "Ethics and approval are two very different things. If a species makes it to the stars only because they were dragged kicking and screaming, there was no point to their being there to begin with. My purpose is not to sew success where there should be none, but to oversee the development of civilizations and intervene when something that would distract from their greatness would arise. I do not expect that such will be well recieved at all times, but it will be vindicated nonetheless." For being the dedicated combat half, he sounds a lot more interested in the philosophical side of these 'directives' than Weiss does. It's almost as if the two had just contradicted each other, but without actually doing so. More like someone having two trains of thought running at the same time, and switching which one is being expressed through words. "My purpose is to fight, but that not all of it. Fighting is one of many approaches that may realize an end in the most desireable way possible. I would like to see the results of this 'impact'." Finally putting that shell away, he gets to his feet, following after Arthur with Weiss in tow.
Arthur Lowell	Giant monster stomping through Afterus streets. The people are pretty okay with this. This is, after all, an /extremely/ multicultural place. As such, there's no issue wandering through the TEMPLE DISTRICT that surrounds the TEMPLE OF PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION. Arthur drifts by and strikes a little pose, the same pose as the statue of Arthur Lowell in the lobby, but otherwise doesn't really comment on it. He's going to avoid any queries about that if he can, but he always takes the time to do that by the statue as he weightlessly drifts along. Leading the group out to the Temple District, he swings by one of the smaller ones dedicated to various scientific deities in the Afterus Pantheon, sliding high above to the left side of a carved relief above the entryway. "CHECK IT." He declares, pointing out a stylized image of Staren at some kind of massive crafting machine. "They didn't even SEE Staren when this thing was made, that shit's 'cause his actions were ENCODED INTO THE FABRIC OF THE MEDIUM THIS UNIVERSE EXISTS IN. Shit be mad fuckin' DIRECT up in this MOTHERFUCKER." Then he drifts back down headfirst before swirling back upright. "Out HERE, lemme tell you, the guys with the BIG ARMIES, the GIANT SHIPS and the FLEETS or whatever? They get FUCKED UP by the LITTLE GUYS. PLENTY of GIANT EMPIRES that would LOVE to be REVERED AS PANTHEON MEMBERS in Afterus. Instead? Fuckin' NOTHING, and some RANDOM-ASS SCIENTIST gets it. Know why?" He slams a fist against his chest once. "ADVENTURING. That's the way you cultivate the FUCK outta some WORLDS. Plenty of WORLDS havin' HUGE PROBLEMS about to TEAR THEIR SHIT OPEN, no fuckin' FLEET about to solve that shit yo. But it gets solved by some ADVENTURING DUDES most times. Give it a shot, yeah? Might not ALWAYS take, but worth tryin'." There's a brief wink to Staren and Kotone. What does that wink even mean???? It's not really clear what he's trying to communicate that they should be knowingly aware of, besides maybe that this will motivate Zwei to do some heroism. "Hell, take a look at ANY of these temples, catch fuckin' MAD PEEPS of a BUNCH of dudes who CULTIVATED THE HELL out of a POTENT SOCIETY with just some ADVENTURES and DUNGEON RUNS and FIGHTS, son."
Staren	Staren shakes his head to Zwei. "I haven't been burned so much as just feel helpless to help some people. We need to work on your approach a bit. If nothing else, the way you're coming across now is making you look like a bad guy. And bad PR is going to cause a problem." Off to the temple district they go. Staren's eyes widen when he's led up to the relief. "Wait, is that..." he stares at it for a long time. "I... wait. Hold on." He turns to Arthur. "You're saying they think I'm a /god/ here?!"
Arthur Lowell	"Lil' bit, man. MYTH FIGURE, more like, or DEMIGOD kinda thing. Think of it like TERTIARY PANTHEON, y'know? You were INVOLVED IN THE GENESIS MYTH, just more MINORLY." Arthur says, swapping back to upside down, drifting up, and then standing, in a sense, on the lower edge of the relief above the passageway. "Couple folks managed to get shit SO RIGHTEOUS they got WHOLE TEMPLES. It's HELLA RAD. You mostly get your NAME stuck on stuff as MYTH SYMBOL REFERENCE. Mostly vidya characters, way I HEAR IT." He paces around upside down as he talks, gesturing casually.
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa listens to Arthur's talke she thinks she gets where he's going but also does think at the very least XCOM may need to keep watch on this one. She's kept mostly quite until Staren just kinda goes pop, this may or may not be going on multiversal video site sooner or later. She looks at Arthur for a moment. "Sounds like I missed a hell of a party. You helped create this world right?"
Zwei	"Please, you'll have to excuse me." Weiss replies to Staren. "I haven't absorbed nearly enough cultural information yet. It's difficult to relate to people outside of my own species yet, since I never reached the part where proper interpersonal relationship data was meant to be downloaded. That, and a lot of these cultures are totally different than what information I had access to in my home facility's archives. I feel like I'm doing alright for never having spoken to anyone other than my handlers before." Despite Asche being literally faceless, there is this really odd sense from the fact that he won't look at Weiss. It's like the physical manifestation of seeing someone mentally cringe with embarrassment at their own behaviour. The statue of Staren however, gets a significant reaction. Both units actually dedicate the time to looking at the statue, then looking back at Staren, as if to make ABSOLUTELY SURE that the two are seeing the same thing. Almost as if to say 'this prude?!'. Asche is the one to actually speak. "That is certainly something worth knowing. Though part of me may argue that superior firepower dictates altercations of conflicting desires, with infinite worlds and thus infinite armies, perhaps the finite few who accomplish anything of worth are in fact, the ones worth looking to. A personal reputation is more easily cultivated and perhaps holds greater sway when no cohesive whole owns the universe, but collectives of them are too large to challenge." He sounds . . . thoughtful.
Staren	"Huh..." Staren finally looks away from the relief. "I guess I need to look more closely at Afterus myths... Check if there's any... followers? I should help..." Still slightly dazed, he looks to Zwei. "I guess that works. But let me make it plain: As limited in resources as you are? If you mess with societies the wrong way, you'll get a lot of powerful people coming after you. So... be careful about that."
Arthur Lowell	Kotone gets a wink. "I helped out a LI'L BIT, y'know. Nothing MAJOR." This is blatantly contradicted by the heavy religious imagery that features his little white whirl symbol and often Arthur himself. Then back to Zwei. "I'm not just talkin' REP, I'm talkin' SHOCKWAVES, the GROUNDSWELL, the POWER! I've been ADVENTURIN' most of my LIFE now and lemme tell you, there's PLENTY of shit-ass fuckin' EMPIRES talkin' TONS of smack about their POWER they're exertin' over shit, but like half of NONE of 'em get shit done. Know who gets shit done? Half dozen dudes with some SICK SCIENCE to drop on some DUMB MOTHERFUCKERS, the real MOVERS AND/OR SHAKERS, you know?" "Point is, you wanna get stuff done? Give up on the shit about FLEETS or ARMIES or whatever." He plants his hands on his hips and strikes an intense pose! "Do what I do. jump your ass around the MULTIVERSE. Have ADVENTURES! Get in FIGHTS! Make FRIENDS! That's how you get the GROUNDSWELL you need if you're gonna get some WORK done and some SCIENCE DROPPED, yo." Then he drops off the inverted position he's in and lands on his feet, instantly shifting to a casual, SUPER COOL cross-armed lean against a pillar holding up the bas-relief carved above the entrance. "Worked GREAT for ME so far! And I'm just some INTERGALACTIC HOOLIGAN. So, works for me, probably works for you, yeah? Plus you'll HELP SOME CIVILIZATIONS along the way. Everyone WINS."
Zwei	Weiss makes about the most friendly and polite 'pffft' noise that someone can make. "I'm a planetary subjugation unit. I'm not rated to fight whole universes. It seems pretty easy to just bail on a world if something goes wrong, but I know what I'm doing at least enough not to try and declare war on a whole world by myself. Your concern is appreciated though! You're kind of obtuse about it, but I can tell you mean well~" Asche seems more focused on what Arthur has to say. Perhaps it makes sense that some combination of the boy's bravado and his message of thrilling single triumph would appeal to the warrior of the pair. "I see. These are entirely different rules than what I am used to, but then I have never confirmed them for myself. Common logic dictates that large empires should be the ones with the power to do everything, but common thinkers are rarely great ones. I cannot deny that in this circumstance, you have vastly more experience than I." For the first time since birth as an Armiger, Zwei feels . . . a little motivated. The statue reminds it of the simulated terrestrial battle exercises facility back home. The idea of having itself enshrined in some culture's memory like that is . . . maybe something to aspire to. "Kilogram for kilogram, my bodies are the most expensive piece of hardware the Collective has every produced. I possess unique abilities of which I am not aware of the full extent. If you are correct, and individual strength and resourcefulness are enough to make one's way here, then I feel up to this challenge."
Staren	"Truthfully... individuals can accomplish a lot. The situations he's describing... where a breakthrough is needed in technological development, or a great threat needs to be neutralized... Due to aura, individuals or, at most, unit commanders are the ones that solve those problems. However... when it comes to keeping the peace day to day, and building and keeping civilizations... That kinda hasta be delegated." Staren looks to Arthur. "You don't keep things running here for the most part, right? Afterus has its own government."
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa gets the wink and tilts her head as she lts those who are able to talk better about this at this point. Arthur may be diverted from a group like XCOM needing to deal with Zwei so yes if this works? Everyone wins, she's however still flagged Zwei s a threat. "Don't look at me I'm not much of imporantce honestly in anything and ... I attempt to avoid fighting I tend to get shreeded pretty badly when more ... major enties show up. I think he just pops in to make sure there's no blood rituals in his name being done."
Arthur Lowell	"GOOD!" Arthur uncrosses his arms and pounds one fist into the opposite palm. "Then now you just TAKE IT! If you don't need CASH and you don't need RESOURCES, all you need is DIRECTIONS for ADVENTURES to get in! And I've got PLENTY of that. Shit, bro, it's practically my BUSINESS. Anyway, STAREN'S got a point here. Gotta keep it HUMBLE, way I DO, y'know? Keep that sorta thing to ACTIONS, way louder than WORDS yo. But otherwise?" He makes dismissive gestures about what Staren says later. "Man, s'not like I'm gonna be makin' BIG GOVERNMENT DECISIONS, you know? It's like, if someone builds you a CAR, and you buy it from 'em, they don't keep the keys." He shrugs. "Like I said. This is just how you CHANGE things. The BIG NUMBERS, that's how you KEEP THINGS HOW THEY ARE. 'Cause, you know, that's usually what runs up against people doing ADVENTURES! Besides, not like any of us wanna be EMPERORS or anything." Then a wry grin at Kotone. Arthur swaggers his way over to her and gives her a friendly backslap. "HEY! Don't worry about it, K. Trust me, run HEADFIRST into enough PROBLEMS, eventually the PROBLEMS start being the ones BACKING DOWN. I started off as some DUMB PUNK with a regular old BROOMSTICK, not even MAGIC! You just keep doin' what you're doin'."
Zwei	Asche and Weiss begin nodding in unison at both Arthur and Staren, seemingly quite convinced of the premise of being an Elite before actually understanding that "Elite" is a thing. "That seems straight forward. Extending awareness into alternate spheres to find opportunities where actions would yield maximum effect seems like the most obvious next step. Weiss will handle information gathering. Asche will handle destroying the enemy when it arises. You said something about a syndicate that disseminates information?" Weiss turns to Staren instead. "Aura?" she asks simply.
Staren	Staren looks at Kotone uncertainly. She doesn't seem like a fighter, but she has gotten involved in things and lived to tell about it... He looks back to Zwei. "Yeah, Arthur runs the Syndicate. Aura is a power all elites have, that enforces their concept against the Multiverse and against other elites. The rules of worlds are locally restructured if need be, so that an elite gunslinger from the old west can take down futuristic killbots because for /him/, those revolvers are deadly weapons, rather than something that's a joke against any modern armor. If some druid from a magical forest has the power to talk to animals, she can go to any world and get directions from a squirrel -- doesn't matter if that squirrel was normal until she got there, and its brain can't /possibly/ hold the intelligence to communicate on that level -- her aura will restructure local reality to /make/ her power work." Staren shrugs. "This is why armies are so much less effective, except under the command of elites with powers that boost the soldiers under their command, but that just means that army's a match for one or at best a squad of elites, instead of being mowed down like an elite is a one-man army."
Kotone Yamakawa	Kotone Yamakawa is just sitting back at this point and thinks for a moment she doesn't get the Elite thing and likely will never groke it she really doesn't think it applies to her relly. She listens for a moment longer and thinks on what to say next. "This is getting into stuff that makes my head swims. I get the deal I seen footage of tanks taken down by a guy with a sword. Then again I tapped into some alien computer systems I shouldn't have been able to."
Arthur Lowell	"THE SYNDICATE NETWORK." Arthur says, making a broad gesture. "Connecting PEOPLE WHO WANT TO DO ADVENTURES with ADVENTURES THAT NEED DOING! Doesn't matter if you're GOOD or EVIL or just GREEDY, the NETWORK will tell you what you need as long as you're not an ASSHOLE or trying to ACTIVELY FIGHT FREEDOM OF INFORMATION REGULARLY. Honestly, there's PLENTY of people who just need to KNOW about a problem for them to want to SOLVE the problem. Like YOU, sometimes!" Arthur gives little fingerguns, one at each unit. Then he gestures vaguely at Staren. "PLUS," he says. "Most of the PROBLEMS we're dealing with these days aren't the kind you just THROW FIGHTING AT until it works Gotta have a LEVEL HEAD, some CONSISTENT INTEL and JUDGEMENT, PERSONABILITY, some INCONSPICUOUSNESS, that kinda stuff. Very specialized thing for ONE OR TWO DUDES, and not FUCKIN' SHIT TONS OF GODDAMN EVERYONE WITH WEAPONS." Kotone gets gestured at. "See, even some RANDOM LADY from a world can get the AWESOME LOTTERY sometimes." He says, simply! "Don't even gotta have a bunch of the shit MOST Elites got."
Zwei	There is a long silence after Staren. Pretty much an eternity for a machine. Most of it is taken up by straining the boundaries of a program called 'suspension of disbelief'. Some processors overheat. There would probably be sparks were they using electricity. "That is definitely something that didn't exist a thousand years ago." Says Weiss. "Though honestly, I'm inclined to believe it. I've seen the terrestrial combat sim footage, and there's no way some of the weaponry exhibited by those people should have had any effect on a pattern-6-bleed, fragile as they are. It's also consistent with the idea that individuals should sometimes possess more overall ability than large groups. Still, that explanation doesn't fully encompass some of the logic defying abilities I've witnessed so far. Forcing another world to act similar to your world doesn't suddenly allow you to perform feats that would have been extremely improbable either. This warrants further research." She turns around with her mouth open to say something to Kotone, before realizing that she probably meant a 21st century tank and sword. Not the kind of sword that she uses, and especially not the kind that Asche does. Her disbelief is sound. "That sounds as if it is exactly what I need at the moment." Asche says to Arthur. Freedom of information is something I hold somewhat close to my heart. I request inclusion into this Syndicate Network in the interests of seeing how much weight your words hold."
Staren	"If by extremely improbable you mean magic, yes it does if those events were probable on /your/ world. Or the world you took a magic wand from or whatever. Observe as I create matter from nothing!" Staren reaches into his bag, pulls out a sort of alien gun-looking thing which unfolds and shifts into a stafflike shape. The head of the staff opens up to reveal a nozzle, which Staren points away from people. "Arthur?" Once a portal's been made to avoid making a mess, Staren activates the device, pumping magical energy into it to produce a brief but powerful firehose-like spray of water.
Arthur Lowell	"PERFECT. Here." Arthur says. With one quick little whirl of his hands, he accesses one of his little lower-level spells, one that's good for communication. A quick wireless authentication key and network address for future access is tossed to Asche and Weiss, offered with no apparent immediate interface with anything, just Arthur kinda emitting radio waves. He also snaps, briefly, summoning up a GATE, offering a convenient target for Staren to fire at! We will not describe its exit point until another time, a long time from now. But you can rest assured that it will be irrelevant.
Zwei	Asche is, as always, expressionless. Weiss frowns. "I'd thought it might be something like that. I'm sure there are rules and such to how it can be used, and I really should learn them, but I can't say I feel the urge to. After learning all there is to know about physical science it's as if . . . well it's like you totally mastered one programming language, only to see people using a new one to do things more easily. Even if the newer one is more convenient, you don't want to completely abandon the one you're already familiar with, right?" She gives Arthur a smiling little wave as she recieves the authentication. "Thanks~ I'll be contacting you soon~"
Staren	Staren collapses the staff and puts it away. "I pick and choose my additional programming languages. Some just to learn and to expand my capabilities... and one because I hope that it will bring me closer to understanding how this whole mess /works/."