Scene #9427: Tae-Young Produce Company-4

Owner	Pose
Distortion Dets.	White smoke hangs heavy in the air. The fight is over, with Ezra once again her usual self, and the threat is over, with the distorted monstrosity left as slowly-dissipating shreds across the floor. If the day were to have any luck to pay Moses' Office and the other Elites back for their troubles, then it would only be fair for some of the catatonic employees still arrayed across the floor to stir and wake, the conglomerated mass of their collective distortions slain, but they don't. Whatever process Tae-young Produce exposed its employees to, whatever effect the still-smoking monolith embedded in the floor had on them, seems as permanent and irreversible as the fields of tomatoes upstairs. The fact that through it all they still breathe is unsettling. Nothing bars the group from exit, at least on this side of the elevator shaft, but by how Ezra kneels on the ground near her detective, breathing heavy and staring without speaking, she isn't quite ready to move, and judging by Moses holding onto her sidekick's shoulders, a steady cloud of her white smoke flowing off her to maintain temporary reprieve from the monolith, she won't be trudging up the emergency ladder yet either. YuRia is, instead, the one who breaks silence, bring up a question surely on everyone's minds- "With all your smoke here, I wonder if it's safe to touch the big slab." With quick steps around the cracked tiles, bodies, and distortion-flesh, the workshop meister finally steps out from lurking in the elevator, to veritably hover over the monolith, and stare at its make-up with a finger on her chin. It does pose the glaring question of what it even is- to be put to these uses, it's surely similar to Lobotomy Corporation's functions, but that isn't a link the majority here present can draw, or explain. Quieter, more evident of emotional exhaustion than she's ever wont to show, Moses clears her throat to muse on the subject, and warn her resident meister- "Don't touch it. Just because you don't have a distortion to you doesn't mean it can't kill you." "Huh? You really think it might kill me? That'd be surprising, your bodyguard's fine enough from it after that display." She reaches down, almost tapping a finger to the surface- "Don't." A fingernail brushes it, stone-clack noise, and... no other effect. "Well, I don't feel like I'm dead! It's rock, it's smooth and polished, and it sounds solid, doesn't it? Do you think there's a mechanism to it if we crack it open? Hm, well, if your smoke is the only reason it's this safe, maybe that's a bad idea, but if it is just 'magic', all lumped in with your Psychoment and blondie's masks, there won't be anything in it... oh, oh, I wish they'd left their notes on this! Too bad the Manager fellow isn't in a speaking mood." Moses just stares, not cautioning her second assistant further. It's the best time for questions and investigation that there will be, before the trudge upwards, with the implicit assurance that the last dregs of this company, even if stalled-out on this project, won't give a second chance to wander back in and snoop around, if it's even still standing on a later date.
Regulus	Regulus is flopped onto the floor, looking dazed, dizzied, and moderately beaten. At a certain point in the fight she decided that the best thing she could do was lie down on the floor and pretend to be knocked out. When the fighting seems over, she groans and cautiously sits up. She yeeks and crawls backwards away from the monolith on her back at first. ''No other effect.'' Regulus blinks and pushes up to her feet, leaning on APPLe for support. "Wait so it is safe?" She walks up, covering her mouth and nose with a free hand and raps the monolith with her fist. knock knock who'se there? She lets her hand drop. APPLe hovers over and looks for some sort of interface, or a panel that can be opened, or some way to muck with the monolith though, of course, monoliths don't typically have those. "Maybe it can be stopped..." Regulus runs forward suddenly and tries to kick it with the bottom of her foot. "Ow!" She says, hobbling back before remembering there's a Veronica. "Oi, Veronica! CAn you smash that to smithereens, love?" She doesn't know if it's a good idea or not but they seem unaffected right now and it might be easier to examine its remains than any alternative. But her inquisitive mind is not so unlike Yuria's. She's wondering how it works and Veronica feels like someone who can smash. "Maybe they didn't leave notes behind 'cause they figured we'd want to figure it out."
Veronica	The battle done for now, Veronica finally lowers her most recent debris-shield to the floor. She glances at Ezra and Moses, looks away, then looks back long enough to make sure they're both alright. She should probably leave them to it, but- "Any-" cough, deep breath after so much exertion, "Anything I can do for you two?" YuRia determines the monolith is inert to the touch, and Veronica turns to inspect it from within the safety of Moses's smoke cloud. That means she isn't able to inspect it closely, but she's not above weighing in just for the sake of it. "That thing came outta the floor," she recounts, "on some kinda mechanism. They built this room just for it. Someone here, or tied to the corp at least, will know more if we can get ahold of them." "Oi, Veronica! CAn you smash that to smithereens, love?" Veronica scratches her chin. "I could try," she says. "But I'm a little worried it might spit out another meat monster if we crack it open, and then we won't be able to put the lid back on the... meat monster fountain."
Petra Soroka	This wasn't one of Petra's proudest fights. Not for anything to do with her performance in it, even though she was left aching and bloodied after narrowly fending off Ezra a few times, but because of her premonition for how this moment will be encoded into her memory. In the adrenaline-flooded aftermath of the fight, with Ezra collapsed on the ground, predictive thoughts on her emotional retrospection are fuzzy and distant, as if the last half hour happened to someone else, allowing her to hold the thoughts while still being deadened to their effect. She didn't, really, expect Ezra to survive. She only barely put her efforts towards making sure that happened, and only after losing an internal battle against the expectations of her performance. Deflective, distant, and uncommitted, it's hard, even in the immediate retrospect, to consider Petra's contribition to the fight as much more than ensuring her own survival, even though she did want Ezra to come out of it alive too. Prodding at her own image inside of her head, she can already feel the beginnings of a sticky blob of guilt that'll definitely grow in the future. But, that can wait until later. There's still a camera overhead, and she's still got a mission to complete while here. Petra's Silver weapon melts out of her hands, and in its place a droplet of blood rolls down her finger to the ground, while she strolls over to Ezra and Moses like she doesn't have a care in the world. "Well, not to seem too stupid compared to your expertise, Detective, but did you think that'd happen? You seemed pretty confident that not only would you get Ezra out of here, but you'd reverse the Distortion. But not with the big guy before?" It's probably not great for Petra to be standing so near Ezra while the three of them are being cloaked by Moses's white smoke to drown out the monolith's. The itching aura that always follows Petra around when she isn't actively suppressing it is actually visible here, at least more than Petra herself is to Moses. Where each tiny mote of smoke typically flows and swirls like fluid in the air, around Petra the psychic particles freeze and shiver in place like static. "Anyways. That could've gone a lot worse! Good job, Detective." Petra swivels around to make her way towards her real objective, the still-smoking monolith. She's more than willing to let YuRia be the one to touch it first, but she's not slowed by any kind of hesitation or fear in inspecting it herself. Her fingers trace down the monolith, staring into the black rock for any sense of familiarity from Extraction or any seams to machinery inside, or even the distinctive hue of Cogito somewhere inside it. "Well, I don't feel like I'm dead! It's rock, it's smooth and polished, and it sounds solid, doesn't it?" "Solid, huh..." It's pretty easy for Petra to attune to YuRia's particular frequencies, musing on the monolith. "That means it's a property of the material itself, or materials inside. 'Magic' doesn't mean 'random'. And the Distortion isn't magic either." Taking out her clipboard again, "We don't know there aren't notes somewhere. Kang wasn't the CEO, just some disposable goon with no guts. I'll have to figure out where they got this, too...." "Can you smash that to smithereens, love?" Petra shakes her head, gingerly to avoid hurting her bruised shoulders. "No. You're not breaking it. If you're so nervous, then I'll seal it off." Silver flows across the floor and then up to wrap around the monolith, encasing it like a sheathe. A vent leading away redirects most of the smoke farther into the massive room, and one side of it is left open for Petra and YuRia's inspection.
Vantablitz Remnants	Fighting Ezra like that must be the hardest battle Ahn has had in the past . . . A long time. She doesn't seek fights out. Most of it happened so long ago that she should have forgotten it by now. She hasn't been so lucky. The fact that she's still standing for now is good enough. Even if she has to lean against the wall for support, taking each breath one at a time, being briefly numb to her numerous ragged wounds from sheer adrenaline makes it all come out to 'better than she expected' by her shock-woozy rubric. Despite the blood soaked into her clothes, she somehow isn't still bleeding. The limited supply of ammo she brought to what should have been an investigation job has run dry. Her backpack is still where she dropped it at last; a thankful glance confirms it; but she can't help but wish that she'd come better armed, as the stinging, leaden cold settles into her arms and legs. Her diaphragm hurts from trying to get enough air. Every breath tastes like rusty iron. 'Huh? You really think it might kill me? That'd be surprising, your bodyguard's fine enough from it after that display.' Ahn grits her teeth, pushes herself up from the wall, and pushes blood-matted hair out of her face, finding enough energy to blurt out "What's wrong with you?! Does being told 'no' turn you on or something?! Be normal!" at YuRia, even though the slab didn't do anything. 'It's rock, it's smooth and polished, and it sounds solid, doesn't it? Do you think there's a mechanism to it if we crack it open?' "Who cares?!" Ahn yells on the verge of a voice-cracking whine. "All these people are gone! Ezra nearly was too! We still have to get out of here, and we sacrificed this much for barely any progress! You're never going to see this stupid thing again, so stop asking! If you want to die that bad then just throw yourself down the elevator shaft!" 'Oi, Veronica! Can you smash that to smithereens, love?' Ahn huffs, shakily, as she picks up her backpack again. "Finally." she mumbles. "A good idea." 'You seemed pretty confident that not only would you get Ezra out of here, but you'd reverse the Distortion. But not with the big guy before?' That gets Ahn to stop before the elevator shaft. Turning her head to look at Moses, she stares at her like a defendant on trial. Thoughts churn in her wired-yet-shellshocked brain until she's far behind the conversation, and her moment to ask her question slips through her grasp; as so many things do. 'No. You're not breaking it. If you're so nervous, then I'll seal it off.' "Why not?" Now Ahn's suspicion is on Petra, though her unreasonably rosy expectations are worn on her sleeve; wide-eyed and innocently waiting. "You're just here to watch aren't you? Why are you making decisions about it now? Did the company hire you?"
Petra Soroka	"Did the company hire you?" "Er-- these guys? No. Not at all." Petra can't help but regress her speaking patterns down back to 'normal', rather than trying to come across as confident, when it comes to Ahn. When she takes her hand away from the monolith, the Silver sheathing spills in to fill the gap where her fingers were, rippling like a stone thrown into the water in reverse. "... You might be able to leave and never see something like this again, but, like, if I walk out of here without understanding everything that happened, I might have just missed the chance to prevent one of these things from popping up on every block in the City. I'm not really... for hire like that." Once Petra says it, she realizes that she actually didn't need to lie at all. She sighs, folding her arms across her chest, the relief of actually telling the truth has her relax more than the fight ending did. "I plan on seeing this thing through as far as I can, whatever that means. I'm not selling it, comandeering it, using it to murder tons more people and make a billion meat monsters, or whatever else you might be thinking; but I am the one here most responsible for what happens after this."
Regulus	''But I'm a little worried it might spit out another meat monster.'' "I...don't think that's how it works, it needs a person to make into a meat monster. It doesn't crawl out of the monolith." But as Regulus doesn't have a mecha and her entire body feels like it's been rolling around in a washing machine for the past hour, she looks over to Petra, quirking her head at her question. "Well the big guy was multiple people right? Maybe that's harder." She is pretty willing to give Moses some benefit of the doubt (because she's cool). But-- Property of the material itself? Or material inside? Regulus is, of course, inclined to think to alchemy. It is...not exactly she can shave off a piece to study it like this though. "I'm not breaking it 'cause I can't or 'cause we shouldn't?" Regulus asks then frowns. Venting the smoke (derogatory) away isn't a bad idea but Ahn is also completely right. It just feels BAD to have gone through this whole experience having learned almost nothing. They didn't even help a Distortion, really, because all the Distortions that got helped here were only Distorted because they showed up! ''We still have to get out of here.'' "I don't know if we're in a hurry now that we're not being hunted..." Regulus admits. "Except I bet that bastard will show up soon to check on Moses." There's even odds that Regulus is no longer doing 'that bastard' for the bit but rather because she's forgotten his actual name. Regulus looks back to Petra. She sees Petra as a friend because even with teasing and bullying, they have a shared appreciation of music. And that means something to Regulus. "Well...I wasn't asking for it to be smashed so we wouldn't learn anything. It's a little hard to learn anything about a black slab. Maybe we can from broken pieces. But if you think you'll figure more out with it intact..."
Distortion Dets.	'You seemed pretty confident that not only would you get Ezra out of here, but you'd reverse the Distortion. But not with the big guy before?' "That wasn't a person. I don't know what it was, but that alone should be obvious that solving it wouldn't work." Moses' eyes flit down to one of the still-breathing bodies left on the floor. "Whatever was taken from them, it's still gone. Damnable device, that... that stone, damnable uses, and damnable makers. No, what happened to Ezra, I can't explain the process, but I have seen that before- I've solved from that state before. I had no reason to assume it was impossible with her." She, however, wasn't exactly suited to make it possible on her own, given her behavior in the fight with her sidekick. Petra's itching aura, felt by Ezra and Moses at least at the edges of her influence, only really shows in Moses' general level of discomfort, not directly associating Petra with the source even though the eddies of smoke die around the void she takes up. Moses presses Ezra's shoulder, a motion that's at least close to offering some comforting assurance, and lets go of her to stay on her own, and start to stumble back up to her knees. "Ezra. Do you pack the HP ampules?" Ezra blinks. "Are they in your case? I'll get them if you can't." "Ehgh...- oh, yeah, yes, Detective, they're right in..." Like some bit of machinery clicked back into place, Ezra's face sparks up with emotion and focus, still battered and exhausted, but speaking again. The carry-case strapped around her shoulder clicks open a crack, and she fishes out a handful of glowing-green glass ampules of patented goo, waiting just a moment for the Detective's nod for her to take one herself. "Here, once you're up to it, hand those out. It'll make the climb out of here easier, at least." Ezra nods- "Hey, HP ampules, come get 'em," Ezra calls, holding them above her head and waving to the others, blood-covered, bloodied, or bruised as they may be- following that up quickly with, "These are kind of expensive, so, maybe this counts as a li'l bit of an apology for your big 'ole buddy Ezra bashing you around a bit..." It's really hard to tell if she's trying to be humorous, she isn't really smiling or laughing. The offer's there, at least! Healing for the hurt. If taken, not that there are grievous injuries present, the K-corp goo within the ampules fixes up flesh, bones, blood, and limbs like new, over just a short while. It doesn't feel great, nor invigorating, but it will fix injuries. Regulus gets even more of a glare from Moses than YuRia does, when she decides to up and touch the monolith- but on contact, it proves to not be immediately suicidal, at least, thanks to the wispy pipesmoke lingering everywhere. Still, the way it sizzles and off-puts ugly, hazy smoke, even of the likes that fizzles on contact with Moses', it's active. Any type of longer-than-a-moment contact with it has the same feel as the irrigation smoke in the greenhouses, immediately psychoactive in an uncomfortable and woozy way. Everyone has seen what too long will do, though as long as you breath enough of the white smoke in, even that shouldn't be a risk.
Distortion Dets.	'Be normal!' "Hm. Isn't curiosity normal? We've figured out what is and isn't safe, nothing's chasing us, and we came here to 'investigate'. Not doing that sounds weirder, but I'm not your hire! Hm-hm..." YuRia stands back, hikes up the hem of her flowy skirt, and dislodges a small teddy bear from somewhere within the layers of her petticoat, letting the creature scamper onto the monolith and start poking at it with fuzzy stuffed animal paws. Nothing immediately apparent comes from this. ' We still have to get out of here, and we sacrificed this much for barely any progress!' Moses coughs, standing by herself, now- "I'm not happy about standing around either. The exit is here, unbarred, with presumably nothing worth consideration that will crop up in our way- we should leave. Ezra, are you standing, are you able to climb?" "Yes, Detective!" Moses pauses, "Say when you're ready to." Ezra nods, blood-spattered ponytail bobbing with the motion, and instead of immediately giving an affirmative, just... starts roaming around to collect up her scattered gear. Moses watches, wary and weary. 'And then we won't be able to put the lid back on the' "The lid isn't even on. Don't treat it as if it's safe, don't expect another monster won't pull itself together, or use you as part of itself." Veronica not having a distortion to her, either, doesn't earn her any expectation of safety from the detective. 'No. You're not breaking it. If you're so nervous, then I'll seal it off.' Moses nods, pipe to her lips- "It was beneath the floor before, when walking here was safe. Sealing it, if that can be done, I trust that better than a shattering. Or do both, if it stays sealed off." Moses doesn't have any aim to keep the monolith around, but YuRia pipes up, "If we can get this to a door, I can shove it in the Atelier for safe-keeping! Oh, but then it'd fill up with smoke. Hm..." Petra seals it, to a nod of approval from the meister and her boss. ''Magic' doesn't mean 'random'' "Of course it doesn't! None of this would be interesting or mean anything if it was. It just means you have to look at it different. With the big cluster of guys, it was some sort of... vacuum of distortion! Snatched up like Moses said, shoved into one mess. Boring, really, it's not like an ugly giant like that has any meaning to it, but-" YuRia pats the monolith through the left-there opening in the shroud, "It's a catalyst for something! I'm not allowed to test it, I know the contract wouldn't let me, but . . . . ." YuRia sighs. "This is kind of inconvenient! Can you grab it up and shove it into my Atelier, if I open it, with all this you built around it staying? It's fine if you'd need to stay within it. I'll have some sandwiches produced if you end up needing food." What is she even saying to Petra? With some manner of probing and investigating, Petra can be very confident, as she likely was prior, Cogito is implemented, suffused throughout the cohesive mass of it. What exactly created this is elusive, but its smoke comes from, if not pure Cogito itself, some nasty metaphysical reaction relying on it, and the City's ambient conditions. 'Er-- these guys? No. Not at all.' Moses squints in Petra's direction, annoyed and irritated (these are two separate things, she is Both). "I'd hope not. It's hard not to imagine what mass of words you'll have to share, in the debriefs or reports you have in front of you. Do you even have that manner of oversight?" Moses doesn't know much about the structuring of an Arbiter's command operations- that she still thinks Petra is one is a mistake, but there is likely to be some form of work for her after this, in an office, or a dreary cement bunker. Or perhaps a phone call. Hers is ringing.
Vantablitz Remnants	'if I walk out of here without understanding everything that happened, I might have just missed the chance to prevent one of these things from popping up on every block in the City.' Ahn stops to chew on Petra's answer, but only for a little. After a few seconds, she smiles at her, more happy than 'relieved', for lack of need of the latter. "Haha . . . I knew it. You're really kind of a good girl, aren't you?" she says, then pauses to catch her breath after speaking so much. "I'm glad you're here too. Sorry for getting you into something so dangerous." she says, as if it were her responsibility. 'I don't know if we're in a hurry now that we're not being hunted...' Ahn frowns. "We weren't in a hurry or being hunted before, either. Your mindset needs a lot of work if you want to survive." she says, as if 'survival' is part of Regulus' daily checklist. 'These are kind of expensive, so, maybe this counts as a li'l bit of an apology for your big 'ole buddy Ezra bashing you around a bit...' Ahn takes the strange little healing gizmo with fifteen percent of a YuRia level of interest, and quietly watches to see someone else take one first (so she doesn't have to do anything as embarrassing as ask), but when Ezra phrases it like that . . . "Thanks . . . I'll keep it for an emergency." Ahn says. Her body is screaming at her that this is an emergency, but she knows better than to listen to it. She's already broken into her metabolic battery and started moving on anaerobic energy; she can tell that much from unfortunate familiarity with how hard she can push her body; and despite how extensively hacked up her limbs are, she can't find any signs of major organ damage, so with what's holding her together, she quickly intuits she can expect herself to walk out. If there's a sudden crisis, she can take the ampoule then. Otherwise, it'd feel unbearably shameful to use up something expensive while she can still move. Especially belonging to someone else. 'Hm. Isn't curiosity normal? We've figured out what is and isn't safe, nothing's chasing us, and we came here to 'investigate'. Not doing that sounds weirder, but I'm not your hire! Hm-hm...' "Oh just shut up." Ahn snaps, attitude turning from guilty to sour in moments. "That's not normal. You're just saying stupid stuff like that to try and make yourself feel better about how nobody can stand you, not because you think anyone is going to listen." 'The lid isn't even on. Don't treat it as if it's safe, don't expect another monster won't pull itself together, or use you as part of itself.' "Yeah . . ." Ahn sighs, shuffling her backpack higher up on her shoulders, and quietly hissing through her teeth. Her stare is on the floor, thirty paces ahead. "You're not safe until you're home." She doesn't like saying it, with just her knife left. Not that it's strictly necessary for her to defend herself, but . . . Ahn scratches at her head again, in the same spot for the third time, coating her fingertips in sticky half-dry blood. Sighing a second time to herself, she trudges towards the climb out.
Regulus	''Hey, HP ampules, come get 'em.'' "Oh wicked. I read about these." She approaches Ezra, then pauses as she remembers that Ezra beat the shit out of her, then unpauses as she reminds herself, with effort, that Ezra was under the control of evil smoke. She collects an HP ampule and then hesitates again. "Hey...um...APPLe... Can you do this for me?" She hands it off to her fruit companion and then extends out her arm and grimaces, looking away. APPLe says, "Of course, Captain." One injection later, APPLe says, "And because you are a brave captain, one of your favorite lion--Oh! The injection site has already healed up. My word!" "Bandaid me anyway, first mate! A captain should show off her scars even after they've healed up!" "Ah, yes Captain." APPLe says before sticking a lion-patterned bandaid on the non-existant wound. "Arright, apology accepted, Ezra!" Regulus says, more invigorated, but is promptly distacted by teddy investigators. It's adorable. ''Sealing it, if that can be done, I trustr that better than a shattering. Or do both, if it stays sealed off.'' "You're the boss." Regulus says though she's listening to Yuria. Regulus also isn't quite sure how much 'oversight' or 'power' in this situation Petra has but at this point she's still tired enough that she doesn't rightly care too much. She eyeballs the exit hopefully now that the monolith is contained. ''Hers is ringing.'' "Oh shit. It's corporate." Regulus says, easing back like she's afraid of the phone exploding. ''Your mindset needs a lot of work if you want to survive.'' "So I keep hearing." Regulus frowns. "But I haven't died yet." She doesn't seem to have survival as part of her daily checklist, it seems more likely that she sort of gets around to surviving by squeezing it between a ridiculous set of priorities that seem to largely involve music and getting to learn about weird devices. She doesn't even think about maybe saving the ampoule for later. She's beat up now! ''You're not safe until you're home.'' Regulus IS however ready to leave and turns to follow after Ahn.
Veronica	"I plan on seeing this thing through as far as I can, whatever that means." "No, that... I respect that, y'know? Thanks. For letting it matter to you." "Sealing it, if that can be done, I trust that better than a shattering." "Think we could get it back in the floor somehow? The manager did something with his keycard, but that coulda just been him signaling for somebody elsewhere to push the "release the evil monolith" button." A pause to receive and apply a healing ampoule. "Might be able to futz with the mechanisms if we opened the floor... I wonder if there's a maintenance access tunnel somewhere or if they just built it and prayed for it to work the first time." As Petra examines the black stone, Veronica takes an interest, stepping up to the edge of Moses's zone of relative safety. This is, after all, a girl who knows something about the Voice. "What're you seeing? Any way to shut the thing off before we get out of here?"
Petra Soroka	"Well...I wasn't asking for it to be smashed so we wouldn't learn anything." Petra folds her arms, looking at Regulus a little judgementally. Honestly, she's got a relatively positive opinion of Regulus too, but it's not really because of her intelligence. Patiently, she taps a finger on her bicep, right where a cut happens to be that leaves a smear of blood on her fingertip. "Hey, tell me, did they have forensics in your era? Or-- wait, no, not really. Basically no one did that until after all those serial killers in the 70s and 80s. Well, anyways, how much info do you really think you'd be able to get digging around in broken pieces in a basement of a company that, may I remind you, was just hours ago planning on getting you killed? You can learn a huge amount from just a normal pebble, about how it ended up there and what hands it's passed through." "Damnable device, that... that stone, damnable uses, and damnable makers." "I wonder..." Petra looks up at the monolith, and the psychic spew coming out of the smokestack-funnel of the Silver. "Friend of mine was looking for something like this recently. If the meat monster's so separate from the monolith's effect, then... hey, Ezra? It didn't hurt, did it? Before we started whacking you, I mean." "Hey, HP ampules, come get 'em," Not Petra, of course. She stays by the monolith, assuming by default that she'd get the sort of stink eye she doesn't actually want if she included herself. "Say when you're ready to." "Oh, you all go on ahead," Petra waves airily without looking towards them. "I'm sure this thing came in here somehow, and I'll get it out on my own. Unless you'd wanna stick around and help, YuRia?" "If we can get this to a door, I can shove it in the Atelier for safe-keeping!" Actually curious in a tone that doesn't have the smug lilt of her interest in the monolith, Petra looks towards YuRia. "Oh, how's that work? Are you able to use doors as portals to your own little storage space? I can't do that with anything this big." "Can you grab it up and shove it into my Atelier, if I open it, with all this you built around it staying?" "Hmm..." YuRia has shot up to be the person Petra likes second-most here, after Ahn and supplanting Ezra, a thought that would probably cause a big fuss if she mentioned it out loud. She crouches down to peer at the teddy bear as it waddles around, and then calls down her ratbot to orbit it. "Well, see, I dunno if I'd be able to bring you to where I'll take it, so I'll think about it. I'd need to hop in with it for more than one reason, obviously." "You're really kind of a good girl, aren't you?" Petra manages a halfhearted smile, uncomfortably aware of Moses's glare at (near) her. "... I try. I'm not made for it, I think, but that doesn't stop me from doing the best I can." "Think we could get it back in the floor somehow?" "Right, if we can open that up, I'd rather hop in there myself first. See if there's a tunnel or something. I'd rather not have to carry it aboveground, of course." "Any way to shut the thing off before we get out of here?" "Before you get out of here," Petra lightly corrects. "I'm not leaving without it coming with me."
Petra Soroka	Do you even have that manner of oversight?" "Oh, I've got kinds of oversight you couldn't even...." While Petra is scanning around the elevator door to see if maybe she can replicate the signal of the keycard to open the trapdoor, her phone starts ringing. She holds up a finger, phone to her ear. "Hold that thought." PHONE: Phoning , Petra Soroka picks up, immediately eager, "Hello! You've got perfect timing!" . . . PHONE: Phoning , Petra Soroka breathily laughs like she's just been complimented. "Ahah, yeah, I've got details. There's even a recording, if you want." PHONE: Phoning , Petra Soroka says with the tone of twirling her finger in a phone cord. "Don't dare... well, if you're not worried about company overhearing. And, speaking of company, she brought plenty along of her own. Did you know I'd spoken to her before?"
Vantablitz Remnants	'Hey, tell me, did they have forensics in your era?' "Huh? Do you have that?" Ahn asks, a little blearily, so it sounds more sarcastic than she means. "Isn't that, like, with bullets and stuff? And they make a lot of it up. I'm pretty sure that's just TV? Oh, but I guess it's the Multiverse . . ." She returns to exhausted clambering. Her grip shakes where she places it. '... I try. I'm not made for it, I think, but that doesn't stop me from doing the best I can.' "It makes me happy that you're trying though." she says. "Probably the most out of everyone here." She frowns at Petra's flirtatious laughing, but she's not about to go right back on what she just said.
Petra Soroka	"And they make a lot of it up. I'm pretty sure that's just TV?" "Um-- hm... well, I guess they do make a lot of it up. But it's about the concept! Bagging up evidence or taping off the scene of the crime before it gets disturbed and stuff, you know? Once one thing's been tampered with, it's impossible to draw any conclusions off anything else, either!" Petra is forced to confront the reality that most of the true crime shows she watched as a kid were basically just fiction. And yet, the fixation remains. Forensics is at least symbolically true. And then, Petra's still on the phone! She can't get far enough away to prevent everyone from overhearing her side of the conversation, or if she could, she doesn't try. PHONE: Phoning , Petra Soroka quiets down in turn, gossipy, "'Dear old', huh? No wonder she's got this much attention on her." PHONE: Phoning , Petra Soroka says, "It's not that much of a story, really-- she's gotten hooked up with some of my own old friends, so we ended up crossing paths conversationally a few times. Never had a chance to meet her in person until now, though." PHONE: Phoning , Petra Soroka says, "And, then! So we get here, and the manager at the desk up top is sweating so much he can barely get a word out. He says some obvious lie about how all the employees have fallen asleep in nice orderly rows, because they just worked so hard, and tries to ditch us when the elevator gets to the bottom floor. He couldn't, though, because he was just so suspicious that none of the others would let the guy go." PHONE: Phoning , Petra Soroka says, "And like he knew it'd happen, this big slab of black stone comes up and starts spewing smoke, turning all those poor employees into one big Distortion. Moses says that none of their 'personal' Distortions lined up with what came out of them, actually." . . . PHONE: Phoning , Petra Soroka says, "Well, it hurts my storytelling heart to spoil you, but I can't lie to you, either. It went about as well as possible, besides the little quirk of the setup. Everyone was really invested in seeing it all through." PHONE: Phoning , Petra Soroka says, "That Distortion, giant gross thing made of meat and skulls, forced us all to run away on the spot, leaving the manager behind. It sounded like it'd bring the whole facility down if we just left it, but we didn't even have the option in the first place because of the emergency lockdown going off. We hid in a tower in the middle of the greenhouses, and Moses's sidekick-- you know her? Ezra?-- got stuck outside with it." PHONE: Phoning , Petra Soroka says, "And here's the part where it could've really not turned out well: the smoke that the monolith was spitting out, that turned the employees into the Distortion, it got her too. That original Distortion got torn apart right after, but she just Distorted normally, rather than something inhuman and disconnected like the other one, which is really interesting, I think." PHONE: Phoning , Petra Soroka says, "She lived, anyways. And now here I am with that monolith, which was what you were interested in, wasn't it?" . . . PHONE: Phoning , Petra Soroka sunnily, "Next time, then. I've got a lot of thoughts on this thing; I'll make sure to write them up."
Distortion Dets.	'It didn't hurt, did it? Before we started whacking you, I mean.' Ezra takes a few moments to think of an answer to this, before shrugging. "I fell a pretty long way! I landed fine, but everything was a little fuzzy, like, gueh, ksssh, crash, and then..." Another shrug. "No more than usual~!" Ezra doesn't look too bothered, but Ezra never looks too bothered. She is, maybe, not the best target to poke direct questions onto, especially from someone who she knows is, in some manner, hostile-aligned. 'Arright, apology accepted, Ezra!' Ezra giggles a bit at that, and rolls her shoulders. Watching the exchange with APPLe, Ezra's stare is intense, for seemingly no reason- just a familiar little interaction and cooperation between the two, and yet she's staring. 'That's not normal. You're just saying stupid stuff like that to try and make yourself feel better about how nobody can stand you, not because you think anyone is going to listen.' YuRia just shrugs at that, continuing on with her perceived task-at-hand. YuRia kind of super isn't normal. 'Thanks . . . I'll keep it for an emergency.' Ezra nods along to that- Moses may have wanted them given out for immediate use, but Ezra is a planner! "Good! They're the good stuff, y'know. Detective makes sure we keep a stock, just in case, even back when it was way rougher to afford it, so, yeah, keep it for an emergency, it'll get you through it!" Moses, with Ezra close at her side, trudge across the floor to the gory elevator, the former giving a short once-over to the dead manager. He's well and truly turned to paste- that doesn't stop the detective from poking and prodding, the disdain on her face broadcasting a lack of success with finding anything like notes, business cards, or a personal phone- she wants an answer to this, beyond the fragmented, loose one, that somehow, Han Hee-joon found a nifty trap to try and throw her into. "Unfortunate. We could try and find his office, if that hasn't been cleaned up, but..." Moses bites her thumb nail. "I'll do my own digging another day. I've contacts to rely on, for longer-term, though, favors, they start to run thin... No, it's necessary. This can't be the whole of it..." 'Well, see, I dunno if I'd be able to bring you to where I'll take it,' "Obviously not! I'd have to bring you to where I'll take it!" Ah. ". . ." YuRia crosses her arms, one hand still resting on her chin. "Or I can just open the Atelier up at the exit. I guess. That's fine too. I'll take all the pictures I can in the climb. Can you move it? If you can't, I'll get it myself once the Atelier's open." Wandering off with a hum, YuRia goes to the back of the elevator, and the cracked-up reverse-side door, useless on this level, and starts to fiddle with it, her actions serve no discernable purpose at first- arrangement of ribbons, golden spools of wire, but with a loud knuckle-knock, a red and gold door opens up, pushed wide open. Not only can Petra store the monolith in here, others who don't want to do the climb up the emergency ladder can, too, hide out in the pocket factory. The investigative teddy bear from earlier climbs up on Ezra's shoulder- gets brushed off, and climbs up on Moses' shoulder, joining them for the climb.
Distortion Dets.	'Hold that thought.' Moses wrinkles up her nose at that- she wants to be following Ahn up and out the elevator hatch, right there above them, now that Ezra's gathered up all she needs, not be condescended by this younger upstart who she can't even see. "Don't snap at me that way, you-" '. . .' Moses freezes. "Who are you talking to?" She asks, knowing the answer already. Anger spreads across her face, and she takes a frantic step towards the sound- not quite at Petra, in such an echo-y elevator box. Moses knows that voice. Like a cartoon bull, Moses' exhaled breaths are limned with the same red smoke as her swords, as she pathetically tries to bat a phone she can't see out of a hand she can't see, with just the normal body of her pipe. "Detective, hey- what's going on? What's got you all, all ruffled up!" "She sent her along, Ezra! That- that-" "Woah, hey! Detective, come on, we've just got to get out of here, okay? We can figure that out after-" "No, give me that phone- if she's behind this, if she set us up to be sacrifices, I need my answers, Ezra! If she wants to know what that monolith does, or is any way behind it, I need to know!" 'PHONE: Phoning , Petra Soroka sunnily,' "Give it here, or hang up, I don't care who you are, but you don't know who you're dealing with like I do. I'll get to the bottom of this if you just hand it over, you-" Moses's words fall apart, veritably snarling Petra's way. What the fuck is wrong with her? When it looks like she's going to, again, try and lunge at Petra- -Ezra physically picks Moses up, to pull her back, held one-handed around the ribcage, and grabs onto the edge of the emergency hatch- "It's not happening, Detective! No way, this isn't the time!" Like a cat, instead of a thoroughly pathetic fifty year old woman, the second she's out of sight, Moses stops her struggle, and lets herself be carried up the ladder.
Regulus	Regulus quirks her head at Petra commenting about forensics. It's a word she's heard before but--Ahn insists most of it's made up so Regulus naturally assumes she was a secret genius all along and does her best impression of the humu emote but on an actual face. "But yeah, I wanna get out of here." And true to form she keeps on following after Ahn as she works on getting the hell outta here. "It's almost over." She assures her to try and soothe her. It's generally easier for Regulus to handle it this way. She does notice Ezra staring at the two of them but Regulus is a little nervous to actually make it a spoken thing. She can maybe ask Ezra about that when she isn't trying to leave the darkest death dungeon here. She did her best to look up stuff about The City beforehand, she had conversations about it, but it still feels like she's leagues behind on what's going on. Which is fine as far as she's concerned! Clamber clamber get outta here sooner rather than later. She is already moving up the ladder so isn't exactly about to jump into an Atelier. She can't betray Vertin like that by checking out someone else's suitcase. She can imagine Vertin giving her a hurt look. 'Wasn't my suitcase enough for you?' No. She's a loyal pirate. A one suitcase gal.
Petra Soroka	"No more than usual~!" It's pretty obvious to Petra that she's being talked-around, especially when it's been literally minutes since beating up the 'Ezra puts on facades' Distortion. She pouts, thinking about retorting over what possible nefarious reason she could have for asking to make sure something is painless, but she drops it before saying anything. She'll just figure it out on her own. "Who are you talking to?" "Whoop," Not that Moses can see, but even if Petra wasn't invisible, she'd have no chance of smacking the phone out of Petra's hand. She barely moves it away from her ear in response to Moses swiping at her, but like a blink you didn't notice you took, she's twisted a step away without any movement at all. Unbothered, she continues gossiping into the phone, giving that her full attention while just raising her eyebrows at Moses. ". . . but you don't know who you're dealing with like I do."} Petra's giddiness at Moses's desperation gradually mixes with genuine concern, and when she finally snaps her phone shut, the last of her smug expression fades away. Stowing her phone away in the internal pocket of her jacket, she pivots and walks out of the elevator, leaving the Watchmen to exit on their own while she stays in the room with the monolith. Looking back at Moses while she's being held by Ezra, "... I'll admit that I don't really know what you mean by all of that. You know who I'm dealing with much better than I do, apparently. But still, there's things I need to do, and she can help me with them more than you can. That's really all there is to it." Turning away again, "Sorry, YuRia. I've got transportation arrangements now, so I won't be hitching a ride in the Atelier. I'd love to hear about it sometime later, though."