Define your meaning of fun

[notglitching]

Who: Rinzler and OPEN
When: After the Moira leaves Emiri, before the events on the 16th
Where: Training Simulation Room, Moro #9, and In Your Ceiling
What: Shenanigans with a side of larcenous roommates
Warnings: Probable violence and a Rinzler, but nothing awful planned

A. Training Simulation Room (Open)

When Rinzler had heard of the training area, his initial response had been disinterest. Defeating phantoms served no purpose, and he wasn't some beta to need training on the very function he was made for. Still, as time stretched out without a proper fight, the need to move started to weigh higher. And if recent events had left him singularly unimpressed with the system's response protocols to a threat, it probably wasn't worth attacking more of his fellow imports. At least, not until he found a target worth deleting.

Still, as the program stood out in the hallway, orange-lit fingers moving quickly over the soft blue of the control console, the ironies were harder to escape. A system in front of him, written for combat. For Games. And here he was, outside, stuck fighting the data-shadows it produced. Rinzler should be in there. He wanted a real battle, not some user-tailored simulation. The enforcer took what satisfaction he could in overriding the safety settings, doubling the pre-loaded templates and setting threat difficulty up to maximum.

The door slid open with a soft chime, and Rinzler stepped into the center, reaching back for his joined disk. But as long seconds ticked by, nothing happened. No lights. No sounds but his own constant rumble. Then:

"Waiting for voice activation."

Noise skipped, mute rattle glitching louder as Rinzler's helmet turned to glower out the door. Those programs definitely needed wiping.


B. Pick your location, (nearly) any location (Open)

While it hadn't rated particularly highly as a threat, Rinzler almost regretted that the beta-user had been killed. Its attack had been an interesting diversion, and if it had gotten away in the end... well, even that had proven educational. The vent-space Chara had escaped through was too small for the enforcer to pursue, but further investigation found larger access paths concealed behind more casings on the walls. Worth securing. Worth mapping. And of course, there was only one way to manage that properly.

Anyone in the cargo bay, barracks, or other main living areas might start to hear some sounds. A scraping in the walls. A ticking rumble echoing through the ceiling. Rinzler moves quietly for the most part, but the navigational difficulties are many and new, and it's difficult to assess when the shape of the passages might carry sound to occupants below. If someone were to look into the ventilation at the right time, they might even see a dim red-orange glow peering back through the darkness. Not that Rinzler's watching you. Necessarily.


C. Moro #9 (Closed to Napoleon Nathaniel)

As much time as Rinzler spent traveling the halls (and air ducts) of the ship, his own room was an almost uncommon waypoint. There was no function to be served inside, and the enforcer slept as rarely as he could. For the most part, Rinzler used it as a storage unit. With barely a handful of items in his possession (and most of those pointless user clothes), he didn't take much space.

On the other hand, it didn't take much effort to notice when those items were disturbed. The first time he'd come back to find his things minutely shifted, Rinzler had offered a flat stare across the room, but no further commentary. Data gathering was a logical goal, and he didn't care enough about any of the objects to object to the intrusion. If the user laid a hand on his disk, it was losing the appendage, but it seemed intelligent enough to know where to stay clear.

At least, until he stopped by and found things missing from his stash. Not the uniforms or the discarded weapons, but the supply of resource tokens they'd been distributed as a reward. Useless on the ship, but necessary for supply exchange on user planets. Valuable.

This time, the stare lasts longer. It comes with a low, building growl.

[[ooc: will match prose or spam!]]

Comments

[notglitching]

It might take a moment's work, but Tex shouldn't have too much difficulty removing the vent cover. Once she has, Rinzler will reluctantly slide forward, slipping out the entrance to roll to his feet in a fluid, easy move. It contrasts a little strangely with the indrawn hunch he stands in when he settles, and the sound that follows the enforcer—a mechanical rattling, like a damaged hard drive skipping with each spin.

Rinzler produces no other sound—no words, certainly, whether to excuse himself or otherwise. Instead, the black helmet tips sideways, questioning. What did the apparent user want?

[a_shadow]

She steps back to allow the suited stranger to roll to the floor. She crosses her arms and waits for him to come to a stop, and then she waits for him to defend himself. Instead, nothing like that is forthcoming and she frowns.

"What are you looking at me like that for?" Tex asks. "You're the one trespassing."

[notglitching]

Shoulders twitch, frame shifting in a shrug that somehow reads a little closer to an eyeroll. Rinzler reaches for the device on his wrist, and a holographic text display pops up, angled toward Tex.

Wasn't.

The walls aren't her quarters. He only came in here because she'd asked. Therefore, no trespass. It makes perfect sense, right?

[a_shadow]

Oh, she's dealt with other passengers who couldn't speak before. That doesn't excuse being obtuse, though.

"Look, I don't want to talk technicalities. The point is I found you in my wall when I was minding my own business."

[notglitching]

Not much excuses Rinzler. Still, if he's dubious of her claim on the wall, the program supposes he can acknowledge the risks. That had been half of the point, after all.

Mapping security vulnerabilities.

The structure was riddled with them, though she'd covered for her own well enough. The helmet tilts again, curious. While Rinzler hadn't managed quite his usual level of stealth, none of the occupants of the other rooms had seemed to notice.

Confirm/deny: audio detection?

[a_shadow]

She scoffs. "Well, you sure found one." The fact that he could get in the duct work like this at all seemed like a major violation to her. She moves toward him to back up her words—she knows how to put on a threatening stance and how to intimidate. And that's what she does. "You need to stay out of people's business and out of the walls."

[notglitching]

The step forward is obvious, nonverbals all but screaming threat. Rinzler's response, on the other hand, is almost underwhelming. The mask doesn't move, noise doesn't falter... but that indrawn hunch shifts forward, closer to a crouch. Not scared. Ready.

The enforcer's written for combat. He's been deleting threats since well before he can remember it, and he's spent the last thousand cycles leashed and perfected and allowed nothing else. Sorry, Tex, but if there's one thing Rinzler's never going to retreat from, it's the promise of attack.

Still, that doesn't mean he's planning to underestimate a potential opponent, and if she does have some user power up her sleeve, it's better to know now. An active scan focuses forward, assessing. No weapons. No strange distortions or unknown power in the frame. The signature, he almost skims past; no useful data to be gathered from a user—

—until the faint echo of code pings back, and Rinzler stalls, half-twitching from his combat crouch to stare.

What is she?

[a_shadow]

He's reacting, that's clear to Tex, but what those reactions telegraph is difficult to discern. He's clearly prepared to get into a tussle with her if she starts one—she'd half expected him to simply turn and run off when she stepped forward like that—but she saw that twitch too. He seems unprepared for such an outcome, and she has to admire the courage to just stand here in the face of her obvious irritation with his actions.

"The stare-down won't work," she finally says, rolling her eyes to show she's not intimidated by his stance.

[notglitching]

Noise skips with a burst of static, like someone huffing derisively into a speaker. The method might be different, but the meaning's not far off: if Rinzler were trying to threaten, she would know. The helmet jerks sideways, crouch dropping almost entirely as the program reaches for his MID.

Identify.

[a_shadow]

"Whatever," she says derisively. He's acting strange enough, and that's what matters. "I'm Tex. Agent Texas on the manifest, if you need to know."

[notglitching]

That's not the ID he's registering from her code. Still, names are barely more relevant than those privacy concerns. Rinzler shakes his head again, noise ticking faster as words scroll out and delete.]

Identify: function/class

No. Simplify. Reformat. Enough that even a user (which she isn't) can't pretend at a mistake.

What are you?

[a_shadow]

She gives him an incredulous look. Just from the fact that he asked that tells her he's picked up something, something that's not apparent just by looking at her.

"I think you know," she says, eyeing him. "Why are you asking?

[notglitching]

The helmet jerks unequivocally to the side. Rinzler definitely does not know.

Most of the readings are clearly organic, a user's frame from head to toe. But the detectable ID, the signature, the sense of code are unmistakable. Not a simple augmentation either, this (program?) (robot?) is synthetic at her source. How?

[a_shadow]

"Then I don't know why you're asking," she says. "I'm the resident of the room. That's what I am, and I'm kicking you out now." She will, bodily too, if he doesn't take that as his cue to move along and forget this line of inquiry.

[notglitching]

The ticking rumble skips again, frustrated. If she won't share the data, it's not as if he'll be able to find out—at least, not without another example to compare against. But it's irritating and it's interesting, and Rinzler wants to know.

Not a user.

Attention stays on the user's stance, but Rinzler doesn't budge. He's slightly terrible at taking hints.

[a_shadow]

That's enough of this. She doesn't respond, just takes him by the back of the neck and jerks her arm to get him to turn around. "Out," she says.

[notglitching]

Tex might attempt the reach, but Rinzler's not so easy to take hold of. Especially not by anyone moving at human speeds. The enforcer slips back liquid-fast, noise rising in warning. The text display vanishes—it's clear enough they aren't talking.

But unless she wants to see what he's coded for, she won't try to touch him again.

[a_shadow]

That was a surprise. He really is fast. "Out," she repeats, jerking her head toward the door. "Go. I'm not talking to you anymore."

[notglitching]

The enforcer remains in place a moment longer, helmet angling in a way that could be a glower, or merely a sarcastic look. She is the one talking now. But fine. Message received, not-user.

Rinzler shifts just a little, deepening his combat crouch... before flipping up and back. One hand touches off the wall, the other bracing against the edge of the vent opening as his lower body slots inside. It's a very precise blur. Once back in the vent, the enforcer doesn't stick around long enough for correction.

Allison can keep her data to herself. And he'll keep exploring.