hadriel_logs | i got the feeling that something ain't right [OPEN/CLOSED]

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i got the feeling that something ain't right [OPEN/CLOSED]

Who: Rey and You!
What: Deathclaw tango and the aftermath, along with maybe any other general whatnots for the month of July. ¯\(°_°)/¯
Where: The City, Rey and Nick Valentine's Home (House 1401), wherever your heart's desire.
When: Post-Intro log.
Warnings: Violence, language, and mostly violence.

I. The City [OPEN]

It's that time of month again. Equipped with her Exurosuit, Rey is already prepped when she heads out. Though seemingly unarmed (she had been training with the sword, but wouldn't nearly consider herself adept enough with the weapon to feel confident bringing one into combat), she isn't what you would consider helpless.

Some things not even Rey can prepare for, however. She doesn't get the chance to make it to the Colosseum, before halfway there she is stopped by the sound of an animal growl. And not belonging to something fluffy and/or cute.

She ignores it at first, attempting to act like casual, unsuspecting prey. Having been here long enough, she's since anticipated the appearance of new creatures accompanying the arrivals.

What she couldn't anticipate was the walking death machine skulking the city streets.

Rey doesn't move, gawking at the creature for a moment. It isn't much different from the others she had contended with here, but something about it screams more predatory and deadly than anything like overgrown spiders or chests with teeth.

Perhaps it's the sword-like claws, which it bears with a threatening poise as it locks its red eyes on Rey. She isn't going anywhere, the legs of her sturdy armor holding her in place as she gaps at the creature. If she runs, it'll surely follow. If she fights, who knows if it'll be something she can tackle on her own?

Before she has the chance to calculate such a gamble, the black and scaly beast sprints towards her on its massive hinds. It's a lot faster than it looks. Rey stumbles back, curling her fingers into fists as she braces herself for impact. It makes a clean swipe towards her head. No doubt it would have lobbed her skull clean off her shoulders in a matter of seconds just then, had she been a hair slower. She stumbles back, nearly tripping over her own feet when the beast is quick to recover and swings its massive arm again.

This time, its colossal claws tear into the chest of her armor. This sends her reeling backwards, crashing her sideways into one of the walls of the building.

"Der'mo," Rey curses under her breath, tasting blood in her mouth from where she had bit the inside of her cheek. She rolls in time before the creature can lunge towards her, cornering her up against the wall.

The light indicators of her armor flare up then, as she turns and faces the creature. Many times before had she gone up against synthetic creations much larger and greater in numbers than this. She had combated whole platoons to a battalion of soldiers who were trying to kill her.

This? She can do.

Heatwaves ripple in the air around her, as the light indicators on her armor brighten. Sparks inspire flames, casting at the tip of her fingers. She can do this. She just has to be ready, and hope like hell that no defenseless individual finds themselves cast into the middle.

II. Home (House 1401) [CLOSED to Nick Valentine]

Pieces of armor peel off as Rey staggers through the front door of the place she calls home. Bruises riddle her arms and chest. Cuts and scratches and gashes pour blood down the side of her face, a trickle dribbling from the corner of her lip. The metallic taste fills her mouth as she collapses into the couch, not caring to change out of her underclothes before dropping her armor on the coffee table.

"Think you could've been a little more help?" she says aloud to no one in particular, and no one answers in return. Rey's head tilts back against the cushion of the couch, staring up at the ceiling with blurry vision. She squints, shaking the senses back into her.

Though no one had answered her rather specific query, the response of Safronov's echo, the Russian sniper she had once been, seems to scoff at her from the recesses of her mind.

Rey huffs, bringing a bruised hand up over her eyes. "You've no room to talk."

She doesn't know if Nick is around to hear her speak with the ghosts that live in her head. It isn't something she is oft to do unless she's alone, at the risk of looking like a crazy person talking to voices that so rarely talk to her back.

It's probably better that way, anyway. Though it had been those echoes that helped retain Rey's sanity during those long weeks of isolation at the sky prison, she can't imagine the impression her old habits would leave on anyone who isn't aware.

"Fuck you, too," she mutters to the smug, silent phantom.

III. Wildcard

[ooc: I might add more prompts as they come to me, but feel free to hit me up if you want to do something or choose your own adventure here!]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Nick returns her glace for only a second, worry still firmly planted in his brow. "If you don't mind. I'll need both hands to sew the sleeve back on my coat. Kind of need two to pull off the detective look."

He chuckles somberly, setting his pen aside and pulling off the buttonless button-up, his eyes lodging themselves firmly on the floor. He knows good and well that there's no way Hope gave her enough parts to fix all the problems he now has. That means more work for Rey, as he can't do it himself in his condition -- more debt to the gods, all because he couldn't keep his nose out of the Colosseum, left the rescuing to people who were better suited for it. Who was he kidding, thinking an old synth like him could help against deathclaws?

Well, he had helped, right before getting his arm ripped off. People were safe because of him; he needed to remember that. What happened to an artificial man like himself didn't really matter in the end.

... except to her. And the fact that it matters so much to her is at the heart of his concerns.

When Rey gets up to retrieve the severed arm, the pain is at least dulled to the point she barely notices.

"What, you mean you don't have one-armed detectives where you're from?" It's a poor attempt at making light of things, as she goes to sit back down next to Nick once his overshirt is removed.

If there's one good thing about Nick being what he is, it's that reattaching a dismembered limb isn't quite as difficult as it would be were he human. They also wouldn't have had the luxury of waiting overnight for this process to work. No need to even worry about the arm withering with decay, or the smell, not to mention the blood...

Seated on the side of his stumped arm, Rey leans in to examine the wires sticking out. Don't want to connect the wrong pieces and end up with Nick being stuck with a backwards function for his hand in some weird way.

There are times where Nick's mechanical nature works to his advantage; being able to lose an arm and live to tell the tale because he can't bleed to death is handy, both literally and figuratively. Not at it hadn't given his system a real shock. It's good to have some upsides to being a synth; the fact he was built rather than born has plenty of drawbacks in the Commonwealth. Those problems are less prevalent in Hadriel, but they still exist at the back of Nick's mind, still remind him he's nowhere near as human as he feels.

And given the unease burdening him currently because he's worried about his family and what the future may hold, he's feeling pretty damn human at the moment.

"We might, but most folks seem to come with two," he notes, shaking his head. He's letting this place get to him; he can't do that. "Though given all the radiation, I'm surprised some haven't sprouted a few more."

As Nick talks, Rey is doing her best to fix the frayed tips of the wires. Her box is still in the room, so she grabs whatever is available and gets to work.

That doesn't mean she can't talk while she works at the same time. His comment gets a scoff out of her then.

"That's unfortunate. Just think of how much you could get done with more arms. Perhaps carry an extra gun or two, even."

She's joking about it now, but the prospect of having multiple limbs does sound cumbersome.

Nick sits still as Rey works, not wanting to hinder her progress. He knows good and well that she takes her work seriously, especially when it comes to him. At least his arm isn't sparking anymore; at some point during the night, he managed to shut off power going to it.

"Just the one gun is fine. It's more than I need in most cases as it is."

That, and if he had more arms, he'd have to sew more sleeves to his coat. He's already not looking forward to reattaching the one it's missing now.

"Not surprising, coming from the guy who bested a group of kidnappers by beeping at them."

Sorry, Nick, but she is never letting that go.

Once Rey finishes with the wiring in Nick's stump, she reaches for the severed arm. Her head tilts, eyes shifting from the network of ripped cords to him.

"This is going to take some time," she warns. "Hope you didn't have any hot dates planned."

He offers her a wry smile. "I don't think you'd let me leave the house even if I did." While he's not keen on the idea of being under house arrest, it's probably a necessity, unless Rey has another batch of spare parts just lying around. At least there's always paperwork to do.

That reminds him, though: "I need to put in a call to the office. Let them know I might not be in for a while." He won't get his hopes up on this being a quick fix, given the fact he can hardly walk from one end of the room to the other with the bent shaft in his leg and the myriad of internal problems that came up during his scan.

After a thoughtful pause, Rey just nods. "You're right. I wouldn't."

That's just tough love for you.

She resumes her current task, her forehead creasing at Nick's comment. The fact that he's conceding all too easily is worrisome in itself. No insistence that he'll be fine, that he can work. Because Rey knows that that isn't true, but that doesn't mean he wouldn't at least try to convince her otherwise.

Her eyes lift from his shoulder to meet Nick's.

"How bad is it?"

For as long as he had been out, he had to have come up with something during his scans.

He sighs as his eyes wander to the floor again, the conflict of whether or not to tell all the grisly details her playing through his mind. He doesn't want to worry her, but that's already a given: it's not as though he can hide how damaged he really is, especially if systems start shutting down again. She can see right through his insistence that he's fine, especially when he absolutely isn't.

What's worse is that she'll probably need more parts, and that's if she can get him back into some semblance of working order at all. He'd get the parts himself if he could, but even that seems like a tall order in his condition.

"My cooling system is shot," he starts, knowing she'd suspected as much the night before, just as she'd started hacking up a lung. "Something keeps coming loose in my vocal modulator. Probably another frayed wire or bad socket. That patch job to my processor is working for now, but I'm already getting warnings about a loose connection. Least I'm still online, thanks to you."

And that's not even mentioning the bent shaft in his leg, the busted power coupling in the only arm he has left, and whatever it is that's loose in his chest that rattles every time he moves.

Edited 2016-07-18 03:57 (UTC)

Seeing that he isn't trying to dance around the subject is similarly worrisome. It means that all of those things that's wrong with him are serious.

Her expression softens when she looks at him. She's all out of smiles and good humor to try and make light of things now, knowing what is wrong, and that there are probably many more things that he isn't telling her yet. They have to take one step at a time. It isn't like Rey can fix all of his problems at the same time, much as she wishes she could.

"I'll look at all of those things once I've got your arm reconnected. Don't worry. I'll take care of it." She forces a sharp laugh. "Maybe even make some improvements while I'm at it."

Though she knows Nick isn't worried about himself, so much as what Rey may do without him around. Hell, Rey isn't even entirely certain what she would do if he's gone.

Edited 2016-07-18 04:13 (UTC)

Nick tries to offer her a reassuring look, but even he seems too troubled to manage it. He's had a long night of thinking about the damage to his synthetic frame, about what it could mean in the long run. Best case scenario, she manages to fix him, maybe with a little help from those so-called gods when it comes to getting more parts. Worse case would be if she can't do the repairs, and they have to find another engineer somewhere in Hadriel -- if here is one.

And worst is if he can't be repaired at all, or even with repairs, something goes wrong and he shuts down permanently. Rey will blame herself if that happens; he knows her well enough to see that in the cards. He can't put that on her.

"I'll just be glad if you can keep me running at this point," he responds ruefully. "I... think that's as close to death as I'd like to get, for now."

If it wasn't obvious before, Rey knows better now that this isn't something she can afford to botch. Nick needs her alive and focused, just as much as she needs him. He's been the one thing that's kept her grounded since she got to this place, and she can't fucking afford to lose that now...

"Dying is shit," Rey mutters, her tune a little different from the usual. Dying is easy, but it's still shit. "I won't let that happen to you. I promise."

Not if she can help it, in any case. Damned if she cares whether it's a promise she may not be able to keep; she'll do whatever means necessary to keep Nick alive.

He'd warn her not to make promises she can't keep, but he recalls one he made to her not so long ago regarding the possibility of being sent back to her world, and how he'd do whatever it took to keep that from happening. Of course, if they ever do manage to find a way to control the Door and keep folks who don't want to go home from going home, she won't be the only one to benefit from it, but she's always on his mind when the topic comes up.

"Hey, I said I wouldn't leave you alone here. I intend to keep m̢̕͡y ͜͠w̡o҉͞r͢d.͜͠"

His brow furrows, irritation crossing him as his vocal modulator acts up. His voice loses a lot of the quality that makes it his own, taking on a garbled, more synthetic sound.

"D͞à̛͘m̛ń͟.͜ ̷ ͟T̡̨h͘er̀͞ȩ͟͟ g̕͞o̴e͡s͡͠ ̨̀ţ̷ha̧t̛ ͟c̨̨o͢n̵͜n̕ec̶̡ti̴̴͞o̴͠n̛͟ ͏a̡̡͠g̨̛a̢͢͠i͘͘n͡."

Rey stops what she's doing for only a moment, blinking up to gape at Nick when his voice malfunctions. Suddenly she's reminded of his dream, and the synth she had been witnessed to inside of it. It's strange to think how easily Nick was capable of sounding like a completely different person from his synthetic counterparts, but now that he loses that aspect of his individuality, it just feels weird.

A moment later, she returns to fixing his arm. "Just be glad that it's just your vocal modulator and not something more important."

His artificial-sounding voice, she can handle, unsettling that it may be. Him losing connection to something akin to his personality or memory banks or anything else would be cause for concern.

"I'll check it out once I'm done with your arm."

Almost halfway done now. For as efficient as she wants to be, Rey is trying not to work too fast, for his sake.

"T͟h͏a̧n͞k̶͠s,̨" Nick replies shortly, quietly. For him, the voice is just one more thing that makes him seem more human than the other, older synths. While he's glad it isn't something more important, it bothers him all the same.

He falls into silence after that, letting Rey work without having to hear the sound of his distorted voice. It's important that she get him working, that she make him feel like he's still himself in that mechanical shell. His trademark coat is ruined, vocal modulator on the fritz -- what's next to go? And will he still be himself without it?

His identity might not be entirely his own, but it's helped him make a life for himself, and at the end of the day, is one of the most important possessions he has.

Grimacing, Rey continues. She figures that his quiet, curt reply was an indicator that he didn't care to talk much, not while his voice is like that. Honestly, it's troubling to her, too. Knowing Nick as she does now, she can't help but think of him as being more human than machine, regardless of appearances and his opinion of himself.

So she works in silence for the next several minutes, utilizing her time and tools to replace and mend the wirings from the detached limb and Nick's shoulder. She tries not to think about what would happen if this doesn't work, and just keeps her mind on the task.

It isn't until she's finally finished that she leans back and speaks: "Okay. Try moving your arm now. Let me know if you feel anything off."

She isn't sure what more could be done if she messed something up or if the damage is just beyond repair. But damned if she won't make an attempt.

It only takes a second for Nick to get power running back into his arm. He gives it a few cursory rotations, privately irked by the torn, synthetic skin all around the socket. Patching his skin is something he's always had trouble with, which is why he generally didn't bother to try. The tears on his face let people know what he was well before he had to explain it to them, which seemed to work in his favor most of the time -- the general assumption was that he didn't hide what he was, so maybe he could be trusted at least as far as a Mister Handy.

"S̶ee҉ms-͞-̷ ͢h̵n." He cuts himself off, grimacing at the dissonant sound of his own voice as he struggles to sound anything like himself. "S̷e̢ęḿş ͞a litt͜lè t͝ig͘ht͜.͡"

He tries to swallow down his frustration -- he knows Rey is working as fast as she can. "Don't t̛hi͏nk ̷they̷'̴d̕ ͠ev̧èn͠ lęt m̸e̢ in̢to D̕iamo͏n͞d C͘ity̡ s̴o̸und́i̧n̕g͘ lik͠e t̸his."

Any mechanical bits Rey can take care of; that stuff is easy. Synthetic skin isn't something she can just mend, though. That would probably require materials and equipment that she doesn't have. She sighs, hoping at least that they won't ever have to worry about that. Nick's already got enough problems as it is, looking the way he does.

She frowns both at his answer and his discomfort with the sound of his own voice. If there was something more she could do for him about that, she would, and he probably knows this.

"Well, let's not worry about that." She couldn't care less about whether some bigoted assholes wouldn't let him into their precious city just because of the way he talks. "I'll loosen your arm up once I fix your voice, all right?"

Of all the troubles Nick has going for him right now, that seems to be the one that's bothering him at the moment, and with good reason.

Nick glances her way, a little embarrassed that he's letting this voice issue get to him so easily. It had fixed itself the night before, but it seems the connection might be out for good for the moment. That's one more key part of himself gone, one more reminder he is definitely more machine than man.

Not that Rey sees him that way; he knows better, and knows better than to let his concern rile hers. He gives her a grateful nod, pulling off his hat.

"Y͏ou͠'r͡e,̕ ̸e͜r̢.̢ G̕o͟in͟g ̡to ̵hav̸e͘ ͞t͡o͟ o͠pe͜n̕ ̀u̶p t͢h̨e͞ ̧b͟ác̨k͟ of ̡my̵ ̡hea͠d ̷t̵ǫ ge͏t̛ to ̸t͘he ̛m͟odu̵l͏a͟to̷r."

Whether Nick was sounding more like himself or an egg timer wouldn't have made a bit of difference to Rey now. She knows who and what he really is, and that's what matters to her. But she can also understand where he's coming from, and why this is important to him. So it's also important to her.

She nods, rising from the couch to swing around it, picking up the collection of tools along the way. Already her movements have improved, which is more than what she can say for Nick at the moment.

"All right. You're going to want to sit back and relax, then."

Not that she can expect anyone who knows they're about to have their head opened up to relax.

While he's had Doctor Amari open up his head a few times, Nick is never keen on having people tinker around in his skull; up there, along with various ports, his vocal modulator, and the wiring to some sensory receptors, is his memory bank. Of all the parts that make Nick Nick -- the coat, the voice, the mannerisms -- that's the most important part. All of his behavior, all of his memories -- Nick's memories -- are up there, recorded onto a piece of unassuming hardware that's vastly outdated in comparison to the third generation models.

But it's his brain, and it's the only one he's got. He knows he can trust Rey, and that she'll take care while working on him, but he can't help but be a little apprehensive at the thought alone.

"Shou͏ld ́b̶ȩ ̡on ̡thę left s͢om̵ew͠her̕e," he remarks stiffly. There's no relaxing for him.

Edited 2016-07-21 03:26 (UTC)

Right. Suppose it would be futile to ask for him to ease off a little.

Whatever, she can still work with this. Not like she has any other choice in the matter.

"Just let me know if you feel anything... off."

And, with that, she gets to working, starting with the visible screws on the back of Nick's head.

Nick doesn't respond, remaining still as she pulls the screws from his head to remove the plate that covers the back of his skull. He's pretty sure Rey doesn't need a verbal agreement from him to know he'll cooperate -- she is doing this for him, after all. She's already done so much.

Within his head, the data bank that serves as his memory whirrs quietly, always processing, always thinking. The wires from it trail through his neck down to the battery and primary processor located in his chest, working with them to give him as much awareness as humanly possible, despite his status as a non-human. His skin can pick up shifts in temperature and texture; his visual receptors take in sights, locking on even the most minute details, while his auditory ones are carefully calibrated to detect sounds that'd be nearly inaudible to the average Joe.

He might not have a beating heart, but he has enough pieces and systems to make him feel human, so much so that he forgets his own mechanical nature from time to time. There are been fleeting moments when he's awakened after rebooting himself and thought for a brief moment he was back in the pre-war era, the memories of the real Nick flooding through him. It passes, of course, but... well, it's almost no wonder he attacked his fellow prototype, his brother.

Nick holds back a sigh as another minute passes, having resigned himself to possibly never knowing if that brother even really existed, if he truly is the reason for the marred serial number on his processor. He still has a lot of questions to ask, and hell, he might not be able to ask them at all if Rey can't get him fixed. He never realized just how much he preferred his own voice until it was gone.

Once again, Rey summons both the mind and memories of the 'self' that can make sense of what she sees when she opens up Nick's head. He may be unique both in his world and Rey's own, the method is all the same. It's technology and mechanisms, and mechanics are exactly the sorts of things that Sarfati and Steyn had figured out.

All it takes is but a glance before they know what to do, and use Rey's hands to work their magic. They're patient though diligent, knowing better than to risk a careless rush job. In this case there are no exceptions, because this is Nick.

There is something reassuring about letting herself go. To relinquishing her sense of control to one of the many ghosts in her head. At least this one is more likely to do less harm than anything else.

She barely blinks, her focus strictly on the task in front of her as her deft hands move the wires and push the damaged metal around. Sometimes, she applies some minor heat through the veins under her skin, welding some of the damaged pieces together. It isn't the most prudent application of her abilities, but it works, and proves to be something of an effective patch-up.

It takes time, and Rey doesn't hazard making small talk to distract her selves or Nick from his position. No need to make him worry or have him move unnecessarily.

Before she decides to close up his head, she shifts her weight to the side, looking down on him.

"Just did a little tinkering so you should be getting less alerts, but I think that was your vocal modulator." The corner of her lip tugs into a slight grin. "Only one way to know for sure, though. Tell me a joke."

He glances up at her, some of her fixes already apparent to him. Having less alerts buzzing in his ears is a relief.

"Been a long time since I had to tell one," he starts, a smile sweeping across him as his voice cuts in clearly after just a second of distortion, "so I'm afraid I'm a bit rusty."

His grin widens as he sits still so she can close his head. "I'm feeling more like myself already. It was only a little while, but I didn't realize how much I'd miss the sound of my old voice. And it's not even mine to miss."

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