daisy023 | REPORT 018 :: SIMULATION // ACTION

Entry tags:

REPORT 018 :: SIMULATION // ACTION | VOICE

[ACTION]

[Once again, SPARTAN-023 walks towards the Battle Dome, trying to see if it had been fixed already. Having been a raining day, yesterday was unbearable for the taller girl in a red jumpsuit, so she tries her luck again... But she stops on her tracks. She could hear something near the village. Her keen ears were able to hear familiar things from the woods.

The Chief Petty Officer walks towards these voices, and presses the voice function of her journal.

She removes the safety lock of her pistol.]

[VOICE]

[There is the low rustling of leaves, sign of someone moving stealthily... and whispers in a language that the wings translate into one deep military voice, and three high-pitched ones.

A lone alien voice yells in panic upon seeing the woman.]

Covenant!

[There are more alien screams of alert upon hearing the growl of the Spartan, before rapid gunshots mute one of the high-pitched voices, making the rest of the voices panic and shoot. The deep voice roars devout threats before it is interrupted by the sound of a broken body, followed by alien gunshots that mute the remaining voices.]

This is SPARTAN-023. I need a sitrep. Now.

((OOC: Set the moment the simulated drones begin to show up, at 12:00pm. Even if in this post Daisy is concerned over the Covenant, you can bring in your own monsters and items! :D))

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[Robert is... more confused than anything. Daisy seems lost, almost, to him. Like she isn't quite sure of anything right now. He can't read expressions well, but he's starting to get used to hers, and her eyes...

He feels overcome by the inane urge to protect her. Him. The pathetic barely-under-five-foot-five scrawny little scientist, protecting the sculpted death machine...

... Nevertheless, he goes to gently take her hand, if she'll allow it.

Either way, he'll fall into step with her, taking in the sights of a foreign ocean - a foreign ocean that, by all rights, should never fit in this building.]

[The Covenant are a familiar threat. She knows what to do in combat. It is part of her being, and she had no reason to hesitate in battle. It's what she is. Battle does not faze her. It was where she belonged.

But this is different. She doesn't know what to do. She is shaken.]

--Sir?

[Daisy's head bolts when seeing Robert's hand. She looks at it... And hesitatingly takes it. Her weapon lowers.

Passing the arch, they reach the cobbled roads near to the house and garage, along with gardens that surround the island with the variety and colours of a lush world. The girl looks everywhere, but not in the way she studied her environment. She stops, and her posture softens as she looks in silence.

There is an empty electronic wheelchair in the roads. Hidden amidst a batch of orchids, engraved with long hair, a younger smile, and a frail appearance, a tomb with Daisy's face on it.]

[Robert was about to ask Daisy if she knew this place.

And then he sees the tomb and he knows.

For a long, quiet moment, all he can do is stare. Daisy's face is on that tomb. It doesn't look like the Daisy standing next to him - maybe soon he'll realize that face is too young to be hers - but for a horrible moment he stares and he thinks the woman standing next to him is dead and this is where she died.

... She is dead, of course, but for an entirely different reason.

His grip tightens against hers, and his gray eyes sting, but he tries to keep his voice steady.]

... I'm sorry.

It's not me. [It is a saddened look, but of something she knew would happen long ago.] It was someone else.

[She took her place. She took her life. But Daisy could not blame her. She could only hope that this person lived a good life, and that unlike the monster that did all of these things to them, that her parents gave her the love they would've given their true daughter.

Daisy directs Robert towards the house. A sign not to dwell on this, for the two of them.]

Good bye, sister.

[The girl thinks to herself, before she opens the doors.

A massive house that had been adorned with vegetation and windows with the same delicacy and care as they had been on the outside. The kitchen, the dining room, the stairs to the bedrooms, and living room, could all be seen from the center.]

Armor's got to be around somewhere.

[She needs to keep herself focused on something. Remember that none of this is real. Even if she wishes it to be.]

[Robert is confused, for a moment. He isn't quite sure what to think. Someone else who looks nearly exactly like Daisy...]

... A twin...?

[But she's already pulling him into the house, and so he follows her with little protest.

It's actually a very nice house with a radial arrangement that is pleasing to Robert's mind. He keeps an eye out for the flash of red that would indicate Daisy's armour.]

... Are... are you certain it would be here, in... in this house?

It wasn't out there. It has to be in one of the rooms.

[She evades the first question. She could've told him it is classified information... But, so were her name and her origins.

Spartans are obsessed with their armors, they can spot it better than anyone. Daisy directs him upstairs, through a large room, into a bedroom with a single bed by a big window.

Surrounded by stacks of plush toys, electronics, and furniture covered in "get well" wishes, the MJOLNIR Mark IV.]

... Ah.

[That is such a jarring contrast. So very jarring.]

... Th-there it is.

[He is still painfully curious about this place, but Daisy doesn't seem to want to answer.]

[She picks the helmet, and makes a quick check with her radar to see if things were idyllic enough not to have anything in this place. There were only the Spartan and the scientist. She removes it.]

Doesn't seem there's anything in here. [Strange that a combat scenario wouldn't load enemies.] We can use this place to rest. The kitchen should be to the right of the main door.

[This is not an order, but an offer... An option that Daisy herself wants to take.]

... I... I would be glad to, but...

[As Robert retraces his steps back to the main room, he asks - fearfully, as if he expects Daisy to be angry:]

Wh-where... where exactly are we, if... if I may ask?

[Her grip on her helmet increases, but it is not of anger. It's of melancholy. She doesn't know how much could she tell him. But for the things they had gone through today, he deserved to know some of what was happening.

Daisy does not answer at first. She looks at the window of her room.]

My home.

Your home... [It raises more questions than it answers, but he says the first thing that comes to mind.]

It is... a beautiful place.

[He's being entirely sincere. Save the pieces of Terra, this is one of the loveliest areas he's seen so far.

He smiles gently, though it's a little wavery.]

...

Yeah.

[The girl holds on to the helmet. Spartans were trained to keep their emotions in check... But she doesn't know what to do. Whenever if to tell him to rest, or to help her suit up.

In this place, she is the complete opposite of the machine built for destruction and death.

She is confused.]

[He's more than willing to help, as the fact he's staying near her suggests. But more than anything, he has no idea what to do. Daisy's obvious awkwardness doesn't help much.]

... D-Do... do you need anything, first, Ms. Daisy?

[... He'll listen to her troubles, if she wants. Or even just be here. Whatever helps.]

[She pauses. Her white wings drop, moving weakly.]

I'm alright. [A lie. Her low tone betrays her.] Better suit up. With everything going on, I'd better be ready. We can catch our breath here.

[She knows that this place is a lie. That it's an illusion. Product of her memories. Truth is, she wants to curl up in that bed, close her eyes, and pray that her parents would be here. Not as enemies, but as feathers.]

[He can't tell she's lying.]

Is there a way I can... assist you with this process then, perhaps? [Considering Daisy's likely to defend him, and not the other way around, he's interested in her being protected more.]

How much do you remember about the armor? [This has a lot of potential for the future, if the Doctor is willing, but in the meantime...] If not... I'll walk you through it.

[She dismantles parts of the armor to prepare to wear them herself. This will keep her mind busy. It will make her feel safe.]

... I... recorded everything I remembered in my nanocomputer as soon as the experiment ended. [His voice is small and anxious... the remembrance of that experiment is, well, uncomfortable.]

So I still remember... some things. But I would like to hear them from you... because I am certain some of the details were logically impossible the way I remember them.

[He wants to learn about this armour for what it's supposed to be.]

[She shares it. After finally setting foot in this house in the first time for over fourteen years, Daisy is amaze she hasn't broken down yet.]

Understood.

[The Chief Petty Officer doesn't feel comfortable with classified information being in others' hands. But when she looks through the window, the Spartan begins to think "classified" in Luceti means "temporarily secret".

She dons away the jumpsuit to replace it for the MJOLNIR. Her second skin. Her safe haven.]

[If it helps, Robert is extremely unlikely to share the information if told not to.]

I remember thinking that... the suit was magitechnology. It could not have been, but I was... convinced that it was. [Softly:] I even... remember some of the blueprints for it...

[Blueprints that, upon further inspection, hadn't actually made sense. Though he didn't notice it at the time, didn't notice with those decades of false information...

Ugh.]

[She looks at Hastings, wondering about the possibilities.]

False memories. Or alternate laws.

[It's just an hypothesis. With worlds having magic, it wouldn't be strange that they'd meld both magic and technology to great efficiency.

The process to put on the MJOLNIR is slow, but one the Spartan has just been used to for a long time.]

Both. I... I remembered things falsely, and the world seemed to fit those f-falsehoods. If only for a brief time...

[He watches his hands, and Daisy's, as she slowly puts on each piece of the MJOLNIR. Even one piece of it is obscenely heavy to somebody like him. The layers of the suit are ingenious - it's a surprisingly advanced piece of technology, one of the first to evoke actual awe in him in awhile.

He finds it sad that they're used for war.]

... What is the... p-proper name of this suit, if... if I may ask?

[Unfortunately, Hastings brought up good points.]

Then again... It was a poor illusion.

[Alas... Such a suit could only be worn by a select few. For all the power the suit had, there was a reason it had its' name.]

MJOLNIR, Mark IV. It was named after the hammer of Thor, a norse god.

[The hammer of the gods, wielded by humanity, against the Covenant.]

MJOLNIR... [He pronounces the word strangely, with an unfamiliarity brought on by never having heard a Norse word in his life.] It is... a-admittedly extremely fascinating technology... though I wonder how it can be p-properly cared for in an environment such as this.

... I remember that... a-at that time, I was aware the suit could... only be worn by certain individuals due to its power. Is... is that still true...? [Part of it is curiosity, and part of it is not wanting it to harm people if only Daisy can wear it.

... Though he'd never seriously try to wear it himself. Even without anything strenuous, he'd probably die due to being crushed under the weight.]

[The girl continues putting up her suit, a few sections still remaining.]

Some replacements arrive sometimes. [Otherwise, maintenance would be loads harder, especially with crazed superpowered individuals. Still something she'd rather have a techie's help with.] But they're not something I rely on.

Only augmented humans can wear it. People with hardened bones and muscles. Anyone else...

[She still remembers the footage of the poor bastard that wore the MJOLNIR, and killed himself with the first muscular spasm.]

There are a lot of systems in place that could stop others from even moving it, though. Safety locks, neural implants, training...

[All of these things lacking with said poor bastard that wore the suit.]

Replacements...? Through the shops? [This makes him wonder if there's a way to use those resources elsewhere.] Do you have to... request them, or are they found sporadically on their own...?

[The words "augmented humans" send a little feeling of fear through him. Fear and not-quite-distate. He doesn't know if it's like the genetic engineering he's seen in the bowels of the genetic black market...]

I would... not wish to use it myself. I am simply asking in the event that... others not be harmed by their attempts.

But... thank you, Ms. Daisy. [It seems grotesque to have this conversation here, in such a beautiful peaceful place.]

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