thecapitol | Making Alliances...for SCIENCE!

Entry tags:

Making Alliances...for SCIENCE!

Who | Lyle and YOU
What | Recruiting for the Science Alliance
Where | The Common Area
When | After the arrests, before the jailbreak
Warnings/Notes | None at this time

The Capitol seemed to be cycling Tributes in (and out, what with the arrests. But Lyle couldn't think too hard about that). New faces maybe meant new scientists, and figuring out who the sprock those might be seemed like a good use of his time. It might eventually bite them in the ass if it occurred to the Capitol that a bunch of scientifically-minded Tributes hanging out and swapping ideas might be a bad thing for them; but as long as they didn't hang out too often in too large a group, Lyle was willing to call it an acceptable risk.

Which is why he's sitting out in the middle of the common area with a sign reading "Entropy Isn't What It Used To Be (If you find this funny, come talk to me about the Science Alliance)" and watching to see who laughs.

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Joshua takes one look at the sign and snorts as he walks in from outside. Approaching the other man, he points at the sign. "What's the matter with that?"

Ok, so he's not the greatest at science puns. He coughs. "Uh, anyway. I'm Joshua Donovan, theoretical physicist, and CERN data monkey."

"Lyle Norg, biochemist and engineer," Lyle answers, folding his hands behind his head and looking up at Joshua. "What year is it for you? It's not really going to hurt your chances of joining in the Science Alliance if you're interested in having other science-types having your back in the Arenas; but CERN was around for a decent period of time where I'm from and I like to know where people stand in history."

Sollux has largely stuck to himself since coming here; it's rare that he's approached anyone else instead of being the one approached. Time not spent in the training center level (and that hasn't been much) has been largely localized to his district's floor, more specifically to his room. But it gets boring, just sitting around with so little to do.

So he's ventured out. He's ignored fellow tributes for the most part; he stubbornly wants not to think about how eventually all but one will be dying in the arena, how one might kill him, how he might have to kill them. He's a troll and can do what he has to, but it doesn't make it a fun subject.

Still, today's trip to the common area - he figured it wouldn't kill him to eat here for once - gets put on pause when he spots the sign. His eyebrows scrunch at first (what does anyone need a sign for?), but the moment he reads it--

"Ehehehe!"

Sollux dissolves into snickering, nasal and obnoxious and harder to ignore when it's coming from a guy with grey skin, horns, and a decidedly strange manifestation of heterochromia. He outright slaps a knee twice; he's someone who loves a good pun.

It's a moment before he decides to walk over. Alliances aren't a concept he's so sure on, not when most will have to die sooner or later. But does a hacker really count for what this guy's looking for? And beyond that, that joke deserves compliment.

"Great pun, dude," he says once he's in conversation range, and he flashes double thumbs up. "Not sure I'm what you're looking for, but that detherveth propth."

Sollux may look weird by the standards of most Tributes, but Lyle's best friend is mostly tentacle when he's not shapeshifting into something else. Horns and grey skin are pretty tame by his standards.

It's good to see someone getting that much of a kick out of his terrible nerd jokes, at least. Lyle grins as the sentient approaches.

"Hey, all I'm looking for is people who like science and might be interested in working with other sentients who like science during the Arenas," he says with a shrug, gesturing to one of the other chairs.

"My name's Lyle. Lyle Norg."

Sollux would have take a seat if not for that last little bit about the arenas. His manner changes immediately, grin sinking from his face as his arms slip into a fold.

"I'm not tho sure about that," he admits. He's not even looking at him now, head turned just to the side. "Making alliantheth inthide like that - they're juth going to have to end, right? Even if we come back, we'd thtill have to lothe each other before that."

Or turn on each other, he doesn't say. He wouldn't want to, would like to think he wouldn't, but that says nothing of the rest - or what circumstances might force them into.

Lyle's heart went out to the sentient, it did. Too bad he couldn't show it.

"It's got it's benefits other benefits," he said. "There's no real way to predict who is or isn't going to be brought back after they die, but making alliances and being interesting in the Arenas seems like a good way to hedge your bets. Plus, it's handy to have someone around with an idea of how to hack technology around when the traps start going off."

The first part caused Sollux's brow to furrow. "They can do that? Jutht... not bring uth back if we're boring?"

He wasn't sure what to think of that. He didn't want to give in and please his captors, but for all he knew he was doomed to a second death, he didn't want it to come soon. To die for a reason like that was ignominious - it was pathetic.

He shrugged to the latter. "I know how to hack," he said. "I'll be fine on that front."

"They'll do whatever they want."

For now. But Lyle couldn't tell this poor sentient that yet. "Look, I've only been here for six months, I'm not exactly an old timer; but the faster you accept that they're calling the shots and you need to keep your head down, the more likely you are to keep your head."

It wasn't a reassuring pep speech about how they were going to overthrow this sprocking mess and replace it with something better, but that was for the Lonestar posts. If Lyle warned him well enough, he might survive to the pep talk.

"Good, good," he said. "I'd suggest familiarizing yourself with the technology here. I had to spend some time doing that myself, this is not what I'm used to at all."

Well wasn't that disquieting. Keep your head down or else was the idea, and to an extent he had done that already; if he had no sense, he would have tried hacking the communicators straight away. It took restraint not to. But even then, the Capitol would do what they want, huh?

Reassuring was definitely not the word, and Sollux's frown stayed firm to hear it. He felt doomed enough already without the confirmation from outside sources. For better or worse, he didn't answer that part of the conversation.

"Familiarithing mythelf ithn't that big a problem," he replied, tone subdued. "Thith would be eathy mode nektht to thome thtuff I've done. Ekthcuthe me if I don't go into it deep." It seemed safer to not give any listening ears a full share of the ridiculous things he'd accomplished.

'Easy mode', huh? That could be interesting. Lyle made a note to contact him during the next Lonestar post to get a better feel for what that might mean.

Because he certainly wasn't going to encourage him to discuss that sort of thing publicly.

"I get it," he said instead, nodding. "Tech's more advanced when I come from. I'm still trying to get the parts to build a proper sonic shower instead of the weird liquid dermal scrubbers they've got here."

Not a lot had actually captured Rosalind's attention since she's been here. Most people have largely seen her wandering bored from one place to the next, either drunk or reading, not engaging with anyone particularly willingly.

But the sign catches her eye, and she snorts a little, a tiny smile crossing her lips. Science. Perhaps someone who can speak her language. Work is the thing that she misses most (well, second most), and there is an implication of possible work that comes along with joining an alliance.

She approaches, brow quirked, icy eyes fixed upon Lyle. Her tone of voice is flat, but she at least tries not to appear unfriendly.

"Right then - you've got a bite. Sell me on it. What, precisely, are you doing?"

"Well, I don't know about you, but making alliances -- temporary as they may be -- in the Arenas can be both useful in surviving longer, but also useful in being brought back," Lyle said. "Most sentients are more entertaining when they're bouncing off someone rather than lurking around in the shadows on their own. The Science Alliance provides those opportunities, but also opportunities to do so with sentients who can at least hold a diverting conversation."

He flashed his teeth in a grin. "Lyle Norg, biochemist and engineer. Yourself?"

The redhead listened, head listing slightly to one side as she regarded him. Alliances. She had been considering making some alliances, but increasingly as of late she had begun to think that wasn't going to happen. Something in her, she realized, read as belligerent and unpleasant. It made it rather difficult to consider anything other than enemies when she felt like friends were simply not suited to her.

On the other hand, there were a couple of people who seemed like they were able to at least find her presence bearable. And if this alliance was all relatively like-minded.....

Lifting her chin, she managed a smile back. Trying, at the very least, to look friendly.

"Rosalind Lutece. Quantum physics."

Edited 2014-08-24 19:14 (UTC)

"Pleasure to meet you, Ms. Rosalind Lutece. Or is it 'doctor'?" Lyle gestured to one of the empty chairs at the table. "There are a few other physicists around, though I don't recall any specifically quantum physicists. What year are you from?"

Finally, a sprocking woman of science. Lyle was seriously weirded out by how many members of the Science Alliance were men. He wasn't sure if they were somehow just missing all the female scientists, or if the Capitol was only grabbing male ones.

"Doctor, Madame, whatever you prefer."

Unceremoniously, she took her seat, crossing her legs at the ankles and crossing her arms against her chest. Closed off. A byproduct of being a woman in the field of science.

"Every year," she answered, speaking it with a shrug like the answer was simple and obvious. "But if you mean the last definitive year when I was not in a quantum superposition? Nineteen-fourteen."

Well, that sure was another unsuccessful attempt at training. It would help if Dennett did something more than get vaguely intimidated by those martial arts practice things that seemed like stubby limbed people. Nonetheless, he tried. Sort of.

Still, it's almost a relief to see the sign. Something NOT about killing or chopping someone's tongue out if they talked too much to the wrong people (something he's becoming increasingly worried about doing.)

However. "'Science Alliance'?" He may not be Tom Pope in Marketing, but he knows terrible sounding branding. "Rhyming? Really?" The pun is just fine, because nerdery. But rhyme, sir, is a bridge too far.

"I didn't name it," Lyle answered with a shrug. "The citizens of the Capitol did, we just rolled with it." He gave the sentient who'd approached his best we understand each other, don't we? face -- after all, wasn't "rolling with it" the best they could be expected to do under these circumstances? Publicly, at least?

"If it helps, it doesn't rhyme in my native language."

He gestured to himself. "Lyle Norg, biochemist and engineer, currently in charge of recruiting. In the sense that I was bored and decided to make a sign instead of taking apart the liquid dermal scrubbers again. I take it you're interested?"

"Ah." Figures. Drag them here from across a dozen worlds for some insane death battle gladiator contest, and they have poor taste, as well.

"Your--what is your native language, then?" Please be something he recognizes. PLEASE.

"Dennett Norton. Neurosurgeon and cyberneticist. And it depends, I suppose." Now that he knows the Capitol is behind it. "What is the mission statement?"

"Interlac," Lyle answered. He didn't expect this sentient -- Dennett Norton, he'd have to remember the name -- to be familiar with it at all, unless stories about Superman had somehow traveled to his reality. Or unless the Legion had also visited his reality, in which case he was going to have to disappoint him fast. "I don't expect you to have heard of it. If you're familiar with the Gregorian calendar, I'm from the thirty-first century. I also speak Durlan, twenty-first century French, and can swear in every language I've come across, but the translation technology here means I now speak all English all the time."

He shrugged in answer to Dennett's follow up question. "The mission statement is that it's nice to have allies in the Arenas who can actually hold interesting conversations between the moments where we're all desperately fighting for our lives. It's a relatively recent thing, a few of us holed up together during Arena 9 and thought that it would be less boring to continue doing so in future Arenas." He grins at Dennett. "I'm afraid I can't hold much of a conversation on neurosurgery, but I might be able to hold my own on cybernetics."

'Interlac' is going to get a blank look from Dennett: he was hoping for something he'd heard of like...French. Lithuanian, even. But calendars--he can do those.

"Thirty first century?" Did he hear that right? Maybe the man had said 'twenty' and he'd just misheard. "You mean, from the future?"

Well, that at least sounds reasonable. "And do they try not to kill each other, too?" Because if so, sign him up. He could use people not wanting to kill him, almost as much as good conversation. "Cybernetics?" Ah, here's his kind of happy face. "Have you seen Alex Murphy here? He's my work."

"Well, it's my present," Lyle said cheekily. "Or at least it was my present. But yes, assuming that you're not from that era or a subsequent one yourself, I'm from the future. Flying cars, casual space travel, most of my teammates are aliens, etcetera. But most of our surgeries were performed by doctors assisted by cybernetics, so I'd still trust your skills on that front over mine."

True, but also a little flattery. A skilled neurosurgion could come in very handy once they got a little more information on the chips the Capitol had embedded in everyone's brains.

"We've gone without an intra-alliance kill so far," he answered. "That might change, but everyone seems relatively content to work together."

He leaned forward, propping his elbows on the table. "Clara's husband Alex? I've seen him around, but I haven't gotten close enough to check out his hardware. Seems like it must have been quite a job, though." He gestured Dennett toward one of the other chairs. "You interested in telling me about it?"

"We...haven't done flying cars yet." It's not his field, but he's suddenly wondering why not. He's pretty sure if Raymond wanted it to happen, it would have happened. "You can watch Alex, and maybe decide from there." There you go: RoboCop: Dennett Norton's walking, talking, and shooting CV.

"Working together, or at least not having to worry about everyone stabbing me," Seriously. Stabbing. Does he look like a stabbable guy? "would be an improvement."

He shifts his weight. How much of Alex's story was his to tell? Well...enough. "He'd been victim of an assassination attempt. A bomb. He required an almost full body replacement. Everything but the brain and hand and a few internal organs is my work."

Lyle leaned forward conspiratorially. "Flying cars seem cooler than they actually are," he said solemnly. "I'd put more effort into space travel and figuring out how to communicate with the other sapient species out there."

(Said the sentient who'd invented a flight ring so that he wouldn't have to put up with awkward and terrifying jet packs. But Dennett didn't know about that.)

He whistled through his teeth at Dennett's description of what had happened to Alex, noting and storing for later examination the way Dennett shifted in his seat before speaking. "I must say, that is pretty impressive. New technology, I take it? Or is it older technology that's been newly adapted?"

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Making Alliances...for SCIENCE!

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let me know if his lisp bothers you and I can type his speech out normally!

Nope, it's fine!

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