damned_institute | Day 38: Game Room

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Day 38: Game Room

She’d never been in the Game Room before.

It didn’t look spectacularly interesting, she had to admit… but it’d be more fun than just hanging out in the Sun Room, right? Yuffie idly thumbed through a deck of cards, walking around the room to examine various bits and pieces. Board games, video games, chess… No really awesome prank material that she could see, but maybe she could rope somebody into a game of poker? That could be fun, but… ah, then again, most of the patients were just like her -- they didn’t have anything really cool that she could swindle out of them. Not until Nightshift, anyway.

Still! She’d keep it in mind. It wasn’t like there was anybody else in the room yet anyway, so any potential swindling would have to wait a little while. What could she do in the meantime, huh? Pick- pocketing a nurse could be fun..! Wait -- no, not when it was quiet like this. She’d have to wait until there was more cover, unless she got distracted. Yuffie hadn’t stolen anything in days, not since that time in Doyleton, with the Kaito kid…

Yuffie smirked. That had been fun.

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This was a stupid idea, Kvothe thought. A very stupid idea. He could could hear the threat in the man's voice but he stubbornly stood his ground. "No, it doesn't. I think that you have the wrong person. Now, you never did tell me. Who are you, and who are you looking for?"

"Fine." The Maximal stood back, folding his arms. "Play dumb if you want. Doesn't make any difference to me- it's just gonna be a Pit-load harder on you." All the while Depth Charge spoke he kept his stare trained on him, monitoring his body language closely. He wasn't going to be caught out. "Name's Depth Charge, though I'm sure you knew that already. I'm going to ask you a few questions. Don't lie- I will know. Now: where were you born?"

Definitely the stupidest thing he'd ever done. He kept his appearance calm, open, projecting confidence. He was good at it, having been trained as an actor since he was a child. He wondered how Depth Charge would know if he lied (and wasn't that an odd name), he'd become very good at that since getting to the University, between his acting ability and more practice than he was sometimes comfortable with. There probably wouldn't be a need, it wasn't like the man could check the facts anyway and from his limited experience here he doubted that anyone had ever heard of the Four Corners as he knew them. "I couldn't say for sure, we were on the road at the time." He smiled pleasantly. "You know, the nurses are likely to involve themselves if you just stand here interrogating me. Chess?"

To be honest, Depth Charge wasn't entirely sure how he'd be able to figure it out, but that didn't really matter. Just so long as he could intimidate X into spilling he'd get the results he wanted.

... or not. The Maximal was thrown clean off balance when all his intimidation got was an amiable smile. Taunting he'd been expecting, maybe even sarcasm, but this? It took him a couple of seconds to get his strategy straight again, and even then he couldn't help the look of bewilderment that came over his face at the suggestion. X was right about the nurses and he could easily have been lying with his answer, of course, but... "Chess? What the slag is chess?"

Kvothe was surprised, but it only showed as a mild raised eyebrow. Depth Charge may well get the sarcasm he's expecting later, but at the moment Kvothe was as eager to avoid the notice of the nurses as he was to not anger the much larger man in front of him. He didn't want a fight right now, and he especially didn't want it to turn physical when he was already injured. "Okay, maybe not chess. Are there any games you do recognize?"

"Recognise?" Depth Charge echoed blankly, peering at the other suspiciously. "You know I don't recognise anything, so quit trying to change the subject." Because that's what it was, wasn't it? An attempt to distract him, lead him off track!

The warning hadn't fallen on deaf ears, however, and this time he dropped his voice to a low growl. "I'm not in the mood for games, X. Not this time."

He lowered his voice as well in response, his expression still pleasant but his voice sharp and intent. "I don't know who 'X' is, as I told you my name is Kvothe. And games are what they're expecting, so come on. You don't have to actually play, just look like it." He turned and went to pick up a chess board, expecting Depth Charge to follow him.

This time Depth Charge hesitated; as hard as he looked, he couldn't see any trace of dishonesty in his target's face. Either he was unused to human faces or X had gotten better at lying. Or he'd got the wrong gu-

No. He shook off the doubt as quickly as he could. That wasn't an option. Not yet.

He followed X (or Kvothe?) to a table with various boards and pieces scattered across it- games, he presumed, none of which he could understand. "Alright then," he said suddenly, "prove it to me. Prove you're not X."

Kvothe straightened the chess board between them and briskly began setting up the pieces. "We take turns moving pieces around," Kvothe said, calmly ignoring the demand for the moment. "I'd tell you how the pieces move but I doubt you'd care and it's for show anyway, just follow my lead." He fell silent for a moment as he put the last piece in place, then pushed a white pawn forward. "It's hard to prove I'm not a person when I don't know anything about them, and there's not a lot of ways to prove anything around here."

A checked board, with two little armies lined up on either side in strict order. This was chess? Looked more like some kind of complicated war game. Depth Charge stared at the miniature soldiers for a nanoklik, still not quite getting it. Oh well. It was just for show... he pushed one of the black foot-soldiers across the board, mirroring his opponent's move.

"Fine. Tell me about who you say you are, then." he answered, darting a quick look over his shoulder to make sure the nurses were otherwise occupied. "But I'm warning you- if one thing seems out of place, we're done." There was an unpleasant emphasis on the final word. Either Depth Charge was getting anxious, or he really meant it.

He could hear the tone, and made a show of studying the board as if his next move actually mattered. "I told you who I am." He moved another pawn. "My name is Kvothe, and I've been attending the University and living in Imre. You've probably never heard of it. I've never heard of anyone with a name like yours before, and I'd still like to hear about this person that you seem to think I am."

Once again, Depth Charge mirrored his move. Was there really nothing more to this game than moving little soldiers around? It left far too much time for him to think about what 'X' was telling him- and that was bad. Because the more he thought about it, the more it started to sound, well, plausible. For a start, how would X know about chess? Or this 'Imre' place? Slag, how would he come up with a name? He could have ben winging it, of course, improvising, but...

"You... really don't know what I'm talking about." the Maximal said slowly, as if each word weighed more than an entire fleet of starhoppers. The unblinking stare that rose to meet his opponent's was curiously searching, even a little desperate. "You really don't have the faintest smelting idea, do you?"

Kvothe shoved another piece forward at random, looking up at Depth Charge seriously. "No. I don't have the faintest idea what you want or who you're looking for." He leaned forward, folding his arms on the table. "Would you start answering my questions, now?"

Depth Charge stared across the chessboard. Then, exhaling deeply, like a tanker sinking below the horizon, he sank back in his chair with one hand over his eyes. We've got a problem. Abandon ship.

He'd tried- Primus he'd tried!- to get X and the kid in front of him to correspond. Probably sent his logic circuits into overload in the process. But he'd seen the young human's face, heard his voice. There was no way he could go on thinking they were the same person.

It was utterly crushing.

Slowly, he slid the hand down from his eyes and over his chin, sitting upright again. "Yeah. Yeah, I'll answer them." he answered simply. "It's Kvothe, right? And you wanted to know who X is?"

The breath Kvothe let out was silent, but relieved. "That's right. I think I should know who you thought I was. And why you want to find him so badly." He felt he had much more control of the situation now, since the man no longer seemed to think he was this 'X' person, and so he was much more comfortable.

"X. Where do I start?" Depth Charge sighed again, this time out of chagrin rather than disappointment. "The Protoform X I'm looking for is an experiment gone wrong- insanity calling itself science, not to mention a sadistic freak. He escaped, turned up in my jurisdiction- a little settlement called Colony Omicron- and destroyed everything there but me, then carried on across the rest of the universe. I make it my duty to find him and offline him. Personally."

He paused to catch Kvothe's eye. "Don't get the wrong idea- you're obviously no cold-blooded killer. Guess if you want something enough you'll believe anything."

Not exactly a flattering comparison, he thought, but he nodded. "Good, I'd hate to think that I did look like some kind of cold-blooded killer." He smiled thinly.

Strangely enough, later in life some people will actually say that he is, but at this point it wasn't true.

"So, don't you know what he looks like? 'Red hair and green eyes' seems kind of vague if you're looking for someone like that."

"It's complicated." Depth Charge shook his head dismissively. "This isn't my real body. I'm normally a slagging robot, but when I woke up here I was human. There were a couple of similarities, though- my optics are normally red and my armoured plating blue. Like this body's eyes and hair. Figured I could use that to find him."

And boy had he been wrong.

"...A robot?" Kvothe looked confused, of course he was from a world without engines or electricity, they didn't have anything like robots even at the University. "What's a robot?"

"What?" Depth Charge blinked, nonplussed. Was this kid for real? "You don't know what...? Never mind. I'll try and explain it. It's like..." He sat back again, this time in thought rather than disappointment. Explaining a robot. Hah. It was like explaining water, or gravity. "A robot's kind of like a human, but made out of metal and full of gears and wires. Everyone from my home planet's like it."

Kvothe sat back as well, still confused but thoughtful. "It sounds like something that has to be built. If everyone where you're from is a robot, who built them?"

If he ever got back to the University he'd definitely tell Master Kilvin about this, he was sure the Master Artificer would love to try building something like that.

Depth Charge couldn't stop himself from giving a dry little laugh. Rhinox would've had a field day explaining this slag. "I'm a fighter, kid, not a philosopher. Most people would say Primus, I guess- he's kind of an all-powerful god. Me? I'm not sure anymore."

Kvothe nodded a little though he's not quite sure what to think. He'd thought it was a relatively straight-forward question. "So, when you woke up here you were completely human instead? Makes me wonder what other people here might really be." Ordinarily he'd think the man was completely cracked. However, the blue hair somehow didn't look dyed and with the rest of the madness in this place he supposed it wasn't any more impossible than everything else that happened. After the statue in the chapel he was prepared to believe a lot.

"There are maybe three more Cybertronians here, plus X. They're all 'cons, though, so I wouldn't trust 'em to so much as hold the door for me." Depth Charge suggested, "I've met and heard of a couple more non-Cybertronian 'bots, but other than that? Your guess is as good as mine. There could be anything here from aliens to ick-yaks. You're human, right?"

"Yeah, I am. Are you sure that X is really here? Or, that he's still here? I saw notes about people disappearing when I answered your message on the board. If he was really here he could be gone now." At least, Kvothe hoped so. He didn't like the thought of more sadistic psychopaths running around the place, especially after the night before. "What do you mean by ''con?'"

Day 38: Game Room

Re: [blarg, sorry, reposted for fail]

Re: [blarg, sorry, reposted for fail]

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