damned_institute | Day 46: Lunch

The mere fact that she'd been susceptible to whatever hold the Institute had had on her yesterday was sufficient to leave Ayumu both upset and angry - no, not angry, downright furious, both at herself and whoever was responsible for that. But there was also the fact that because of it, she'd lost out on an entire day of work, and in several ways had ruined some of what she'd done already. That little conversation with Himura the day before, for instance, was something she'd sincerely prefer not to remember if she'd had any choice in the matter.

Unless the man was a complete moron, which, unfortunately, was one thing she couldn't believe of him, he had to have realized just who her brother was. After all the effort to keep that fact quiet (not exactly a secret, but certainly not advertised; half the Shinsengumi probably never even realized it because there was no reason to) she'd gone and chatted about it with him. Told him all about it, practically painted a bright target around a weakness that shouldn't have existed in the first place.

She'd spent the shift in the Sun Room pretending to sleep, while in truth forcing herself into calm. After years of practice she could shunt away the useless and distracting emotions, focusing only on what was important and needed to be at the forefront of her mind, and by the time the intercom signaled the lunch period she was feeling considerably calmer. The time to silently observe others had, as well, alerted her to something she probably should have noticed earlier: Mello was back. Would her previous objective be reinstated now? He seemed to have far less of a bulletin presence this time, so perhaps not. Still, though, it bore investigating.

None of her thoughts were visible, of course, as she moved through the line, examining the lunch selection somewhat dubiously. Now with the benefit of Yuuko's memories she might recognize the food, but she certainly didn't share the enthusiasm for it that her imaginary self apparently had. Ayumu skipped past that part and settled for the salad bar and some bread, then positioned herself in a place where she could watch both the door and the rest of the room, setting her journal open in front of herself as though planning to write something. There was far too much that she'd missed, too much work to do now.

[for Okita]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Tch, stupid zeptoliters trying to dictate what data's appropriate to communicate," the Reaper grumbled. "It's regular right-angle quadrilateral parallelograms like them that stifle creativity at it's core. Censorship is garbage. CRUNCH! I'll add it to the heap."

His statement was accompanied by the customary slamming of fist into palm, a satisfying smack as the two came together.

"Fine, your exhaust pipe or whatever you robots got down there," he said irritably in response to HK's remark as he picked up a chunk of pizza. Half of the slice's volume disappeared in a matter of seconds down the endless maw of Minamimoto. "I am a product of my factors! Evolution is the revolution that gave birth to my resolution within this binomial distribution!"

HK tilted his head slightly to one side, trying to analyze any meaning that might be found in that statement. The only thing that made absolutely no contextual sense was the 'heap' business, although apparently this meatbag thought he was tough. Heh.

"Objection: I am not some petroleum-powered relic! I was powered by a top-of-the-line energy cell that is likely to last at least forty times your maximum lifespan, meatbag." Ugh. Petroleum. How barbaric.

"Statement: Evolution is a force that only works in an appreciable manner over millions of years, meaning, meatbag, that droids smart enough to alter themselves will always be more superior than you. We see a problem in relation to our current environment, and we fix it. Your 'factors', unfortunately for you, only gave you... that." He pointed at the loud meatbag.

"Your tubing! Whatever! If you don't have an output for me to input your zetta stupid ideas, I'll make you one!" yelled Sho, spraying grease and cheese from the piece of pizza he was in the process of devouring.

"Yeah, and guess who made you in the first place? You lack Imagination; robots got no Soul! You can make as many iterations as you want and you'll still just be a programmed pile of scrap!" he continued to rant, waving his arms and gesticulating wildly. "Artificial Integers will never outwit a true genius! If I had my psyches here, you'd already be derived!"

HK threw up his arms to defend against the lipid-filled spray. Meatbags were so disgusting! "Statement: That would imply that you are capable of doing such a thing, meatbag!" he shot back. He was an assassin droid, after all! He was surely better than some random, loud, messy meatbag at disassembling their kind.

"Threat: Insult my master's work again, meatbag, and you will be in far too many pieces to be able to regret it!" He was probably overreacting, but he hadn't gotten the chance to kill anything recently! "Query: Does your brain cell ever get lonely? Suggestion: Maybe it should be let out to have some fresh air. I know ways to make that happen."

"I'll carve holes in your aluminum asymptote anytime, anywhere, you attoliter!" laughed Sho. "You'll have to get in line though; I've still got other numbers to crunch in my order of operations!"

Sho chuckled; the deadline was coming up and so was the termination of Joshua's function. Now, if only he could find a way to get Joshua to the oxygen tanks. Or better yet, maybe get the oxygen tanks to him? If he just had a method of delivery...

"Hah! I'm in my prime, so don't think I'm easily divisible!" the Reaper boasted, starting in on the next slice of pizza. "If you try to oxygenate my brain, you'll be the one suffering from rapid oxidation." This guy would make a perfect target for an aerosol can flamethrower. "Try it and I'll knock you down to a 41 on the Von Luschan scale!" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Von_Luschan%27s_chromatic_scale)

"Protestation: Now you're just using words that vaguely match the sound! Query: Are you incapable of producing profanity? Are those terms missing from your database?" That usually only happened to droids that suffered damage from electrical fires. Results were usually amusing.

"Statement: A meatbag, however skilled, cannot match even what abilities I am limited to now." Go on. Try it. I have a stabby thing hidden on my person. "Without sounding like a brain-damaged Weequay. Like you, in other words." One that had swallowed a maths textbook.

"What? Quiet, radian! Profanity is the domain range of stupid hectopascals who lack creativity!" spouted Sho, waving about the piece of pizza in his hand as he gestured. "Monosyllabic mainstays are the mark of a minuscule mind!"

X-rated idiots with their F-Bombs and A-Holes could just stay B-hind and rot in the Stone Age for all Sho cared.

"What, you got a jet pack and flamethrower stashed away in there somewhere?" said Sho sarcastically, gesturing with his pizza and (un)intentionally flinging grease across the table at the robot. "You look plenty squishy to me, gearbox."

What the heck was a Weequay?

"Yeah, well at least I don't sound like a bad set of command prompts," snorted Sho. "Your dull descriptors are like a roadblock on the highway of communications."

"Statement: That is only because you haven't made the effort to learn more languages, meatbag. Many of them are quite creative in their profanity. But of course, being a meatbag, you would be limited to something significantly less than the three thousand that I know." Boast completed. Next, please.

"Statement: I have enough to terminate you easily, meatbag, not to worry." He wasn't going to say what in advance. This one was loud enough that the nurses might actually hear if he made note of it.

"Lie: Oh, I'm so hurt by your disapproval, meatbag. I think I shall cry. Or become a pacifist and never look down on meatbags from the lofty heights of droidness again," HK replied, mockingly. He was not going to defend his prefixes. Neither was he going to drop them. They were his!

"I only need one language: the language of numbers!" laughed Sho. "You just know a lot of garbage."

It was too bad he wasn't gonna talk; Sho would have liked to know if this was one of the ones he and Haine could hunt down for weapons. The idea of scrapping HK for fun and profit was highly appealing.

"Shouldn't that have been 'Sarcasm'?" pointed out the mathematician with a grimace. "Besides, I think you'd make a better pacifier than pacifist."

If Sho cared anything about small children, he might feel sorry for the kid that got a mouth-plugger made from HK, but he didn't so he didn't.

Day 46: Lunch

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