[IC] Worlds of Fire

[Totem]

Originally Posted by Ransom

As instructed, Codina sticks with the group, but on her way to the archives she greets the receptionist. "Hello, my name is Marilyn. I'm new here? Is there anything I can do to make your day brighter?"

[ooc] Diplomacy-21, applicable reaction mods +7. She's just trying to build some rapport and maybe catch a mention of any odd happenings.

"I wasn't aware that we had anyone new starting," the receptionist says with a somewhat tight smile. "I'm fine thank you."

The receptionist is polite, but uninformative; there is clearly something going on, probably relating to the Fundamentals and your apparent association with them. How exactly they have managed to get themselves in here in some kind of position of authority isn't clear, but it's unlikely that they've presumably sealed the building off without making themselves unpopular to some degree. On top of that Eight doesn't seem intent on slowing down; if pushed he will remind you that the reception has been under observation for a while now and the Verb isn't going to have been able to sneak through there.

[the_matrix_walker]

Alec wanders a bit, but keeping Eight in sight so as not to wander too far without their escort. While his scanners look for anomalies, he looks as well for anything strange visually. He checks through mundane data and glances his eyes about looking for strange dust patterns, air flow, unusual thermal or EM behavior and the like.

[ericthered]

Originally Posted by Totem

The receptionist is polite, but uninformative; there is clearly something going on, probably relating to the Fundamentals and your apparent association with them. How exactly they have managed to get themselves in here in some kind of position of authority isn't clear, but it's unlikely that they've presumably sealed the building off without making themselves unpopular to some degree. On top of that Eight doesn't seem intent on slowing down; if pushed he will remind you that the reception has been under observation for a while now and the Verb isn't going to have been able to sneak through there.

Ants. We're ants, and they're a probe that's following us. They know how to get the food source that we want, but need our help navigating the ant's nest ... And they've release phermones to make the other ants ignore the camera, and its extending to us. So what is it that an ant can help a probe do...

If they won't speak to us conventionally, I suppose I'll have to use other means.

Michael slides his mind into hers, and probes around:

"Who owns and pays for this place?"
"Who am I and what am I doing here?"
"What is stored in the archive?"
"What other locations would have information similar to this archive?"

[Totem]

[OOC: Okay, we seem to be hanging around in reception for a while.]

Originally Posted by the_matrix_walker

Alec wanders a bit, but keeping Eight in sight so as not to wander too far without their escort. While his scanners look for anomalies, he looks as well for anything strange visually. He checks through mundane data and glances his eyes about looking for strange dust patterns, air flow, unusual thermal or EM behaviour and the like.

[Alec: Battlesuit (Sensors) 14 (variable modifiers taken into account): 2+1+2 = 5 (success by 9)]

At present there is nothing that Alec can see that appears to be out of the ordinary.

Originally Posted by ericthered

Ants. We're ants, and they're a probe that's following us. They know how to get the food source that we want, but need our help navigating the ant's nest ... And they've release phermones to make the other ants ignore the camera, and its extending to us. So what is it that an ant can help a probe do...

If they won't speak to us conventionally, I suppose I'll have to use other means.

Michael slides his mind into hers, and probes around:

"Who owns and pays for this place?"
"Who am I and what am I doing here?"
"What is stored in the archive?"
"What other locations would have information similar to this archive?"

[Michael: Telereceive 17, -2 range = 15: 4+6+2 = 12 (success by 3)]
[Michael: Psychology 14: 6+3+5 = 14 (success barely)]
[Michael: Psychology 14: 3+2+1 = 6 (success by 8)]
[Michael: Psychology 14: 2+3+3 = 8 (success by 6)]
[Michael: Psychology 14: 1+6+2 = 9 (success by 5)]

Michael gets inside the receptionist's mind and manages to glean some information. The building is currently occupied by Creek Industrial, who specialise in inspection work; as the receptionist understands it they basically act as third party witnesses for testing of industrial work. She's unclear on precisely who you are all meant to be working for, but is certain that someone in the management has made it clear that you're not to be impeded. The archive holds paper records from all of the inspections that they've done, plus some internal records and the stationery stores. The only other place such records would be stored is in other offices or electronically.

[Ransom]

Originally Posted by Totem

[OOC: Okay, we seem to be hanging around in reception for a while.]

Taking this to mean that we have time for an actual conversation...

"I wasn't aware that we had anyone new starting," the receptionist says with a somewhat tight smile. "I'm fine thank you."

"Oh, I don't work here. We got called in because we heard there were some strange happenings going on here." Codina glances at the Fundamentals by the door and lowers her voice a bit. "I'm guessing that we share a desire to get those... things heading on their way as soon as possible."

[ooc] I've been forgetting to mention it, but anyone reading Codina's mind will need to beat her Mind Block skill of 15 to avoid getting a bewildering tangle of memories of events from her past, most of which never occurred.

[Totem]

Originally Posted by Ransom

Taking this to mean that we have time for an actual conversation...

Given that Eight is currently of the thought that as reception has been under observation for a while now the Verb can't have got in there, he nearly just stalked off and left everyone behind. I'm technically not roleplaying properly by leaving him standing in the background just glowering at you all.

Originally Posted by Ransom

"Oh, I don't work here. We got called in because we heard there were some strange happenings going on here." Codina glances at the Fundamentals by the door and lowers her voice a bit. "I'm guessing that we share a desire to get those... things heading on their way as soon as possible."

"Well, we haven't had any strange happenings around here," the receptionist assures you, clearly unsure about how to take the "things" reference when Codina is talking about her apparent colleagues. "I'll let you know if I see anything." Perhaps a bit weirded out by Codina's approach, she gets back to work, trying not to look put off.

[Michael: Psychology 14: 5+1+3 = 9 (success by 5)]

While Michael is still inside the receptionist's mind he picks up the trailing end of the answer to Codina's conversation: the receptionist is of the opinion that the only odd thing around here at the moment is the Fundamentals themselves and, by association, your group. While aware that she has to be polite, she isn't entirely happy with your presence.

[ericthered]

Michael turns to eight:

"Look, you asked us here to do work only humans can do. If you only have us do the things a fundamental would do, then we'd be missing the entire point of being here. Let us work -- this won't take long."

Michael looks for one other piece of info -- where this would be stored electronically, and who would be able to get it.

Michael lets the receptionist answer Codina.

"Eight, why did we choose this archive?"

[Ransom]

"Well, we haven't had any strange happenings around here," the receptionist assures you, clearly unsure about how to take the "things" reference when Codina is talking about her apparent colleagues. "I'll let you know if I see anything." Perhaps a bit weirded out by Codina's approach, she gets back to work, trying not to look put off.

"Appreciate it. Have a good day!"

To the others: "Nothing much to see here. Let's go look through these archives. Hopefully they'll be more interesting than the federal reserve records I used to audit."

[Totem]

Originally Posted by ericthered

Michael turns to eight:

"Look, you asked us here to do work only humans can do. If you only have us do the things a fundamental would do, then we'd be missing the entire point of being here. Let us work -- this won't take long."

Michael looks for one other piece of info -- where this would be stored electronically, and who would be able to get it.

Michael lets the receptionist answer Codina.

"Eight, why did we choose this archive?"

Eight doesn't appear to be convinced by Michael's comments and continues glowering. In response to Michael's question he looks exasperated. "This is the only archive in the building," he points out.

Originally Posted by Ransom

"Appreciate it. Have a good day!"

To the others: "Nothing much to see here. Let's go look through these archives. Hopefully they'll be more interesting than the federal reserve records I used to audit."

Moving onto the archives reveals stuff pretty much as previously indicated. With four people moving stuff around constantly it's a bit busy in there, especially since they are largely ignoring you and so will occasionally try to close the shelves up on you if you're not paying proper attention to them all. [Leo: Sense (Out of the ordinary) 13, -2 = 11: 2+6+1 = 9 (success by 2)] Leo looks around but can't immediately sense anything particularly special in the room. He keeps looking around just in case; he's never been somewhere like this before and whizzing the shelves back and forth is kind of fun.

[the_matrix_walker]

Alec continues his visual and electronic scans as they move about in the archive.