2.14 - Voice

[breakingmyheart]

[Posted about two hours after Megamind's post.]

[Seconds before transmission, almost everything is reset. The lost areas and items reappear, the above-decks areas are restored in their entirety, and the 'space' and sunlight around the ship come back. Zero is returned to normal and anyone teleported down there is automatically released. Anyone who has had their powers or weapons temporarily removed will get them back. Auto-demoted Wardens regain their previous status and everything associated with it.

The loose panels are still around. For some reason, it's raining lightly on deck. A few random bits of furniture in the common rooms have changed colour.

The voice of the 'Admiral' comes from Toshiko's network signature, quiet and tired.]

I don't stand by everything I said, but I don't hold myself above any of it. Anyone who wants to call me a hypocrite, a coward, a sadist, a weakling…

[The feed shifts. Tosh's voice. Hi, Barge.]

I know. I just - I know.

I need…time. To end this without doing any more damage. Tomorrow I'm going to come out. I'm not - I'm not going to fight. I'm not going to defend myself in any way.

[There is a background interjection from Megamind: But I will!

Tosh is quiet for a moment, probably pulling a face at him.]

...Whatever's decided, I'll....go along with it.

Comments

[technophilic]

[ Satsuki has been watching events unfold from a safe haven. She has also been on suicide watch. Not that she would have helped anyway. And while she can understand the impulse, she rather likes the quiet option better. ]

I believe all of those terms apply in this circumstance.

Do you wish to die?

[ The response isn't emotional, just. Satsuki. ]

[breakingmyheart]

[Kinda.

But if she says yes, certain parties are going to take that as permission. If she says no, those very same parties are going to take that as justification. So silence seems like the better option here.]

[wecanavenge]

You bitch.

[breakingmyheart]

I know.

I know.

But at least you don't need to worry about having a bitch for a Warden.

[ Audio ]

[warisart]

You punished everyone.

Because you could.

[breakingmyheart]

[Not exactly. But the full explanation is something she can barely even grasp right now, never mind articulate, so she can't respond to this.]

[routemistress]

[Iris is tightlipped and furious, speaking in a clipped and careful voice.]

As long as you're detaching from the barge, as long as you're putting right what you messed up, I'll be one of them standing between you and anyone trying to 'urt you.

Not because I agree with anything you said, not because I'd be sorry to see you 'urt; right now I honestly wouldn't. It's still me job to prevent 'arm on this boat, though.

[breakingmyheart]

Thank you.

[For being reasonable more than for agreeing to defend her.]

[Private]

[wedonot]

[It takes Charles a long time to respond. He wants to scream at her, wants to ask if she realized what she was doing to people, that nothing she did did anything but hurt people, that apologizing doesn't change anything, but he swallows it. He's spent two miserable hours remembering the four worst days of his life, and all he really wants to do is lock himself in his room and not say anything to anyone. But he can't pretend this didn't happen, that they'd tried to stop Rex from blowing up the goddamn engine room, with her in it, and this still happened.]

Whatever else happens, [And his voice is tight and controlled, almost like his throat's constricted and it's taking him an effort to form each word.] I hope you're unpairing yourself from Erik.

[The "you should know what your new policies, you did and what it did to him" goes unstated, but is still heavily implied. B(]

[Private]

[breakingmyheart]

That won't be a problem.

[dalekemperor]

Are you... interfaced with the ship? Does anyone there... know how to remove you without... damaging the system?

[breakingmyheart]

I do.

[Or at least she can work it out.]

[an_abomination]

[Covers his mouth, in part out of shock, and in part out of wanting to resist the urge to yell and scream. While he had suspect it was someone on the Barge, knowing it's a Warden is still a shock.]

Without doing any more damage? [Drags a breath in through his teeth.] Is the Barge stable?

[breakingmyheart]

I think so, but I don't know what'll happen when I...disengage. That's why I need time.

[Video]

[mistconduct]

Dead girl walking.

[private]

[megamind]

Shut up.

Not one word, Chris. Not one miserable word. This is hard enough.

[mightymorbid]

Good.

[with_my_teacup]

No.

[Private]

[most_feared]

Tosh, I need you to listen to me. If you can remotely control anything the ship is doing if there is a bit of you conciously doing this, then make a panel near the engine room that has a safe path almost to it. Almost.

Because these people need distracting before they go after you directly or worse, go after my inmate and hold him hostage to get to you! If you got a grain of you in there, try for me. I'm going to have someone lead them that way.

[Private]

[breakingmyheart]

[Fuck.]

Kay, I don't know how the loose panels even happened. A lot of things that happened weren't my decision, exactly, I - I don't know if I have the control for 'almost'.

[As much as she knows he has a point and that it's a good idea, if she accidentally does let them into the engine room? That's worse than Kay's current worst-case scenario.]

[Private]

[itstopped]

[Even though Felix has been insinuating himself into every group that's trying to depose her -- even though he's been trying to configure Barbara's laptop into something that could oust her -- he's not actually that upset compared to the others. Oh, this has been unpleasant, but a prison is a prison and the part he's most angry about has been true from day one.

Which is what prompts him to ask, entirely calmly:]

Are you still in control of the ship right now?

[Private]

[breakingmyheart]

Not really.

Most of it's...gone.

[deadliestviper]

Hello, Toshiko.

I understand you're extremely fond of watching inmates suffer. Because you're so special, [her voice is so poisonous a taipan would drop dead from the toxicity] as we all know after seeing you selfishly torture everyone on board, children included, I volunteer to indulge that morbid little fascination for you.

If you ever see me on board this ship, cherish the sight as it will be your last. Considering you can't see the forest for the trees I doubt you'll miss your eyes, and no doubt the Barge will be relieved to see you lose that lying tongue. Since you apparently are incapable of producing worthwhile handiwork, you surely won't need your arms either. Your legs? Well, you're not going anywhere for a long, long time, sister. And as for that sad, warped little brain of yours, I think it'd look beautiful adorning a crowbar. It'll do a lot more good there and on the walls than it ever could in your thick skull.

Of course, that's just one possibility. And you know, Toshiko, we can go over every possibility in painstaking detail.

And if you turn a capable warden on to me? Throw me in Zero for threatening a child-torturing piece of self-righteous shit, that's fine. Because I know everyone on board with a shred of sensibility is crying out for your blood, you stupid, worthless, holier-than-thou corrupted cunt.

How many times do you think you can die?

[ Private ]

[warisart]

[Ben's voice is tight and sharp when he hisses her name over the feed.]

Beatrix. What... Stop!

[with_my_teacup]

Go fuck yourself, Sato. You ain't a martyr here and you aren't going to die on my watch.

[breakingmyheart]

[No response - really, what would she say? - but as much as she doesn't want anyone putting themselves at risk on her behalf, for any reason? This is one of her favourite sentiments, right here.]

[ Private + Megamind ]

[surfaceshine]

[Dean's pissed. He's beyond pissed. And he's absolutely a proponent of an eye for an eye, and there's a lot of weight on Tosh's side of the scale.

However.]

I know you don't agree - [Okay, yeah, he's still pissed.] - but I'm still here to do a job and I still don't want people just randomly murdering other people or being murdered because they made stupid, shitty decisions. You get into a tight spot, I'm not on the lynch side.

[ Private to Dean ]

[megamind]

...thanks.

Soon as we can get her unhooked I'll explain everything I can-- including why she wasn't in control for... a great deal of this nonsense.

Later.

[ After the mob's passed. ]

[Private, text -- to the Admiral]

[omaera]

[Since Anya shoved her out a window, Junko has been profoundly deaf. Which is a shame, because she would have loved to hear the words the bear was right. That also means that she doesn't quite have the gist of what's going on here now. She sees the ship goes back to normal and sighs, shooting a line to what she's still thinking of as the Admiral.]

Oh My God! Giving up so soon???

[Private, text -- only the Admiral on an extreme technicality, sorry Junko]

[breakingmyheart]

It feels like it's already been too long.

[Thank God you're using text so she doesn't have to contend with your freaky Doreamon voice.]

voice;

[supersonic]

[ Pietro was, quite honestly, ready to bestow a swift knife in the back upon whoever was responsible for locking his sister in a cell and subjecting her to twelve hours of torture. But something about the way she says that — I'm not going to fight — cuts right through him. (Hasn't he been there, in Megamind's shoes, defending someone who had decided not to defend herself, because her life mattered more to him that all the people she could possibly harm?) Even that thought doesn't negate his anger entirely — she isn't Wanda, and she hurt Anya — but the rage in his voice is cold, restrained for once. ]

Why did you do it?

voice; private

[breakingmyheart]

[After a long pause:]

You're the only person who's asked me that instead of telling me.

[Unfortunately she doesn't have much of an answer yet, at least not one that doesn't sound absolutely horrible to her own ears.]

[can_has_vodka]

[Arkady is sitting in the dark, barely her outline visible. Her voice when she speaks is shaky, full of tears, and absolutely livid-sounding.]

You...deliberately tormented, hurt, and imprisoned everyone here. You mocked us all while you did it. You demoted or caused the demotion of a lot of good people out of your own sick, skewed judgment of them. You blinded people. You caused people to be cast into the space between worlds, maybe forever, including two who went willingly just to get away from you. We may never get them back, Sato.

[She labors to catch her breath for several seconds.]

You took away almost everything we had to stave off despair, everything we and the Admiral had built to make this place more livable. Because you were in despair, and you wanted everyone to be as miserable as you have made yourself..

This whole time, if you were so unhappy, you could have just left. But I suppose that wasn't dramatic and attention-getting enough for you. Instead, you chose to punish every one of us because the Barge is so imperfect, including those of us who work our arses off to make it better!

You took away the pub I worked so hard on with Faith and the others, and when a great lot of us got together to rebuild it, you took it away again. Out of spite. And then you want to go on and claim that we deserve it. You couldn't be any more full of shite if you were an elephant in need of an enema.

And now you're putting on a show of being contrite. Except that it's a bloody sham, especially compared to the month you just put us all through! I know you enjoyed it. You were gloating while you hurt us. I don't care how you or your paramour try to justify it, you're poison. I never want to see you or your defenders around me, my Inmate or especially my Pub, again.

[breakingmyheart]

[There's no response to this because, really, it seems like there's nothing she can say that would dissuade Arkady from the explanation she's decided on. It feels like even acknowledging it would just piss her off more.

It's more or less what she wanted everyone to take away from this, anyway.]

[impure_tale]

[sardonic in tone] Well, so long as you don't "stand by everything you said."

[breakingmyheart]

[There's really nothing to say to this. It's not as if she's trying to excuse herself, so a 'so long as' doesn't seem like something she can respond to.]

[requiresssacrifice]

I can't wait for somebody to kill you for this.

But that won't happen, will it? Because you'll just be coddled and defended like the last warden who pulled something like this.

[breakingmyheart]

I'm not a Warden any more.

And I don't want to be defended. I'm not asking to be. If anyone else does, it's their choice.

video

[looksfine]

[For the moment, Aya is still without sight. Which means the only actual indications as to how she is feeling at the moment come not from her eerily impassive expression and dead eyes--a result of having been sucked out of a faulty window panel into the cold (not that she could feel it) abyss--but from the equally cold tone her voice has taken to.]

Fix it.

Voice

[breakingmyheart]

I am.

I'm doing everything I can.

[bodilesswarrior]

[There's nothing in her expression; no rage and no sympathy. Her voice is cold.]

Tell me why we should trust you.

[spam]

[routemistress]

[Iris is among the people ranged outside the engine room, and she can feel the change; the fog that was blocking her mind has lifted, and her bus has materialised joyously on the deck again. She comes up beside Barbara, visibly sagging with the relief of it, and lays her hand on Barbara's arm. It's all there; the butterfly-wing surface of Barbara's presence, the obscured promise of deeper layers Iris never tries to touch. She speaks quietly, for Barbara alone.]

...I don't either, but we are back where we should be.

[darknessb4me]

[Arthas just tuts, disappointed.]

After all of this, it's just you?

[breakingmyheart]

Just me.

[yeahscience]

Some apology. [And she doesn't even have to worry about answering because he's hanging up before she can.]

[silvestris]

Oh, please. You lie like a fifty-cent whore, honey. 'I'll accept whatever you decide--oh, wait, I have a hundred guards to make sure no one can carry it out.'

Besides, what I want to do to you, you would never submit to. No one would. So stay in there, safe as houses, where none of us gets what we want except the wardens. Business as usual, right?

[breakingmyheart]

[Accepting a majority decision that hasn't been made yet isn't quite the same as accepting being tortured and/or lynched by a minority - but still, you'd honestly be surprised, Selina.

She didn't ask for anyone to protect her, and she's not happy that it's a choice they made. But she's completely fine with people making their own assumptions and running with them, because nobody's going to believe anything she says to contradict them anyway.]

private; /and throws the more rational character too, what the hey

[ukan]

[Lark first checked up on his own 'people', the ones he doesn't want to lose. He doesn't particularly care what has happened to the others.

All except for one woman, that is. His concern and curiosity for her aren't friendly, necessarily, but they are genuine.]

Toshiko, is it? [Yeah he's not sure he's saying that right :T ]

Are you all right?

private

[breakingmyheart]

[Unfortunately, she doesn't really know Lark, and at this point she expects that pretty much any answer in even the ballpark of honesty is just going to invite a torrent of much-deserved abusive sarcasm.

Maybe it will anyway, just by accepting the implication that anyone cares.]

I'm fine.

[Lying and bracing herself it is, then.]