2.24 Malcolm's Aside -H- Year Thirteen

Malcolm's dreams about his wife take on a new, somehow overly-polished and desperate tone in this newly terrifying place.

“Why are you sitting like that?”

“Do you not like it?”

“It's a bit confusing.”

“I've changed.”

“...I can see that.”

She gets down off the desk and walks over to him. “I'm very busy these days, but I was able to pencil you in for a few moments. What is it?”

In his dream, he had wanted to tell her about Emir, that the both of them had survived. But... it doesn't work. His mouth doesn't open and he can't speak for a while. He watches her.

He clears his throat, but it doesn't help to open his airways. Seeing her like this is somehow stifling. 

Finally he settles on saying what she might want to hear. “You look...”

“Intelligent?” She smirks.

“...a little too good.” he can admit.

She laughs and turns her back. “If that's all you wanted to tell me...”

“Don't be like that, you have a little time...” She lets him slide his arms around her shoulders in a warm embrace.

“What do you think you are doing?” Her reply is a bit cold. Her voice is businessy. She's not smiling anymore. But... he knows her.

“Making you look at me, making up for the moments we've missed.” With enough whispered words and a heartfelt confession... she is relaxing into his arms.

“Fine,” She says, leaning back on him now. Her voice sounds remarkably perfect, just how he remembers it. “I'll try to make some time to see you more. I can't be working all the time.”

“Thank you...” He whispers, going in for the kiss. In the dream he is much more confident than he could ever be with her in real life. That she gave in easily, should have clued him in that this wasn't a particularly good dream, yet he needs to hear that she misses him still, despite everything...

“...but sweetie, it's time for your shots.”

Of course it has to be a nightmare. He blacks out in the dream at the sight of a needle so close to his face and wakes up in a cold sweat.

It would be great if he could wake up from reality so quickly. Her beautiful face haunts him that week. Warm and cold, warm and cold.

Loki discovers that he was listed on applications for permits to build the research station out, as a partial investor, which he is able eventually to prove is not him. Circe is terribly obvious in her ire, and her efforts to entangle him for her revenge. She would give him liability for her project, but never any access to the potential revenue. As the place has been abandoned and he is the only named sim who can be found who is not in trouble with the law in any known city, the Council of Roaring Heights eventually will give it to him as long as the lower levels are demolished completely and after they have conducted exhaustive data gathering operations there. He fully complies with all of the city's requirements.

He has taken temporary custody of Jiraya as promised until his parentage can be proven to know who he belongs to, and there are biweekly social visits with the local adoption agency and interviews with the principle investigators as well. The city wants him to go home to his real parents, but there is an uproar about his adoption paperwork and it's legitimacy, being from Holy Cow Memorial back in Starlight. It's going to take time to place him, so his identity is kept quiet for the foreseeable future.

“If that's the way you're going to be, then I'm not going to give this to you!”

Malcolm has gone back to the days when he was mad with worry.

Jiraya was unable to be recovered in the move from Lab 02 to Lab 03. He's sure the boy was killed, because that's what is done here with the clones when they get to the end of their testing lives. He'd tried to run away when he was following Nervous, and they killed him for it. That's what he's afraid to say out loud. He's afraid he pushed the boy into a dangerous situation. If he had gotten to help, wouldn't this place have been raided, by now?

“It's fine, I'll take it.” He says instead. Trying to have a normal conversation.

Ceres tries to figure out what subject 901 wants, so they can form some kind of arrangement. She knows he wants to escape of course, but would it be too dangerous to let someone like him out as they make their exit? If he could be used to subdue Planchette or distract Circe, that would be ideal, however, and it would cover Atom and her trail to have more chaos when the day comes to leave for good.

She looks around first, making her attempt at subterfuge extremely obvious. She doesn't want to get in trouble herself, but staying collected in front of him right now is hard. He looks very... dejected, today. Not that she can blame him, after the way he's been treated most recently.  But she's not sure she knows how to be nice.

She hands him the mug. “How are you feeling?”

“Aren't you smart enough to figure that out?” He grumbles, after a pause.

“You're worried about number …I mean, Jiraya.”

The mug is still warm and it's comforting just to hold it for a few moments. Eventually he nods, not looking up.

“Let me tell you something good, then.” Ceres waits, and gets no immediate reaction. She continues, whispering in cautious delight, “Jiraya has been found by local law enforcement. It's only a matter of time before we can all get out of here.”

She is rewarded with wary eye contact, and his green eyes glance up to meet her face. It looks like she's excited about what she said. “Won't you get in trouble, too, if this place is finally exposed?”

She shakes her head. “That's just it, Atom and I have a plan to get out of here before that happens. He wants to leave everything and go somewhere unreachable. Now I know that Atom doesn't like you-”

“Do you think you're using strong enough language?”

“It's fine, he hates you then, so don't say anything or he'll target you or the kids or something. He's petty about things in a personal way.”

“But you trust him enough to go far away with him?” Malcolm suddenly feels an unfamiliar wisp of concern for her.

She inclines her head. “He hates Circe more than anything, and he is my brother, so it'll work out for us. What I'm telling you is, when the time comes that Atom and I are set to leave, I'll come and free you and some of the other subjects as fast as I can, to create chaos so that Circe cannot follow us and Planchette cannot stop us.”

He mulls this over for a moment, working his jaw. “Do you think... there's a good chance that Planchette will try to stop you?”

She nods. “He's a loyal idiot. He'd never betray my mother because he's in love with her and doesn't see her for what she is, a lunatic with a stone heart.”

Malcolm takes in a slow breath. Weighing the likelihood that Ceres could be lying. She's doesn't seem that way, she's always seemed like an 'end justifies the means' type.

She can see his hesitation. “I've lost a lot of sleep over this. Malcolm, you aren't like us, you're a good person. I can't leave you to the mercies of my mother any longer. There's no benefit, to begin with. Nobody's even buying the research. With Jiraya recovered, and the police here are known to be like bulldogs who never give up, there's not a chance the lab can continue. This place is our last hideout. Right now the best hope, is to leave Circe holding the bag and for you and some of the kids to get out before they get here so you're not caught up in it.”

“How do you plan to stop Planchette?”

She shakes her head. “It's not how, it's when.”

He frowns, trying to understand, but she straightens up abruptly when one of the sentinels goes by. She waits for it, then leans back over the bars. “Most of those things are broken and can't record properly anymore. To begin with, they only take grainy video, and not sound.” She taps the side of her head. “It's a form of psychological control, how they look. But... remember not to tell Atom about this.”

'I could get in trouble', she mouths at him silently, making the words as large as possible on her mouth.

“Thank you, Ceres.” He groans when he tastes the hot liquid. He hasn't had coffee in years. Judging by the guilty expression that's on her face, he can enjoy it thoroughly.

While they are not exactly friends, he gets along with her well enough. She has become disillusioned with working here, realizing that there are better places, above ground. But this is all she's known. Malcolm tries to be kind, despite all the years of abuse that she has helped to perpetrate. “Maybe we can help each other.” He says cautiously, meeting her gaze.

She smiles a little.

“Ceres- before you go-”

“Yes?”

“I think we can help each other. But I'm going to need a guarantee. Show me the path to the exit.”

She takes a step back and looks over her shoulder. The Ceres he knew would never agree to something like what he was asking. To his surprise, she nods and backs away, taking the empty coffee mug with her. “I'll come see you again.” She promises.

Nest has a modest office in the middle of the city.

“How do I look? Square enough?” The blond woman blinks slowly, trying to remember how they'd gotten themselves into this kind of mess. Meeting with the most well-known investigator in town seems well above her pay grade, but then again she's fairly sure they can leave the town quite easily if things were to get out of hand. The Director is obsessive over any mistake, and they cannot come back empty-handed today.

And I'm stuck here with this fool. “You look wonderful, dear.” Ceres enunciates, reminding him to play his part.

He takes her arm and leads her over to the office entrance. “Let us go, my love.”

They are led into a quiet and somehow serious feeling space by a secretary and asked to wait. So they do. The room is warm, compared to the underground spaces that they are used to working in, and it's quite impossible not to sweat a little bit in the humidity.

Mr. Elliot Nest sits down wordlessly and looks them over for a while. He does nothing to hide his displeasure at their meeting.

“Mister and Missus, Coloss, I've reviewed the documents you've provided. I suppose you are here to tell me more about why you've sent them.”

Ceres turns on the tears that she's been practicing so diligently. “We-well, it's a bit of a story, but our son, Jeremy has recently run away from home. We moved here a few years ago from Starlight Shores, he was having trouble in school, we- it didn't seem that serious in the beginning, but it must have been something he couldn't talk to us about and-” She stops mid-sentence and cries into her hands.

The young man gets to the chase, interrupting his wife. “So, when can we take him back?”

“What makes you think that the boy is somehow in police custody?” Nest replies cooly.

Atom shuts up, recognizing the error he made.

“Uh...” He can't say that it's because they witnessed the scene themselves on security cameras before they fled the second lab.

“It's true that our department is very capable, but missing persons, I wonder why you came to us? When my team and I chiefly investigate other matters, some would even say, less serious matters. The boy will be found I have no doubt, but if he's not committed tax fraud or run an underground Speakeasy then it's pretty safe to say that my team and I will never meet him.” The man continues.

Ceres regrets every word that Atom speaks after that. Predictably, he is unable to salvage the mission to retrieve their lost subject. Her need to get away from the Director and the whole of the operation grows more desperately every day. She elbows him to shut up a few times, and he can't- it's compulsory for him to try and control the outcome of every situation.

In another room, Everet has had the privilege to listen. Jiraya has told everything he could to the investigators, although there is a lot of fear of backlash so it's not everything that he may know. It may take a long time before the weight of his ordeal is known to world at large. There is no way he will go back to the couple or the things that he endured at their hands, and he may even be able to be reunited with his family again soon.

As important as the child's recovery will be, what's on Everet's mind the most right now is what the boy has been saying. There are many more people to rescue... and he claims that Malcolm, and even little Emir, are still alive.

Everet hates the fact that he is not allowed to tell the family of the boy's recovery yet. There is too much still at stake as they don't know where the base of all the operations was moved to. They've got to get to Circe, the Piper, to end things.

They will close in soon enough, assuming that insane woman doesn't retaliate after losing her base of operations and reveal herself more quickly. The department and even the independent Private Investigators like Everet, all must have the same story to send into the lab and to the ears of one prime suspect; Circe (formerly Beaker) Kirke. The child is being searched for, and has not been found or discovered by police, officially at least. If it is suspected that he and his story are recovered, then Ms Kirke's victims may suffer many worse things than they already have, only to disappear forever this time.

Waiting is the hardest part of Everet's job. If family was not so directly involved in this case, he would no doubt be moving on to another line of work by now.

The meeting didn't go as well as they had been expected to make it. Ceres doesn't want to ask, but her natural curiosity gets the better of her. “...what is that?”

“This is our way out, my darling.”

“You're basically my brother, so can you stop? The meeting is over anyways.”

“I am your brother, you know, genetically at least.” He corrects her. “And this, is Planchette's device. The one he is never without? Well, after the most recent purge we have an extra one, so this is mine now. It contains maps and travel plans, information about the place he comes from. It's not exactly another dimension like we thought.” He raises one blond eyebrow for emphasis. “Ceres, it's the Future. This is a technology that hasn't been invented yet in our time. ”

She mistakes his lack of drama for a lack of the subject matter being important. She just wants to get home and wash off her makeup that ran from all that fake crying. “Alright, can we get back to the lab first and you can tell me more about it after our shift tonight?”

Business continues fairly normally underground.

“And then you have to kick upward, sharply, with the flat of your foot, not the ball-” Planchette is going stir-crazy for real this time. Atom tries to focus, but all he can think is that the man's personality has shifted again. He seems very high-strung lately. Atom doesn't reply. “And I know what you're thinking, that's not true Jeet Kun Do, because of the kickboxing element, but it is- because it works and you can adapt it.”

Atom glances over his shoulder briefly, then back at his work. He's going to stab himself with that needle one of these times, and it's going to be hilarious. “mmHmm.” He mumbles, hoping he just keeps talking. Olivia, well, the eleventh one, fell asleep waiting for her exam to begin when Planchette wandered in off of shift hours and began talking excitedly. This gives Atom ample time to test and tune the wavelengths the device uses in proximity to Planchette. It used to be his, after all, so it responds to him.

The device is nearly calibrated. He should be able to leave soon. Thank you, dead man.

She shares the news with subject 901 as soon as she can. Atom is finally fully onboard. “We can get out.”

Malcolm pretends he didn't just hear that, but his heart kicks oddly and he has to focus on hand placement for a moment so he doesn't fall off the bar. “When?”

“Right before last meal, everyone will be distracted by shift change. I'll let you out after Atom heads to our evac point, and after I lock Circe in her office.”

“Planchette?”

“Easy. He eats first. I'm putting something in his food.”

He grunts with effort. “...how do I know I can trust you?”

She flashes back-

To the last evacuation.

To the things that she saw and felt during the last purge.

There are shudders in her breath for just a moment. “Because I can't be here anymore either.”

He watches her for a few moments, does some reps, and thinks about that. There was conviction in the tone of her voice. “Okay.” He says. “Then give me the key for Circe's office, I'll take care of her for you. You take care of Planchette, and bring Emir to me... or near the exit?”

“The exit.” She says quickly as the sentinel slides by. “It's the opposite way from where Atom and I are going. He'll be safe there. I'll unlock it.”

“Show me.”

“Yes. Yes I will. This plan is perfect.”

“I'll leave the keys you need on that shelf there to your left.”

Malcolm's eyes slide over the other items on the shelf that just seem to be out of his reach. “I can't leave Atom at our back, won't he try to do something to me, to ensure that Emir and I can't get away?”

She frowns a moment, “...maybe.”

“Not maybe. I'll need to protect us. Give me one free shot at him on the way out. I'll only take it if he's a threat.”

She mulls this over, thinks of all the years that Atom has spent torturing 901 in a thousand and a half unnecessary ways.

“You know what, sure. I'll pretend I didn't see anything. Just this once. As long as you don't try to follow Atom and I.”

Malcolm makes a disgusted face at her, but it's not like she can tell. “Got it.” He says.

“Great.”

Ceres wonders if everyone's going to come out alive this time. Is locking Circe up enough, or will she pursue them into the portal? Without the calibration device to direct it though, she should be powerless to follow. And Malcolm has agreed to wait to call the authorities until he and Emir have gotten away from the lab above ground. Local police should be able to rescue any remaining subjects before Planchette can wake up to purge them or Circe can free herself from her office.

“You have my word.” He says more formally, after alighting from the chin up bar.

Not long after, Atom announces to her that everything is in place.

Malcolm is ready to do his part, assuming Ceres doesn't screw anything up.

It's going to be all or nothing this time.

“Finally...”

It's time to leave the stigma of this place behind them all.

Ceres waits, like she promised, to see Malcolm open his door and go the other way. She follows Atom into the elevator and escapes, he will never see either of these people again.

Malcolm makes it a short sprint to Circe's office after retrieving the key from where she'd stashed it.

He trusts that everything went well downstairs...

Planchette passes out, merely asleep, as promised. He will wake up with a wicked headache and have good reason to run for his life. But this is not his story.

A few levels up, the real reason we are here has finally gotten the key right where he wants it.  

click

What a satisfying sound. The sound of it all coming together. He tries the door gently to ensure that it's not going to open. Circe is off in her own little world today, it takes her time to notice. There are a lot of loud sounds in this old and decrepit place.

He breathes a sigh of deep relief, so far, Ceres has been reliable. Circe is locked in.

It's dimly lit, but one can see all kinds of dark shadows in the well. Emir is too busy being scared to notice those things.

Ceres had told him to stay right here until his dad comes to get him. 'Not to move, at all', and she'd even hissed it at him as if it were important; 'Stay out of sight of my mother.'

...doesn't that mean that he can't let these things see him either? He tries not to panic, but feels it setting in as the sentinels roam on their predetermined tracks, sliding closer to his location.

His dad is there right before he starts backpedaling. Malcolm claps the boy lightly on his back. “Let's go, Emir.”

He watches his dad gain entry through the door...

...and realizes that he has no idea what happens next.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

People argue about how to teach Jeet Kun Do, as it can't be taught or it won't be pure. So it's a martial art that is more of a mindset, made to be adapted rather than codified. 

Vampire poses don't work well with Circe, she just makes them look sarcastic. 'Oh no, don't bite me....' 'not there'.... secretly she likes it, of course. I didn't find many of those poses useful. Ironically the one useful vampire pose early on in the story is the one where Malcolm's fist can grip the bars on the cell, that's from the Vampire Knight posepack... go figure.

I told him not to smile so much.

Once again I must thank the modding community for making fun poses and my silly storytelling antics possible. Ani's Savvier Seller was helpful this time, to show all the clipboard pictures, as the restock option borrows from uni application animations... Works great as a research type checklist.

ATS3 has some lab equipment, Sevirinka has others (The Chemical Laboratory and several accessory props, police gear, coffee clutter). Doors and windows are called Alcatraz, up on TSR (I used several other items by that creator, vents, a/c units etc). Textures and tanks and the metal gate double doors are from a great world called Woeford (highly recommended for any kind of post-apocalyptic stories). The NRAAS fan items are also online. Fight poses by Bangsain (a Korean site, use google translate). 

The above ground lab 'Research Station' is ripped entirely from Isla Paradiso in the Island Paradise EP. Some lady lives in it normally.

Kawaii dou made Planchette's outfit (based on the series Black Butler) and the blood splatter rug (thank you Becky for sharing) 

The entrance to the final lab... I staged too much. Game breaking staging, that's what you get here. But seriously, I was really happy to get some of these shots inside the abandoned well/ entry to the third (and final) lab. Clear floor panels are from ITF, and I had to fine tune a lot of lighting for shots to show up. I wish the result was more useful, but it made for a really otherworldly gameplay environment.

There are many photos that I was unable to use...

...some for very obvious reasons.

Next time, for a least a post, we will be back to our regularly scheduled programming! ;3