Folkmore IC Contact

[getscooperation]

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[getscooperation]

The scenario, live or not, engenders concern by its very nature. Most people don’t bother to try and take precautions against an assassination unless they’re concerned it’s going to become an issue. You didn’t do it wrong. There was simply a very slim chance of success, and that depended on the person you were asking, not on how well you said not to worry about it.

[ So yeah. Ask a sociopath and you probably would have been fine. Sociopaths are very limited tools; the Red Room avoided cultivating them. They wanted someone who’d be able to feel and do it anyway. At least, that’s what they’d wanted for her class before she dropped a building on their heads. ]

This person is from your world? Do you know if the vendetta is personal or professional?

[miniroth]

Most people don't take precautions against most things, I've found. I admit I never really thought about being attacked before, they were always a complimentary skill set to our own.

[SOLDIER too had no use for sociopaths. They couldn't pass the rigorous tests needed to be certain the process wouldn't turn them into literal bloodthirsty monsters.

Doing a terrible job of raising the children in their care, that's completely different.]

This one in particular is, yes. I believe it would be professional; I would at this point qualify as a lost asset, which would if it became an issue, make me a high priority target for retrieval or removal.

[getscooperation]

[ …how long has this kid been active? He can’t be much more than sixteen. Yelena had been active while still a child, but assassination and combat training were very different asks. Most child soldiers were given some training, but considered disposable by the bastards who ‘recruited’ them. This kid said he’d been in charge of his whole unit? What kind of a messed up… ]

Is that your opinion or was that relayed to you by your potential assassin? Because only a moron attempts to retrieve someone when there is no way to actually bring them anywhere else. If he’s stupid, your life is about to get a lot easier.

[ She does not actually think the assassin is stupid, but she wants Sephiroth to have to look at the actual evidence. ]

[miniroth]

If anyone could figure out how to violate the barriers between realities, it would be Shinra's scientists. We only believe Folkmore is inviolate because its capricious creator says it is.

I don't really consider that to be foolproof evidence.

[getscooperation]

Is the assassin also a scientist?

[miniroth]

I don't know how things are done on your world, but if you're attempting to imply that if he's not a scientist it can't be possible, I regret to inform you our scientists don't use themselves for those kinds of experiments. They find disposable people in case something goes wrong, like SOLDIER. Or Turks.

[getscooperation]

You have to know something exists to be able to work on the problem it presents.

Unless you think your scientists back home already know of the existence of Folkmore, there’s not a lot they can do.

What’s a Turk?

[miniroth]

There's many departments and many realms of study, I won't dismiss it as impossible. Especially as it wouldn't surprise me if I have a tracking device. All the others in my type as well.

If you were from Gaia, you'd be a Turk. It seems like a very similar profession.

[getscooperation]

[ At this point she’s not sure if he’s reaching out to this thought of being tracked and returned as a thing of hope, necessity, or just… conditioning. It’s hard when they train you to think they’re all-powerful to realize that their necks snap like everybody else’s.

(Incredibly satisfying, though, when that realization comes.)

So she doesn’t point out that tracking devices have a range. ]

A former Turk, perhaps.

Do you want to be returned to Gaia? If answering truthfully over the network makes you uncomfortable, you don’t have to answer.

[ She just wants him to think about it. ]

[miniroth]

[Surely they can cross entire realities.]

If it's true that time is paused here, which I have zero actual evidence of right now, then no. There's much I want to get done first so I'm better prepared.

However if it is NOT, then I've been derelict in my duties, and the team I'm assigned to keep alive may be getting into trouble. I should return if the opportunity arises, before someone gets eaten by a baloir.

[getscooperation]

[ …huh. Okay. ]

In that case, if his purpose is to return you, then your purposes are aligned. That should present you with little difficulty.

[ Or, you know, NOT, depending on if that actually is why he wants to kill you, which she very much doubts. ]

[miniroth]

That's a fairly sizeable "if", and why I wish to take precautions. Being shot isn't very pleasant, I'd like to avoid it.

If nothing else, it's not like it'll kill me for long. I'm sure sooner or later even a master assassin will get bored of trying to eliminate the same target over and over, and then we can have actual dialogue. Thank you for the suggestions.

[Nope, it's pure revenge and he hasn't really clued into that yet. You can't reason away revenge easily.]

[getscooperation]

…again, I hope you can see how statements like that are a reasonable cause for concern.

[ Natasha has already thought of over a dozen ways of dealing with someone who she wanted dead if they showed up here. The most pleasant of them involves a deep dark pit and spikes. She’s sure anyone else with similar training could come up with similar solutions. Sephiroth is not safe.

But she’s only met him via text. She’s seen the extent of his conditioning. She’s listened to the confidence with which he speaks of his own skills. She knows exactly how dangerous child soldiers can be, and the way he speaks of scientists makes her cautious. Natasha has seen too many unspeakable things to assume Earth holds the sole patent on them.

Still, he asks good questions. He’s a child. ]

Whatever other precautions you take, your best bet is still going to be finding out if he wants to kill you, why, and then working to see if you can eliminate that cause. Hopefully you’re right, and he will not engage in a futile exercise.

[miniroth]

[..Clearly his wording needs work, of all the things left out of his education, simple things like interacting with strangers really could have used more time. Another thing to try out at school, practice was obviously needed.]

I don't, but I'll try to remember it for the future. I'm sorry if it's alarming, I'm really quite okay.

The rest will have to wait and see. This "trial" currently going on is remarkably distracting.

[getscooperation]

[ She's starting to seriously doubt his definition of 'okay' is standard. ]

Would you like me to explain why it's concerning? It may involve asking personal questions.

What aspects of the Trial have been distracting?

[miniroth]

Yes. I'll answer what I can, if it's not too private.

Did you know a toy appears every time you eat a potato wedge?

[getscooperation]

It doesn't start out as too private, but it is personal: How old are you?

[ ...a toy? ]

No, I didn't. What kind of toys?

[miniroth]

Fourteen this past winter.

Keychains with cartoon dogs on them mostly, so far. And a knitted tiny truck. I'm trying for a stuffed animal so I can give it to a classmate.

[getscooperation]

[ OMG, he's trying for a stuffed animal so he can give it to a classmate. ]

How long have you served as a SOLDIER? How many combat missions?

I'll have to give it a shot. I like potato wedges.

[miniroth]

[Alluka really, really likes stuffed animals.]

All my life. I was raised by Shinra for this purpose, but my first solo deployment has only been right before I arrived here.

They're quite good. I don't recommend the icecream, as tasty as it is, it can make you say embarrassing things.

[getscooperation]

[ Cool, cool, cool, she's so furious. ]

What is Shinra?
Have you been active in the field before this deployment? If so, at what age?

What kind of embarrassing things? Random noises?

propaganda!!

[miniroth]

[It's perfectly normal!]

Shinra Electric Power Company is one of the major world powers to be had on Gaia, it began as its namesake and has since grown into a significant national presence, long before I was born. They still specialize in bringing modern tech to poorer regions of the globe, providing cheap energy, medical care, sanitation etc.

I have, but closely monitored and always with more experienced fighters, as is standard. I believe about ten? But don't take me wrong, it didn't happen often. Most of my education has been simulations.

No, it's more of a lack of a filter I suppose? Imagine you see a man with an absolutely terrible looking hat, and he asks you if you like his hat. You WILL tell him exactly what you think of that hat, whether or not you want to.

[getscooperation]

I see. This is done against the will of the people who live there, as you told me when we first met. That is why Shinra requires SOLDIERS.

How long has it been standard for Shinra to use children as soldiers - or SOLDIERS? Were you the only one being raised this way or were there others?

I am asking to establish context. I'll attempt to explain why shortly.

...I see. Yes, I think I will avoid the ice cream.

[miniroth]

It's not the most efficient way of doing things. But many cities and nations welcome Shinra as well. Some actively lobby for reactors in their area.

There are others, but not many. Until now, most SOLDIERs are pretty standard recruit from adults who apply and pass basic training and can get through more advanced training. But better results can be had if you don't wait until a combatant is twenty before you start their training, then there's years and years of bad habits that need to be undone first.

We do have a public security force roughly analogous to most nations' armies, based on some searching I did to try to compare.

???

1/2

[getscooperation]

[ 'But better results can be had if you don't wait until a combatant is twenty before you start their training, then there's years and years of bad habits that need to be undone first.'

Oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooh boy.

Oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooh boy.

Wow. Wow. This is bad. This is... really bad. And she can't even get to his world to light it on fire.

And he'd try to stop her if she did. Man, they got him good. Shit.

(She bets they told him he was unique. She bets they told him he never failed. She bets they made him feel so special even as they were torturing him -- his attitude toward doctors? toward scientists? advanced results? -- that he believes they are his home and that everything that's been done to him has been done for some... greater good. Fuck.) ]