[Surprisingly he's doing a good job at keeping the glitter off of himself, somehow. WILD. Probably because he's using it in very gentle tiny quantities, on this little tiny crane...
She can peer over his shoulder!! He glances up, grinning and wiggling the little crane a bit.]
I figured I'd make something to go along with those flower arrangements in our memorial hall! The flowers are nice, but it's still so sparse in there, you know? Come, come - join me!
[ ah, childhood. an experience dolls don't have, but still, there's something familiar about having to eke out a day to day existence, and more specifically, slumming it in the city...
which, coincidentally, is what he's going to get to experience, except the video linked has no fucking subs so i have to live like an animal and write my memshares out.
it's been several days since you've first come into this small, dilapidated city in the yellow zone, and the first time you've attracted this much attention from some of the more unsavory sorts to be found in a city where living is more of a matter of survival and not getting the attention of any predators than anything else. it's strange, though- you have no idea why they would be singling you out over any other hapless civilian who happened to be wandering the streets at this time.
well, you did ruin their criminal enterprise and black market trafficking slash smuggling ring (is it trafficking when they don't think of you as a person?), but they shouldn't have been able to trace that back to you. for all your bravado, though, you're basically unarmed, and they've brought quite an overkill amount of bodies to bear.
"boss! our backup from the west just showed up!" "hold three guys back to seal off the rear- the rest of you, with me!" ... really, isn't this a bit much just for dealing with a single doll? why such a disproportionate show of force?
"you goddamn doll! give us back our credits! if you obey quietly, we'll spare you after chopping off one of your hands!"
...what? "what the hell are you talking about, you scumbag? hands aren't even that valuable to you in the first place, are they?" they ignore you, of course. it's like talking to a brick wall, but... whatever the hell they're going on about, you didn't steal any of their credits.
"get her! we'll take our credits back and then sell her body for a good price! i'll treat whoever catches her to distilled water tonight!"
... this is a terrible ending, but you can't see how you're getting out of this. how miserable, that after everything, the last thing you'd have expected was to fall into the hands of a bunch of roadside thugs. haha, in the end, you can't even keep the simplest promise, can you?
which is when the sound of gunfire breaks out from a nearby alley. "--picking up a new enemy!" "fight back, fight back immediately! what the hell are you lot doing?!"
"hehe, too slow! did you ask the permission of UMP9 before making a move on my big sis?"
... wait, that's that doll you freed the other night. what is she doing here...? does she have any idea what she's gotten herself into- no, of course not. "reina?"
reina beams at you, idiot that she is. "it's not reina, it's UMP9! 45, i know i don't know what it is you're trying to do, but you haven't finished it yet, have you? let me give you a hand!" ]
[ anyway cool! glad we're doing this again. ... she's not going to be the first one to say something, because what do you say to someone after experiencing them being mauled by a dog. ]
Wow though that's also a lot?? THAT'S A LOT. Neat. He hates this life, he hates memshare week most of all. He didn't flash back to his own memory since he was busy experiencing Wild Doll Life instead, so he just. Sighs. Places a hand over his face for a second, and then turns to look at her again.]
--Guessing you just saw something too, hm? I saw a, ah - little sister of yours, I believe.
[ sometimes, a doll nearly get captured and sold off by the local crime ring. it's. fine, maybe. ]
... 9? She's the only one who'd ever refer to me as 'big sister'...
[ which would be the only reason anyone would, you know, think that whoever they saw was her little sister, but that only narrows down the pool of what he's seen by so much, since. 9 calls her 'big sis' a lot.
anyway, what she saw. right. well, hopefully the descriptor she's about to give is fairly specific (it'd kind of suck if it was a more commonplace occurrence). ]
A dog. You were young, and it attacked you while you were trying to eat.
I think so! You called her Reina... She showed up to give you a hand, since you were being accused of crimes you didn't commit.
[As opposed to the ones she apparently did?? He gets so little of the lingo he heard in that memory dear LORD.]
--Ah. [WELL, on the plus side, at least he doesn't seem bothered by it. On the other hand.] I was on the streets for a little while! The dogs weren't very kind, hah.
[UNLIKE BEFORE HE IS INDEED GOING TO ASK because wh. What does that MEAN.]
I'm not sure I understand? [??? His brow furrows and his head cants to the side, bird-like in his confused curiosity.] Does it have something to do with - the way they referred to you? As dolls?
[That sure is true though, huh? He only huffs out a somewhat dry little laugh in response. People are people are people... For better or for worse.]
Tangentially. More or less, we're beings who were created for the sake of humanity. Whether we're guardians, caretakers, bartenders, bodyguards, maids- it's illegal for us to not have a registered owner or master.
[ hmmm, how do you dumb these explanations down to a point a ye olde can understand... ]
Most of us don't get much in the way of autonomy, though usually it isn't quite under threat of death. But if you end up stuck with thugs like those, like she was, then it's just all the more unfortunate, I suppose. [ pause, a moment to think, then she taps at her temple. ] There was an order, at the back of her mind. If she'd ever disobeyed, she'd be forced to kill herself on the spot. They'd enslaved seventeen other Dolls this way, too, so I dismantled the connection, and destroyed the unsightly thing responsible.
It turns out that while doing that, I picked up a stray.
[WOW ALL OF THAT IS VERY BAD!! It's definitely a little hard for a ye olde to grasp properly, but she's a very good dumb-things-down-to-ye-olde-levels teacher. He certainly gets enough to be Offended on her behalf, in any case. There's a flash of something displeased in his expression, before he frowns.]
What a horrific thing to do... ["Beings created for the sake of humanity" means NOTHING TO HIM okay. Clearly 45 is a wholeass person in the same way the swords are wholeass people, though he also... understands now, that sometimes they don't have an easy time viewing themselves in that way.]
Hah - it's no wonder you picked up a stray, then! Of course they would want to help you out for the work you'd done for them.
Oh, no, don't give her so little credit. She tried to trick me into taking her place so she could free herself. It's just a shame that she both underestimated me and made the mistake of feeling guilty for trying to leave me in a trap I easily dispelled.
I mocked her thoroughly for not running then. Told her plainly that she was freed, owed me nothing, and that staying with me would only bring her trouble.
[ and like, considering that she basically hacks into a criminal enterprise's servers on a whim, not wrong, ]
[FEELING GUILTY FOR LEAVING HER IN A TRAP oh my god... She sounds like an interesting person though, whoever she is. And he's more curious about 45 now than before, even though he'd already been decently curious. He huffs out a little laugh.]
People like that tend not to care when they run into trouble anyway, I've found.
[Troublemakers flock together... Birds of a feather, right??]
Things turned out alright after that, I take it? If it was an old memory.
I made the mistake of telling her she reminded me of myself when I was younger, so she went and decided we were kin afterwards. Went to the effort of dressing like me, too...
[ thus, 'adoption...' she really did just pick up a wholeass stray for a twin sister. ]
[SHE'S NOT WRONG ON ANY COUNT HERE and he laughs a little, quietly amused. Maybe there's something about their wildass lives that just catches the attention of the Powers That Be... Thinking similarly:]
Hah! I'd say not a soul among us has managed to live a life they could call "boring" by any normal person's standards, true enough. [A little quirk of a grin.] To the point where I'm sure some of us wouldn't mind a boring life at all.
[Maybe, like. Two of them. The rest are all maniacs who love their insane rollercoaster lives.]
[Belph deserves a peaceful retirement but he just keeps getting the pain of survivor pool. Terrible.]
Just this and that. [NOTHIN MUCH.] I'm a cultivator, so I handle spirit-related matters! If you live like a ghost, then I suppose I live like a ghost hunter, haha.
[THEY ARE SO DUMB GOOD LORD but he just laughs and waves a hand.]
Hunting ghosts is only part of the job description! You're plenty safe, of course. I do communicate with them and solve their problems, too. Consider me something of a secretary for you!
["Ghost buster" and "ghost customer service" are like the two comparisons other people have drawn, terrible.]
[ just because she's stealth chaotic doesn't mean that she isn't ]
Oh, good, I could always do with another liaison or two. Communicating with people without a proxy involved gets to be a little difficult at times when you're not supposed to exist otherwise.
I said earlier that all of us are supposed to have masters and employers, didn't I? It's ... tied to our being in a way, connected to our identities.
[ it's directly tied into their network id codes, but lmao, ye oldes. ]
Being without one makes us illegal. We shouldn't exist, but we do. We don't have access to anything that requires network verification, and people don't necessarily go out of their way to harass an illegal doll just because she's illegal, but that's because they would have to care enough to do so in the first place. They're ignored because they have no one who has reason to care what does or doesn't happen to them.
[ they're the beggars and the strays, the unwanted and the dismissed. ]
In a way, all illegal dolls are ghosts. We're just what happens when you take that to its logical end.
[ something something taking advantage of not having any solid footprint in society. ]
[He'd also mentioned something once that grated at Wei Wuxian. Something about how it was routine procedure to just - reset a personality? Erase memories, when owners were switched?
Well - he's a ye olde, so of course he doesn't get the idea of owning a machine. Machines don't even exist where he comes from, and to him, the difference between say a toaster and 45 is stark.]
--But I suppose you can get things done that way that you'd have trouble getting done in any other situation, mm? And I guess groups like that exist in any world.
A squad shrouded in mystery. ▓▓▓▓▒ has met them once, and others can only guess at the members' identities from rumors. Members of the squad all have advanced AI and high capacity for independent operation. Rumor has it that Squad 404 usually deals with ░▓▒▓▓▓▒▓▓▒▒▒░░
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no subject
Date: 2020-06-30 01:48 am (UTC)She can peer over his shoulder!! He glances up, grinning and wiggling the little crane a bit.]
I figured I'd make something to go along with those flower arrangements in our memorial hall! The flowers are nice, but it's still so sparse in there, you know? Come, come - join me!
[But haha, life ain't easy. As soon as she sits down, she gets to experience childhood!]
no subject
Date: 2020-06-30 03:16 am (UTC)which, coincidentally, is what he's going to get to experience, except the video linked has no fucking subs so i have to live like an animal and write my memshares out.
it's been several days since you've first come into this small, dilapidated city in the yellow zone, and the first time you've attracted this much attention from some of the more unsavory sorts to be found in a city where living is more of a matter of survival and not getting the attention of any predators than anything else. it's strange, though- you have no idea why they would be singling you out over any other hapless civilian who happened to be wandering the streets at this time.
well, you did ruin their criminal enterprise and black market trafficking slash smuggling ring (is it trafficking when they don't think of you as a person?), but they shouldn't have been able to trace that back to you. for all your bravado, though, you're basically unarmed, and they've brought quite an overkill amount of bodies to bear.
"boss! our backup from the west just showed up!" "hold three guys back to seal off the rear- the rest of you, with me!"
... really, isn't this a bit much just for dealing with a single doll? why such a disproportionate show of force?
"you goddamn doll! give us back our credits! if you obey quietly, we'll spare you after chopping off one of your hands!"
...what? "what the hell are you talking about, you scumbag? hands aren't even that valuable to you in the first place, are they?" they ignore you, of course. it's like talking to a brick wall, but... whatever the hell they're going on about, you didn't steal any of their credits.
"get her! we'll take our credits back and then sell her body for a good price! i'll treat whoever catches her to distilled water tonight!"
... this is a terrible ending, but you can't see how you're getting out of this. how miserable, that after everything, the last thing you'd have expected was to fall into the hands of a bunch of roadside thugs. haha, in the end, you can't even keep the simplest promise, can you?
which is when the sound of gunfire breaks out from a nearby alley. "--picking up a new enemy!" "fight back, fight back immediately! what the hell are you lot doing?!"
"hehe, too slow! did you ask the permission of UMP9 before making a move on my big sis?"
... wait, that's that doll you freed the other night. what is she doing here...? does she have any idea what she's gotten herself into- no, of course not. "reina?"
reina beams at you, idiot that she is. "it's not reina, it's UMP9! 45, i know i don't know what it is you're trying to do, but you haven't finished it yet, have you? let me give you a hand!" ]
[ anyway cool! glad we're doing this again. ... she's not going to be the first one to say something, because what do you say to someone after experiencing them being mauled by a dog. ]
no subject
Date: 2020-06-30 05:13 am (UTC)Wow though that's also a lot?? THAT'S A LOT. Neat. He hates this life, he hates memshare week most of all. He didn't flash back to his own memory since he was busy experiencing Wild Doll Life instead, so he just. Sighs. Places a hand over his face for a second, and then turns to look at her again.]
--Guessing you just saw something too, hm? I saw a, ah - little sister of yours, I believe.
[And some. Other various things. Hm.
Sketch.]
no subject
Date: 2020-06-30 05:21 am (UTC)... 9? She's the only one who'd ever refer to me as 'big sister'...
[ which would be the only reason anyone would, you know, think that whoever they saw was her little sister, but that only narrows down the pool of what he's seen by so much, since. 9 calls her 'big sis' a lot.
anyway, what she saw. right. well, hopefully the descriptor she's about to give is fairly specific (it'd kind of suck if it was a more commonplace occurrence). ]
A dog. You were young, and it attacked you while you were trying to eat.
no subject
Date: 2020-06-30 08:36 am (UTC)I think so! You called her Reina... She showed up to give you a hand, since you were being accused of crimes you didn't commit.
[As opposed to the ones she apparently did?? He gets so little of the lingo he heard in that memory dear LORD.]
--Ah. [WELL, on the plus side, at least he doesn't seem bothered by it. On the other hand.] I was on the streets for a little while! The dogs weren't very kind, hah.
no subject
Date: 2020-06-30 03:59 pm (UTC)Oh. That's ... a fairly old memory. I'm almost surprised. In any case, she all but adopted herself into the position of being my sister.
[ funny thing, considering their strong physical resemblance? it's like they could be twins. ]
The streets aren't very kind to anyone, are they?
no subject
Date: 2020-06-30 11:16 pm (UTC)Is she not your sister? [He does not understand... the doll gun lore. But he does offer a little smile at that, a brief and dryly amused quirk.]
No, they don't seem to be. Strange, isn't it? The sort of things that stay the same from year to year or world to world.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-01 12:16 am (UTC)[ maybe ask, and he shall receive an explanation. it can't be that much more complicated than swords, right, ]
Well, I suppose society is made up of much the same people in the end. It's just the stage setting and dressings that change...
no subject
Date: 2020-07-01 02:35 am (UTC)I'm not sure I understand? [??? His brow furrows and his head cants to the side, bird-like in his confused curiosity.] Does it have something to do with - the way they referred to you? As dolls?
[That sure is true though, huh? He only huffs out a somewhat dry little laugh in response. People are people are people... For better or for worse.]
no subject
Date: 2020-07-01 02:44 am (UTC)[ hmmm, how do you dumb these explanations down to a point a ye olde can understand... ]
Most of us don't get much in the way of autonomy, though usually it isn't quite under threat of death. But if you end up stuck with thugs like those, like she was, then it's just all the more unfortunate, I suppose. [ pause, a moment to think, then she taps at her temple. ] There was an order, at the back of her mind. If she'd ever disobeyed, she'd be forced to kill herself on the spot. They'd enslaved seventeen other Dolls this way, too, so I dismantled the connection, and destroyed the unsightly thing responsible.
It turns out that while doing that, I picked up a stray.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-01 04:57 am (UTC)What a horrific thing to do... ["Beings created for the sake of humanity" means NOTHING TO HIM okay. Clearly 45 is a wholeass person in the same way the swords are wholeass people, though he also... understands now, that sometimes they don't have an easy time viewing themselves in that way.]
Hah - it's no wonder you picked up a stray, then! Of course they would want to help you out for the work you'd done for them.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-01 05:07 am (UTC)I mocked her thoroughly for not running then. Told her plainly that she was freed, owed me nothing, and that staying with me would only bring her trouble.
[ and like, considering that she basically hacks into a criminal enterprise's servers on a whim, not wrong, ]
But as you can see, that clearly didn't work.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-01 07:02 am (UTC)People like that tend not to care when they run into trouble anyway, I've found.
[Troublemakers flock together... Birds of a feather, right??]
Things turned out alright after that, I take it? If it was an old memory.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-02 02:00 am (UTC)[ thus, 'adoption...' she really did just pick up a wholeass stray for a twin sister. ]
But I suppose it's been fine, yes.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-02 04:20 am (UTC)Hah! How quick, how quick. What an impression you made! [To collect a duckling at the speed of light...]
"I suppose" doesn't make that sound too convincing, but I'm assuming you just live a very intense life in general, to be honest.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-02 03:13 pm (UTC)It's an interesting life you live when you live as a ghost, Wei Wuxian. I imagine yours hasn't exactly been boring either.
[ like, most people who end up in a murdergame don't exactly have normal lives, she's putting it out there. ]
no subject
Date: 2020-07-02 06:02 pm (UTC)Hah! I'd say not a soul among us has managed to live a life they could call "boring" by any normal person's standards, true enough. [A little quirk of a grin.] To the point where I'm sure some of us wouldn't mind a boring life at all.
[Maybe, like. Two of them. The rest are all maniacs who love their insane rollercoaster lives.]
no subject
Date: 2020-07-02 08:36 pm (UTC)[ maybe belph can go into real estate and snooze around all day??? the rest of them, on the other hand, ]
And just what do you spend your days doing, hmm?
no subject
Date: 2020-07-03 04:15 am (UTC)Just this and that. [NOTHIN MUCH.] I'm a cultivator, so I handle spirit-related matters! If you live like a ghost, then I suppose I live like a ghost hunter, haha.
[Kill him for this joke.]
no subject
Date: 2020-07-05 08:08 pm (UTC)[ she's still not 100% on what a cultivator is so learning via context clues sure is uh, something. ]
no subject
Date: 2020-07-06 01:24 am (UTC)Hunting ghosts is only part of the job description! You're plenty safe, of course. I do communicate with them and solve their problems, too. Consider me something of a secretary for you!
["Ghost buster" and "ghost customer service" are like the two comparisons other people have drawn, terrible.]
no subject
Date: 2020-07-07 04:15 am (UTC)Oh, good, I could always do with another liaison or two. Communicating with people without a proxy involved gets to be a little difficult at times when you're not supposed to exist otherwise.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-07 04:50 am (UTC)[Hehe medium jokes. ANYWAY--]
Why is it that you don't exist, if you don't mind my asking?
no subject
Date: 2020-07-08 12:16 am (UTC)[ it's directly tied into their network id codes, but lmao, ye oldes. ]
Being without one makes us illegal. We shouldn't exist, but we do. We don't have access to anything that requires network verification, and people don't necessarily go out of their way to harass an illegal doll just because she's illegal, but that's because they would have to care enough to do so in the first place. They're ignored because they have no one who has reason to care what does or doesn't happen to them.
[ they're the beggars and the strays, the unwanted and the dismissed. ]
In a way, all illegal dolls are ghosts. We're just what happens when you take that to its logical end.
[ something something taking advantage of not having any solid footprint in society. ]
no subject
Date: 2020-07-08 07:43 am (UTC)[He'd also mentioned something once that grated at Wei Wuxian. Something about how it was routine procedure to just - reset a personality? Erase memories, when owners were switched?
Well - he's a ye olde, so of course he doesn't get the idea of owning a machine. Machines don't even exist where he comes from, and to him, the difference between say a toaster and 45 is stark.]
--But I suppose you can get things done that way that you'd have trouble getting done in any other situation, mm? And I guess groups like that exist in any world.
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