with_my_teacup | R37 - error, post hijacked

Look, I don't wanna alarm anyone, but we got some real unsavory characters on the network all of a sudden.

[Riddick toggles over to another feed, where someone is calling in from outside. A middle aged man, with gray threading through his hair, yellow eyes, and a face like he makes a professional career out of dismantling brick walls with it.]

Hello, all you mothers' sons! I bet you thought you'd seen the last of me.

[The stranger grins, which is even uglier than him not grinning, but it's a friendly kind of ugly-- some barge veterans will recognize Brachi Stildyne, though a few years older than last seen.]

[Back to Riddick]
...so yeah, I'ma just go to work.

[Spam, Kitchen and surrounding areas]
[And he does go to work, not expecting any voices on the network he much wants to hear-- he's been away for days, still feeling that unnatural fatigue but not so much it's keeping him in bed anymore. He just drifts in as if he wasn't gone, an hour early, looks at what's on the menu and starts work.]

[OOC: Specify spam, vidya, or Stildyne- responses from Stildyne will come from

umgekehrt. Warning, character in icons is uglier than he appears.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

From:

woulddieforthem

A do over? I think Johns screwed that pretty well for all of us.

They got out ok right, Jack and Imam? They were my responsibility, I told them I was going to get them out. But I don't remember.

From:

with_my_teacup

...they got out.

[switch to private.]
There's equipment here, real future tech. What if we could change the past. What if I came back quiet and Johns and me having a pissing match didn't make us late for sunset.

From:

woulddieforthem

Change the past? If that could be done why not change it further back? Wake us up before the ship got damaged, save everyone's lives?

I know you did things, but you didn't cause people to die out there. Johns would have killed me and Jack just to save his own ass.

What happened there wasn't your fault and we all would have died if you hadn't decided to help us.

From:

with_my_teacup

What happened ain't exactly acceptable in the long run.

If I pop you early, will you take care of Jack. She needs someone she can trust or her life ain't gonna go well.

From:

woulddieforthem

Nothing about that flight was acceptable.

I'd take care of everyone, Jack included. I made that mistake before, I won't again.

From:

with_my_teacup

I can work with that.

Don't worry about Johns, though. I'll play nice until he's out of your hair, and then I think I know what to do with him.

...and I don't mean homicide. But don't tell anyone that. My reputation, it'd suffer.

From:

woulddieforthem

You've changed.

[She'd seen him play people, she'd been lure in before but she'd also seen him start to be different. This was even more so and she had no idea how to process that.]

What the hell happened to you?

From:

with_my_teacup

[He's on the defensive-- he can't help it. He knows he's changed, and the impulse, the instinct, is to pretend he hasn't, that he's still the threat in the dark. People make mistakes when they're frightened. Safer, when they're frightened.

But he can't.]

I... had a while to think things over. [He lifts his chin defiantly.] I told you the technology here fucks with time.

From:

woulddieforthem

[She's seen enough to know, as bad as he is he isn't the worst thing out there. Maybe she's too idealistic or just naive, but she's not afraid of him, not anymore. What happens, happens.]

How long are we talking? Because I must have been out a damn long time.

From:

with_my_teacup

Between one thing and another it's been ten years since that planet. Give or take one or two in cryosleep and dealing with the local death cult.

[Five years in the UV system, freezing. Five years on Not Furya, sorting his brain out after what had happened to him on the barge. He'd lost track of time on the Basilica, marked his time there by assassination attempt, not by days and nights.

He just drops the number on her, flat, not reacting like it's strange, not trying to explain how it could be.]

From:

woulddieforthem

No way I have been out for ten years, cryo isn't even supposed to be done for that long involuntarily and I sure as hell didn't sign up for that.

And you don't look any older at all.

[Not entirely true, around the eyes he did, older, worn, tired maybe.]

Jesus.. I'm sorry. I was supposed to get us all off that rock and things were supposed to be better.

From:

with_my_teacup

You saved the Imam. The kid. You saved me.

What happened after that-- you couldn'ta seen coming. Now that I've seen it? I'ma give it a miss.

From:

woulddieforthem

At least I got that right.

Are you serious about being able to go back?

From:

with_my_teacup

Completely. I have to jump through some hoops, but it's possible.

From:

woulddieforthem

Then go back, knowing what you know now, and help me save those people, as many as we can. No burials, not fights, no wild goose chases. We get out and then jump ship as soon as you can,as far form where they know you as possible.

I may not trust you, depends on what Johns tells me and what I believe.

From:

with_my_teacup

I won't play coy about his addiction this time.

I'll pop you before the crash. Your captain, your copilot, don't have to die like they did.

As for Johns?

I'ma call his daddy about his little problem. Boss Johns can sort him out; one less merc on my tail.

From:

woulddieforthem

If I don't know you then, I didn't, I won't know I can trust you so you may have to make me understand.

But I know you a little now, and for what it's worth I do trust you.

From:

with_my_teacup

I know. Maybe I'll try straight talk instead of bullshit this time.

You'll be fine. You'll take care of the kid, keep her from getting to thinking my lifestyle looks like a good idea. I'll take care of myself.

I trust you. You're stronger than I gave you credit for, when I left you in the dark. You set me straight then. You'll keep shit together this time too.

[His jaw clenches. It wasn't like he was falling down on the job earlier, but nothing's going to stop him now.]

From:

woulddieforthem

You'd get a better response.

[She laughed, a bitter bark but there was a little humor left in it.]

Strong, right. More like I didn't have a choice, when your back is against the wall at least it gives you something good to push off from.

From:

with_my_teacup

I respected that about you. You didn't fold. You fought. Like there was an animal in you.

From:

woulddieforthem

People were depending on me. I did what I had to do to keep us alive; as many of us as I could.

From:

with_my_teacup

[The corner of his mouth pulls up in a humorless smirk.]

You coulda done a lot less. You weren't short on role models there.

From:

woulddieforthem

Yeah, and you could'a killed us all and taken off in the skiff yourself. We never know what we're going to do until we get pushed to it.

From:

with_my_teacup

Ain't that the truth.

I don't exactly have an ETA. Turning the clock back kinda depends on human factors. I can't tell you when it'll go down. Then again... you probably won't remember.