video - bathroom mirror; timed to Saturday morning

[entertainaplanb]

[Becky's been a little nervous about showing her face on the network thus far, but... what the hell, she's met enough people in person by this point. Besides, she's not really sure how to describe what she thinks is the latest result of one of those vertigo spells.

So she grabbed some old lipstick and wrote her network number on her bathroom mirror; pardon the London Underground shower curtain. Her hair's down, and she's wearing a purple t-shirt and jeans.]

Has anyone seen anything like this before?

[She holds up a gun... sort of. There's no obvious place to load bullets, and that cap thingy at the end certainly wouldn't let anything out. Not to mention all the dials on it.]

Very steampunky, to be sure, but this one's got me stumped.

Comments

[15minuteslate]

not outside of a steampunk collection, no

...is there even a trigger?

[entertainaplanb]

There is, I think. It's just hard to see how it--

[She manages to depress the trigger a little, not to full firing, but enough that the barrel lights up a bright blue-white. She lets go of the trigger almost immediately, looking more than a little alarmed.]

...works. Um. Okay. Whatever it does, it's very... bright. And I don't think I want to find out in my apartment.

[15minuteslate]

DUDE. you should definitely test it.

[entertainaplanb]

Not in here! Sure, it could just be a light show, but it might also burn my apartment down. Not to mention if it screws up getting my security deposit back.

[She takes a deep breath, and some of the reflexive panic ebbs away.] Well. Clearly it's time to comb that list of secluded areas a little more closely.

[15minuteslate]

well obviously not in THERE

but yeah find somewhere you can let that thing off

hm, none of the college locations would work. maybe try somewhere in the dead district? I hear that's pretty much empty these days. it's kinda dangerous though.

[entertainaplanb]

Dangerous how? I don't want to get stuck somewhere with no way to defend myself. [She eyes the gun-thing for a moment.] This... might do the trick, but I don't even know what it does yet, so I'd rather not rely on it.

[15minuteslate]

dangerous like lots of abandoned buildings and not a lot of police presence. a lot of homeless people used to live there, but thunder corp's been trying to get them to leave.

if you don't wanna be found, that's the place to go. and if you don't want to go alone, I'll come because ngl I'm pretty curious about that thing. probs best to buddy system this anyway, since if something goes wrong and you're hurt you're gonna want someone around who can go get help.

[by which Mamoru means, he wants to see the steampunk gun go off.]

[entertainaplanb]

It probably would be better not to go alone, if it's that bad. But if it's that empty, it's probably also the best place. [Oddly, she's not that worried about the lack of police presence, considering the whole thing about how the police are... maybe not so trustworthy. But the buddy system is probably the better part of valor.]

...No time like the present, if you're up for it.

[15minuteslate]

I'm free. where do you want to meet?

[entertainaplanb]

Is there a safe place to park outside there, or near the edge?

[15minuteslate]

yeah, there's a mall just east of it that's not too sketchy.

[entertainaplanb]

Meet you there in an hour?

text => action!

[15minuteslate]

you're on.

[Mamoru will be waiting for her in the parking lot outside the main entrance. He's got his harley parked in a parking spot like a decent human being, and is leaning on it as he texts to the network.]

I'm here when you are. I'm that guy texting next to a motorbike by the huge main entrance thing.

[entertainaplanb]

[If he misses seeing Becky driving in, she should be pretty obvious when she parks her car and gets out. She doesn't do texting and driving, secret numbers club or no; nothing's that important. But between the video and the brief text to the network... well.]

Headed for you.

[And so she is; after that, she puts her phone away and approaches.]

Thank you for doing this, really. I didn't want to impose, but if the safest place to test this thing isn't all that safe...

[15minuteslate]

No, it's okay, you're not imposing at all. I'm glad to help. And besides, it's nice to know that this numbers thing isn't all collapsed mines and falling out windows.

My name's Mamoru. Nice to meet you.

[He grins and extends a hand.]

[entertainaplanb]

Becky. You too. [She returns the handshake.]

I caught the video about the mine, but do I want to know where falling out windows comes into it?

[And then she looks around the parking lot and shrugs.] Following your lead here.

[15minuteslate]

It's -- it was the first unusual thing that happened to me.

[Mamoru shrugs. He won't elaborate further unless she asks.]

C'mon, this way.

[He takes off down one of the smaller side-streets, away from the mall.]

[entertainaplanb]

[She doesn't ask. She knows enough about how these things go to know that what triggers the vertigo doesn't always make sense, and that the result can be tame or... pretty disturbing, really.

Instead, she just follows his lead. This is a part of town she hasn't really seen before, and she can see why she hasn't heard much about it before now. It's making her glad she went with the buddy system.]

[15minuteslate]

[Mamoru leads her down the streets, which grow more dirty and decrepit by the minute. He turns off into an alley, one surrounded by windowless walls. He looks around a little nervously.]

How's this look?

[entertainaplanb]

This should be fine. I don't see this taking very long.

[She fishes the gun thing out of her purse - for lack of a better place to put it, she stuck it in there before she left her apartment.] Okay. Time to see what this thing does.

[15minuteslate]

[Mamoru's interested for sure, and it shows on his face, but it looks like a cool, detached interest.

This is a lie. He thinks that gun is rad as hell. So maybe he's not standing quite as far out of the way as he should. After all, it's a small alley.]

Fire away.

[entertainaplanb]

[Oh, Becky would be lying if she said she weren't a little excited. This is a pretty cool little thing, after all; she mostly didn't want to burn down her apartment or anything.]

Okay. [She takes aim at the far end of the alley - this can't be that different from what she remembers of firing a gun, right?]

[Wrong. There's a lot more kick when she fires than she was expecting, and she's so focused on trying to keep her balance that she only barely notices the shot going wide. And the bolt of lightning headed straight for Mamoru.]

[15minuteslate]

What the --?!

[It hits Mamoru squarely, causing him to yell and seize up in an extremely undignified way, before everything goes fuzzy and then blank.]

[entertainaplanb]

...Oh my God.

[Becky all but runs over to Mamoru, once she's fully regained her balance and sees that he's down for the count. She checks for a pulse first, and he's still got one; that's good, since she has no idea how she'd begin to explain this one.]

Oh my god I am so sorry I didn't know that would happen. [She'll probably say it all again when he wakes up. In any case, she starts fumbling for her phone on autopilot - until one of those damn vertigo things hits her, anyway. Just what she needed out here.]

[When it passes, she looks at the gun and sighs.] Fat lot of good it does for me to remember how to aim it now.

[15minuteslate]

"Ughhhh..." Mamoru groaned as he came back to consciousness, squinting into the light. He didn't feel up to sitting up just yet, but he did shade his eyes with a hand. "You...you shot me," he said, incredulous. "Oh my god, I was just shot with a friggin' steampunk gun and survived."

He's not sure whether this is horrible or really cool.

[entertainaplanb]

"I am so, so sorry. I had no idea it was going to do that. But apparently firing a Tesla isn't that much like firing a gun after all."

...She may not have realised she just gave the thing a name that she didn't have when they started this conversation.

[15minuteslate]

"It's ok. I think I'm fine. Thank god that thing's apparently meant to be nonlethal, right?"

He sits up, blearily shaking the fog from his head.

"I like the name you picked, though. It's a little cheesy but I can't say it isn't appropriate."

[entertainaplanb]

"Very good thing. This would have been incredibly awkward to explain."

And then Becky frowns. "What do you mean? I didn't give it a name."

[15minuteslate]

"Not to mention I'd be dead," Mamoru griped. "Or in the hospital. And yeah, you did. You just called it a Tesla."

[entertainaplanb]

"Well, that's what it is, I - oh, for the love of God."

Becky's just... gonna facepalm now. "Couldn't possibly have known that when I got the thing, could I. That would probably be too easy."