(Untitled)

[flotillaborn]

WHO: flotillaborn & iron_liver
WHERE: StarkTech
WHEN: Wednesday Afternoon
WARNINGS: None so far!
SUMMARY: Tony has promised Tali a tour of StarkTech, and possibly a job.
FORMAT: Prose to start! I'll match whatever, though.

Comments

[liverletdie]

Tali was directed to a waiting room, but the secretaries had barely looked up. They were very used to their employer's eccentricities, and generally, if someone asked for him, they didn't even have to call him, or e-mail him. Instead, they just filtered off his guest, and went back to answering phones.

That was likely because Tony Stark was one of those sorts that watched his front desk. Or rather, he had a passing interest in it, and whenever his name was called, his attention shifted right over to the front desk. Security cameras picked up on the video, and ten minutes later, he was finishing the last of his elevator ride to the first floor.

Dressed in his usual suit, the jacket slung casually over one shoulder while he approached her, he reached out with his free hand toward the young woman.

"Now what is such a beautiful young woman doing in my building?"

[flotillaborn]

She didn't want to put off a potential employer by being rude to them right off the bat, so she tried not to let him know that she was a but confused as to why he'd invited her to tour the building if he wasn't even going to remember her a few hours later. Instead, she reminded herself that it was a common human custom to shake hands and reached up to shake Tony's hand only slightly awkwardly. This whole 'having more than three fingers' thing was still a bit strange.

"Tali'Zorah vas Normandy. We spoke briefly on the communicators about the possibility of finding me a niche here at StarkTech." She hoped that she sounded confident in herself; she'd debated coming in her quarian form, but had decided against it.

[liverletdie]

Okay, trite flirtations were a no-go on this one. He filed that away, along with the name, and basic stats he was picking up. Height, approximate age, breathing rhythms. Pretty much anything he could pull together was going into mental storage.

"Indeed, I'm glad you arrived so fast. I've already got a few stops we can make. I hope you're up for a long walk. Why don't you follow me, and I'll take you into some of our labspaces," he offered.

Well, okay, he really was willing to give her a job, but he always like to figure out what made his workers tick. Flirting was simply the most expedient process when it came to the opposite sex. He held out a hand to guide her toward the elevator.

[flotillaborn]

Trite flirtations were also likely to go all but unnoticed with Tali -- one thing she lacks is much experience with the opposite sex. She'd prepared for the tour as if it was probably going to be an interview - reviewed how best to phrase her qualifications, made sure to review key successes that she'd had on her previous missions - that kind of thing.

"I didn't want to keep you waiting," she admitted. She'd also been eager to take a look at the facility after browsing over the information she'd found on the 'net.

"And I don't mind long walks. Do you have any questions for me so far?" She followed him toward the elevator, trying to keep her posture open rather than drawing her arms up to her chest like she might've liked to. She did remove her coat, though, draping it across one arm so that she wouldn't be too warm inside the building.

[liverletdie]

When they entered the elevator, he finally leaned against one of the bars, and answered. He didn't push any buttons, but it started moving on it's own anyway. "Actually, yes. Quite a few."

The filtered music started playing, but it was faint enough to have a conversation over. "I'm curious about the projects you've worked on before. I know you mentioned several different projects back home. Why don't you tell me about them?"

[flotillaborn]

Unfortunately for Tali, her most notable achievement as far as missions she'd been in charge of was Haestrom - and she wasn't sure whether she should be telling someone she was trying to impress about the time that everyone on her mission was killed except for her and the quarian who'd been assigned to protect her

[liverletdie]

"The youngest? How impressive," he mentioned, and a hand rose to touch his chin in thought. "What kind of drives did your ships have? I've done some work into it myself, but I'm interested in how far other people have managed to go with space-flight. Mine is not exactly marketable."

He smiles, and indicates for her to continue. Man this elevator is slow...

Which means it's purposefully going slow thanks to the jerk you're talking to Tali.

[flotillaborn]

"I should mention that I am from what is likely an alternate universe from this one first. The most recent ship I inhabited was equipped with a Tantalus-class drive core. The oversized engine allowed for increased FTL speeds and durations compared to vessels of similar size, in addition to superior sublight acceleration and maneuverability. It also allowed adequate power production for advanced stealth systems."

She pauses. "Does any of that sound familiar? Most long-distance space travel is done using a system called mass relays; it allows instantaneous travel over thousands of lightyears."

[liverletdie]

"Not a bit," he mentioned, before smiling down at her. The height difference was very apparent in a small elevator.

"That's alright though, we've had our own breakthroughs. I'm assuming FTL is Faster than Light travel? We've worked on it bit by bit, but you know how it is, making a better future has to start with investments here at home," and he paused as the elevator made a small ping.

Yes, he timed it perfectly. He gestured for her to step out of the elevator.

"Which is really what I'm interested in. Here we are on the first R&D level, where we're working on alternative energy solutions."

[flotillaborn]

How many times had he taken this elevator to know exactly how long it was going to take for them to get up to this floor? It made her wonder about just how many employees he gave this sort of speech to

[liverletdie]

"Nope, just the power," he said with a snerk. Then he looked at her, and stopped. Probably a bad idea to lay on the sarcasm. "No, we're actually working on a wide range of not only power sources, but also ways to use them. There are some that I personally have made that could work, but they're too easily weaponized to be viable to the general public," an admittance to that one. Repulsor tech was great but, as he said, it could be so easily converted to weaponry.

"That's what we're trying to do here, actually. I want to find something that will be clean and safe, as well as something that won't accidentally turn into a Chernobyl or 5-Mile Island," he explained, before noting toward a small group of researchers playing with Algae.

"Now, I'm more of a tech guy, but I'm always willing to invest in projects, if I think they'll move forward."

[flotillaborn]

That doesn't strike her as something that an 'industrialist with no scruples' would say, but perhaps Ghost is misinformed -- or Tony is trying to put on a good public face. From what she's been able to glean from Tony so far, the latter seems a tad more likely than the former.

Surprisingly, sarcasm was something Tali was actually used to. "For all I know you could've outsourced," she pointed out after a moment, finally giving in to her urge to cross her arms over her chest. "Too easily weaponized?" She raised an eyebrow. "Do you use it for personal consumption, then? Or is that also too high a risk, should the technology somehow fall into the wrong hands?" She was curious about what exactly he could've created that he deemed safe for himself, but not for others.

She assumed that what he meant by 'move forward' was 'produce money and useful results'.

[liverletdie]

"Oh, you haven't heard the news? I'm surprised you didn't look me up. Tony Stark, Iron Man. We're the same guy. I'm the one in the red and gold armor that flies around trying to protect people when I'm not in my garage, or here." He even smirks, and turns away from the algae project. "Personal consumption, though. Oh, that's right, I know where I've heard words like that. You've been talking to Ghost," he smiled. "You know he's tried to sabotage my company for years, right?"

"Anyway, yes, I use my repulsor technology to fly around in a big metal suit and make sure things don't explode around me. For years, it was the only thing keeping me alive, you know."

[flotillaborn]

"I didn't want to presume that your suit's power source was the one that you were talking about. I don't know that I would wear something I considered easily weaponized." She nodded at his words, managing a smirk when he mentioned Ghost.

"It isn't as if I was making my communication with him a secret -- and he left his encryption nice and open to you when we were speaking together, so he's not trying to keep it a secret either." She made a mental note to look into repulsor technology a little more regardless. "And no, I wasn't aware that he's been trying to sabotage you actively but I'm not surprised."

He'd been friendly to her, but he certainly erred on the side of paranoid as far as she was concerned. Still, he'd been willing to exchange technology with her fairly and that was something.

That perked her interest. "The suit itself wasn't keeping you alive, though - just the repulsor technology, correct?"

[liverletdie]

He snorted. "Please, Ghost couldn't encrpyt from me if he tried," his tone wasn't derisive, but simply confident. He knew who could hack in the city, and who could beat out his brain. It wasn't Ghost by a long shot.

"To answer your question, it was the tech and the suit, until I had it miniaturized a bit more. After that, though, it just didn't seem like it was something I should give up. People needed me, if only to keep some of the small rogue's gallery I had collected at bay."

[flotillaborn]

She wasn't going to touch that one with a ten-foot pole. "Regardless of whether he could or not, there were blatant markers that he was leaving it open on purpose." Perhaps she was betraying too much of her own technical skill, though -- she decided to fall back into what he was continuing to talk about.

So he did know what it was like to live in a suit, if not permanently then at least for a time. That was a bit of information to file away for later.

"Fortunate that miniaturization was an option." She cracked a small smile, though. For whatever anyone said about him being an ass, if he was willing to keep doing things because people needed him then he wasn't a terrible person.