It was more the need to fill idle time that brought Ratchet down the hangers; it was one of the places he hadn't given much time to really getting a feel for yet. The countless different ships were intriguing in their diversity and the massive constructs that were apparently little more than armored shells were... well, those were kinda creepy. Like someone's bones just standing around. They even had faces...
He picked up on the music after a while, following the sound through the rows of ships to a cluster of what looked like combat frames. The dark ship docked in their midst stood out and not just because it seemed to currently be doubling as a stereo. He circled until he found the source, stopping in front of the airlock and taking in the scene inside; it looked messy. Arms crossed, he waited until the man inside removed the tool from his arm before saying anything.
"I was under the impression that operating on yourself was something you did when you weren't somewhere with a perfectly functional medical wing."
Dustin felt he was being watched. This might've seemed obvious, considering that his visitor was standing almost right in front of him, but his full attention was directed to the task at hand and his overall perception was, thus, badly stunted. It wasn't even until he'd removed the screw, transferred it to the large magnet with the rest of its liberated brethren, and shakily deposited the screwdriver upon the airlock floor that Dustin even registered that he had been directly addressed. With a few deep breaths to gather his nerves, the genius pried his eyes from his partially dismembered prosthetic and caught sight of the intruder.
He was a robot.
Other days and other encounters would see Dustin pondering how this creation worked, possibly plotting how to get a look inside its chassis (this sounds dirty but you know what I mean), because hell, sentient machinery that isn't a construct of the ship itself, how did that happen I wonder? But right now Dustin wasn't in the inquiring mood. As a matter of fact he wasn't in much of any mood
( ... )
Ratchet knew how this worked- even if he had been noticed, you don't say anything sudden to someone with a screwdriver stuck in their arm. That's just not playing fair. So he waited patiently, expression scrunching up when he got the curt answer, as expected as it should have been. Not that he blamed the human- most lifeforms got cranky when pain was involved and it almost certainly looked involved here.
"You're prying open your arm. I think that still counts," he shot back, moving up to the airlock to get a better view and resisting the knee-jerk reaction to just take over. "What are you trying to do? Aside from possibly finding a very creative way to pass out."
Dustin instinctively shifted in the opposite direction of the approaching sentient robot for obvious reasons. Ratchet had caught him in a very vulnerable position here, so needless to say that Dustin was acting with far more caution than he normally did, and with a hearty overlay of paranoia to keep him on alert.
"They wouldn't know where to start." He gave up on trying to ease off the covering and reached for a pair of needle-nose pliers, but hesitated, clearly unnerved about continuing with an audience. Instead he brought up his hand to swipe away the clumps of hair glued to his brow and affixed the robot with a level stare. "You wouldn't know where to start. So why are you still here?"
Dodging questions was never a skill Dustin became fluent in.
Yoshimi is looking for her (for lack of a better word) boyfriend...thing. She seems to spend a great deal of time doing this. In fact, it has come to represent a full third of her life on the meatship: One third is devoted to reading and lazing about, another third is split between fiddling around in Engineering and sparring in the Sensoriums, and the final third is spent either actively with Dustin or...looking for him. Or wondering where he is while being too lazy to go look for him
( ... )
She rolls her eyes, keeping distinctly out of his personal space as she watches--she knows that hovering would just be annoying at this point, and she knows not to mess with that tone of voice.
"I'll be quiet," she says, too busy cataloguing wires and junctures and loose components to arch a skeptical brow at him as she usually would. "I don't need you to walk me through it to figure out its mechanics." Which is fairly true, though, knowing him, he's come up with some brilliant, more efficient way of rigging some infinitesimal part of it that she won't understand by sight alone. She'll deal with it when the time comes.
Unfortunately, this vow of silence lasts only a few minutes. That's one of the downsides to her being as close to comfortable with him as she is--words come easily to her when she's relaxed, and even more easily when she's intent on something that isn't her own social anxiety.
Dustin tracked her across the airlock, pausing in his methodical cleaning to make sure he knew exactly where she was stopping to watch. This didn't bother him as much as it probably should; Dustin wasn't exactly worried about Yoshimi purposefully coming to sabotage his prosthetic or anything along those lines, he trusted her too much, knew her too well. It was more along the lines of her prodding him whilst manipulating very delicate wires, or stepping on some stray supplies that he hadn't gotten around to organizing yet.
There was also having Yoshimi asking him entirely too many questions while he was trying to work, but at least in that case Dustin could just ignore her. Which he did. Mostly.
Motoko's knuckles contained, like the rest of her, a high metal content. Therefore, they made a sharp sound when knocking against any hard surface, artificial, to the right ears. Knock knock, Dustin. Someone wants your attention.
Hello, Motoko. Have a very uncomfortable-looking genius in an airlock, who also currently happens to have an exposed bundle of wires propped out of his open prosthetic and is delicately freeing them with a modified box knife.
See him glaring at you through the open door like some sort of heavy-browed deer in the headlights.
Comments 37
He picked up on the music after a while, following the sound through the rows of ships to a cluster of what looked like combat frames. The dark ship docked in their midst stood out and not just because it seemed to currently be doubling as a stereo. He circled until he found the source, stopping in front of the airlock and taking in the scene inside; it looked messy. Arms crossed, he waited until the man inside removed the tool from his arm before saying anything.
"I was under the impression that operating on yourself was something you did when you weren't somewhere with a perfectly functional medical wing."
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He was a robot.
Other days and other encounters would see Dustin pondering how this creation worked, possibly plotting how to get a look inside its chassis (this sounds dirty but you know what I mean), because hell, sentient machinery that isn't a construct of the ship itself, how did that happen I wonder? But right now Dustin wasn't in the inquiring mood. As a matter of fact he wasn't in much of any mood ( ... )
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"You're prying open your arm. I think that still counts," he shot back, moving up to the airlock to get a better view and resisting the knee-jerk reaction to just take over. "What are you trying to do? Aside from possibly finding a very creative way to pass out."
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"They wouldn't know where to start." He gave up on trying to ease off the covering and reached for a pair of needle-nose pliers, but hesitated, clearly unnerved about continuing with an audience. Instead he brought up his hand to swipe away the clumps of hair glued to his brow and affixed the robot with a level stare. "You wouldn't know where to start. So why are you still here?"
Dodging questions was never a skill Dustin became fluent in.
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"I'll be quiet," she says, too busy cataloguing wires and junctures and loose components to arch a skeptical brow at him as she usually would. "I don't need you to walk me through it to figure out its mechanics." Which is fairly true, though, knowing him, he's come up with some brilliant, more efficient way of rigging some infinitesimal part of it that she won't understand by sight alone. She'll deal with it when the time comes.
Unfortunately, this vow of silence lasts only a few minutes. That's one of the downsides to her being as close to comfortable with him as she is--words come easily to her when she's relaxed, and even more easily when she's intent on something that isn't her own social anxiety.
"What exactly are you doing, anyway?"
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There was also having Yoshimi asking him entirely too many questions while he was trying to work, but at least in that case Dustin could just ignore her. Which he did. Mostly.
"Upgrades."
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See him glaring at you through the open door like some sort of heavy-browed deer in the headlights.
"I'm a little busy, Major."
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"I want to talk with you about your responsibilities aboard this ship."
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"What about them?"
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