EVENT: SPACE PIRATES ▒ APRIL 20-21

[ataraxites]

CHARACTERS: Ensemble production!
LOCATION: Anywhere.
WARNINGS: Pirates, violence, etc.
SUMMARY: Brief encounters, finding ransacked/damaged areas, making your way to the oxygen gardens.
NOTES: Open to all!

The ship has been invaded by pirates. They're noisy on the network, but you haven't seen any, not in person. Though if you go far enough things start to make themselves apparent. Kitchens have been ransacked. Pieces of the walls are torn out, media libraries overturned. Maybe you should get your valuables together and find somewhere safe to hole up...

Comments

[testgasm]

The room itself is a wreck, with belongings strewn everywhere, papers of cruedly-written memos and maps posted to the wall.

Wheatley has just stepped out for a second, really. He can only carry so many things at once, and so he has to risk leaving one end of the portal open for short periods of time as he collects more of his belongings from the upper passenger deck and his and Topher's auxiliary lab.

So here he is, transporting the very delicate metal basketball that is his robot body, when he rounds the turn into the portal and sees someone standing in his room who is standing in his room oh god--

He shouts, stumbling backwards and jerking the portal device (and subsequently, the lifeless robot shell) upward in surprise--it takes him a moment of flailing and clutching his chest to realize who it is. His first instinct, of course, is Topher, but he's quick to correct himself when he observes the appropriate degree of shagginess.

"T--MARTY!?"

[foolproofed]

"Hey."

And then he waves elegantly like so--



Because clearly you're overreacting and he doesn't care. At all.

"Man, the shit that pops up around here when you're not paying attention." Smacks his lips a bit as he looks around. "Not a conventional way to travel rooms though, I think. Random people could come in and wreck their shit all up."

[testgasm]

Wheatley stands there, halfway in the portal, wide-eyed and trying his best to stave off a panic attack. He breathes deeply for a few long seconds, apparently working to get himself over the scare, reminding him that there isn't anything to be scared of because it's just that Marty guy. Must have accidentally wandered through the portal.

"I was just--I was out for a second--" he whines, which is true, but it doesn't change the fact that somoene's busted into his room.

"Anyway, I'm dropping this off," this, meaning the metal sphere with handles, which he hoists into his arms for emphasis and then places gently on the mattress before motioning back towards the portal entrance, "and closing up the portal, so you're going to have to come out here. Because. This is my room."

[foolproofed]

"--Your room. You just. Have random magic sci-fi holes in the walls to your room?" But then he notices what a ninny Wheatley is sounding like (maybe that's too harsh but seriously do you want cheese with your whine). He looks around, squints like he just found a Blue's Clue, and looks in the other man's direction. "... Having people in your room makes you that antsy, huh?"

But Wheatley

but but but

What's the sphere about?

He's not a dick, though. He moves toward the exit as he talks, because that's just how you're supposed to do. Polite and all that jazz.

[testgasm]

Having come down from his apparent panic attack, Wheatley is quick to usher Marty out of the room, poking his head in one last time as they leave.

"S'a good way to keep it locked from the inside without being stuck in there, yeah."

It doesn't quite occur to him that Marty doesn't understand what's going on, and as soon as he exits the portal, he goes for the edges of the metal sheeting that make of the wall--that particular panel seems to have pried away, slightly, perhaps with a blunt instrument like a crowbar, and as soon as he jerks the loosened fixture, the portal vanishes, revealing metal coated in what looks like white paint.

Move the portal surface, close the portal while leaving the one inside the room intact. It's pretty ingenious, Wheatley thinks, especially when he doesn't have access to any emancipation grills. Having successfully sealed off his room, he looks incredibly pleased with himself, hoisting the gun over his shoulder.

"See? All closed up."

[foolproofed]

"Well, cool, but what the fuck was that? You don't seem to be into magic, so I'm calling bullshit on that theory." He motions to the wall, brow furrowed with the aura of waaaat all over his face.

...

"And do you ever clean that poor place."

[testgasm]

Wheatley makes a half-skeptical, half-bemused face, the face of someone who's never even thought about cleaning his room, much less actually done it.

"Well, ah. I know where everything is, so I don't really--"

He trails off, realizing there's a more pressing question.

"Uh, portals. Quantum tunnels, you know."

Because that explains everything.

[foolproofed]

....

"Well shit, that explains----nothing at all!"

Surely that was the reply you were expecting.

"I'm half-assedly studying in electrical engineering, not in Quantum Leap here."

[testgasm]

He manages to look offended, furrowing his eyebrows and pulling his lips tight. It's another moment before his expression softens--he can't expect humans to understand his incredibly advanced science right away, and he hefts the portal device off his shoulder and into his arms, presenting it to Marty.

"See this? Aperture Science Handheld Portal device. I've got--I've got the one portal open in my room, right? So I just--"

And he pulls the trigger on the device, replacing the orange portal and instantly opening up the window to his room.

"--and there's the other door. Go in one end, come instantly out the other. Very simple."

[foolproofed]

"... So it's a gun that can transport you across solid matter."

This seems like shit straight out of a best-selling videogame.

"I guess it's a hell of a lot cool than getting some cardio workout and just walking into your room like a normal dude." ....... "If you shot someone with that, could you jump through their stomach and end up in the holodecks, or something random? Oooor is it a killswitch for anyone standing in front of it."

DOES IT WORK ON PEOPLE this is the most important question of all

[testgasm]

"It's...not a good idea to look directly into the operational end of the device," he says, shrugging as if that doesn't really mean much to him.

"Not to worry, though. Humans aren't very good portal conductors. And--and you can't put a portal on a moving surface." except for exactly one time in portal 2 and we still don't know why that is a thing

"S'why I could get rid of the one portal when I moved the metal sheet a little. If the surface moves, they don't stick."

[foolproofed]

"... Cool."

Not even just a bland 'cool', because it's really actually pretty cool.

"What if, like--you move the portal before you're done going through it? What then?"

[testgasm]

It takes Wheatley a moment to puzzle out what Marty means, but he raises both eyebrows in realization and then manages a slightly uncomfortable laugh.

"It'd just shove you out one side or the other."

Which is a relief, given the alternative he's picturing, and he's pretty sure something like that had happened during prototype testing.

"No--you won't be split in two, portals are perfectly safe."

Momentum, however, is very dangerous.

[foolproofed]

"I can't tell if that's a great thing, or a little disappointing." No, it's a good thing, but the image of someone stuck in a portal or dragging half a body around? Tooooo funny. "So why exactly are you so sold on these things, exactly? I mean, don't get me wrong, if I could I'd use that shit 24/7--but using it as a way to get in your room is a little much, isn't it?"

[testgasm]

"Well it's a good thing, isn't it? Much less messy, that way."

He grimaces, apparently picturing the specific type of mess something like that would make. Wheatley never did learn why you weren't supposed to look into the operational end of the device, after all.

"Lets me lock the room from the inside and not be stuck in it," Wheatley replies matter-of-factly, pulling back the metal sheeting of the wall just enough to get the portal to vanish. "I mean, I don't do it all the time, but, uh. Given the situation, I thought it might be...prudent."

1/2

[foolproofed]

"I don't think you have to worry too much about the pirates," he grumbles, leaning to inspect where the portal used to be, "One look at your room, they'll think their own fellas already plundered it."

And then he motions back behind him when he turns to face the fella.

"But hey--Portal pit falls? That'd be pretty swank. You ever get hostiles, you could shove a pirate into it like it's a swimming pool, have them pop right out into open space. Or something super morbid."

[foolproofed]

....

"I guess technically you'd have to make a portal on the outside of the ship, though."

[testgasm]

"No--"

His answer is immediate, and he looks as though Marty's just hit something of a button.

"No portals to space. Inadvisable. Everything just gets--gets sucked out there, it's messy. You're better off with one on the floor, one on the ceiling, and then moving the one on the floor after they've been falling for a while. Still messy, yeah, but less so. As far as property damage is--is concerned."

Marty definitely needs to know how to kill people with portals.

[foolproofed]

"All right, no space then. So we're killing people with gravity then--"

wait

He points thoughtfully and practically wrinkles his whole face at that.

"--You don't kill people with physics on a regular basis here, do you??"

[testgasm]

"What? No!"

Wheatley seems very appalled at the very thought, and clutches the device to his chest.

"Just...seen it happen, is all. Unpleasant."

[foolproofed]

"I'm just making sure! Just making sure. I'm a friend, totally harmless, please don't use physics to brutally kill me, is all." Not that he looks worried or he's inching away, he just—y'know. Likes to set the record straight on this sort of thing. Besides, you look like a possible villain. Glasses, ginger, vests and guns and killing people unawares. You just neeeever know. Like that Son of Sam guy, look at him.

[testgasm]

Real final boss material, this guy.

"Nobody--nobody's going to kill anyone, don't worry."

Unless the pirates showed up, maybe. "It's all fine. Everything's fine."

[foolproofed]

"Good to know."

Totally content, really. If you wanted to kill him, you'd have totally smashed him via portal by now, or something.

"Want some company? Unless you're wandering off into some danger zone. Then you're totally on your own regardless."