8155/GIRL Belittled in Lab

GIRL Belittled in Lab
Date of Scene:	01 October 2021
Location:	Materials Laboratory - GIRL HQ - Bludhaven
Synopsis:	While working in a lab at GIRL HQ, Harper Row is plagued by doubts, fears and phantasm of her abusive father (the ever so 'friendly' touch of The Straw Man). In the heat of the the moment she concludes that something is influencing her so knocks herself out with her own stungun. Coming to unsure about her previous conclusion she gets back to work and develops improved stun bullets.
Cast of Characters:	Harper Row, Straw Man

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Harper Row has posed:
Friday, October 1st, 2021: Early Evening

On the Pym Technologies Campus there exists a multistory building upon which the letters G, I, R, and L are emblazoned in letters that rival those of the Hollywood(land) sign in Los Angeles, California. The letters stand for Genius In action Research Laboratories which the building is the official headquarters of.

Within the building, Harper Row (a newly recruited member of the research organization) is occupied with research in a materials laboratory. On the table are a few homemade electro-bullets, from the batch she made almost a month ago in her apartment. Non-lethal... yes. Electro-stunning... yes. Are they good enough... no.

Talking to herself, Harper asks, "Would it be possible to make it so that there's little to no evidence left after the bullet is used?" as she defines what she is hoping to do with this private research session she's initiating.

Straw Man has posed:
    "There'd certainly be a good sum of cash for a bullet that leaves no evidence," the voice behind her says. "Show up your old man, Get ahead in life. Get out of the gutter. "You'd prolly screw that up, too, nevermind."

    That slurred voice is not an unknown one. It's her own father. How did he get in here? A stained wife-beater t-shirt, greasy hair, and in his boxers, as if he was just watching TV. Behind her. There he is, in the flesh, sitting another research seat. Spinning lightly, a beer bottle dangling between two fingers. "Place is legit? How'd you bust in here, anyway?" he asks, as if she must certainly not belong here.

Harper Row has posed:
Harper starts at that voice. ("It can't be," she thinks, "He's in prison... isn't he still?") She turns and pushes herself back onto the counter seeing her father there.

Marcus Row. A small man, maybe an inch taller than his five-foot five-inch tall daugher. His relatively short hair is slicked back with a slimy grease more appropriate for the 1950s than the early 2020s. Stubble covers his cheeks and jaw, thicker as a not-quite-yet soul patch and mustache. His bare arms are covered in intricate tattoos from the back of his hands up to his shoulders.

"How did you get here?" Harper asks first but quickly says, "No... we'd've been notified if you were let out... or escaped. You can't be here." She frowns and says, "Definately not dressed likt that," which prompts her to simply yell at what she concludes must be an apparition, "Shut up! I'm already showing you up. And I belong here!"

Straw Man has posed:
    "I asked first, little lady," the slightly drunk voice returns. "You got everybody fooled that you belong here, inventin'..." he lazily looks at her work. "Invisible bullets or whatever. You're not here because of you. You're here because the Batman got you here. Didn't urnit." He holds the bottle up to his lips, taking a sip of the beer. "I mean, what're you gonna do with it anyway? Be criiime fighter? Rescue your sorry ass brother from whoever's gonna kick his ass this week?" He smirks. "Pitiful."

Harper Row has posed:
Harper starts to speak and then stops. ("Wait, would he have?" she asks herself before) She snorts, "Batman had nothing to do with this. My professional standing got me here."

She glares at the apparition and retorts to him, "My father... he wouldn't know about Batman and me," ("Just my brain playing tricks on me. Ignore it and it'll go away.")

Harper turns away from the apparition and puts a query into the GIRL system: <<Methods for producing foamed metal. Piezoelectricity from collapsing metal. Query: Potential combination for this.>> and sends the query to QUINN along with a request for text based response.

She's trying to focus on her work. There's nobody in the room with her after all.

Straw Man has posed:
    "Maybe not, but I do," the form of Marcus answers. He stands up from the chair, strolling casually over to lean on the back of the chair behind her. The feeling of the pressure that alter's the way the seat rests seems real enough, whoever this is. And the smell of beer is unmistakeable. "Looks really fancy," he says. "But don't pretend you just woke up one day and showed up here. You may not be talking to your real father," He releases the back of the chair and walks a few steps, sitting his filthy boxer clad butt on the table to face her. He examines the beer bottle, "As fine as his taste in drink might have been," he adds. He looks back at Harper. "But what I'm saying isn't a farce. Is it?"

Harper Row has posed:
A response comes back from QUINN showing a few processes for making foamed metal and a list of metals that exhibit piezoelectric qualities. Along with it comes a query from the quantum intelligence of her own, asking Harper if she can join her in the lab.

"No, you can't!" Harper replies outloud even though she has the voice recognition protocols turned off. Shaking her head at herself she types out a politer denial into the computer.

"Taste or not, he didn't have the head for drinking," Harper replies about her father to the aparition without looking at him. ("No! It!") "Yes, I'm doing good for the city. Both as a city employee and as a vigilante. Doing more for the Row name then y-... /he/ ever did."

Straw Man has posed:
    "Oh, there's a lofty goal. Doing more good than a deadbeat incompetant criminal," Marcus laughs. "Don't get too pie in the sky or anything." He watches the interaction on the terminal, as if he had every right to the information. "So you're a city employee and /criminal/," he says, replacing the word vigilante. "Because that's what that is, let's be honest, now. And that's fine for you, but being successful of your own merit. He points a few times with the hand holding the beer bottle. "That's too much, right? You gotta stay in the dirt. Can't get too away from 'the people'."

Harper Row has posed:
"Robin Hood was a criminal too," Harper says idly as she types another query into the system to ask QUINN if there are any existing fabricators that would help her make bullets out of foamed metal already in the GIRL or Pym Tech repositories.

"I know that it's not entirely legal but... costumed vigilantes have a tradition of being forgiven despite the letter of the law. Especially in Gotham," she's saying this more to herself than to the apparition. It's almost as if she is taking advantage of the situation now to psychoanalyze herself. She's confident in herself, despite nearly lifetime efforts of the real Marcus Row to try to tear her down.

"If you knew anything you'd know why we stay in the Narrows," she says acoustically to the apparition. Naturally there's a number of real reasons: it's what the siblings know, it keeps Cullen at the same school (even with the problems that occur there he'd prefer to stay there), and ... sudden changes can be problematic in many ways.

Straw Man has posed:
    "Keeping Cullen at the same school?" Marcus asks, did he hear that thought? "Who are you kidding?" He spins the chair to face him, putting both hands on the arms of it and leaning in face to face with Harper. "You have the ability to invent devices that could change the world, and you use it to fight petty crimes in the most forsaken of neighborhoods in the nation. You have a gift that could stop entire wars, that could revolutionize medicine, and could make you more money than this city sees in a decade, and that includes Bruce Wayne." His tone is aggressive. "Don't tell me you're that stupid as to simply stay in the shithole you grew up in because it's /comfortable/. We aren't talking about moving up in the world to Chinatown. We're talking about moving to the Pacific Palisades, girl." He stays close, his breath hot and angry, the tone still matching her father's.

Harper Row has posed:
"Nothing prevents me from doing what I'm doing and other things," Harper says defiantly.

Then the results come up on the computer screen. Nothing that precisely matches what she's looking for but... no, that'll do as a start. Especially when combined with this other thing. So... maybe this could be done, yes.

"The Pacific Palisades?" Harper asks incredulously and shakes her head. In seriousness she says, "Nope, never gonna happen," and then snarkily says, "Couldn't stand sunsets over the ocean. Just not right. Gotta have ocean sunrises you see," with a complete understanding that she's bullshitting this infuriating apparition. Harper's completely okay with this.

Straw Man has posed:
    "Defend, deflect. Dismiss. I'm just an imagination, right? I'm just a figment? A ghost perhaps?" He lets her turn the chair back to the screen. "But who are you really arguing with? Can you sate your own mind forever? You could be the next Stark, and instead you're content to sit in this lab, a lackey, someone else takes the glory. So read your code, report your findings to someone with more stones than you got. Someone who will use it to make their money. Someone who will be living the life you could live, if you were just willing to take a look at the big picture." He casually tosses the empty beer bottle across the room, and it shatters into a spattering of brown glass in the corner as he strolls toward the door. "But you know, nobody says you can't do both. Be the hero, save the Narrows, and get for you while you're at it. It's not me you gotta square with."

Harper Row has posed:
And there it is. She gets even stronger in her own self image.

"I am no lackey. And you're more than an apparition... but you're definately not my father."

And with that she leans down and reaches into her bag. When she sits back up she's brandishing a stun gun. Holding it at the ready and vaguely pointed in the direction of the image of her father, she says, "Lets call off what ever it is that you're doing here to me... or else. Cause I know how to use this." She waggles the stungun to clarify what it is she means by 'this.'

Straw Man has posed:
    Marcus stands by the door, and looks over his shoulder. He seems completely unconcerned. Slowly he turns back around. He doesn't rush, but slowly walks back to her, bare feet slapping on the lab floor with a cocky grin. "You think I'm your enemy," he says. "But I'm not. You think I'm...other." He stops in front of her. A snap of his head forward at her comes with a whisper. "I'm not. You can embrace me, fear me, glorify me, or villify me. But you can't ignore me. I only come to you with what I am given. I only come to you...with you."

Harper Row has posed:
Enemy. Strong word. Opponent, absolutely. Enemy, no not really.

Other, yes. Definately. Sure she has her doubts, but Harper wouldn't say these things to herself... would she?

Embrace? Never. Fear... maybe a bit. Villify... what ever this was did that to itself...

Harper's mind is full of thoughts about what ever it was that has afflicted her. But she has a solution. She wasn't threatening the image of her father with the stungun... no, she was preparing for something else entirely.

While she had been holding the gun in a two handed grip, Harper releases it with one hand and, pressing the tines to the wrist of the now free hand she pulls the trigger.

*ZAAAT*

The stungun does its intended job and Harper collapses to the floor as she looses consciousness.

Straw Man has posed:
    One would think that was the end, but the words linger in her sleep. Images of what she could achieve if she was to just try. Wealth, recognition, safety. But it's all just a dream perhaps. Maybe the whole conversation was. There's no broken bottle in the corner of the room, the second chair is still pushed in the way it was before the incident. It's like it never happened.

Harper Row has posed:
Harper doesn't remain unconscious for long. Maybe a minute... perhaps less.

When she comes to her first thought is that it was a dream but then... no, she's on the floor of the lab at GIRL so it wasn't a dream. And... ow, yes, there's a taser burn on her wrist. So, not a dream. Maybe someone on the train drugged her? Yeah, that's probably all it was. Right?

After she gets a coffee from the common area, Harper returns to the FabLab while drinking the steamy hot drink. Getting back to work, the blue haired engineer successfully develops a form of piezoelectric foam bullets that fully meet her needs (with the gauss launcher it'll be able to be fired without a problem and on impact it'll crunch into a flat disk and discharge into the target as if it were a miniature stungun with the same amount of charge as her stungun). A couple of more hours sees her devise an autofactory about the size of an old-timey desktop PC (you know, like the ones in the late 1990s!) into which metal scrap can be fed and foam piezoelectric bullets will be produced.