9523/An Awkward Meeting

An Awkward Meeting
Date of Scene:	08 January 2022
Location:	Penthouse - Kord Co
Synopsis:	The back engineering of a cyborg!
Cast of Characters:	Ted Kord, Carin Taylor

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Ted Kord has posed:
Ted Kord looks at himself in the mirror. He has donned his Blue Beetle costume for the first time in months, minus the hood and mask. He is sporting a beard and long hair gathered in a man bun currently. He looks over at drone 01, waiting with clippers.

"I dunno now. I think the beard makes me look kinda dashing. I wonder how it'll work when I turn my helmet on..." 'Helmet on,' happens to be a voice command. The costume is far more sophisticated than it looks. Before he realized his mistake the hood slithers up over his head and the face mask deploys... with several inches of beard sticking out.

"Eyaaaaaahhhh! Helmet off! Helmet off! Fuuuuu..."

Carin Taylor has posed:
    Meanwhile...

    Downstairs, a girl slips in, her shoulders a bit hunched, dressed in a Chicago Bears hoodie, in blue, with a baseball cap that reads 'I <3 NYC' on the front. Her hood is pulled up, letting only a few wisps of coppery red hair fall loose, her pale skin pure alabastar, or albino, it's hard to tell. Her eyes suggest otherwise, being green rather than red or pink. She has a small duffel slung over one shoulder, dressed in canvas sneakers and ripped jeans. She approaches the main elevator, then takes out a key card, a bit uncertainly sliding it into place for the elevator to beep at her, then open as she looks around, a bit wideyed. Snazy!

    And then she's riding the elevator up, and the doors open as she approachs the front door. Because Booster surely told this Ted guy she was coming, right? Right? Right.

    So she slides the card into the slot again, stepping inside, then stops and stares at the man yelling about getting a helmet off, his beard sticking out all over. And freezes in place, letting the door close behind her with an audible click!

Ted Kord has posed:
Ted Kord notes the new arrival, as the face mask retracts. His histrionics immediately stop. He adopts amore defensive stance, hand falling on the oversized handgun worn on his slim waist.

Well, okay... despite her unusual appearance, she obviously has been given a key. She doesn't seem bent on attacking him. That has happened far too often in his own digs lately. He knows the signs now. Usually the person would already by stabbing, shooting or bludgeoning him.

Also professional killers do not dress like a ragamuffin.

"Huh... uniform malfunction. And you would be...?"

Carin Taylor has posed:
"U-um....I'm...Carin?" the girl says questioningly, shifting from foot to foot a little as she holds her duffel in front of her a bit defensively. "Um, Booster said I should come here. With all the stuff going on."

    There's a slight pause, then she says hopefully. "Are you his friend, Ted? He said you would know what to do with me." Or at least, she hopes he does., Coming in to find his beard stuck in his helmet does raise questions about him.

    Also the man bun. Manbuns raise soooooo many questions.

Ted Kord has posed:
He's been sent a girl. By Booster. He remembers a really illegible note on a napkin. It could have said 'Carin'.

"Okay Carin... sweetie... can I call you sweetie? Sorry. Carin. I'm afraid I don't know anything about whatever problem you are having. Come in the living room and tell me your story and I'll see if I can help. Booster sometimes thinks I'm Superman. Do you want something to eat? I ordered a pizza. I let it cool for 3 1/2 minutes to assure the cheese is the right elasticity. You aren't ill or anything, I hope. I'm not a doctor. Pardon my appearance. The hair... I was abroad for several months. I'm going to get it cut, maybe tonight." He indicates the living room sofa.

Ted talks a lot to cover up his shyness when meeting people.

Carin Taylor has posed:
    CArin nods, eager to please at the question. "Um, sure, sweetie is fine." she says, not wanting to offend, then perks a bit. "Pizza sounds great actually...I just had part of a chili dog for lunch." she confides. She hesitates at the question about being ill though. "Nothing that's catching?" she says truthfully after a moment, pausing to take off her shoes by the door, then padding over in her socks to the sofa as she sits down where indicated, setting her bag on the floor. It makes a metallic *clunk* noise as she does.

Ted Kord has posed:
Ted Kord notes the clunk. Ehh. can't be worse than anything he brought in. He opens the pizza box after counting down the time on a wall clock and offers her plates, a soft drink and a slice. "Forgive my bluntness, are you a Mutant? Mutants have far more trouble than they deserve in general. Anyway relax if so. I pull for Mutants, we're an EOE at Kord Co."

Carin Taylor has posed:
    Carin takes the plate, pizza, and drink happily, settling back as she pulls her legs up to sit cross-legged. "Um...weeeelll...I don't know." she admits after a moment, flushing. "I kinda can't...remember. Much of anything, really, past the past few weeks." She carefully sets down the soda someplace she won't knock it off, then takes a big bite of the pizza, chewing as she mmmms. "'Sho gud..." she says muffledly.

Ted Kord has posed:
Ted Kord frowns at that. "The last young lady I brought home with a missing memory, turned out to be a rogue nanotech AI, designed for combat. She was a lovely person." He lets her think about that before popping the cap on a beer and taking a swallow and a bite. "Well, finish eating and tell me what you do remember, if you can. It can wait. Repressed memories can be difficult. I am Ted by the way. I'm going to kill Booster for leaving me ill prepared. Are you a runaway or in trouble with the law?"

Carin Taylor has posed:
    Carin blinkblinks at Ted. "...uh huh. Um. I don't think I'm secretly a machine. I'm a cyborg, if that helps?" She frowns. "...though I could be a machine that thinks I'm always a cyborg, but really I'm just really delusional."

    She looks a little alarmed at the idea, though she's distracted by the last question. "Um...well. Yeeees? But in a good way. I think. I mean, I don't think the laws after me. But definitely a runaway." She takes another bite from the pizza, gathering herself as she chews before trying to explain.

    "Um, the short version is I was kidnapped....I think kidnapped, I don't remember how I got there exactly...um, taken? By a corporation. Called Cyberdata, cuz I had powers. And they wanted me to be part of this cyborg program, the S.H.O.C. program." She hesitates. "S.H.O.C. stands for Special Hazardous Operations Cyborg."

Ted Kord has posed:
Ted Kord takes another sip considering. "Well a cyborg is more in my line. So you had powers and they cyborged you? This is happening a lot to Metahumans and Mutants. Could I run a couple scans while you're eating? Obviously, you're not a full conversion cyborg. Do you ave any idea what the cyborging was for? I may need to take you to my workshop. It's downstairs. Anyway... I'm going to throw a little switch and if anyone has you bugged, they will be treated to an earsplitting static spike. I can run the scans from my desk. The drones will actually do it."

Carin Taylor has posed:
    Carin nods slowly at the request. 'Um, sure. Go ahead, scan away? I know a little bit. There was a scientist who felt bad for me who helped me run away." she says, pausing to pop open her drink and sip from it. "She said she'd disabled the tracking functions. Um, and the brainwashing function. For my Brain Box. That's one thing I know what it was for." she says, frowning quietly. "They wanted our powers, but they didn't really want, um, us. So they installed something to wipe our memories, then they were gonna just...make us killers. LIke, the Terminator or something. Obeying orders, no matter what they were."

    She tilts her head. "I know I have kevlar implanted under my skin too, and that my Brainbox helps me with perceptions when I'm using my powers." She perks, then sets down the drink, standing up. "Like this."

    There's a Carin shaped blur suddenly running in a circle in the middle of the room, a breeze following after her as she swirls around and around, then stops again. "Um, like that." she offers, clasping her hands behind her back.

Ted Kord has posed:
Ted Kord checks to make sure she is indeed not broadcasting any information, then starts fiddling with the sensors, trying to make some sense out of any scans of cybernetics. "I have a degree in robotics... there's some overlap with cybernetics. As for behavior modification devices, those are above my pay grade, but I know people who could help. Very impressive display of super speed. I guess you need short hair to avoid it whipping about."

He looks over the monitor, and comments while he processes the scans. "So I'm assuming you need shelter. You need clothes, toothbrush, like that? I have a lot of clothes in a guest room. This sort of thing comes up a lot."

Carin Taylor has posed:
    Carin holds still for the scan! There is no radio signal or tracking type signal you can detect, though there is a wifi signal. Shortranged, the sort you'd get from a good laptop maybe. The most obvious is a small cube embedded in her forebrain, that appears to be tied into the areas of her brain dealing with sensor input, physical reactions, and memory. She has kevlar composite plates that are implanted under her skin all over her body, acting as a subdermal armor...maybe good for shedding heat friction too. Other than that, she has quite a few modification done to strengthen her bones and joints, probably to make them more resistant to high speed movements. Others appear to be tied into her lungs, her digestive system (which has been partially replaced), and areas that deal with metabolic processing. The wifi signal appears to be coming from the cube in her head. Basically, her body has been streamlined and improved to better handle superspeed and providing the necessary energy and oxygen to keep her body running at full capacity. There's signs of a system in place to shed lactic acid buildup from her muscles as well.

    "Uh. Yeah. I mean, there was a guy who helped me out, Dane Whitman....he's like a black knight guy hero? But he had to leave because of stuff, and then Booster said you might be able to help me and I should come here...." She pauses. "I got the basics, I went to a Salvation Army thing to get some clothes and the toothbrush an' stuff. But I only got a couple changes. And, um, the uniform I had on when I ran away." She pauses.

    "Also my murder gloves."

Ted Kord has posed:
Ted Kord start running a decryption program on the wifi signal, pondering how to best neutralize it or mute it. A jamming field. he'd need a little time with that seeing as it was parked n her forebrain. "Well in the normal course of things, people develop powers in stages. there is the initial... origin and as time goes on your body adapts to the powers and you become more powerful. Looks like they helped you along there. Can I say I'm disgusted they'd take a nice girl like you and turn her out as a weapon... murder gloves?"

Blink.

Blink.

Carin Taylor has posed:
    She flushes a bit. 'Well, it's what I call 'em." she says, squatting down to unzip her duffel, then pulls out a matched pair of bronzed metal gauntlets that look very high tech alloy of some sort. She slides the right one on, wiggling her fingers. "It's for, like, if I hit things when I"m going really fast, so I don't mess up my hands, and..."

    *SCHNIKT!*

    ...now it has two inch metal claws that have popped out of the fingertips. "It does that too." She retracts them, then sets them down. "Oh! And Booster told me to give this to you too..." She rummages in the bag, then takes out a small black cube...about the size of the one in her head. "He said he got this off a Cyberdata truck? Someone tried to steal it. I think it's a Brain Box." She walks over to offer it to Ted.

    UP close, it's mostly featureless, save for several connectors and plugs here and there.

Ted Kord has posed:
Ted Kord takes it gingerly and looks it over carefully before placing it in a metal box. "Thanks. Booster is like that, he comes through when you're about to throttle him. The gloves make sense. Current technology can reinforce your hands but... it's cut down on your manual dexterity and often can cause nerve damage."

He leans in close to her for a moment and says in a stage whisper, "No murdering if you're throwing in with me or under my roof at least. Deal?" He extends a hand to her. She seems a pretty nice person... with murder gloves.

Carin Taylor has posed:
    Carin nodnods seriously. "Oh no! I don't like the murdering. That's why I ran away. I don't like fighting much. I'm much better at running away." she admits, sheepishly taking the hand and shaking it. 'Um, deal though!" She returns her hands behind her back, clasping them. "Um, let's see...so, other than that stuff, I was at this facility where they were training us in combat stuff. There were lots of us there. Some of the older ones had gone all the way through the program, I was the youngest. There was this scientist who I guess got a conscience or somethin', and she set things up so I could get my brain box fixed so it wouldn't keep messing with my head or track me, and then got me a keycard so I could sneak out and run away."

Ted Kord has posed:
Ted Kord smiles then. "Okay. I think we need t make extra special sure that brain box is off or out of you. I need more examinations for that. I'll look over the rest of the mods as well. Make sure they're working the way they should. For now, pick a room, and get some rest tonight. We'll continue in the morning."