The streets of Hatchi were bustling yet quiet all at once. Today was cold, and so folks weren't much for chatter. Civilians hurried from one spot to the next, and the security presence in the area was noticeably light. With the war for Plant over, soldiers stationed at home on both sides of the planet had become somewhat lax. Whether this was good or not was yet to be seen, but it certainly made sense.
Vocado stepped into the city with a sense of purpose, his cloak up high to defend from the conditions. Hours ago, he'd offered an invitation to meet with Cheri, the chancellor, for a conversation. When she agreed, he'd sent her coordinates in Hatchi. A curious decision, but one that felt right, given just how much effort Vocado had put in to keeping this city safe from Lottus.
In the few visits he'd made to Hatchi, he'd gotten a good sense for the surroundings, so finding and reaching his destination was much less trouble than it should have been for a foreigner such as himself. In the short time it took him to get to his destination, he was given plenty of awkward stares, and a handful of hateful ones. It wasn't every day a Tuffle crossed paths with a decorated war hero from the enemy side, after all.
Vocado entered through the front doors of the chancellor's office, and waited patiently. He and the Android behind the front desk exchanged wordless looks. Cheri knew he was here, that much was certain.
PL: 100,000
KP: 6/6 MP: 0/6 HP 0/280
Resources: Battle Armor, Arm Blaster, Sage Staff, Dyno Cap, Charged Blood Ruby, Zenkai, Saiyan Pride, Impossible Recovery USED Resources: N/A
Post by Chancellor Cheri on Sept 10, 2024 2:12:39 GMT -5
Not long before, Cheri had received a curious invitation from an old wartime foe of hers, Vocado. Cheri had, of course, been keeping up with Vocado’s escapades all this time, at least as far as those escapades have been knowable to tuffle intelligence services (or, as tuffles knew them, ‘services’), which is where Cheri learnt that Vocado was one of the few saiyans who had accomplished the legendary ‘Super Saiyan’ transformation. There was also a bit about a ‘liberation campaign’, but there wasn’t as much to know there.
The invitation was to talk and Cheri, ever one for social healing, had no reason to disappoint. Besides, as a general case, it wouldn’t be wise to risk upsetting a being capable of blowing up a city if they happened to be taken in by a tantrum— the Chancellor was thankful that Plant accomplished planetary peace before the Vegetans reached such a ridiculous level of ‘Super Saiyan’ saturation. Still, certainly strange: Vocado hadn’t asked for her to choose a location, as Cheri might have assumed, what with her power in and knowledge of this city. He’d chosen his own spot! Amazing. Now, sure, he had chosen one of her own offices but, still, credit where it’s due.
At the appropriate time— which was a few minutes before the specified time, naturally— Cheri teleported into place via one of the city’s common teleportation arrays, moving from one busy office to another. (They were common in the sense of ownership, not rarity, of course… but there were a good few of them, too, to facilitate demand.)
”Chancell—”
”Yes, I can see him on the cameras.” And, more reliably, her scouter was picking up on his power signature. ”Show him the way.”
Hopefully the roof height wouldn’t be an issue for him.
”Warmaster Vocado, good greetings,” she introduced. It was a crude title, but to not use it would be improper. The room was decently small, but it had all sorts of charts and diagrams up, showing all sorts of economic graphs and charts going over destron saturation over time and the like. It even had a Newton’s cradle on it, one of the ones that levitated. ”Please, be seated.” Available for use was, indeed, a saiyan-appropriate chair. Relative to everything else in the room, it looked comedically big.
Vocado bowed politely at Cheri's entrance. "Chancellor," he offered in return greeting. To say he was impressed by her political rise would be a tad bit of an understatement, though he supposed both of them had started rather low ranking, now hadn't they?
Being here was a bit awkward, in a very subtle way. It wasn't so much that either of them had apparent vitriol, mind, but it was... Off. Being in Hatchi was one thing, but in one of their offices? Something about it felt backwards. This building should be half-ruined in Vocado's presence. Used as shelter from a bombing run. But he shook those thoughts from his head. That was imagination for a younger soldier. A foolish one.
"Things seem to be running smoothly. No threats of genocide in the last fiscal quarter must improve staff morale."
Taking the seat offered, Vocado nestled into it, finding the seat a tad too big for someone of his own rather short stature. If anything, Vocado was merely an incredibly tall Tuffle, being five-foot-five-inches.
"I hope we can simply skip the small talk and get to the point. If you're a fan of the decorum of it all, though, I'm willing to oblige."
Post by Chancellor Cheri on Sept 10, 2024 19:49:30 GMT -5
Warmaster Vocado’s bow was unnecessary, but appreciated. He seemed… awkward, perhaps, and not just because the ceiling was scraping against his hair. Cheri understood why, of course: peace was awkward, and these two in particular had quite the history. Only a few short years ago, it was all ‘pound of flesh’ and ‘battlefield nemeses’; Cheri was glad to trade it for ‘good greetings’.
”Oh, and what a fiscal quarter it’s been, too.” A light-hearted deferral, of course, in reference to Plant’s recent economic success— war, you’d never have guessed, made for good business. ”And we haven’t had any attacks any mightier than terrorists acting on their lonesome, either. We’ve even been able to bring some effort and funding a few categories higher up the hierarchy of needs.” When you didn’t need to spend so much on munitions, you could afford to help with the arts, education funding, real estate reform, and aged care.
The seat fit Vocado nicely. Height was a funny thing: ‘half-height’ didn’t seem like too much, but tuffles, who were generally half the height of saiyans, seemed even shorter than the imagery the term evoked would imply. Point being, sometimes it was hard to grok the height difference without seeing it firsthand, and sometimes even then! If Vocado were a tuffle, he’d be a tall tuffle to the same degree that a 10’10” saiyan is tall.
”The decorum has its pleasures, but I loathe to bore. I’m curious: what motivates this visit?”
Vocado cracked his neck, and sighed in anticipation. Having this conversation in front of a mirror was one thing, but being face to face with the real deal made it a tad... Concerning. Tuffles were odd folk, after all, at least in the eyes of a Saiyan. What would Cheri say to his proposition? Laugh him out of the city? Only one way to know.
"I want to spar with you. Test both of our strengths."
He paused for a beat.
"I know it's been a while since we've seen eachother. Spoken at all, actually. With Plant being in the state it is, and our expansion efforts going the way they are, our people need to be unified now more than ever. Enemies across the stars are looking at us and seeing a totempole to smash. And they'll tear right through it if we don't have a unified front."
A good explanation, one might assume, but did Cheri agree?
"We'll have to fight on the same side sooner or later, so I'd like to develop some strategem we can employ in the heat of battle. Tuffle intellect and Saiyan might are the strongest forces in the galaxy; combining them can only make us stronger."
Post by Chancellor Cheri on Sept 11, 2024 3:49:35 GMT -5
Uh oh. The ‘I can probably go Super Saiyan whenever I want’ warrior with a history of hating Cheri was cracking her neck after she permitted him to ‘cut to the chase’. He wasn’t going to attack now, was he? She didn’t need to bring up a shield, did she?
Turns out, no, she didn’t. Not yet, anyway. Cheri’s eyebrow raised.
”Vocado, that’s…” She stopped, then brought her hand to her head, nestling the nasion (the top/root of the nose) between the tips of her left hand’s thumb and index finger, then signed. For a few moments, pause, eyes closed. Then, her eyes opened again, and her hands and fingers moved back to their appropriate positions. She looked him in the eyes: as serious as before, but with an edge of seriousness previously lacking. ”You’ve been wanting this for a while, haven’t you?”
Cheri did not need to test her strength; she knew exactly how strong she was, and how strong she could get, in rather certain numerical terms. ”Very well.” It wasn’t exactly obscured that Cheri didn’t buy Vocado’s reasoning but, then, she was agreeing to it… she stood up from her chair. Perhaps it was unfair to say that Cheri didn’t buy the reasoning: no, it was more so that Cheri didn’t believe that this was the reasoning that motivated Vocado’s asking. ”I agree.” Agree to what bit, exactly, Cheri? ”I assume you have a spot already chosen, already prepared?”
Vocado turned bright red at Cheri's reaction. Pursed lips and stammering followed, combined shortly with an indignant grunt.
"Y-yknow I wasn't going to ask! I just figured, since we're both soldiers, maybe you'd want to settle the score!"
He had expected her to decline, or at the very least say no whilst laughing at him, but to be frustrated? Annoyed at the request? It wouldn't do. Now, Vocado didn't get angry, mind, but he was certainly fed up with the whole idea. Throwing his hands up, he stood suddenly, bumping his head on the roof and denting it slightly.
His finger pointed at her, accusatory in all the ways someone who's been made a fool of would be able to manage. "Our blood runs the same color, Cheri. Just because you spend your days toiling away in a lab and signing paperwork doesn't mean you can't want to spar. To test yourself! It was a simple request, and you're humoring me."
Was it his pride that brought about this embarrassed response? His honor? No, he just thought of Cheri differently, he supposed. Where Vocado wore the badge of soldier proudly, Cheri resented it.
"I don't need your pity, and I don't want this like some hopped-up junkie. I'm a soldier, and so were you. We train. That's how we keep our people safe. That's how we repair the cracks in this foundation!"
Huffing, Vocado walked toward the door, being careful to lean down to avoid cracking the ceiling any further. Maybe he was overreacting, sure, but he'd known enough Tuffles; seen their superior stares and sighing tones. He knew how Cheri felt about his proposal.
"Shall we fill our day with something else, then, Chancellor, or should I wait until the sky falls down to see you again?"
Post by Chancellor Cheri on Sept 11, 2024 22:12:25 GMT -5
Ah, now this was different. She was getting a reaction out of Vocado that made his face twist in ways she’d never seen on him before. Cheri herself almost opened her mouth to say something when Vocado implied that she was a soldier, as that certainly wasn’t how she thought of herself since the war ended, but she elected not to say that— not with Vocado as he was.
She let him speak in full.
”OK.” She nodded— if she hadn’t already stood up, this would have been the perfect opportunity in pacing. ”I get it. You’ve made your point.” She didn’t want to pick away at any details or deny him any points, not when he was in this… volatile state, of sorts. Just… go along with it.
”Though,” began Cheri as she vaulted over her desk to the other side, thereby moving closer to Vocado, ”I regret to inform you that, if you were hoping to find an even match for your Super Saiyan power,” a term she spoke of in reverence but with a strange emphasis, as if to imply that there was more to the term than its mere composite words, ”I will invariably disappoint. There is a project in the works, but— well, that’s still a few months off, given current projections. But, sure, I invite you to test that when it’s ready, too.” Hopefully that’d help improve his mood.
”Let the sky stay where it is;” she said, now caught up to the ‘Warmaster’, ”show me your arena.” As distasteful as fighting for its own sake usually was, it would very possibly be a better pick than Vocado's 'something else' option. She could picture it now: the two sitting at a café, with a heavily imbalanced weight of food ordered between them, and Vocado staring daggers when food wasn't obscuring his vision.
Vocado clicked his tongue, keeping his eyes forward as they walked. ”You don’t get it. I’m not looking for an equal. I want to see where you’re at and prepare you. Lottus is on our side— for some reason. It’s only a matter of time before he decides he didn’t get his fill of this city, and bites down on it again.”
His anger was stymied, now. Waiting to return but cooled off. They turned a corner, then another, and suddenly they were headed for the front entrance of the office and out the door.
”The reports. They’re bad, Cheri. Yangcong worked his way out of hell. Lottus too. Arcose’s power grows, and it won’t be long before they make a choice that won’t benefit us. That’s not to mention the rogue factions in-between; Maxsuz, the Namek-folk— it’s a growing chess-board, and you’re down in your lab assembling the board for a game of checkers.”
In the enclosed courtyard of the office, Vocado stopped. It was quiet, here. Bereft of foot traffic. Did the Tuffle staff here know a fuming Super Saiyan was stomping about, or was it pure coincidence? Vocado didn’t pay it enough mind to ruminate on it.
”But you see, I know full well you’re only following to appease the ‘Warmaster’. Humoring me. I can hear it in your tone. So a spar is off the table. Let’s discuss this instead.”
Vocado looked her in the eyes for the first time since they started walking, and crossed his arms.
”Give it to me straight. Don’t play conversational politics— how do you really feel? I’m no child. If you hurt my feelings I won’t puncture a hole in the ozone layer.”
Post by Chancellor Cheri on Sept 12, 2024 4:32:09 GMT -5
No, it wasn’t going as hoped. After that initial friction, Cheri had hoped that the social atmosphere would relax, and Cheri wouldn’t have to worry so much about resisting the fight or flight reflex every time Vocado’s voice was raised or fluctuated with an emotional chink. He was speaking of threats like they were near, and Cheri understood full well, but the way it came across in his voice wasn’t inspiring confidence. At parts, it seemed like an encounter Vocado should have been having with a therapist or a friend instead of a target of past hatred.
Cheri nodded at the seriousness of Lottus’ continued existence, given his capriciousness. It was precisely threats like these that motivated Cheri so strongly to work on that… next project. She dared not consider the matter deeply away from the safety of a psionic security mechanism, in case there were any mind readers around like that whole silly incident last Wednesday. ”Yangcong is still dead in Hell, going by the last time I encountered him… two days ago.” When she ended up fending him off after a mutual dimensional entanglement, but that was another story.
Vocado wanted honesty, or at least he thought he wanted it. But that was a good thing to want! He even said he wouldn’t have an outburst if he was offended— Cheri certainly believed that he currently believed that. So… her tone changed. The way she held her body changed, more relaxed, but more confident. More vulnerable? It was hard to say. Cheri was too good a speaker to tell.
”You want honesty, so it is honesty that you shall have:”
Following, her tone was calm, an undisturbed pond despite all the splashing.
”This isn’t new. This feeling. The thought of being surrounded on all sides, of hanging on by a thread. The notion that we are existentially delicate. We, the tuffles… it’s been beaten into us for half a century, because of the Vegetans, the invaders, the conquerors. Every day, we knew what we were up against. Every day, against powerful monsters we could only face with artifice and trickery— it was exhausting. But we learnt to keep calm and carry on. For us, looking outwards, seeing the threats out there, down here? I do apologise if the fear you register in my voice does not hold up to your standards, Vocado, but, believe me, I know what’s out there. The saiyan warriors get more powerful with their physical body training, I understand, so understand this: my work ‘down in my lab’, my technology— that’s how a tuffle ‘trains’. And I do not ‘train’ in anticipation that an optimistic future awaits us.”
She exhaled, finally. When she spoke, it had returned to the state of calm she’d almost lost at the end there. It was almost funny, looking at the two as a third party, seeing the sheer height gap.
”I understand your concern, but I know its origin. The Vegetan zeitgeist was so focused on the Them, the Other, the Enemy, of course it couldn’t look elsewhere but them— us. And now we’re at peace, and so where do we focus? A dangerous galaxy, its details clearer than ever now that we’re bothering to look at them. It’s a dangerous galaxy out there, I agree. We must be prepared to face the worst it has to offer, I agree. But this is not new. It's just that the luxury of having resolved the immediate problem has made the precarity of our place in the wider galaxy apparent... but the tuffles have known that since before the Vegetans ever landed. So, as always... we keep calm, we work, and we deal with it."
Vocado just listened. He wanted to interject; disagree, chastise or berate. But he listened. Waited. Let her finish. It was only fair.
In a way, he felt that they had similar thoughts. Diametrically opposed, in some ways, and sincerely identical in others. Vocado saw a bench and sat on it, which was a rather poor choice. One end rose into the air.
”Why do you think we invaded, Cheri? Our ancestors lost their homes. Were adrift for ages unending. We were the Other for plenty of worlds along the way, and unless we keep that title, we die.”
It was stated plain. Slightly, subtly, mournful. As if Vocado felt guilt or maybe mourned the loss of freedom his predecessors had. But he kept that to himself.
”I apologize for scaring you. I kept this city alive, once. Cowered in your sewers when the legend came true and a golden glow bathed the universe for the first time. I know the kind of fear you speak. I felt it every day— Feel it every day— because of the tremors my heart felt when the man I could have saved from madness unlocked the power to obliterate worlds.”
Vocado paused. Twiddling his thumbs in hopes that someone calmer than him would take over. But Pitt was dead, and so was Perilla.
”You know what the worst part is? I wasn’t as scared when Lottus transformed as when Nasu did. Because he meant the legend was wrong. That anyone could get their grubby, grimy little hands on the power of titans.” His eyes drifted down to his own hands. ”I’m glad you don’t know what this feels like. It’s… big. Like you’re watching outside yourself. At first, anyways. Controlling the emotions that come with limitless power is the hard part. And most of my ‘peers’ would never waste the time.”
Part of him wished he’d died that day. To rest. To ignore the truth of the legend being fulfilled twice, thrice— dozens of times now. He could have done his duty and passed on. But he lived. And Perilla didn’t. Pitt didn’t. Rapini didn’t.
”Before the Super Saiyans, it was Azoth, and before Azoth, it was you. There’s always a threat, Cheri. I’ve always been watching the stars. When the gunfire dies down and I can think, I realize how much more work there is to be done. How many people I have left to kill. How many lives I’ll fail to save along the way. I don’t want your name to be on the next obituary. That’s all.”
Post by Chancellor Cheri on Sept 12, 2024 6:10:18 GMT -5
Cheri sat down on the other end of the chair, the one raised into the air. It barely lowered.
”I can tell you why you invaded, if you’d like. I’m trained as an anthropologist, and the Vegetan mindset is my specialty. The Sadalan exodus is… quite interesting, I’d say, and I’m not just saying that because it’s my expertise.” There were certain details to that whole period of history that many Vegetans preferred not to acknowledge, both in the sense that it legitimised saiyan colonies outside of Plant (thereby weakening the nationalistic narrative that sought to make ‘saiyan’ and ‘Vegetan’ indistinct terms) and in that it revealed the Vegetan cultural trait of desperation, which had been burnt into the culture through continual strife, was far from universal and therefore harder to justify. There was plenty more, of course, but Vocado wasn’t asking to hear it yet.
Cheri nodded morbidly. Can a nod be morbid? Yes, it can. We know this for certain because Cheri just did it, do keep up. ”Seeing the power of the Super Saiyan as one so far beneath it does have a certain effect, doesn’t it? I wonder…” She thought of an old theory she had regarding the ruination of Sadala, one that preceded even the demonstration that Super Saiyans were a real power. ”... No, never mind that.” But, to consider fear in terms of the Super Saiyan? To think of what one could do? To think of what ruination one might have already inflicted? Cheri believed him. The ‘power to obliterate worlds’ indeed.
The thought gave the chancellor pause. When Vocado said it was best that Cheri couldn’t access that type of power, Cheri was left unsure how if she agreed. The emotions of it… on one hand, some slightly hubristic part of the tuffle thought that she had a greater hold on her emotions than the majority of saiyans, and therefore this was a power she could easily bring to heel. But, the scientist, the worrier? It recognised that the emotions of a tuffle blown out to such an extreme degree would make her an alien in her own mind, yet alone body. He was right, then. And if it was possible to achieve this level of power the tuffle way, and Yangcong more or less demonstrated that it was, then Cheri knew that that was her path. She didn’t have anywhere to go but stronger. She thought of something to say, but instead elected to let the silence have its peace for a time. The possibility of dying any day now was something she’d come to peace with over decades of hardship as a soldier. She’d been a soldier for longer than Vocado’s been alive, she knew.
And, then… the project. Projects, really, but only one was especially relevant here. As he stood up, the part of the chair she was on slumped back down to the ground with a relieved croak, and she stood up herself when it reached touchdown.
”The… smaller ones, yes, without issue. Better lasers. Faster teleportation. More efficient shielding.” Then, a deep breath. ” And the big one? The project? You may see it, provided you consent to a targeted memory wipe after. It’s one of those matters where I’d say ‘if I told you, I’d have to kill you’ if this were a film. We've already found a few mind-reading spies so, no, I can't just trust you to keep a secret, as much as I'd like to; not even I can allow myself to understand more than a part of it at a time, it needs to be that secure. What I can tell you is that this is a project almost ten years in the making and that, if projections hold, it will be completed no later than the 21st of October.” But that wasn’t enough information, was it? Not for someone like Vocado. Not for a Vegetan. ”And that it will possess enough power to allow me to kill a Super Saiyan.”
She let that one sit in the air for a moment. Then, she smiled.
”I can teleport us to the appropriate laboratories, if you’d like to see? For projects big or small.”
"No. I've had enough of talks of why's and why not's. My people did what they did, and so too did yours. In the end, that's all any choice our predecessors made really boils down to. Did's and didn'ts. The finer details may as well be chaff; excuses to justify the wrongs."
Cheri's secretive nature about her work was... Interesting. Boldly claimed, too. Even Vocado, who himself was a Super Saiyan, would have trouble killing one of his peers. And yet the thought intrigued him. Shouldn't it terrify?
"Provided I'll remember everything but the project itself, I would be agreeable to that. I don't want to forget this conversation, nor that we went down to see something of importance. Would that be alright?"
Of course, there was the subtle fear that his whole library of memories would be wiped. That he would lose his sense of self. Be turned into a Tuffle puppet. There was surely an unspoken agreement that doing such a thing would spell doom for the Tuffle populace. Too many folks would deduce something was wrong, and Vocado himself would snap back to his senses in due time.
"We could do a tour of each facility, if that suits your schedule. End off the day with the main event? It's your choice."
Post by Chancellor Cheri on Sept 13, 2024 2:47:09 GMT -5
Unfortunately, Vocado didn’t take Cheri up on her offer to describe the Sadalan exodus in more detail than it usually ever could be. A shame, really, thought Cheri, who delighted in such details and interesting anthropological points. There were many lessons to be learnt from such a historical event, but, despite the world-shattering power of Super Saiyans, hopefully, such lessons won’t ever be needed again. Hm. Maybe she should tell Vocado about it anyway, at a later time. Or perhaps just leave a note, or send a message to his scouter a few days from now.
”Just the project itself. And perhaps some embarrassing memories from your youth, as a token of goodwill.” She meant it as a joke, and she doubted he’d take her up on it, but it was also entirely possible as a feat of neural manipulation. ”Of course. I’ll have you check the neutral action sheet, too, just so you know I’m not trying anything.” A neural action sheet— and believe me, that was the simplified name— was an informational matrix designed for tuffle recognition and understanding that dictated the ‘plan’ or ‘list of actions’ when manipulating a brain, alongside all the safety measures and provisions you’d expect. It was sort of like the punched tape old automated vehicles could use to play specific music, but for subtle brain surgery. Now, it was tuffle technology, and the chances Vocado knew what it was was slim, but hopefully the very idea that there could be confirmation of such a thing was reassuring. Or maybe not, sometimes the Vegetan mind did peculiar things.
She got closer and began typing on a keyboard over her right arm that wasn’t there a moment ago. These were the technological marvels that programmable matter made possible!
”Very well. Don't make any sudden motions or flare your ki.” These hadn’t really been meaningful concerns for over a century but, still, it kept some relevance when operating faulty teleporting technology. ‘Keep still’ as a warning before teleportation mostly stayed around as a way for tuffle parents to get their children to stay still for once. The flaring ki one wasn’t usually an issue at all but, well, these were unprecedented times, and this was a Super Saiyan we were talking about. Ki that potent could rip problems into anything. ”Have you ever used magic? Sometimes wizards have a negative reaction to selective teledimensional displacement-action.” Her tone was entirely serious. Studies were still ongoing as to precisely why this phenomenon occurred. Perhaps it was something to do with a magical connection coming with being enmeshed in the structure of the world, making non-magical teleportation disconcerting, or maybe the wizards were faking it to screw the rest of us over.
Assuming no issues there, Cheri was just finishing up with writing on her arm-mounted keyboard. ”OK, the sequence is displacement-active. Are you ready?” She was near to him, but not touching: just how primitive did you think their teleportation technology was, that it required everything it teleported to be touching? ”We’ll be there in 3… 2…”
”1.” She smiled, glad in having been able to predict the timing rather precisely.
Cheri and Vocado found themselves somewhere else entirely. It was miles away but still in Hatchi, or rather under Hatchi, with most of its distance gained from being deep, deep underground. The two were deep enough below Hatchi that it was further from the surface than any miners on Earth have ever reached, many dozens of kilometres down. This distance from the density of the city allowed for this to be an open space, with pseudometallic floors, walls, and ceilings arranged in large, connecting rectangular prisms. From here, a large number of tables were visible, with all manner of technological devices, tools, and blueprints laid across them. All of the small projects, at least the ones from this laboratory, were laid out for presentation.
Vocado and Cheri were not alone there, though, as various tuffle androids— Machine Mutants, specifically, small, levitating, white-shelled robots designed for fine dextrous action and scientific thinking, with cyclopic eyes of varying colour— flew from place to place, continuing their work. A machine mutant with an eye of neon pink flew by Cheri, handing her a cup of freshly-materialised coffee. An orange-eyed one would stick by Vocado trying to get a genetic sample, to confirm that he wasn’t under some form of ‘total genetic disguise’.
”Where to first, Warmaster?” A poke at his title, now that he was so much further out of his depth. Literal depth, too, deep underground. ”We have, over there, zero-point emergency teleportation development.” She pointed, and would continue pointing. ”Then, over there, the early development of so-called ‘harm conductivity’ technology. Over there, applications of transcendental geometry for the purposes of battlefield munition transport. Right next to it, ki-disruption tech. Oh, and over there… no, never mind, that one hasn't been implemented yet, there’s nothing to show. Well, other than that last one, does anything catch your interest?”
Looking around, it wasn’t at all clear where the ‘big project’ would even be.
Teleportation was, in theory, something Vocado would have little trouble with. Temporal displacement was something that technically happened in just about every fight he'd ever been in. When you and your opponent can punch holes through the center of the planet, and move so fast the naked eye cannot perceive it, one could, in theory, equate the experience to having the whole of yourself transported without your own will being involved.
If you squinted just right, teleportation was like an incredibly fast car ride.
As Vocado thought that to himself, he was elsewhere.
The lab was vast. Doodads and gizmos and weaponry strewn about in varying degrees of complexity and completion. Vocado held back his awed gasp quite well, replacing it instead with a slow, satisfied-looking nod.
"The munition transportation seems like a curious device. How does it work?"
As they walked toward the demonstration table, Vocado couldn't help but let his eyes travel. He was truly in the belly of the beast. Part of him wondered if his brother would've disavowed him for this. If his sister would've laughed him out of the manor. Ghosts couldn't put up much protest, though, least of all ones that never got a proper burial.