vault66 | 1st Team Meeting

Entry tags:

1st Team Meeting

WHO: Azula and any vault dwellers who show up.
WHERE: The Rec Room
WHEN: Three hours after her annoucement.
WHAT: Azula's "War Council" to disseminate information and introductions...also snacks.
WARNINGS: Possible discussions of violence and/or dark backstories.

Azula had attended a number of war meetings growing up as well as social affairs for meeting with important members of the public or military. This was different for a number of reasons, the largest being that this was a place no one seemed to have any respect for her title.

But she could handle that. It had taken her half a month to come to terms with it but here the title "Princess" was only as important as she made it.

Unfortunately that meant having to play "Nice" having to bite her tongue and not get frustrated when she wasn't catered to. That would have been harder for her two years ago, and impossible a year ago.

But here we were, with her waiting patiently near the entrance to the Rec Room to greet people as they came in. Oh how far she'd fallen.

"Come in, help yourself to some snacks. We'll get started soon."

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As everyone files in and chooses whether to sit or not Azula moved to a place in the room where she could be seen and cleared her throat to get everyone's attention.

"I think it's best to start with everyone introducing themselves. I've only been here a short time and haven't spoken with all of you and would appreciate it. Share as much as you like but I think it's important we know who we have and what they can do for our team."

She expected that at least one if not more people in the room would share as little as possible but that couldn't be avoided. For all she knew the others might just lie.

(( While information has been coming in short bursts there has been plenty uncovered to talk about. After introductions are finished the floor is open for anyone to bring up something they've learned that the others should know about.))

Edited 2020-06-19 01:08 (UTC)

(( Seeing as every day may present some new horror or challenge it's important to ask questions, even if its just asking the opinions of your fellow vault dwellers. Questions can be assumed to be posed openly to the group but if you want a specific person/people to answer tag them in the subject line.))

(( Here's where if you have a goal you want to propose, or a request you wish to make of the group you can do so. No promises that anyone will want to help but squeaky robot gets the grease as they say. ))

"As I introduced myself before, I am Princess Azula of the Fire Nation. A place I am aware most of you probably have never heard of."

Though for a moment she glances around the room hoping for some look of recognition. Even if they knew her true nature she would almost prefer it to this feeling of being so far away from home.

"My kingdom was the strongest in our world, the most advanced though not nearly as advanced as the technology in this place. We were on the verge of establishing peaceful relations and unity for all the kingdoms. Though I fear I may never see that come true now."

Sure that "Peace" would have been after her nation dominated all the others with fear and fire but she didn't need to share that part.

"I have some combat training, though I've been cut off from my fire bending. But a warriors greatest weapon is her mind. I won't let what I've lost get in the way of our claiming victory over this place."

Sandy raises her hand to go next then realizes no one else did that and looks awkward putting it down.

"Um...hi! I'm Sandy...Sandy Marko." She starts sounding unsure and looking uncomfortable addressing a room full of people older then she is.

"I'm from New York, Brooklyn if you want to get specific. And in my world we used to have superheroes. So if you've heard of like spider-man, Captain Marvel, Iron Man...maybe we're from the same place? I dunno. It'd be cool if we were though."

She shuffles her feet and offers a crooked sort of smile.

"I'm only really good at running fast and getting into small spaces but I'm learning. Louis taught me how to sew so I've been trying to fix the clothes I find. I fixed this dress."

She does a little spin showing off her faded and pale green dress that have some rudimentary stitches keeping it together.

She looks like she's trying to figure out what else to say and adds "And before anyone asks, I'm 13. I know I look younger but I'm a teenager!" She sounds a little defensive on that subject.

This is fucking ridiculous. Jiro hated his own team meetings and hanging around in the warehouse, and he hates doing the same thing in this shitty rec room. He's sprawling on one half of the couch and isn't at all hiding his annoyance with being here in the first place. Fuck everything. Cookies were not worth this. The basics are all he goes for here, because the rest of it is irrelevant when it comes down to it.

"I'm Jiro, but everyone already knows that." Maybe. He may not have given his name to them all, but he's talked to everyone at least once and that's good enough. "I'm from Japan, in the year 2017, if that's even fucking true. Who the fuck knows? Anyway, I'm shit with computers and whatever, so what I can 'do for the team' is move heavy shit and punch... creatures."

He has to start thinking of them as either some category removed from sentience, or objectively evil, to deal with the mole rat and cockroach infestations.

As people start talking about what they've been learning Sandy raises her hand again.

"So after I got bit by the mole-rat I went back into that area we just opened up and started looking around. that's where I found the Batons and helmets." She starts before lifting up her Pip-Boy and scrolling through the texts.

"I found a computer password and used it on the computer in that room. I think we can use it to unlock the door if no one else has done that already? And there was this file. I don't really understand all of it so lemme just read what I copied."

" Subject 004-02. Modified FEV injection appears promising. In contrast to previous attempts, subject has maintained ambulation and some coherence two weeks following exposure. Preliminary data support my previous theory this mutant strain may benefit from continued radiation exposure following acclimation to host. I have requested permission for maintained high radiation levels in testing chamber. Louis remains unconvinced cognition will survive such measures, but I'm certain the overseer will understand the merit of this modified protocol. As he so often likes to say, humanity depends on us."

After she finishes reading it she offers to show the screen to anyone who wants to read it again.

"So I think like...it sounds like they were trying to cure whatever's in that chamber? And Louis had something to do with it?" She glances around for the robot curiously.

"What do you guys think?"

"So hey...this has been bugging me since we woke up here."

Sandy again this time not raising her hand.

"Do we think that like...we may not be who we think we are? The message we got when we woke up said our memories might be messed up but...I feel like I grew up in New York. I don't remember anything about Vault-tec or whatever. And if none of that's real..."

She looks fairly concerned that her entire identity might be some elaborate lie before shaking her head.

"I don't wanna believe it but what do you guys think?"

She's a fucking warlord.

"Peaceful relations and claiming victory sound like opposite things."

Azula is going to be a problem, he's realizing. If something happens in here, she's the one to take down.

"And what's fire bending?"

He likes Sandy. He does. But... he can't help it, watching her twirl in that shabby dress and talk about sewing. The words just spill out.

"You're still playing house at 13? Grow the fuck up."

"Sounds to me like they were experimenting on whoever was in there, not trying to cure them. Acclimation to host."

Jiro doesn't understand some of those words in the write-up, and he's not very smart, but that phrase doesn't sound benign to him. Nor does referring to whatever it was as a 'subject'.

"And they did it to others first if they're comparing it with previous attempts. We're fucking lab rats, that's what happening here."

"Hello there! I've met most of you." Yunlan flashes a quick grin around at the ragtag collection of refugees. "But not all. If you haven't heard it yet, I'm Zhao Yunlan, former head of the Special Investigations Division of Dragon City, China."

He's perched on one of the booth tables, one booted foot on the table with his elbow on that knee. He glances around the group, pausing on the less familiar faces with genuine curiosity.

"Not that that matters here! The long and short of it is: I have a criminal justice background with some combat experience, I've handled diplomatic communications, and I'm qualified with hand-to-hand and firearms. Over to you guys."

He doesn't remember that message in particular, and wasn't paying enough attention to the video, but there's been talk of these fake memories around. It's bullshit. He wants it to be bullshit, but it does make more sense than pulling in people from different universes and time periods.

"I don't believe it."

He has a very strong sense of self and a vivid, as well as visceral, connection to those memories. He still has scars. It wasn't some weird-ass dream.

"Sewing's important. Hey -- think I can tap you for repairs if I wind up ripping the suit?"

He'd prefer to get out of the awful blue-and-yellow onesie as soon as possible, but he doubts he's going to get anything more fashionable down here. Faded sundresses might be fine for a thirteen-year-old girl; Zhao Yunlan has slightly different taste in clothes.

She's doing her best, though, and she gets a cheerful grin for it.

"There's some people with superpowers where I'm from, but I don't know those specific guys. New York's a long way from my home, though."

"You know," Yunlan comments, "I've been thinking it might be nice to figure out where some of those creatures are coming from and see if we can shore up the cracks. The last thing I want is to run into an angry mole rat on my way to the bathroom at two a.m."

The rest of Jiro's introduction isn't a surprise, though the parts about 2017 and Japan are useful information.

If, as he says, any of that's even fucking true.

"Can I see that?" Yunlan leans over, scanning through the text with the expression on his face slowly smoothing into neutrality. "Hm. That's... maybe so. It depends on what whatever was in that chamber looked like before they got that injection."

It sounds a lot more like unethical human experimentation to him, but without more information, he can't be sure the scientists deserve to be condemned. If Simmons was telling the truth, after all, they'd rebelled over orders that went too far.

And if they were already willing to infect people with mutant viruses that destroyed their minds and bodies, what the hell was 'too far'?

"Two of them came from a hole in the wall just past where the cave in was. Sandy crawled in there, but didn't get very far. They didn't even show up until we got into that section of the vault, right? So, they don't have an exit past there yet."

Hopefully.

"Their nests are probably in the new sections somewhere."

The roaches are more ubiquitous, but he's been watching them and they have a couple places they seem to congregate in larger groups.

Yunlan waves a hand from his perch on the table. "So! Saya and I broke into the Overseer's office after the reactor got up and running. There's a robot in there that looks a lot like our three handybots, only with some kind of blaster weapon that it tried to use to blow our heads right off.

"We managed to talk it down, and, long story short, it goes by Captain Simmons and claims it's now the Overseer by chain of command. Supposedly the scientists and civilians out here led a mutiny over some kind of order they didn't want to follow, and the fight that followed killed 'em all. As far as it knows we're all nice, docile civilians willing to follow orders... and I think we ought to keep it thinking that until we talk it into giving out access to the secure systems and telling us how to unlock the sealed doors. It claims it'll authorize expeditions outside as soon as the rest of the Vault's up to code."

His tone is casually sarcastic, but his foot is swinging back and forth at a tempo that suggests he's not too calm about the blaster robot.

"Oh yeah? Maybe we can block that up." Yunlan leans back, wrinkling his nose as he thinks through the options. If the mole-rats have some second entrance to that hole, it might not do too much good, but they're big enough that any space they can get through is going to be easy to find.

"I didn't know they only showed up when you got to that section of the Vault. That was before my time. Good to know!"

Block that up and they maybe suffocate, or starve to death, or eat each other out of desperation. He doesn't want to think about any of those scenarios.

"Yeah, there were only the cockroaches before."

Which is sort of strange, but cockroaches are the type to get into everything. Mole rats are...

"Where did they come from, the rats? Do you think they were used in experiments, or that they somehow got into the vault from the earth and there's a breach?"

Were the rats already here before they got irradiated, or is there a hole to the outside somewhere?

"Good question. I haven't seen any rat cages in those experiment rooms, but I haven't checked 'em all, either."

The experimentation largely seemed to be human, if the ripped and bloody Vault suits are any indication.

"They look like underground creatures if you ask me -- and I guess it's not impossible for something like that to dig all the way down here. Especially if there's cracks in the rock from quakes. And we know there's been some collapses, so I'm guessing there've been quakes."

"I didn't think of that, earthquakes."

He hadn't given any thought to what could have caused the cave-in or some of the other dilapidated areas of the vault. What fallout from a bomb might have done to whatever mountain or bedrock the vault was buried in.

"I think they dug their way in. Maybe we should check out that hole again and see if it leads somewhere outside the vault."

Into the earth, and maybe they could tunnel out like mole rats.

"It could be a nice way around having to beg for the key to the front door!" Yunlan's perking up at the idea, though he isn't fully convinced. At least it's something to do, though.

And they do have built-in flashlights on their wrist computers....

"How big's that hole? We might want to bring some weapons, just in case a pissy mole-rat goes for our face."

"Fuck that! Dismantle the pile of junk and get the data for access codes from the microchips and shit!"

That's how robots and computers work. Yeah. Jiro looks like he wants to go down to that office right now and tear the robot apart. This is all military experimental bullshit and he's not stepping in line with it.

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Page 1 of 11

1st Team Meeting

Introductions

Current Events

Questions

Goals/Requests/Ideas

Azula

Sandy

Jiro

Reading the Terminal for Test Room 3

Are our memories our own?

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Zhao Yunlan

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'Captain Simmons' and the Overseer's Office

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