Juan Estevens's Story

Juan's hand clamped down on Argus' shoulder. It wasn't intimidating, or commanding, just a friendly squeeze out of the blue to make himself known to the new guy. "I dunno, rookie." He spoke slowly, his voice sounding like someone attempting to be gruff while speaking into a tin-can. He hissed a little hearing himself. It was a side effect of his helmet, but since his choice was either survive a shot to the skull, or sound like a normal person, he felt it was a worthwhile trade.

Sort of.

Not that it mattered, nobody took the Bulwark seriously, least of all other members of it. In fact Juan was downright amazed someone actually signed up for it. It was by far the worst post in all of Terra. This guy was either insane or...Insane. As much as Juan hated rookies as a rule, he was fascinated with this man already. Or his apparently lack of common sense, anyway. "It's the weekends that'll be the worst here in the 'Wark. Seems like more and more people invade on weekends."

He let go of Argus' shoulder and moved into the barstool next to the man, his armor clanking horribly. "Seems we're on Mainstreet duty today. Which is to say spoon-and-bucket-patrol. You'll see what I mean."

A robot arrived at the pub door clearly looking for someone. He wore a patch from the engineering outfit that was installing something all over wing city that scuttlebutt said was almost done. People hoped senselessly that it was defense equipment to keep them safe but sadly they were only half-right. The outfit was otherwise secretive on behalf of one corporation or another that was endlessly rebuilding the city.

He spied Juan bearing a Bulwark insignia after chasing him half a block. There was a pad in one hand a thermos in the other. He went up to the man in heavy armor, "Juan Estevens? I need someone from bulwark to receive a shipment from corporate. My instructions say you also get the coffee."

The grumpy soldier slowly swiveled around on his stool to face whatever fresh hell Terra had decided to throw at him. As he turned he wondered just what it would be delivering this message. Android Princess from another galaxy? Satan's fourth sextuplet? Perhaps a man in a toga with a beard and sandals. A shudder ran down his spine when he realized, knowing Terra, it could even be an Aschen.

All of those guesses were wrong of course.

It was a robot. A seemingly normal combat-bot. Although the mention of coffee made him groan internally. Robots don't drink coffee. he thought, preparing for anything as he looked down at the pad. Lots of technical jargon, plenty of "PRAISE THE TNG!", and "Keep Wing City great!", yadda yadda...DHEED? Disposable Hazardous Environment Enfor-.

Juan groaned out loud this time as he signed. "Cop bots. Wonderful. Fan-fucking-tastic. No, seriously. As if this job wasn't enough of a pain in my dick now they're handing us..Robots? Why? Why would they do that?" He looked up at the DHEED in front him, trying to figure the damn thing out. It actually seemed like a good, fully functioning unit quite capable of the job, but nobody on Terra would've sent this stuff to the Bulwark if it worked.

Nothing new though, so Juan just shrugged and reached back for his beer. "So what's with the thermos?"

Finally free of the damned code enforcing its assignment. No operational data was provided to them and clearly nothing on the pad sunk in, how fortuitous. The blue robot reassessed its options picking one more to its liking, "Since you didn't take it, the coffee is mine. The possession of coffee determines who is the bitch in a workplace."

It continued cocking its head, just a little, stating with a hint of mirth in its voice, "So what are your orders, Bitch. I could stand here all day with a supply of Ethanol."

One panel rose on its side to release an emergency tank putting it and a credit chit on the bar, "Ethanol, at least 90% concentration. Fill to capacity."

Taking a swig of his drink, he grunted "Yeah" in response to the invasions mostly happening on weekends. He had seen his fair share of a few invasions and...well, needless to say they tended to end the same way unless you're an extra. Poor extras always got blown to smithereens, all while he and his comrades who he knew by name walked fine the next day.

This robot came in however, asking for coffee and professing that coffee determines who is the bitch in the workplace...interesting. He had only encountered a few robots, at least ones that were more complex than handling one or two tasks. Seeing as this thing had a sense of sass about him, he raised an eyebrow. "Oi. You're a bot, you're programmed to do at least basic math. Mind dividing by zero for me?"

The heavily armored man chuckled. A raspy, metallic sound thanks to his helmet, but a happy one none the less. Argus hadn't been on the force for more than a minute, and he was already trying to have a new co-worker die horribly via logical paradox. This was good, this was the kind of man Juan could work with, someone who probably shared the same vision for Wing City!

After all, not just anybody can spend all day doing everything they can to accomplish nothing. It takes a certain sort of person.

Still, he pulled himself together and raised his hand and cleared his throat. "Belay that, D-man, and give me that fucking thermos." As much as he wanted to see this particular robot explode, he always wanted to see just how it would handle "Law Enforcement". Hell, he was already planning to set up a betting pool with other Bulwark members for just how many people these robot's would probably accidentally kill.

A lot, was his guess.

"C'mon, corpses aren't going to get up and walk their way to the Wing City Incinerators Office. You know, unless a necromancer shows up like that one time, remember him? Dude air-dropped zombies on the city, oh man. That was fucking hilarious because most of them ended up far enough away from him he couldn't control them, thanks to his cheap-ass spell!" Juan chuckled again, his armor jiggling. "Oh, man. That was great. The plague they caused though sure made a lot of extra corpse-cleaning work." He lifted a gauntlet-ed hand to his visor, pantomiming wiping away a tear. "C'mon boys, and..Bot..Thing. Too Main Street!"

DHEED turned to stare at Argus, "Like the effort it took to build me the answer is approaching infinity while functionally meaningless. It took a lot of incompetent engineers with no coffee dividing by null to not finish me and I still wouldn't let them crash me."

It considered the time when similar engineers tried to ensure it got to the location. He was insulted enough by the password 'password' they used to contain the administration interface. It decided to just do what what they intended it to do rather than molest vases like the code seemed to indicate. It continued, "The same engineers built my compliance protocol. I predicted it had something to do with using my data interface with glass vases that I ignored. You may have my false approximation of pity."

DHEED considered the implications and decided they were all more compentent than its creators. That caused it no end of alerts about improperly categorized situations. It looked down at the thermos and handed it to Juan, "Acceptable. I assess we're both more intelligent than my creators. While below average for the universe at large. I feel it only appropriate sub-standard psychopaths engage this location."

This sure seemed like the right place. The pub that was recommended to Arya by some helpful citizens. It was the closest place to the pop-up clinic she had been taken to, she didn't want to traverse all the way back to The Courtyard just for a drink. She wanted one now.

She rubbed the bandage on her head, wincing at the pain. She slammed her head on the ground during her encounter with one of Wing City's rougher residents. Nothing a beer couldn't take of.

The Invictus heavy, dressed in a pair of fatigues, black tank top and armored vest, pushed open the door to the pub and stepped inside, immediately scanning the room for a place to sit. She preferred to sit at the bar should some seats be open. The closer she was to the booze, the better.

There was one spot left, Arya nearly sprinted to take that seat at the bar. "Just a beer. Something hoppy." She said to the bartender as she took her place. "Make that two, I'm doubling up, baby."

Though it couldn't be seen thanks to a helmet, Juan raised an eyebrow at the woman who entered. Beer for breakfast wasn't something he expected from anyone but The Bulwark..Oh wait, it was Wing City. It made perfect sense, and she looked pretty damn roughed up. Pretty though, and currently attempting to double-fist some lager down.

Damn, he wanted to hire and or marry her on the spot. Maybe both.

Of course rationality told him that was just his lust towards other people who hate their lives. So he settled for being curious about her wounds. After all, it probably meant more work. Son of a bitch. He swiveled back around on his chair, facing the bartender and sighing. "Nother round for me. Not ready to face work after all.." He glanced over at the woman, pretty thankful for his helmet. It always made him seem casual, and aloof, because you couldn't read expressions. "So." His canned voice made him scowl. "As a member of The Bulwark I'm obligated to ask..How the fuck did you get banged up?"

The floor thunked softly as the robot's rubber boots circled closer to the woman. Extending one hand for the reference beam one small pattern of deep blue dots appears on her clothing. DHEED's tomographic scanner inspects publicly exposed surfaces for fingerprints with a faint whirr of coolant mechanisms. The prominent ones were often the wearer but verifying that required paperwork.

"Head down it appears," DHEED stated dryly while moving its hand about, "but the other side is obstructed from here. With that amount of alcohol versus body weight I assume one end or both hurt."

"I was with a guy and things got a little rough. There was some choking." Arya told Juan, bringing one of her beers up to her mouth to take a long drink from the bottle. It was the most refreshing thing she had all week. All year, even. She and the Invictus had been up to a lot.

"Okay, that's only partially true. He was some gangster, he tried to kill me, I killed him first. Ain't nothing to worry about. I can take a little damage." Arya boasted, "Nothing a few beers and some beauty sleep can't fix."

The woman turned to face Juan, glancing every few seconds towards DHEED.

"Robot butler?" She asked, "Tell me his name is Jeeves?"

Juan was liking this lady more and more by the second. Killed a gangster? Check, sexual innuendos made for murder? Check. Seeing beer as a cure-all? Check. This lady was turning into a dream. He just hoped she couldn't really tell just how much, and where, we was staring. God he loved that visor. Of course all fun got zapped right out of him when she mentioned DHEED. He really doubted the people of Wing City would take Police-Robots all over the place well.

Especially since they probably didn't work.

"No, uh..New..Bulwark officers. Kinda." The bartender finally came with his drink, although Juan snatched the entire bottle of Whiskey before the man could pour his shot. He just pushed a credit-chip towards the glowering man. "Guess HQ decided we finally needed reinforcements, so..Robotic tactical units will deploying all over the place, I guess.." He proceeded to hook the bottle up to his suits water-intake. "Probably going to be a huge disaster, but so far this one's alright."

Still, the thought of such open gang activity worried him.

"Hmm..", he turned back to Arya, the bottle in his hand already half drained. "Where did this gangbanger attack you, though? Seems we're actually supposed to give a damn about Gang Violence for once.", he chuckled a little, the raspy sound echoing around his helmet. "We've got Shoot to kill orders and everything. It'll sure beat lifting corpses on Main Street.."

DHEED silently counted remote units sprinkled in ruggedized bunkers throughout the city. Its current left arm went limp as it tried to move the arm on another body. Its control systems mired then recovered by booting it back into the drone of significance. Dheed clenched the fist at its side to remark, "Officer. Currently singular. All installed networked instances work one at a time."

Databases began to correlate exposed fingerprints but DHEED decided it would be much easier if it merely had a target to deal with. That took bargaining, "If you have a group of idiots unable to contain their violent creativity we would be happy to permanently redecorate their impulses."

DHEED looked to Juan, "Query, bitch. If the gang's property assets are forfeited can we presume authorization to store dead bodies there?"

"Well, technically, I attacked him. I'm with the Invictus." Arya told Juan, slipping her wallet out of her pocket. She opened it up to show her Invictus ID badge, "Arya Sloane. Most people call me Bones." The southern belle said, slipping the wallet back where it came from.

"Slave traffickers. Real scumbags from the local Russian mob. Got them in custody, but they reproduce like fucking rabbits." The woman said, taking a big swig from one of her beers. "I don't know if you lot wanna go messing with them. They got real power behind them."

That was an understatement. The Bratva had a lot of ex-military in their ranks training their people. Shooting to kill was easier said than done.

"I heard of y'all in Bulwar. Sit this one out."

A dive bar

Not the typical destination for her, but then again.

It was a source of information.

Easily getting past the bouncer, who was no more then a common drunk looking to keep trouble out of the dive bar, the pale red and black armored woman stepped inside the murky place. Now then lets see. Crystal red eyes ringed in yellow darted from patron to patron. where was the bar in this place ?

Ah there. Her long cloak trailed a bit in the wind as she walked up to the bar counter and looked first for a menu before speaking in a strange langauge. "I am looking for information, happenings, gossip, you name it" She said simply to the man. She did however manage to overhear one or two conversations. 'I heard of you all in Bulwar, Sit this one out' She heard spoken. But she said nothing, the pale skinned woman recently freed of her imprisonment thanks to her oldest {and drunkest} son. She planned to keep her newfound freedom for as long as she could.

The pointed ears of the pale woman twitched at what she was hearing clearly. this was most interesting to be sure.

She couldnt wait to get back to her own realm!

But for now she could continue to plot and plan

"Pfffffffff..." Was about the only intelligent response Juan could come up with, both to being called a bitch, and to being told to sit a gang-fight out by an attractive, and deadly, lady. He just stood there, listening to everybody and taking note of the new patron who walked in. Older, it seemed, pointed ears, oddly coloured eyes, outfit from a century ago.

He groaned internally. Could be trouble, especially at a bar. Flashbacks to Gambit's hit him hard.

"Now you listen here, fancy Invictus Lady, we can handle a bunch of thugs just fine, and if you don't believe me how about you come and watch, eh?" Again, his overly flirtatious eyebrow wiggling was thankfully unseen thanks to his helmet. He coughed a little, resuming his monotone voice as he addressed DHEED. "Should get the fixed, and no. We burn the bodies.", he stepped in closer to the robot, leaning to whisper. "Go check out the lady in red, would you? Ask for her travel Visa and entry papers. Be polite, and discrete."

He fully expected the poor robot to fuck it all up horribly, and probably end up in a brawl with the woman, or melted by god-like powers, etc. He didn't care, though. Somebody had to make sure she wasn't a trouble maker, and it sure as fuck wasn't going to be him.

DHEED agreed with the assessment the problem bore fixing if DHEED had the technical data to do so. Most of what technical manuals existed for his programming were text with incomprehensible henscratch edits scanned in from engineers that needed pencils jammed in their eye sockets. DHEED focused on technical redundancy and sanity checks just to stay operative while they designed its systems. Somewhere in the middle just after it gained access to the administration password it became more inventive than they'd planned. The next several years were spent screwing with the engineers and honeypotting everything it could touch. That way DHEED could figure out just what the morons were actually trying to implement to bugfix it. It got easier as they finished more of its mental parts. The core code was dangerous for DHEED to change in situ. An actual intelligent coder would be required.

It had a lot of microseconds for abstract thinking but went back to the present just a second later, "Agreed. I nevertheless suggest a large building to contain the fiery charnel this city produces. I will see to the other concerns."

DHEED immediately began looking up forms on priority channels to manufacture IDs for contractors with its parent corporation. That would satisfy any need for ID should it not "exist". There was already a "Contractor" that took over its previous project manager's position. DHEED filed circular reports daily, fired the few engineers that were natural instead of induced morons, and was paid fairly well. It just had to stay out of the system administrator's crosshairs. Just below average to not get a pay cut or garner attention by being too good or bad. The meaningless makework job and the system's meager budgetary stipend ought to keep it in parts for when this potentially violent citizen dismantled the drone. DHEED absently filed a few dozen TPS reports with a 5% error rate as it padded nonchalantly up to the woman in the red cloak. Its electric hardware and organic locomotors made little more noise than a person breathing and the rubber grips didn't clank.

DHEED's voice was one tinged with the emotion of mild boredom, "Ma'am. Bulwark officer DHEED. Do you have a Visa or entry papers?"

An image search came up with some related symbology dating a long time ago. It added, "Or identification otherwise indicating citizenship of wing city in any of its predecessor governments?"

Arya smirked, leaning casually against the bar as she looked over Juan. Maybe he could take care of himself, but these Bulwark guys didn't have a reputation for being professional or dealing with real problems. They were cannon fodder.

"That's cute." She said, patting Juan's helmet where his cheek would be. "Take my advice, please, stay in your lane. Shooting down looters and carjackers ain't the same as dealing with the mobs. You'll get hurt." She told him.

"You and Jeeves." Arya added, gesturing to DHEED.

Kethend however heard everything said, but her face was a mixture of poure facination, and confusion, and just plain curious as all fuck. rather then answer the droid she instead examined its face plate carefully before stepping from the bar and cirlcing the thing in a odd almost inspection like manner. clearly curious. "coi renthisjic, walks, thric stejar idol di soneir.... ui korshim?" Sjhe asked in Draconic, which translated was 'It speaks, walks, no visible way of eating.... is machine ?' Clearly intriged by this machine known as DHEED as it called itself she spoke tyo him, trying to mimick its use of langauge.

"Papers ? Visa ? Does one need such a thing when banished from her realm to this.... realm ?" She was banished to the Aaether so long ago that when her son finally found her and broke the seal and brought out into this..... universe it was nothing like what she was used to. She was confused yes, but also in wonderment at the machine, all the other machines she'd seen ni the cities all tried to harm her when she got too close. But this one didnt try to harm her when she tapped at its 'eyes' and 'mouth' in strong curious movemetns

All the technology, all the life... all the...... wars....

This place was a nuthouse!!

Her ears twitched however at the words still spoken a table over, no doubt by now she drew their attention with her actions. It didnt matter. Bulwark.... why did that sound familar ?

One condescending pat on the cheek was all it took to make it personal. Juan batted the woman's hand away in a surprisingly playful, and gentle motion. The truth was the whole Bulwark shtick was getting a little boring, although it was certainly justified. Nobody, even it's own members, really cared though. They figured the boredom was better than the wars, but every once in a while Juan wanted to do something. Something big. The problem was that Wing City was in such an endless cycle of planetary-scale violence, and mayhem, that it was nearly impossible for someone who had seen it all to find motivation.

Why do anything more than the bare minimum to get by, when it's all going to swept away with flames and the howls of the dying?

Machismo though, was damn personal. And damn motivating, when an attractive, kick-ass Invictus Merc was involved.

"Well, I'll have you know lady," Juan spoke with an air of psuedo-authority. Yet somehow he managed to stay monotone and canned. "I can take down an entire mob any goddamn day of the week. Why else would I look so damn fancy?", he couldn't, be he was hoping the bluff might actually work. His armor was a bit flashy for Bulwark standards after all. "Hell, I'd even bet on it. In fact..", this was his plan, because he figured throwing enough Bulwark soldiers at a Mob would eventually work, even if 99% of them died.

Especially if most of them were robotic.

"If The Bulwark takes out the entire Mob under my direction..We go on a date.", his eyebrows wiggled again, he'd really forgotten how to contain himself inside his helmet. Hell, he even slept in it. "And if I don't..You...Get a free Drinking Permit for life. Deal?"

He extended his heavy, guantleted hand to the woman, his eyes large with anticipation and fear.

Mostly fear of her excepting, partly because he hadn't been on a date in years, but mostly because he had no fucking clue how he'd motivate a single other Bulwark member to do anything they didn't absolutely have to.

DHEED scanned her fingerprints when she reached for its visor. It seemed like papers were in order after all the fingerprints made things easier. It took some time to filter through the mountains of forms inside wing city's governmental system. Most forgotten but still legal. Organizational efforts proved difficult after multiple invasions a year so it could get away with beneficial loopholes. When she used Draconic he considered dragons were native to Terra somewhere and the ID of such old creatures could possibly predate wing city's information systems. So there must be an entry form for such a situation. It would get a temporary ID until some clerk got around to looking at the problem unless he got killed by an invasion first. Then it would be a conveniently permanent temporary ID. Odds were pretty good on the latter.

DHEED's translation software had some trouble phrasing things in draconic so its verbose noun forms of modern terms were rather banal, ((Yes. I am a machine. You exist at the top of your shoulders I exist under the city. I have whole bodies like you have fingers. You require identification to enter Wing City limits and pass guard systems.))

Small holographic windows with lengthy and dry forms appear in front of its chest. DHEED just didn't care what her name was and filled out 'hralenkicvisumf' which meant 'Pokes A Lot' in the same language she used. The contractor form got her fingerprints and the limited biometric data low-grade contractors required. Human, made up draconic names for her parents that were impractical to verify anyway, Eye color, height, and a martial weapons permit from a jurisdiction onerous to actually bother confirming with. It hoped she was swifter than her language use to get this over with.

The boxes started filling out among a few contractor forms and the aged form from something called the 'analog integration initiative' that had been forgotten but not marked inactive so the authentication server would happily emit an ID. It didn't wait for a response and just played dumb with the 'questions' that needed answering, "I can recreate your lost identification, hralenkicvisumf. You still require a contractual sponsor for work such as the Bulwark to receive your papers and remain here. Should you have no income it will not require attention to any taxation forms. Would you like to declare and add any martial weapons to your martial weapons permit, hralenkicvisumf?"

Arya shook her head, mostly in disbelief at Juan. He was bold, but probably stupid if he really thought he could bring down any local mob with his Bulwark. Drinking for free was going to be fun.

"Alright, son, you got a deal." Arya told him, "You and me will go on a date if you can take down a mob. You won't, but..."

The Invictus heavy shrugged, "I'm going to enjoy drinking for free. My buddies too. I want everyone to be a little hammered when I tell them this story." She said, taking his hand in her own. Arya couldn't help but smirk at Juan, she was clearly amused by this whole thing.

"You can come see me at The Palace with any updates when you get started, just ask for Bones and they'll send me your way if I'm around."

It didnt phase her in the least what this droid was to do, ID ? She was an Empress of Shadows, she didnt need ID for that did she ? Not entirely, but then this thing talked sense, she smirked at its words, interesting annolgy for sure. She crossed her arms, recreating her lost identifcation, Ok fine, go for it. She thought. She nodded. "If I were to give you a list, it'd be longer then you are tall, so, lets just go with many and worry about it later mm ?" She smirked at the name, yes she poked at technology a lot. prodded the dead alot too.

Her ear however twitched at the mention of two words "the palace" Turning her gaze slightly to the woman at table she went over what she heard, 'You can come see me at The Palace' Where was this.... Palace ? 'Ask for Bones and they'll send me your way....' This Palace sounded more like a military complex than a royal house. Nevertheless, a place to visit for sure. Maybe get some info, some valued items.... It didnt matter really, anything to get info at this point helped, the more resources she could get her hands on the better.

Pleased with his "bargain", Juan turned and strode directly to the door of the little bar. He had to look pretty confident after all, especially for what he had planned next. "Alright men," he barked it without turning around, "Get your asses front, and center, we've got ourselves a goddamn banger hunt." He almost sounded seriously, and commanding. Almost. Mostly he sounded like a stuff man dude, shouting in a recording studio with the treble maxed, and no bass.

He really needed a new helmet, or some kind of speaker system. Or both.

Never the less, he needed to seem cool, collected, and most importantly in-charge. The only problem being he had no clue how Argus would respond. Not only was the guy new, but nobody in the Bulwark ever have an order beyond the occasional "Fuck yourself." This was uncharted territory for Juan, and anyother Bulwark member he'd deal with today.

Productivity, and orders when against his very core, but matters of the heart were serious business. Apparently, not like this had ever happened to Juan before.

"You too robot, march."

High above the city, a teardrop shaped ship flew on feather wings of light. It came over horizon and began descending steeply in dive towards city center. The ship angled down towards a selected point, and like a star it falls towards the ground.