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Week 89: Masking.

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Post  Tansai Kay Tue Mar 24, 2015 11:21 pm

Hugo's book tour had taken him to Magellan Spire, that remote hub of EI decadence, which meant that even by his standards, the hotel he was staying at was somewhat over the top. Spiralling gold mechanisms with no physical purpose twirled around the lobby, beautifully getting in people's way as they made their way across the plush carpet. His agent having already checked him in, he strode towards the stairs leading up to his room before he saw a familar face waiting in one of the huge plush chairs of the lounge. Or at least half a familar face, the rest of it covered with a mask. Tansai pulled herself out of the seat and headed across the floor towards him. "Hey. Been a while, kiddo."
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Post  Hugo Tue Mar 24, 2015 11:33 pm

It took (a very well groomed) Hugo a second to register who his former co-worker was, but when he did his face split into a huge grin. "Tansai!" He moved to embrace her in a massive bear hug, pulling her close. He smelled like ozone and something sharp and clean. "What are you doing here? Busy with work?" His voice was friendly, a little loud, and... utterly, sincerely affectionate. There was a little concern in his eyes, however. "Is everyone alright?"

He was flanked by two people, one of which was a small Asian woman with a shoulder length haircut. She oozed professionalism, and had the patient but intense look of someone who was employed to herd Hugo in the right direction. The other was a young Indian man of middling height, with beautiful hazel eyes and a dark grey suit which offset Hugo's pale blue one.
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Post  Tansai Kay Tue Mar 24, 2015 11:43 pm

Tansai had cleaned up, but there's no hiding the distinct smell of spending a long time in polluted areas which permeated her hair. It smelt like corrupted ash. From within Hugo's arms Tansai replied "I'm fine Hugo. Haven't really been in contact with anyone else." After a moment, she gently pushed away and wiped her suit down.

"I've read your book, by the way." she continued, in a tone of voice worryingly similar to a school teacher about to begin a lecture. "And I thought, given that you were going to be in the area, that I might pop in and talk to you about it."
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Post  Hugo Wed Mar 25, 2015 9:21 am

Hugo sighed slightly and rolled his eyes. "You wanna talk about the book too? You should have booked with Keota!" He laughed a little, but his mood was notably more muted. "But let's go to the room, first. I'm starving." He gave the popular hand sign for <<Fall In>> to his entourage. He moved up the plush stairs, his shiny metallic shoes swishing along the carpet, flanked by the man and woman. There was a large set of elevators at the landing, made of a clear plastic so one could see the lobby and then the decorated elevator tube while going up. When they entered the elevator, he smiled at Tansai. The smell was more obvious here, and he knew it well; it had taken many hand-washings to get it out of Una. "And are you okay? Taking some time for yourself?"
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Post  Tansai Kay Wed Mar 25, 2015 10:56 pm

Tansai laughed. "I considered booking ahead. Or just breaking into your room while you were sleeping, but this way seemed easiest." Her tone was flippant, but Hugo saw how she had glanced at the lift controls as they entered; she may well have actually worked out how to break in. "I'm good. Set up my own company, things are going pretty well. Less action packed than before, but that's fine. Well, I sometimes have to break up gang fights, but that's easy enough when you can fire riot grenades from your arms."

She looked up at the taller agent. "Not much on the personal life front. I think one of the new hires has a crush on me, but they're not really my type."
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Post  Hugo Thu Mar 26, 2015 9:10 am

Hugo chuckled as the elevator sped upwards, showing a full view of the gallery before changing into a view of clouds; as if thy were rising away from the surface of the Earth. "What even is your type? It's hard for me to picture you on a date." He gave a grin to Keota, who was taking the time in the elevator to text and aggressively smeaker since she didn't need to keep an eye on her wandering employer. She didn't even acknowledge him. He sighed and shook his head, before glancing at Tansai. No sense of fun, he seemed to be saying, faux disapproval momentarily on his features.
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Post  Tansai Kay Thu Mar 26, 2015 8:24 pm

Tansai shrugged. "Don't know. Never really had an interest in the whole dating thing. One night stand now and then is fine for me." She glanced out of the window at the image of clouds surrounding them. "Wish they wouldn't do this. I already know the hotel doesn't cover that many floors."

She paused for a moment, as the image grew darker to simulate you disappearing into space, the Earth beneath their feet. "Actually, this bits pretty nostalgic. Didn't think I was going to end up in space quite as much as I did when I first joined."
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Post  Hugo Thu Mar 26, 2015 9:00 pm

Hugo looked down at Tansai, and then down further to the distant Earth. "I spent enough time in space with AMS, and with Oracle.." He trailed off a little. Keota was still continuing to ignore him, but the Indian man gave Hugo a little sympathetic look. He'd probably read the book. Hell, all of EI had probably read the book. "..But there were good times, like the Worldview, too. Man, what a ship. The tour's gonna take us on there at some point, right?"

To this Keota vaguely nodded, but she was always vaguely nodding in a go-getting, encouraging, managerial sort of way. The elevator stopped; it had hardly even felt it was moving to the augmented agents. The screens had pulled them up to a castle floating in space, with shining golden spires and gleaming ramparts. It took them closer, to a balcony which opened onto a rooftop.. All ostentatious and overdone, but objectively beautiful all the same. The doors opened, and screens, holograms, and real props made the transition from elevator to flawless. "Huh. When Alessandro was here, apparently there was a peaceful under-sea scene. That would have been cool." He walked down the hallway, leading his guardians, and Tansai, to his room.
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Post  Tansai Kay Fri Mar 27, 2015 11:11 pm

"I didn't actually go on the Worldview trip. I was busy." said Tansai, shrugging before nodding vaguely back towards Keota. She stepped off of the lift into the corridor, glancing around at the space palace. "I think they mix up the locations each time you change your room bookings. I saw a brochure with a huge forest version on it."

She paused, before reaching into her pocket and pulling out a small datapad. "Oh, by the way, here." she said, handing the huge Hugo it. On it was a smeaker frequency and encryption code. "I had to remove the Oracle codes, and it's annoying not being able to use this."
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Post  Hugo Sat Mar 28, 2015 4:41 pm

Hugo took the data pad, laughing a little. "Mortherfucker, shit, I forgot you didn't come with us. But, well, I did spend most of it... less than sober." There was a momentary notice informing Tansai that someone was pinging her smeaker frequency, and Hugo walked down the hall to his room. "Testing, testing, here's mine."

Outloud, he added, "Here's us." There were no numbers on the (two) other doors, just names, titles. There was the Duke's Ballroom, the King's Suite, and the last, the Princess' Larder. He tapped on the door, which opened with the touch. Inside, there was a large open space fit with roaring fire, tons of seating, and a bar and food area that could have fit 50. "..Bigger than I thought. And the station is paying for this?" Keota nodded again, and grunted, "For parties after the show. They expect it."
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Post  Tansai Kay Sun Mar 29, 2015 4:23 pm

Tansai slipped into the room behind Hugo, glancing around at the room. "That's one huge princess if this is all her larder." she joked, tapping her fingers on the tables before kneeling down and inspecting the surface. "Not real wood, but bloody good synthetic." she announced, tapping it rather hard. "Which is probably good. No cyberwolves coming after you for not using a coaster." Her face did the weird movement that Hugo knew meant she was smiling under her mask, and her tone was clearly joking.

Her tone over smeaker was less jokey. "I talked to Silvia, by the way, after your trial."
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Post  Hugo Sun Mar 29, 2015 4:39 pm

Hugo didn't seem interested in the counters, but nodded along with Tansai's terrible jokes. Instead, he opened the fridge and gave a snort of delight. "These look like real sandwiches, though. Wow, look, even little leaves on it! Lettuce? Amazing. Come grab some, everybody!" He took a large sandwich, made with a whole loaf of crusty bread with a bunch of meat and sauces, and chomped down with every sign of enjoyment. The rest of the room, with it's warm fire, plush couches, and stairs leading up to who knows what other kinds of master bedrooms, were ignored for food. Hugo made happy noises while eating.

However, there was enough pausing between bites to smeaker rather less jollily. "I haven't yet." For a moment, between bites, he looked a bit.. despondent.
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Post  Tansai Kay Sun Mar 29, 2015 7:10 pm

Tansai grabbed a sandwich herself, and began pulling it apart into small square towers of bread and filling. She picked one up and it disappeared under the mask with a slight "Fwoop" sound, leaving no crumbs visible on the mask. "Damn, real mustard. How much are you paying for this room?" she asked, as if she couldn't afford it herself fairly easily.

"Can't blame you. She's done one of her whole disappearing into the jungle acts. I could barely get her to stick around for an evening before she hopped on a plane. I wasn't going to say anything about it until I read your book."
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Post  Hugo Sun Mar 29, 2015 7:37 pm

"Oh, it's all the publisher, the news stations, some.. more earnest fans, too." Hugo nodded a bit, and looked to Keota for confirmation. She nodded, taking a sandwich in one hand, and not eating it, and using the other to slide and write on her tablet. The holoscreen showed a page with cramped information. "Tonight's is paid for in part by The Magellan Nuke Society, in addition to the B&S local." She sounded slightly more relaxed than before, and even had a tentative bite of her sandwich. "Ooh, good mustard, too."

Hugo gave a look to Keota and to the still unnamed Indian man, who had also helped himself and was chowing down with every sign of enjoyment. There was silence for a moment as they ate. He smeakered, "I figured... About her running, I mean." He chewed with less gusto, but with the exception from a couple of brief glances from his male companion, it passed without comment. "She didn't want to be in the book, at all."
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Post  Tansai Kay Wed Apr 22, 2015 2:31 pm

Tansai inhaled another square and chewed it pensively. "I can see why the Nukes would be interested. They could use some good press. Also, you know, famous party going nuke and all that." She leant on the side. "Got to admit, I was a bit disappointed you didn't mention me that often. You missed some cool stuff there."

"I know she didn't want to be. That's not what I was getting at. It's the rest of the stuff in there I want to talk to you about."
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Post  Hugo Wed Apr 22, 2015 10:42 pm

Hugo chewed, giving Tansai a look. She was mentioned a fair few times, but well, they hadn't really socialized much, so what was there to write about. He smiled though, raising a hand in the international sign for "give me a minute, delicious food here".

The food barely interrupted his smeaking, however. "No, of course you do. Everyone does." There was only the faintest hint of a sigh.
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Post  Tansai Kay Mon May 04, 2015 12:35 am

Tansai continued devouring the food, not a single crumb staining her mask somehow. "Relax. I'm not annoyed at you. It was a good thing you did not including Silvia. But I caught her just after your grand trial, before she disappeared off into a swamp, and we talked it over. I wanted to know your side of the situation, get all the context before I give her any terrible advice about it."
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Post  Hugo Mon May 04, 2015 5:27 pm

Hugo looked only very slightly nonplussed, wondering where to start. His brow furrowed. He ate his sandwich a bit. It really was very good. He sighed. He cast a glance around for a pickle. He turned to Tansai. He turned back to his food. Eventually, he spoke, or at least smeakered.

"I, like, my whole thing, what I do..." Useless, he waved a hand and tried again. "When I first found out she liked me, I was afraid I was gonna hurt her. She was just so little, and so.. soft. But I wanted to know if I ever did anything.. mean, untoward, if I got.. carried away and didn't listen if she said to stop.. I wanted to know she could stop me." He looked at Tansai here, his mouth smirking a little. "And now, well, she's fucking lethal. Those spines.. I turn my toxin filter off, and she could shoot those things out and kill me easier than just about anyone else." There was approval, affection, even a little lust in his voice as he said that. Then his smile saddened. "But, there's more to being strong than just.. being strong. It's not enough to know she could kill me, I need to know she would, or at least fight, if I did something... If she was uncomfortable, if I.. if I fucked up."

He shook his head. "I told her about the book, and every single part of her was screaming that she hated it, she wanted nothing to do with it, that she wanted nothing to do with it, but she still said I could include her if it would make me happy." His face conveyed what the muffled smeaker was trying to, disgust, disappointment. "If she's that afraid to say no about the book, what would stop her if we were even more focused on fucking, or.. Who knows what else? She thought that she would do it to make me happy, and that's.. that's the worst. She'd just let me be terrible if it would make me happy. And that would be the worst of all, right?"
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