Week 79, In Taiwan: Worries. No, not worries. Concerns.

Taiwan was beautiful. Could have been beautiful. May once have been beautiful. It wasn't really beautiful. It was kind of crappy actually. Horrible, and gross. And... Terrible. Yeah, it was pretty terrible. Still people called it home. People he cared about a lot, in a sort of associative way. So.. He could understand their need to protect it. It was home. But it would be nice to leave. of course, they weren't, not for a few hours... He sighed deeply, looking around. Soon.

Eventually his eyes fell on Stephen, another silent watcher of the landscape while they waited for the appropriate time to make their escape. He gave his fellow ex-Fed agent a brief smile, and flashed a nonchalant <<Situation Normal. Update Your Position?>>. But he didn't expect and excited reply.

Stephen was likewise staring out at the landscape, although his thoughts were less preoccupied with its aesthetic qualities and more concerned with identifying potential hiding spots, threats, and sort of out-of-place movement or scenery, and he frequently lifted his rifle to peer down the scope at a potential target. Fortunately for the moment all was quiet, and he looked over to Hugo to catch the sign, acknowledging with a nod, and raising a hand to respond.

<<Situation Unknown,>> he signed back. <<Possible trouble.>> His hand hovered in the air uncertainly for a few seconds as he searched for a way to phrase his concerns. <<Squad status: damaged morale. Infiltrator specialist All Fucked Up, understood?>>

Hugo's brow furrowed. There was a small nod, and a flurry of signs. <<F Sees D as Ai Jinn Threat>>. He frowned more, looking over the terrain but signing back, <<Sees Me as Ai Jinn Ally>>, then <<Personal Damaged Morale>>. He shook his head. The words weren't right, but they were conveyed with the hurt facial expressions Stephen could read across the short distance. <<F Personal History with Ai Jinn Damaged Morale>>, he eventually conceded, <<Unsure on How to Proceed. Requesting Orders>>.

<<F requires specialist support,>> Stephen rapidly flicked back. <<You require R&R. Schedule a mission?>> A possible glimpse of movement caught his eye and he raised his rifle to stare off into the distance, switching to a private smeaker channel to continue the conversation while his hands were occupied.

"Girl ain't right in the head," he muttered. "Better get herself seen to. Ain't her fault, but she needs help. Seems to me, though, she ain't the type to go lookin' for any, and us bunch, well... we ain't exactly psychiatrists, are we? I'm startin' to figure we might want to sort something out for her, but hell if I know where to look..." He finally lost interest in whatever it was he had seen out in the wastes and let the rifle drop, but kept talking on the smeaker regardless, his hands instead going through his pockets and pouches in hunt of an elusive item. "Don't take too personally whatever she says. She's been through a lot and still seems to be goin' through it one way or another. Heh, we get back, we can go hit the town sometime and I'll buy you a beer. Or a bar. Fuckin' money." He shook his head as he realised just how ridiculous the offer of buying drinks was, between the two agents.

Hugo grinned at the offer of alcohol, and seemed to relax a little as Stephen kept talking. "My playground has a bar, full time, so.. I already own a bar." He sighed and looked back out over the terrain. The Mule-Tech full of Nutribars he had brought were almost completely gone, the BioCleene used to wipe the gore from his teammates, and.. There really was nothing for them here without the help of the Resistance. He felt... weird. "...There were a lot of people on that space prison, compadre. Not just locked up but.. running it. I killed a lot of them and set the bombs that got the rest." There wasn't any remorse in his words, just the simple restating of facts. "The people there. There was a... person that wasn't much more than a bunch of twitching, pain... meat. And there was a guy who probably hadn't had seen another person for years, a psychic, just alone in a tiny box for... for forever. He tried to psychic blast my brains out. I got him back to Jerusalem, but the Order killed him." There was still no emotion there, as his hands signed <<Danger to Squad/Corporation/Citizens>>, but he wasn't making eye contact with Stephen.

He shook his head again. "I've been looking for months, but I just only found his name."

"Shit, amigo, that sucks," Stephen replied, dropping into the spanglish hybrid when Hugo did. "Well... you wanna look on the bright side, fella like that probably don't work like a normal human bein' no more. Can't imagine how he musta been on the inside. Least he ain't sufferin' no more, you know what I mean? Same goes for the rest of the folks on that station. Ain't the happiest endin' for sure, but it's an endin' one way or another, and that's better than the alternative for some."

He paused briefly to consider Hugo's words. "Telepath, huh? He anythin' to do with that raid we pulled on the Two Snakes warehouses? Patient lists and psychic procedures... trackin' down your mystery man? Escaped subject get picked up by the Ai-Jinn, or somethin'?"

Hugo nodded, finally giving Stephen with an appraising look. "Dunno. Most of the stuff was wiped. They made him a biokine. Some other corp, a long time ago. Fifty years? More? And I don't know how long he was in that little box. Don't know why. But they did bad shit to him to make him that way." The nuke adjusted Una in his arms, and looked down at her black pearl shell. "Corps do bad shit to people. Alexi, my friend, he's a mercenary. His wife's a nurse. From the EI. He's here, somewhere, on this terrible island. I haven't heard from him for six weeks. Hell, his wife hasn't. I want him to be a bouncer at Our Game."

Hugo was obviously thinking something, but he was half-talking aloud as he realized to realize what it is. "I have a lot of friends. I.. try to be a good one. And I see a lot of shit. I think.. Corps are bad. But I wouldn't hate everyone in a whole corp, even if the whole corp hated me. My friends in AMS don't respond anymore, but... I don't hate them. But the guy, the psychic, he hated everyone. He tried to kill me and I was trying to help him. I... I don't know."

Stephen looked over at Hugo, his brows creased in slight worry. "I feel you, amigo. This world... well, it ain't really that great when you get down to the brass tacks, is it? The people in charge do some bad shit, for sure. Hell, I got outta the Fed cause I just couldn't be part of that anymore. The lyin', propaganda, how harsh they are and how they treat the people who want it better... difficult to go shut down an Underground cell when a man gets to figurin' he should be on the other side of the line, you know?"

The drawl was slower than usual, and Stephen was clearly thinking as he spoke too. "Shit... I don't usually get to thinkin' like this 'less I'm drinkin' by myself. Whatever. But you know, Hugo, you are a good person, you hear me? You look after your family and your friends, you want people to be happy. Shit, you try and help people you just met even after they try and kill you with mind lasers, and you know that whatever happened to him to make him that way it ain't your fault. I guess... some of them you can't save, you know? But you try. That's what counts." The statements grew more determined as he continued, and by the end he was nodding seriously.

"Yeah. I... Yeah." He didn't sound convinced, but after a moment he looked over at Stephen and grinned. He felt much less weird and his fellow ex-Fed was... He was.. great. He made him feel better. "Shit, compadre. You're good at this shit. And.. You're a good friend too. Better than anyone I had in basic or AMS or anything. I just... I just treat people like people should treat people when they are friends." He didn't even seem to notice how badly phrased the sentence was, and he was smiling as he gave another look around to the terrain before focusing back on Stephen, obviously in a slightly better mood. "..I just wish Fenrir wasn't mad at me."

"Hey, I'm just tryin' to tell it like it is. Least, how I think it is. This whole bein' honest thing gets me into trouble 'bout as often as it helps out, you know?" Stephen was staring out at the scenery again, his eyes darting back and forth across the landscape, but he was grinning as he did so. "Fenris might be mad at you, but like I said, girl's got problems and she needs help. She's still your friend, you know? Wouldn't care so much if she wasn't, I reckon. Get her better, she'll calm down, and things'll be alright." Stephen nodded confidently. "We just gotta work out how to make her better. Must be someone out there who handles this kind of thing." He sounded quite sure that whatever Fenris's issue was, it would be easy to solve by finding an appropriately qualified person to deal with it.

Hugo racked his brain, tilting his head as he visibly thought. "I gotta be honest, I don't think I know anyone who.. heals people's brains. I know a bunch of doctors, but nobody who deals with trauma. And I know a lot of people, compadre." He frowned. "Except for psych evals, I don't know anything about them." He sounded worried. No, not worried. Concerned. He looked aver at Stephen again, unsure of who would even be a qualified professional for this.

"A psychiatric evaluation sounds like it's goin' in the right direction," Stephen mused. "This kind of thing is what the psych stuff is all about, right? Noted that Oracle doesn't seem that hot on keepin' tabs on their agents, though..." He paused briefly, scratching his stubble in thought, until seemingly struck by a sudden idea. "Well, shit, what about Miss Masuda back at HQ? This whole kind of... uh, field, it's got some overlap with that ethics philosophy stuff, right? Maybe we should drop in on her when we get back, express some concerns. Don't gotta name names but she might know where to point us if we're tryin' to find that kind of help. Whaddya reckon?"

"Y..yeah! She actually seemed nice in email. She would know someone, or.. where to go, anyway. Yeah! That's a great idea. So.. Let's do that. And.. ..I don't know. Maybe Fenrir will forgive me for.. whatever, later. She can't be mad forever, right?" He grinned hopefully, fully aware Fenris had changed her name and had tattoo'd her face for.. some revenge based reason. But she surely wouldn't hold a grudge this long? Right? ..Right?

"She won't be if we help her out," Stephen reasoned. "Kind of the whole point, ain't it? But hey, we got us a plan of action, best we can do is see it out and see what happens. Can't fix nothin' if we don't try!" He gave Hugo a thumbs up and then signed a quick <<strategy confirmed>>. Now all they had to do was get back to the mainland without fucking everything up and they'd be well on the way to sorting out this mess.