Log: Settling In

[notyourrookie]

Who: Agent Washington (OU)+open!
What: Adjusting to life in Gulch
Where: Scoping out the city (Shopping District, Park, a cafe)
When: Between October 26th and 30th
Warnings: None



York's safe house really had turned out to be a good choice. The security was good and it does make him feel better knowing that it was there. Lets him sleep more easily, when he actually manages anyway. It's better than staying in the casino with the constant noise of people outside leaving him on edge.

Getting to grips with the city is a top priority though, and has him heading out . Exploring. Scoping out is probably more accurate, treating it like he would a mission.

The shopping district seems the best place to start, busiest at least, and a good place to figure out what's normal here. The helmet store has a wide variety of them in the window, and he scans a catalogue showing enhancements and mods that are available. Some of those would be pretty useful if he's honest with himself. There's weapons shops too; nothing as heavy as the weaponry he's used to having at his disposal, but it's a start. There's a nice set of knives in there too. Now that is something he's going to have to get hold of.

He spends lunches in the park. It's a little surreal to see the covered ceiling up above and know that the sky outside could kill him, but it's nice to take off his helmet for a while. The place is climate controlled, and considering the last places he'd been at home had been a desert, an icy wasteland and a humid pit of a canyon, he's not complaining.

There's a little cafe a few minutes walk from the safehouse that stays open all night, and it's a better option to be there than sitting awake and twitchy in the safe house when he can't sleep.

Comments

[notyourrookie]

She finishes treating the cuts and scrapes on his hands, so they're covered up against the plague clouds. "Thanks," he says, and he means it. Even if this would never have happened if he was wearing gauntlets. "I'd have hated to die because of a few clouds."

[oquirrh_at_the_wheel]

"These clouds don't mess around," she reminds him. "Having to clean plague toxins off of your clothes is bad enough, but they corrode open wounds and sear soft tissue like acid. You've got a good helmet, right?"

[notyourrookie]

"Yeah, I want to avoid that." He doesn't need any more scars if he can avoid them. "It's good, yeah. Be easier if I could wear my armour but people don't go in for that here."

[oquirrh_at_the_wheel]

"Armor? You have a full suit like that? Isn't that heavy?"

How awesome would that be in a place like Sidewinder?

[notyourrookie]

"It takes some getting used to," he admits with a shrug, because the armour isn't so surprising but the specs were. "But I've been living in it for oh- a few years so it's weird to not have it now."

[oquirrh_at_the_wheel]

"Living in it? Doesn't that get uncomfortable?"

[notyourrookie]

He shrugs at that. "Better than getting killed. I used to take it off to sleep and that was it." And more recently, not even then. He didn't want to be around the Meta without it.

[oquirrh_at_the_wheel]

That sounds a lot like her winter gear. Back in Sidewinder, she used to sleep in her warm layers; only the outer, waterproof shell ever came off.

"How bad was it?" she asks. "Where you came from?"

[notyourrookie]

That was a loaded question, but easy enough to answer if he didn't have to talk about it personally. "Well, humanity has been at war with the Covenant for my entire life until recently. The threat of extinction is never a fun one."

[oquirrh_at_the_wheel]

"Extinction?" That...wow. "Covenant? Are they--" Not human, so "aliens?"

[notyourrookie]

"They want to wipe out humanity. They weren't doing a bad job of it." You heard the stories, even away from the front lines. The crew of the MoI received messages. "Yeah. Bunch of 'em."

[oquirrh_at_the_wheel]

it sounds to her like he's not missing much. ... No. That's not fair. He would have left people behind.

"And you fought them?" she asks instead.

[notyourrookie]

He nodded briefly. "Yeah. Saw action on the front lines for a while. The last few years I was special ops, part of a special project. Saw plenty of action there too, but mainly against the Insurrection."

[oquirrh_at_the_wheel]

"Insurrection? As in, a human insurrection?" she asks. "Why would people do that when they're supposed to be fighting for their survival?"

[notyourrookie]

"Yeah. It's been a problem for years. Terrorists." His shrug is dismissive. "I don't know. Money, power. People still want all of that even when humanity is at war."

[oquirrh_at_the_wheel]

"That's despicable," she whispers. "...but not entirely surprising, I guess."

[notyourrookie]

"People are always selfish. Doesn't matter what's going on."

[oquirrh_at_the_wheel]

"Yeah." She can't argue with that. Even though she cleaned his hands for him and bought him a drink, she knows how selfish she is about other things.

Like wanting to be in Armonia right now.

[notyourrookie]

"I'm sure now the war is mostly over, everyone can get back to hating each other." They'd be back to fighting Insurrectionists and trying to drag back the scattered colonies in no time.

[oquirrh_at_the_wheel]

"Nobody's there to make them get along?" It's a longshot, she supposes, but somebody has to do something.

[notyourrookie]

"UNSC is the main force and they're one of the sides fighting. They're kind of... Earth-centric. It's just a mess."

[oquirrh_at_the_wheel]

"That sounds familiar. We have an UNSC here and they're the same way."

[notyourrookie]

"I believe it. An organisation like that is always going to favour where the money comes from, where their elite come from."

[oquirrh_at_the_wheel]

"But they settled this planet so they could mine fuel out of it," she says. "You'd think they would care at least a little."

[notyourrookie]

"Sure they do. About the fuel." He sighs and drags a hand through his hair. "It's... people are cheap. As many of them can get slaughtered by the Covvies as needed. But the tech? The tech absolutely cannot fall into their hands. Recover or Destroy."