Power Play: The Mechanic

Power Play: The Mechanic
Date of Scene:	28 January 2014
Location:	Argon City
Synopsis:	Avira and Deelel head down to Able's for Avira to get a chance to talk to Mara about the events in Purgos. Deelel waits outside to stand watch and work on an art project while Mara seems to think there is more to Avira than she's letting on.
Cast of Characters:	Avira, Mara, Deelel

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Mara has posed:
Accessing Archive Data.

Mara had been looking into a small power issue effecting Able's Garage in purgos where she ran into some old friend and some new ones. She'd managed to make her way back to the Garage and was trying to put some of the strangeness out of her mind.

Avira and Deelel had other plans in mind to drag Mara perhaps back into the truth of the matter. Finally General Tesler also tells everyone what the real source of the problem is.

Outside Abel's garage a pair of light cycles pull up and Deelel looks over her shoulder to Avira as her's comes to a halt.

"All right I'll be waiting out here, just say your bringing the bike in for maintenance hopefully they won't be too over burdened with repairs and other jobs to handle something unannounced."

Deelel's own bike vanishes and she rezzes something else which looks almost like art tools and seems to be working son some project or another involving the local landscape.

Avira has posed:
Talk about some bad timing!

Avira had actually been 'around' when the various screens of Aragon City were suddenly filled with Tessler's announcement. Hearing it sent a shiver down her spine (both of them, really) though the content of the message had mostly directed its aggression against the Renegade. Of course, the Renegade wasn't to blame at all-it was those mysterious thugs and their (apparently weird for the Grid) weapons.

Avira slows to a stop and dismounts from her bike, the helmet of her suit sliding back to reveal her face. The circuit lines on her suit still glow pale white though the Spine is nowhere in sight, now fully camoflaged into her suit. Hopefully she wouldn't need to pull a weapon because she'd have to resort to using the disc to fight with-something Avira was actually not that good at.

"Got it." Avira says, stepping back to let the bike derez back into baton form. Turning it over in her hand, she casually walks into the garage.

"Ummm...helloooooo?" she calls out awkwardly.

Mara has posed:
Calling it a Garage may be more Flynn's doing long, long ago. Why? Because it's more like a factory then an Garage there are dozens of huge hulking red lined light tanks being worked on, light trucks, cars, even light jets, also row after row of light cycles are being worked on the the various programs that work here.

There are milling about but a male program with a odd bowl hair cut looks up from where he's working and calls out to her.

"Greetings, welcome to Able's Garage? What do you need? You break em, we fix em."

The program seems to be pleasant enough but there's something about he says Able that hints at some level of sadness. Deelel would have spoken of Able and how he was one of the first programs Flynn made after Clu, and just how respected and honestly he was loved by the population of Argon. One could only guess how his loss would have effected the basics who worked for him. The odd thing is he has some semi transparent gear with a green tent over his eyes like goggles and about his wrist displaying some other data likely about the bike he's working on right now.

Avira has posed:
Seeing the array of CLU-aligned tanks gives Avira some pause. It'd been quite some time since the incident with Mercade and beyond that, aside from a meatspace association with the 'Renegade', there really wasn't any reason she'd catch heat from CLU. ...being a User aside.

Still, she had nothing to worry about and relaxes. "Hello! It's my Light Cycle, it could use a real tune-up." Avira says, letting the baton flip over her palm in her hand. "Figured...better come to the best."

She looks over at the tanks in the garage, her mouth drawing into a worried frown. "...if you can fit me in, that is." As she looks, she also scans around for Mara.

Mara has posed:
The male program grins at that.

"You'll not find better even in Tron city."

He notes before a teal haired woman comes up to the pair and speaks up.

"Zed, thanks. I'll deal with our customer here. There's somethings I want to talk to her about."

Mara seems friendly enough she's down right pleasant really

"First I wanted to say thank you for your help, and you say you need your light cycle worked on I'll handle it. The name is Mara, and I never caught your name."

She offers Avira her hand for a shake and seems to be taking a look over her for a moment.

Avira has posed:
Avira can't help but think 'there's a Tron city'? Does TRON know about this..? She'll have to figure that out later.

Casually, she passes the baton over to Zed. Or she starts to before Mara intercepts his potential customer. The friendliness is encouraging but her words elicit a bad feeling in the pit of her stomach.

Despite that, she smiles. "Oh?" So much for remaining unconnected, but at least Mara seemed thankful to be out of that small spot. Avira transfers the light bike baton to her left hand and shakes Mara's with her right. "Avira. My name is Avira."

Still smiling, she offers the baton. "How have you been holding up?"

Mara has posed:
Mara looks to Avira as she intercept the Baton and moves for one of the opnf the few free stalls and gestures for Avira to follow her as she takes the baton from her. She takes a deep breath, an oddly human thing one wouldn't expect a program who hadn't been outside to do before she says.

"IT's been hard since Able died to be honest."

She rezzes the bike and gets ready to work on it.

"Still you and your friends were something it's strange to see that many combat able progames these days seemingly still freelance."

Avira has posed:
Inwardly, Avira breathes a sigh of relief. Maybe, in the confusion, Mara had been so blinded by her anger with the Renegade to notice. That would work out good for her, wouldn't it? That reaction still betrayed a very weary-sounding response before its even said.

"Oh. I'm sorry to hear that. I ran into a program named Beck the other day. He seemed pretty worried about this place."

After a moment she adds, "And worried about you."

But she laughs off the note about freelancing with a friendly laugh. "Well...someone's gotta step up and do the right thing, right? Especially in Purgos." the worried look returns. "That place is really dangerous lately. Did the outages bring you out there?"

Mara has posed:
Mara says "Beck? So you know him?"

She warms up a little bit at that but him being Worried.

"Look someone has to keep the Garage together and that someone is me, his concern's touching but I know hwat I'm doing."

She gets to work on the bike and just scares.

"When was the last time you did maitnace ont his thing it looks like it's not seen any for half a cycle and what has it been driven over?"

She gets to work as the talk contiunes.

"The outages have been effective the Garage and General Tesler will not tolerate delays on any order he puts in here."

She smiles at Avira's comment as she works.

"Purgos was a boom town before the purge, it went bad after Flynn vanished."

Avira has posed:
"Yes. I've run into him a few times before. Yesterday included." She tries to pass it off as casual, again. Don't make her seem like she knows Beck too well-frankly, she doesn't. That's easy. "W..well, it's not just the garage. It's you too. That he's worried about."

After a few moments, she reacts with embarassment. "Well. Uh. It's been around Purgos a few times. Been...pretty busy lately...No time to bring it in." She considers adding more excuses but figures that's enough.

Speaking of excuses though-Avira frowns. "...well that's a little unfair. Don't they know the outages are effecting the garage?" Placing her hands on her hips, she turns away from Mara and the bike to look at the vast array of parked tanks. "Then again.." she says quietly, "...I'm not sure Tessler would be known for being fair anyway." She tilts her head, "Did you find anything while you were in Purgos?"

Mara has posed:
Mara says "He's generally the one to get into more trouble than I do."

Mara actually seems amused about that still Beck cares, it's good to honestly know such.

"Purgos has been busy, far too busy."

She takes a tool and the entire bike goes transparent as she works. She seems to be just fiddling with parts, that would be impossible to do with something made in Avira's world.

"No, he's not I intend to protect everyone here as best I can. I'm not about to lose anyone to the games. We all lost enough friends already. Actually I did it. Looks like whoever behind it has got into Purgos energy distribution station. That's the most logical place to tap the city's energy grid."

The power then without warning flickers as the garage goes dark for a moment and it boots back up.

"It's getting more common. At this rate they are going to start rationing energy to the non military programs."

She doesn't seem happy about this as she keeps working on Avira's bike. Mara pauses for a moment as another question hits her mind.

"So what city are you from, and how did you know that Deejay?"

Avira has posed:
"Really?" Avira laughs. "I wouldn't have guessed it." That is a lie. Avira knows firsthand that Beck gets into trouble pretty much all the time. At least in meatspace that trouble is a little less dire.

As Mara works, she can't help but be fascinated by her method and at how easily she can pick apart the bike. A marvel of programming, no doubt. "Not going to lie. Things look pretty rough in this city. I'm not in the business of pointing fingers but..." As if on queue, the power goes off, leaving them all in darkness save for the ambient light of their suits.

She files away that name for later, though, assuming Beck or Deelel would know where that is. "Is that where you were trying to go? When you were in Purgos?"

Mara asks a question that should be very simple for her to answer but instead, Avira pauses awkwardly. "Well, I met Deelel in a club a few cycles ago.." Quick, she needed a city! She tries to tap Deelel for that but as the seconds tick away, she starts hoping for a distraction instead. Maybe the lights will go off again.

Mara has posed:
Mara says "It's true, he's likely one of the biggest trouble makers I know."

She seems a bit amused about the comment on Beck as she works. She then pulls a part flat out, and starts working on it, it's showing pixlation like when Deelel's hurt, interestingly Mara is getting it back totehter and pushes it back into place once she's done.

"Yes that's where I was trying to go, till I ran into the goon squad. I have never seen weapons like those. There's a few that the Security Programs have but those are all designed to counter things like Light Tanks."

Hat and Pavel shot at her once with one of those when she was going to be quartered.

She looks at Mara for a moment seemingly amused, it was true entertainment programs traveled sometimes but why is Avira pausing?

"Where did you meet...?"

Mara has posed:
There is thankfully for Avira, a power flicker which happens and this one lasts a bit longer than the previous one.

Avira has posed:
As those seconds pass, Avira still manages to look natural. Nothing was wrong here, nope. "I've never seen weapons like that before either." Avira admits, "Which is strange. In my line of work you see a lot of weird things." All truthful things to say. She hasn't seen that kind of weaponry before...in the hands of Programs.

Fortunately, Dee comes through for her. That, combined with the power outage distraction give her enough time.

"Gallium City. It feels like forever ago now, ha ha ha..." Mara might not see how relieved Avira looks during the blackout.

Mara has posed:
Mara says "Gallium? It seems she does get around then. As for the weapons it's concerning. Who could have produced something like those?"

Was Flynn up to something? Was it ISO remants or was something worse lurking out there. She doesn't want to think to o hard about that. The outage did save Avira, from getting notice but Mara does think she's a bit strange.

"True the cycles do seem to go past quite fast. Let's see here It hink I almost have it but what did you do to this cycle? It looks like it's been through a small war..."

Avira has posed:
"Deelel...certainly does do a lot of traveling, yes." Man, if Mara only knew the extent Deelel has traveled. Her mind would be completely blown. ..or whatever the blown mind equivalent is for Programs. Flipped bits maybe?

"Those weapons, that's part of what I'm into investigating." Well, not quite, but it made a convenient excuse. "I hope to get some answers soon. Those things were...dangerous." Casually, she rests her hands on her hips. "This bike? Well...it's been a very long time since I've had it serviced." Fleeing from the games that one time a while back was likely hard on it. Including the number of other fights Deelel used her bike in offensively.

Mara has posed:
Mara would likely BSOD to hear of a program being outside the system in the world that Flynn came from. After all Flynn came from somewhere but nothing is really known by most basics about it, other than it's there.

"Those weapons? Who could have developed them. I can only thing of a few people who might be able to and most of them work for Tesler or Clu."

The Blackguard would have them logically and they don't which leaves a few people who are cubed or missing. If it was one of the missing ones why would he give the weapons to programs like that?

"It certainly looks like it's been well used, I am still mystifed about some of the damage. You could only get that going over the outlands...but these bikes don't work there."

She peers at Avira.

Avira has posed:
Avira's tried to be careful about what she's said to locals. She doesn't want to disrupt the system. She doesn't want to spread panic about the confusing outside or Users existing. Still, sometimes hiding the truth gets pretty tricky.

"Maybe they did. Or maybe." Avira's eyes narrow. She knows of another Program that has the capability of influencing a data world like this. "Or maybe a virus created them. That's what I'm thinking...that announcement from Tessler earlier has me wondering. Of course I'm a little biased."

Antivirals were like the police of the Data World if her discussions with TRON were any indication. If she was going with the freelance idea, it'd make her like a bounty hunter, right? Or a DETECTIVE.

"Are you sure? Because I sure as heck haven't been driving that over the Outlands. Maybe it happened in Purgos-that sector needs some serious reformatting."

Mara has posed:
Mara stops dead in her tracks at the mention of a virus she just haults for a moment.

"There's only ever been one virus on the grid. It was an ISO that glitched out, he's been long derezzed. So far as I know."

Mara hopes Abraxas is cubed, it take something meddling on par with Flynn to make something like that happen again. She tries to not focus on memories of those events. She was fortnate to be so far away from the infection in Argon. She contiunes to work on it.

"Maybe that's it."

She doesn't seem to fully take Avira's story at face value but she'll not press on it. Avira did save her right.

"Just about done here, as for the station? You and your friends are going to check that out, I take it?"

Avira has posed:
Whoah, that reaction. Avira considers admitting she didn't know that but she'd appear as a pretty crappy antivirus if she did.

"Just keep this between you and me but...I think there's another one." Avira says, her voice lowered, "And I don't think it's the Renegade either." Mentally she makes a note to ask about that former virus later. No need to raise more suspicions as there were already some brewing over the condition of her bike.

She keeps her voice low and answers Mara with a brief nod of the head. One hand lifts to press against her lips in a sshhing sort of motion. "The power outages cannot continue. Someone will get to the bottom of this."

Mara has posed:
Mara is just about finished he work as Avira makes the comment about there might be another virus. the Renegade was a malcontent, not a viral. She hated him but didn't want to for lack of a better term degrade a program lk that.

"I see and yout hink this is involved. I'll show you and your friends the way, no I'm not taking no for an answere on this."

Mara finishes up turns the bike back into it's baton forma nd hands it to Avira.

"All fixed up, it should be good, jut bring it in a bit more often or you might need to fully replace it."