( video + action )

[mucked]

Who: Peggy Carter + YOU
Broadcast: Video, fleet-wide.
Action: SS Starstruck
When: 12/7

[ the feed clicks on with an abrupt vision of peggy carter, sitting (once more) on the starstruck's bridge. today, however, she's without the casual accouterments of tea or mug or whatever what might suggest her address is anything but business-like. ]

Have we got anyone amidst our number who might be considered to be considered a de-facto expert on these...implants of ours? [ ... ] I've got questions to ask. And I've heard tell of at least one person attempting to remove theirs. If it's an undertaking that anyone else has pursued, I wouldn't mind a little chat.

[ -- she puffs her cheeks and (upon a moment's consideration) adds a disclaimer: ] I have heard about how fruitless and frankly painful the attempt likely is -- rest assured, I'm not pining for any sort of elective surgery. [ not yet, at least. ]

For the time being, let's call it a mere preliminary investigation.

[ and one she doesn't like talking about over the damned network -- but if others are right, it's not as though they have much privacy off the broadcasts, either. she'll make her first fresh inroads in this fashion, and return her work to the shadows when required. ]

Comments

[stagstorm]

[When prisoners consisted of kings and highborn hostages, that might well be true. All the same...]

Mayhaps. If this implant was removed, what would come of it?

[mucked]

One might hypothesize that a fleet-member, having been relieved of his or her implant, might have an easier time going AWOL.

[stagstorm]

What happens when one is... AWOL.

[mucked]

One is absent, sir. Without leave.

[stagstorm]

Then why not bloody say so?

[Though she did address him as a knight. That's more than what he's been getting from most people.]

[mucked]

Hn. [ sharp. impatient. ] Why bloody not, indeed.

[stagstorm]

[He frowns, unappreciative of the attitude.] So without these implants, we might leave? How?

[mucked]

I imagine it's how they're tracking us, for one.

[stagstorm]

A kind of scent, is it? Bastards. [He strokes his beard, unusually thoughtful for his normal demeanor - a hazard of too little drinking. Even if I removed my own, I would need to do the same for the remaining crew.

[mucked]

And, by all other reports, that might be thinking ahead by far too many miles.

[stagstorm]

[He growls lowly in frustration.] It would be a problem easier solved if they weren't such cravens. I would rather die in combat ten rot away in these metal beasts.

[mucked]

[ her chin lifts. and she looks at the feed (almost) with admiration. ] A soldier, are we?

[ -- but the man has '4f' written all over him, from appearances. ]

[stagstorm]

A soldier. A knight. Aye, all of that. [And more. But he gains no pleasure out of being a king. Let himself be a knight! It's a simpler life.] Though this place affords little chance to be either.

[mucked]

On the contrary, I'm quite certain soldiering involves rather a lot of hurrying up and doing nothing.

[stagstorm]

True that might be, but I never lacked for a good brawl, even while waiting.

[Or if not that, a good whore to warm his bed. There's too few of those as well.]

[mucked]

You'll find yourself sorely bored, then. Apart from the odd pugnacious backwater planet -- most fighting seems to be long-range and technological.

[stagstorm]

Bugger that. That's a coward's fight. [Other lords might fight from the center or for the rear... not Robert though. He was always at the front, showing his knights and soldiers just how to fight.]

[mucked]

It's quite elegant, actually.

[ and terrifying. if she prefers a brawl, it's only because then she feels more certain of winning. ]

[stagstorm]

Bah, what use is elegance in a battle?

[War was blood, violence, and sound. He'd never known it to be elegant. A joust might be elegant, but he'd never much cared for jousting.]

[mucked]

It's a question I've often asked, myself. And not yet have I discovered any satisfactory answer.

[stagstorm]

None is the only answer. Any bastard stupid enough to go into battle thinking training yard twirls will save them from a stray arrow or a hammer's heavy fall isn't like to see the other side of it.

[mucked]

Aha. I see we're working from two very different notions of elegance. I mean that the ships guns can be almost surgical in their precision. Elegantly on-target. Not fancy in the least.