you'll be a leper, be a healer, be a sinner, be a saint

[ahollowman]

What we've been doing for one-fortieth of a second can't continue indefinitely.

If you compare the six days in the Book of Genesis with the four billion years of geologic time, on that scale, one day is equal to about six hundred and seventy million years. At three minutes to midnight on the sixth day, mankind appeared. At one fortieth of a second before midnight, the industrial revolution began.

And it's unsustainable.

There were a couple things I learned eight years ago in a cave with Ho Yinsin. One of them? Was that it's all unsustainable. And it needs to change.

Ultron wasn't wrong. He wasn't right, either. But he wasn't wrong, even if the execution was, even if he lacked empathy. Even if he had no appreciation for the sanctity of life. Something's got to change. We've got to evolve. There's more out there, we've seen it, I've seen it, aliens, the Asgardians, dark energy. Cosmic Cubes. If we keep doing what we're doing, there is no future.

There's just one-fortieth of a second.


Darrow still used fossil fuels. It was weird, and Tony didn't like it. Why did it work that way? What made it that way? Who the hell could say, because Tony had yet to see even a single convincing piece of evidence that Darrow wasn't just some elaborate simulation, that it wasn't thoughts thinking thoughts of their own, ten million billion calculations every second on an alien computer.

So why did his motorcycle still run on gasoline?

There was a way to fix that.

It started with Henry Cheng, a boy whose first language was thought, a boy who needed his RoboBee. It became Panoptes Solutions. Soon it would be too big for the two of them, especially because there were things they couldn't, wouldn't, or shouldn't be in charge of. A think tank of two guys was a pretty shit tank. Phil had asked Tony how he'd sift for employees, and Tony had known the answer. He'd set up shop -- he had literally set up shop, they had computers and a band saw and a screenprinter -- and began to make logic puzzles.

Little metal boxes, opened very specific, convoluted ways. Not all the same, but different, with different kinds of puzzles. Meant to target different kinds of minds. Mechanical intelligence, social intelligence, knowledge of chemistry or advanced maths. Things for tactile learners, some puzzles better suited to observers or the more auditory type.

In the end, they all contained a business card with a web address on it.

The web address took them to a website that prompted them to submit a resume.

And if Tony liked the resume, the submitter was given the address of the shop that would one day be Panoptes Solutions and an invitation for an interview.

[ any characters who might be interested in joining the think tank are free to respond here under the assumption they solved one or more puzzles they found around darrow. it's up to you how difficult it was for your character. they can meet him at his shop, which looks like a half-furnished cement-floored shop with some equipment, a refrigerator, a blaring ghetto blaster, and truck delivery bay doors in the far end of it.or chase him down somewhere else. ]

Comments

[startarebellion]

Galen had no idea what to put on his resume. The puzzle boxes had been easy. Relatively speaking at least, because when you could access the Force and the binding energy of every living thing in the galaxy could direct you to do what was "right" then it was pretty easy. On his own Galen probably just would have cut them open with his lightsaber to see what was inside.

The hard part was figuring out what to put on a resume. He didn't particularly need a job, nor did he really want one. But this seemed like the sort of thing people who were trying to get out of this city would do so he decided to give it a try. His resume had been short.

Former assassin and revolutionary. Problem solver. Unconventional employment history.

That was it. If the universe wanted him to get the job then that would have to be enough. He was mostly trying to not get the interview and give himself an excuse to not take the job. It didn't work.

He was given an address to what looked like if it tried hard enough one day it would be a workshop. Today was not that day though.

"Hello?" Galen called out, narrowly avoiding drawing his lightsaber out of habit. "I'm here about the job from the puzzle?"

[ahollowman]

"Problem solver?" Tony said, as he spun into view on a black, sturdy-looking metal stool. Tony was a non-traditional workplace kind of guy; he could appreciate a non-traditional resume. And he could appreciate most of all someone who identified themselves as a problem solver, given only a few sentences.

"Still interested? Have a seat. there's--" He waved around the shop, to illustrate the various chairs and sittable surfaces.

"So, like making stuff?"

[startarebellion]

The first thing Galen noticed about this guy was how different he was from Vader. Which was ridiculous because he'd never met anyone like his old Master other than Vader himself. But this guy was so different, entirely relaxed and comfortable with himself. Galen got the sense that the guy actually liked who he was, which was definitely different from Vader. Already he was feeling good about this.

"... Not exactly," he said, reaching out with the Force to pull one of the seats to him before sitting down on the plain stool without even looking. It wasn't even that he was showing off, not entirely, just a small demonstration of what he could do. "I have a basic knowledge of technology that's more advanced than what's here but I am a problem solver. Most of my life the problem I was pointed at happened to be the eradication of a certain Order. I'd like to do something more... beneficial now. I solved the puzzle because I can reach out and attune myself with something called the Force. It can guide me toward the 'right' course of actions for things."

[ahollowman]

Tony raised both brows in restrained surprise. If there was anything he'd have liked to hear, it was what he was being told; there were people in Darrow comfortable with working with advanced tech. More advanced than Darrow, anyway. 'More advanced' was always a sliding scale, especially anymore.

"Okay, sweet trick," he said, pointing at the stool the man had called over to sit in.

"The way you're descrbing your ability right now is making me bothered, so I'm gonna-- we can poke at that later. I get it. I get being done, I get wanting to go in a different direction. Especially because there will be no eradication involved. I'm looking for thinkers and makers. I wanna make Darrow suck less. You think you're in?"

[startarebellion]

Galen wasn't sure if he would consider himself a builder and a maker. Galen could build things, he had a basic understanding of electronics, mechanics, computing, and other things but it wasn't what he was. But maybe it could be? Maybe that was what he could become, or at least be useful for security for what this man wanted.

"I am," Galen said, almost surprised by how sure he sounded. Because he did want to make this place better. "Would you like to see something I built? I didn't design it should give you an idea of what I know."

[ahollowman]

"Yeah," Tony said. He turned his curiosity on the man he was interviewing, if that was the right word for it. It could have been simple, Tony didn't care, so long as it was built by the man's two hands, because somehow that mattered to Tony.

"I'd like to see it. You have it with? If bot, I guess it's field trip time.n

[startarebellion]

"It's called a lightsaber," Galen said, unhooking it from his belt before letting it levitate in the air between them. He reached down and found that place of calm where the Light Side of the Force seemed to surround and engulf him. Using the Force he disassembled the blade into it's various, individual components.

"It's blade is plasma and it's powered by a kyber crystal. It can cut through nearly everything."

[ahollowman]

Tony stared at the blade with an expression somewhere between a child's greedy fascination and a deep fear, because it could cut through anything, and Tony was a man obsessed with being safe, protected, wrapped up away from harm. He wanted to reverse engineer the thing. He was sure he should never be allowed to.

"Okay," he admitted, "I'm impressed now."

He reached a hand closer. The temperature was low, and the hair on his arm wasn't being raised.

"Holy Christ. The positive ions and free electrons are in practically perfect balance. It has no electric charge. Perfect collective behavior. You can hold the thing in your hand? Respect. Please turn it off now."

[startarebellion]

Galen took the lightsaber back into his hand and turned it off. It probably wouldn't really do to defy a potential employer but at least the man seemed to be impressed by it. While Galen didn't exactly invent the lightsaber he did understand and know how to use it.

"So do I have a job?" Galen asked. "I come with the added bonus of being a... security expert."

[ahollowman]

Tony liked the sound of security expert, although he wasn't about to admit it. He'd been his own bodyguard for years, but now, potentially, he had a list of employees to think of. People who could be targeted by KIRIN, the way Tony had been targeted by his stable of nutjobs. His own emons.

He held out a hand to take Galen's.

"You're hired. For as long as you'll have me. When can you start?"

[startarebellion]

Galen was honestly a little surprised that he got the job. He wasn't sure he had even really wanted it when he first got here but once Tony had started telling him about it Galen really wanted this job. He wanted to do something important, something that helped people.

"Well, I'd have to clear my busy schedule of meditating and getting frustrated that I can't find a way out, but I think I could start immediately," he said, reaching out to shake the man's hand.