subsystem | Training Sims

Entry tags:

Training Sims

[ The recording is short, the quality decent, not wobbly and handheld, at least. Kate appears from the shoulders up and lifts a hand into the frame in a brief wave. There's a quick glimpse of a dark tattoo on the inside of her wrist. ]

Hi. I'm Kate Bishop, and after all that weird crap at Olympus I assume I'm not the only one looking to get in a little more simulation time to get back on the horse or brush up some skills. I've helped people train in the past in a few different areas, and I'd like to offer that again if anyone is interested. I've got fairly wide experience as an operative, and a pretty broad aptitude set. Except for technical stuff. I'm no good at that, but that just means if you are, I'd take some training in that as trade.

Anyway, I'm attaching a list of some stuff I've offered in the past, but I'm also open to ideas if there's something in particular you're looking to work on. Let me know the skills you're interested in, or the type of matrix you'd like to experience, whatever your parameters are, and we can work something out. We can mash a few of the usual options together, or make up something totally different.

Any skill level is welcome, I'm just as happy to work with people who were unplugged yesterday as people who're vets and just want to stretch out or knock some rust off. If you're training to try to get onto a crew, or just want to poke around and try out some new things, that's cool too, seriousness levels are also flexible. Oh, and payment, that's flexible too. My favorites are coffee and trading skills for skills, but we can always work something out as long as you're honest. Respond here or message me privately if you're interested or have questions.

[ The video cuts here, and a text file is attached. ]

BASIC MATRIX SKILLS:

Jump Test Prep

So You Just Passed Your Jump Test, Now What?

Agent Identification

MATRIX COMBAT:

Old Timey

Modern Timey

Future Timey

VEHICLES:

Flying Things

Boats

Other

ANOMALOUS SKILLS/OTHER:

Intro to Magic

Non-Human Forms

( ooc: related log post is here, feel free to tag both or just one, anything's fine with me. IC questions about what the options mean/what sort of matrixes they're in more than welcome! )

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ She gives a little noise of acknowledgment. But: ]

I'm afraid I don't actually know what their Matrix was like. It was...set in the past, right? In Zion's past.

Yeah, that's right. It's based on the year 2000.

[ Kate pauses, concedes. ]

So "modern" is maybe a little misleading since it's technically the past, but that era is the most common and very similar to the one I come from so that's just how I think of it, I guess.

Edited (Icons, bane of my existence ) 2015-08-12 00:23 (UTC)

It makes sense. When I hear modern, I still tend to think...writing everything longhand and waistcoats and more carriages than cars.

[ Not exactly true, but it's actually fairly close to the truth. Kitty's throwing up a smokescreen, but at least it's a thin, wispy one. ]

But really, everything modern is this, isn't it? Great fleets of warships and technology integrated into the brain. Everything we think of as modern is just an illusion.

[ But Kitty your matrix sounds cool you should take people to see it :c

Kate doesn't laugh, but she does smile. It's not video anyway, so whatever. ]

Yeah, pretty much. We have such an odd mix of futuristic and primitive here it's kind of hard to conceive of it as modern, but it is. I'll have to pick a new word for it.

In any case, [ she doesn't quite clear her throat but there's a shift in tone like she might have done ] if you'd like to see it first hand to get a better idea of what I mean, I'm happy to give you a walkthrough in a sim.

[ her matrix is an OPPRESSIVE REGIME OF TYRANNY AND INJUSTICE
and really terrible fashion choices, bellbottoms everywhere ]

A new word. Perhaps we ought to run some sort of poll. I've suggestions myself, but they're all completely ghastly.

[ Buuut that's sort of dragging her feet to avoid answering that second, crucial question. Kitty gets to the end of her wheel-spinning, and then has to decide yes or no...Or maybe she'll decide to drag her feet a bit more. ]

Anyway - I'd like to, but I've not got all that much to pay with, I'm afraid. Not at the moment.

[ Wait what how can there be bellbottoms and waistcoats and carriages, that seems terribly wrong in several ways ]

We can always arrange something, if you'd like to. Like I said, I'm flexible.

When I first got here, the staff at the Sphynx let me pay with stories and recording cello pieces for them in-matrix and stuff like that until I got on my feet. I'm happy to pay it forward.

[ And also.... ]

You are the waitress, right? Who warned us about Olympus?

[ So much of her world is a grotesque mishmash it's so terrible and great

There's a momentary, audible intake of breath before Kitty admits: ]

Yeah. That's me. Lizzie Temple. I suppose it would have been more polite to introduce myself from the start.

[ And then a small, genuine smile - unseen, of course, but maybe noticeable in her voice. ]

I know it wasn't exactly...well, coherent, actually. My warning, I mean. I'm just really glad that you were able to work through it, and that word got out, and that people were helped, at least a little.

You did what you could. And so did we.

[ Kate's firm about that; any misgivings she may have, or regrets that more couldn't be done and sooner, none of those have anything to do with the part ~~Kitty~~ Lizzie played. Just in case that wasn't clear, she makes it clearer. She's great at saying things very baldly. ]

What you did was incredibly important, and brave. I'm glad you're okay. If you want some sim training, it's on the house. Just don't tell anybody or Rocket over there will yell at me forever.

[ That draws a little laugh out of her. ]

Oh, God, I don't want him yelling. He's so ridiculously soft and sentimental under all that growliness and gruffness - it's really embarrassing.

[ But...But there's a little undercurrent of paranoid misgiving that makes her laughter fade a little bit too closely. Some little extra-paranoid part of Kitty's brain wonders: is Kate offering this for free so she can get access to Kitty's brain? Once, Kitty had visited her pretending to be some junior reporter, and maybe Kate's suspicious. And being an operator for a sim dive - Kitty doesn't know how much access that gives, but...

But nothing. You really think she'd stab you in the back like that after you helped save all those people? No; for a few minutes, you're a hero. You can trust that people will be dealing with you fairly for a little while at least. ]

Anyway, I'm glad you all are okay, really. And I'd really like to - I just don't know about those skill-training sets. I don't think I'm really the combat type.

[ Kate laughs too, because that's a joke, right? Rocket ridiculously soft and sentimental? Maybe she squints at his posts a little, but... surely.

Anyway. She is oblivious to Kitty's hesitation, or at least the reason for it. If she senses some reluctance, the way Kitty keeps responding to Kate's offers by throwing up new barriers, she takes it as the result of her ordeal, whatever it was. Fear of going back in after a seemingly narrow escape. ]

Combat's totally optional! It's a popular one, but there are plenty of other choices if that's not your angle. We can do whatever you want, really. Run around the rooftops of Renaissance Italy, or fly biplanes or space age fighter jets, ride dinosaurs, be animals, hear an orchestra, just wander around a type of world you've never seen before. Seriously, what would you like? What're you interested in? I'm sure I can come up with something.

[ It's not usually in Kitty's nature to be dramatic. Really, it's not. She prides herself on being sensible, pragmatic, and level-headed. Unflappable. Kathleen does keep a very steady head, her teachers had told her parents. She's a good English girl, after all, bears up under all stress with firmness and an optimistic energy.

But there's something completely overwhelming about having those choices rattled off to her like they're nothing. All these wild and fantastic freedoms. Things she hasn't even dared to dream of. It's stupid, completely stupid - she's been out of the Matrix for...months now, she's not completely sure how many months - but she's been free for months, and all of those things were open to her all that time. Like, maybe this would be okay if she had just been pulled out of the Matrix and was completely taken off-guard by the news that she's not a lowly commoner and criminal any longer. But she already knows that! So this is so stupid, no matter what she's been through and dreamed about in the last few weeks. No matter anything.

But Kate rattles off that overwhelming array of fantastic freedoms, and Kitty - to her utter mortification, her complete humiliation that she will never recover from - suddenly finds herself bursting into tears. ]

Oh -

[ She crams her clumsy hands over her eyes, applying pressure to her tear ducts, as though crying were like bleeding and could be stopped the same way. So stupid, so mad and stupid. And it's all the worse that she's only using voice, because suddenly there'll be snuffling and whimpering on the other end of the line and Kate will probably think she's fallen in a swoon or something. If Kitty's lucky. No, it sounds like crying, there's no getting around that. ]

I, erm - sorry. Sorry. [ And then, so that Kate will have something to respond to that's not just insane-girl-weeping-over-nothing-at-all, she snuffles out: ] Seeing a new world would be...wonderful, I'd think. [ A rattly breath. ] Someplace where they're good to their people.

[ If Kitty is caught unprepared for Kate's offer, Kate is certainly caught off-guard by Kitty's response. She doesn't burst into tears or anything, so it can hardly be called an even exchange, but her first reply is also ]

Oh--

[ And then a moment of fumbly silence as she revisits the last moment or two. Yes, that is crying. No, she does not know why. She is pretty sure she didn't do anything? And then Kitty answers, which-- is maybe a bit of a hint, as to what the source of her sudden outburst might be, but also a new problem all on its own.

Someplace where they're good to their people is an unusual request, not one for which Kate has a scenario already tucked in her back pocket. It takes some thought, because where who is good to which people? And how good is good? If she knew anything at all about where Kitty is from she could at least evaluate relative goodness, relative amounts of people, but this sounds like a plea for something more pure, more comprehensive, and that--. That is a tall order.

But the girl is crying and she has had a heroic and probably terrifying month or so and Kate has made this pronouncement that she can come up with anything and so she is going to come up with something. Somehow. ]

I can do that. How's the day after tomorrow, for you?

[ Bless Kate for not mentioning it. Bless Kate for not asking after her, for just acting natural. Any sort of kindness would just compound the problem of Kitty-being-a-madwoman, and she'd just start crying harder probably and just get more furious at herself which would make the problem even worse. God, she hasn't...She hasn't cried since that second-to-last day in her Matrix, that wretched, horrible day when the whole of the Resistance died - everyone but her and that coward Nick - and her parents tried to hand her over to the government and she got hunted down and captured and in a quiet moment she just broke down. She's not cried even once since then. Not even when she heard all about everything. This is so stupid.

So bless Kate, truly, for just turning to business. A bit of business is just what she needs to steady herself. A bit of business, worrying about scheduling, occupies her mind enough that she's able to sniff and wipe her eyes and sort of warble out: ]

That'd be good, yeah. Maybe in the morning? I should think it'd be less crowded in the morning. Since people still don't like rising early even here, which really makes no sense.

[ It was only half intentional, more instinct and awkwardness than deliberate kindness. But she would have, if she'd thought about it. Just carrying on is what she'd prefer if she were in Kitty's shoes, and there's something about the girl that makes Kate think maybe their shoes aren't totally different sizes.

So, business. Kate consults her calendar. ]

Sure, I think I can do morning. People are always going to want to sleep in no matter what the world, but I'm usually up pretty early. Say, how do you feel about dinosaurs?

Edited (adding hook bc why not) 2015-08-14 15:00 (UTC)

[ It's been enough time now that Kitty's able to sniff quietly, and drag her wrist across her nose (an advantage to using voice instead of video is that you can be absolutely repulsive), and answer in a much more normal tone of voice. So that's good. Even better is that last question, which startles a shaky little laugh out of her. She's even feeling well enough to offer a little bit of a joke in return. ]

Well, I can't say with any certainty; I've never been formally introduced to one. There wouldn't be any risk of us getting...eaten? Or something of the sort.

[ Kate laughs too, brief and light. ]

Well, I can arrange introductions if you'd like. No risk of getting eaten, I promise. And the big ones are careful about where they step. It's a pretty neat place.

Then that sounds lovely. Really lovely. Thank you, Captain Bishop - you're being so terribly kind.

[ Normally when Kitty says that, she's being aggressive and sarcastic. It's weird saying that without any sort of irony whatsoever. Feels strange on the tongue. ]

[ Kate doesn't seem to notice if there's any strangeness in Kitty's tone, and her own is full of a smile, a little amused but not unkindly. ]

Just Kate is fine, really. Even my crew doesn't call me Captain Bishop. And good. I'll meet you at the Sphynx then and have that one cued up for us.

Kate, then. Okay.

[ And there's a little, quick flash of embarrassment - after all, to Kate, she's still Lizzie, not Kitty. It's weird to lie to someone so sweet. But: ]

I'll see you there.

Edited 2015-08-15 01:35 (UTC)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Training Sims

voice

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

1/2

2/2; private

private

private

private

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject