He rolled his eyes, tempo slowing as was his custom when forced into explaining the seemingly self-explanatory: "...Sean, a little detail about the wonders of the Nomad incumbus; it gains access to the entire neurological data of it's willing (or otherwise) host. Thus saying, If I merely handed the airlock codes out hither-thither to every disposable within the department, then what if they, personally, became infected, and took the liberty of using the exact same information against us? My friend, the prospect of gently floating through the ether, a noiseless scream lodged in my imploded trachea whilst my organs detonate into a bloody morass doesn't exactly sound thrilling..."
Achille grinned mirthlessly, coldly even, glowering at the bar. "He has a point though, the security risk in here is practically ungodly. What with everyone perusing the dangerous sectors of human ingenuity, the potential for accidents is intolerable. Hell, what if the NOX tanks ruptured? Or the cryocoolant? Or the H-fuel? Or the chlorine? Or the..." Achille quickly crafted a mental memo to consult Le-Roux about the possiblity of installing an ejector capsule within the vicinity of his office. "...After all, we wouldn't want the particulars being injured in any way now, would we?"
His grin suddenly broke from solemnity back into mirth, a line of jest furrowing his jaw.
"Well Sean, as to the matter of some hypothetical saboteur discharging a weapon at my person - assuming they incapacitate Grengar at first of course, which is unlikely enough in itself - they'd have to... Ah, well, it's better to show you, oui?"
Achille, fluidly, kicked away the stool and opened his arms, staring at Sean with an air of the expectant.
"...Well go on then friend, hit me. I hear you've got the haymaker of a heavyweight."
"Well Sean, as to the matter of some hypothetical saboteur discharging a weapon at my person - assuming they incapacitate Grengar at first of course, which is unlikely enough in itself - they'd have to... Ah, well, it's better to show you, oui?"
Achille, fluidly, kicked away the stool and opened his arms, staring at Sean with an air of the expectant.
"...Well go on then friend, hit me. I hear you've got the haymaker of a heavyweight."
Sean was so startled about Achille's statement, that he just stared at him for a moment. Did Achille just ask him to punch him?
Back on Leeds, in the pubs, he expierienced quite a lot of brawls. Ususally, when they finishing fighting; the results were broken glasses and bottles, a charge against someone and a several broken bones or limbs. Compared to other situations he faced earlier, every aspect was the same. Except one: Achille was certainly not drunk. He only had a single glass, so Achille couldn't be intoxicated. That made Sean look at the situation in a sceptictal way.
Should he do it risk it anyways? He was confident that it wouldn't cause too heavy injuries.
"...and you're sure that...I mean...seriously?..."
Sean was in doubt that this would go well. He had a look to Gregar, who still sat motionless next to the entrance.
"...do you really want me to...? Well, then..."
He clenched his hand into a fist and rose it not too high, to not break bones. Then his fist flew forward, into Achille's face, aiming for his jaw.
As Sean's fist careened ominiously towards his visage, something throbbed insistently within Nadeau's back-pocket. Sean, mid punch, sensed the tension build on his arm, his fist slogging through the air towards his fellow man's face as though the two objects were opposingly magnetised, before snugly embedding itself into Achille's cheek with all the terrifying velocity of a particularly apathetic garden snail.
"Curious." Nadeau gargled, struggling to manuver his molars around the lip of Sean's knuckles, their tendons flaring as he fought to connect the blow: "The field bubble appears to be a trifle underpowered, if you just hold it there an instant, friend I…"
A distortion of the light, and Nadeau temporarily vanished, as everything in his immediate surroundings, glasses, bar, alcohol, onions, stools, customers, and cutlery were jerked protestingly into the air, and, ululating wildly, were thrown onto the nearest surface solid enough to halt their respective trajectories. As for Sean himself, the man swiftly found himself jammed arse-first into a previously closed barrel of rum, the counter shunted on top of him for good measure. Only Grengar remained implacable, swaying mildly.
"My Satan, I've killed the man!" Achille panicked, rapidly digging him him out of the rubble, frantically wondering what damming impact such an eventuality could incur on his insurance. When it became clear that there was nothing actually wrong with the man (except for a mild sway in his step), the grin returned.
"Apologies friend, whilst the graviton shield sown into my back pocket is certainly effacious, it's results have a tendency to vary… quite drastically. Just a mild warning not to throw anything in my immediate vicinity in future…" He japed, dragging Sean back to his feet; "…Or indeed any fast movements within 0.5 square foot. Nothing personal, but I do happen to be the recipient of a copious quantity of death threats; it's proving quite unsettling."
He observed the surrounding havoc with an aura of indifference.
"Assumedly I should be paying for this, oui? Name the value, friend. Apologies, but since my little incident with Mr Daerune over there failed to bear fruit, I still required some other form of creative field test. No permanent damage done, I'm sure."
Out of the sudden, Sean found himself in a odd postion, soaked in rum. He was sure, he lost conciousness for a moment. He tried to speak, but instead he just stammered incoherent words. For a moment, he felt like someone used his spine as toothpick.
When his vision cleared up, he understood the degree of the havoc. This man, who was standing infront of him wrecked the entire bar. To sum it up, the feeling Sean now felt was a mixture of being flabbergasted, worried and angry at the same time.
Achille just destroyed the whole bar. The counter, the bottles, the glasses. Tables, chairs and even customers were knocked down. When Achille was going to draw him back up, Sean thought about grabbing Achille's head and smash him against the counter. Or at least against what was remaining of the latter.
He suddenly refrained, because a better idea came to his mind.
"Apologies friend, whilst the graviton shield sown into my back pocket is certainly effacious, it's results have a tendency to vary… quite drastically. Just a mild warning not to throw anything in my immediate vicinity in future…"
"Are you f<censored>ng insane?! I mean, what the hell is wrong with you?! You can't just tell someone to hit you when you have a BLOODY GRAVITRON SHIELD AROUND YOU!" Sean's head had a (slight) crimson tint by now, his whole body shaking from infuriation.
"…Or indeed any fast movements within 0.5 square foot. Nothing personal, but I do happen to be the recipient of a copious quantity of death threats; it's proving quite unsettling. Assumedly I should be paying for this, oui? Name the value, friend. Apologies, but since my little incident with Mr Daerune over there failed to bear fruit, I still required some other form of creative field test. No permanent damage done, I'm sure."
Sean knew what he would do in the next time. He would visit the medbay, to have him patched up. He would visit Robert and tell him that Achille just destroyed his beloved wine source.
After that, he would visit Kenji. Perhaps Kenji's habit to slice things up could finally come in handy.
"...ah...man, that hurt! Why didn't you like like...put it down a level? Look at that mess! Don't do that EVER again or I'll throw you out the airlock..." *mumbles* "...or better tell Grengar to do that...."
Zack stood up slowly and took a couple of steps away from his favorite corner booth. He proceeded to swat some of the dust from his jacket while looking around at the mess Achille had just made of the bar counter and immediate surroundings, including Sean.
He proceeded towards the mess while Achille pulled Sean to his feet, only when he got closer did he smell the rum. "Sean, are you alright there Lad?" he asked. Sean seemed to be fine, just a bit shaken. "Bloody Hell Achille!" he stated not taking his eyes off the mess that was a sealed rum barrel only seconds ago, "It just had to be the rum, didn't it? I mean, it could've been that junk you Gauls call wine, but no, it just had to be the damned rum, didn't it?" he asked rhetorically. "I seriously hope you can dig up a new barrel somewhere quickly or I'm gonna be grumpy as Hell" Shoving his hands into his jacket pockets he started off towards the exit "I'm off to bed, I'm too old for this crap" he walked off shaking his head and with an amuzed grin on his face. "What a bunch of nut jobs" he thought to himself with a chuckle.
Lux flinched at Roberts statement. it was blunt and to the point, like an club.
"Well... It depends" He replied.
"Wound? Perhaps. Capture? Possibly. Kill? No, I don't think I could do it".
"Note, I said 'think' however. If he has done any crimes, then justice will be not be kind to him and neither will I".
He took the gum out of his mouth and put it into a wrapper. He then skillfully threw it into the bin behind him. He then withdrew a lollipop from his pocket that he unwrapped and then rested in his mouth.
"Like I said though... it depends on the details...".
Thanks to Achilles blunder, David could not go to his usual haunt after a solid trade run.
Oh well. he thought.
He had business to attend to. Achille had wanted to meet and discuss plans for a Freeport expansion project. David had drawn up some plans as he had a knack for that sort of thing. He spotted Achille from across the dome.
"Get over here you buffoon. You just had to blow up the bar didn't you?"
Achille walked over with his usual swagger and glanced down at the table where David had laid out his blue prints.
"Here's a rough idea of what we could do with endless resources."
![[Image: OYQaKG0.png]](http://i.imgur.com/OYQaKG0.png)
![[Image: vWQa9T1.jpg]](http://i.imgur.com/vWQa9T1.jpg)
![[Image: x2kzKBj.png]](http://i.imgur.com/x2kzKBj.png)
"Modular bases have always been versatile, but this one is pushed to the limit. That power array can't support much more than this. I've been playing with this idea for months, but never put it on paper with Freeport 10. This is the first draft including Freeport 10, but this is the mark 10 version of the modular installation in my eyes. This would however also require a staffing of roughly 2000." Achille glanced up at him.
"What? A reactor of this size and factories of this caliber require manpower."
He pointed at the third page.
"The power array would connect to Freeport 10. We could decouple it if we needed to, such as if you were using massive amounts of power in the labs and there was a possibility it could feedback into the main reactor... I don't know why you would do this, but I planned for it anyway. Which brings me to my next point..."
He turned the page over the desk, revealing the second page
"A massive capacitance array. I know you like things that use insane power, so this array should be able to store enough power from the core for incredibly large bursts. It would take some time to charge and could charge faster if solar arrays one and two were slaved to it, but when charged they should hold 1 terajoule each."
"Naturally, I had to throw in one or two fun bits. He said, motioning to the breweries.
"Why pay for it when we could make it ourselves and sell it?
He slid the plans over to Achille, pleased with his work. Achille was looking over the plans intently, his expression hard to read...
Ernst watched the show that Achille put up with a grin. "Most entertaining comedy act I've seen in a while", he thought to himself, "probably not as funny though to the comedians." More alholic fluid, the fine beer served in the Dome, flows down his throat. Not as good as the one you usually get back in Rheinland, but it still is something.
Seemingly satisfied, Ernst puts the glass down and glances through the dome, looking for something else that might be interesting. His gaze focused on David and Achille, looking over some sort of blueprints. The ex-Cryer, now working in the research branch of the Commonwealth, walks past the two and had a short glance over the paper. He then leaned onto a wall close to the table, and pondered about the plans and whether he was permitted to interfere and give some comments.
"Screw it..", the man mumbled, and walked over towards the two.
"Looks neat. Who has created these plans?", he says when none of the other two were talking currently. He has not forgotten all of his manners after twenty-five years of mostly being in sterile laboratories.
He assumed that they'd be surprised about his sudden appearance, but that did not matter to him at all.
"That's a lot of space that would be available in the labs, and elsewhere. The expansion would be almost as big as the Freeport itself. That'd be billions worth of materials. I assume you have the possilibity to acquire said amount? Oh, silly me, of course you do. I could contact someone in Rheinland that could probably send materials our way if you want to pursue that plan."
He still looks at the plans, patiently awaiting an answer and some explanations.
The Doctor is sitting down at a table in the partially particulated bar. Kicking a small chunk of debris that somehow has evaded the previous efforts at sweeping, he sighs and looks around at the remaining amenities.
He sets his datapad down on the table, designs for some kind of humaniform machina showing across the screen.
He looks around, unsure if his Kusarian meeting partner will arrive or not. In the meantime, he ponders what he might like to have as a drink. Or if he should not drink, or if he should take cues from his guest. So many variables!
"Yes, yes, beepity boop" *he says mockingly to his datapad, alerting him to some computation that has recently completed*
Susan McCarthy enters a certain bar under renovations, walking up to the bartender up at work. "Glass of water, and a packet of sugar please." Pushing a stray hair out of her eyes, taking a seat at the bar, hoping to see a few specific people enter the bar.
She glances over at the bartender. "I normally don't do this, but.." Nodding her head slightly. "Good bye Sean. I would say its been fun, but I tend to find stretching the truth a lie at times."