sixthiterationlogs | I'm waving through a window, oh, can anybody see, is anybody waving back at me? [OPEN]

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I'm waving through a window, oh, can anybody see, is anybody waving back at me? [OPEN]

WHO: Samantha Moon
WHERE: Various Locations (see below and put one in your subject!)
WHEN: First week of October
OPEN TO: OTA
WARNINGS: Will update as needed, but just assume Sam's potty mouth

Kitchen at the Inn
It scared Sam a little bit that she was starting to develop a routine. But she was. And whether that meant she was settling down or giving in, she couldn't really say. And she wasn't sure she wanted to analyze it too much. At any rate, for the time being, she was just sort of going with it. Which meant that the first thing she did in the morning was swing by the kitchen. She always waited until after people had done their breakfast thing, so she wouldn't be in the way. Or, more accurately, so her Rube Goldberg-esque distillery wouldn't be in the way.

She usually made about three batches of potato vodka every day, at this point. As long as there were potatoes. She was always careful to cut out the eyes and save them for the botany freaks. Sometimes, she would experiment, trying to mix in different flavorings.

They usually all tasted vile.

But that was fine, since the vodka was strong enough to burn off a normal person's taste buds, anyway.

There was something calming about sitting on the counter, watching the way the diamond-like bubbles traveled through the tubes. Like one of those glittery stress-relievers on the corner of a professor's desk. Sam played little mind games, counting and following and observing. Anything she could do to avoid thinking.

Didn't help much. She still saw Avery's name, like a fucking neon sign on the inside of her eyelids, every time she blinked.

Spear Fishing
Sam decided it was pretty safe to assume that she'd never go down in history as a singularly spectacular fisher. But there was a gross, morbid satisfaction to spearing fish. Likely, it was a combination of factors, the most obvious being that what she really wanted to spear was the faces of their generous Overlords. At least fishing was more productive than hitting a tree with a lead pipe. Her hands still stung from all of the cuts and bruises she'd inflicted on herself. Not to mention the ones Danny had given her.

She wadded up to her calves in the water. The Overlords had given her a pair of black, short pants with laces up either side that, unfortunately, delighted her little Goth-loving heart. And they were perfect for getting wet. Sometimes she wore them with her scrub tops or some of the shirts she'd collected over the past year and a half, but today, she was just in a sports bra.

One thing she would absolutely never take for granted again was the way the sunlight felt on her skin.

Schoolhouse Library
Of the many gifts she'd received from the Overlords, the one Sam trusted the least was the large set of colored pencils. She'd watched one-too-many horror movies growing up. She kept expecting some bizarre plot twist. Every time she'd draw with red, someone would lose blood. If she drew monsters, they'd come to life. Somehow, drawing a picture of something might whoosh it into the circus. The usual tropes from her life before she was, in fact, the monster at the end of the horror movie.

But there was nothing.

Which wasn't to say she started to trust or anything like that. But she did start to draw.

And out of a desperate need to be useful to someone, she'd taken it upon herself to start decorating the library with headers for each category of books. Science. Sports. Mathematics. All of it. With perfect, neat handwriting, she labeled the sections, then drew little pictures around and through the letters. Spinning planets with rings of fire. The pennant over Wrigley Field (if only...). An elegant Pi, like a rusty shed with a roof curved by the rain.

The project was good for long nights, when Sam couldn't sleep. But sometimes, she'd be in the middle of drawing something that would remind her of...

She blinked and saw it again. Avery's name.

And somehow, on stolen bits of paper and old napkins, his face started to appear, thin and bony and redheaded. Just like she remembered him. Just like he'd been when he...

...no. There was no point in thinking about what he'd done to her any more.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Bruce waited for her to process, and he smiled at her first question. "It's because of the type of gamma radiation I used and in extremes. When he's awake it's supercharged, he practically glows with it." There were other reasons too, explanations Bruce had, but he generalized when it seemed easier. "If my eyes or veins ever start glowing green, just be smart and move out of the way. Get Tony or one of my team, he sometimes listens to them." Rarely, but it happened. Bruce was pretty sure the Hulk was more likely to listen to them than himself at this point in time, but being at an inner war was nothing new.

"I wonder if he's gone because they couldn't replicate the accident, or because they think he's more trouble than they want. Or who knows why, really, but I'm sure it was a deliberate decision." Bruce drummed his fingers on the top of the table, not quite looking at her. "Clones would make sense in this case. The Hulk is a part of my body and my brain most of the time. For that to be completely gone, I'm not sure what it would take, but I'd certainly like to know for my own reasons." To permanently decide to get rid of him? That used to be the goal.

Sam ran her tongue along the tips of her teeth. "Bear with me on this train of thought," she said. "But, see, the thing is, vampires like me--we call ourselves Kindred, I guess, because we like euphemisms. But Kindred possess something known as 'The Beast.' It's a kind of parasite. Sort of what makes us vampires, instead of baseline humans. And when we get mad or scared or hungry, The Beast basically takes over. It's like baser instincts. Fight, flight, food. There are vampires who dedicate their whole lives to finding ways to control The Beast, instead of letting it control them. And, well, since I've been here, I haven't had a single episode of frenzy. Even though I've been royally pissed off. I mean, like, beating-up-a-tree levels of angry."

Which was to say, Bruce might be on to something. Two points of data didn't represent a pattern. But there was the possibility that there was some common theme they'd stumbled onto.

Or it was just the Overlords being control freaks.

Or both. Both was entirely possible, really.

"I wonder if there's anyone else here with a similar MPD-like situation going on that's...no longer going on."

Sadly, the first name to spring to mind was Fucky Darns. But that was different. That was terrestrial in origin and completely in the realm of normal science. Also something he'd told her in confidence.

Bruce listened to her describe the Kindred, and that was interesting, and semi-similar to his situation. He was the only one of his kind (thank God), so to think there was a whole group of super powerful people with the same struggle, he could see why things might have gone sideways in her world. "So they removed both of our Beasts, but left us otherwise the same. Although I don't ...." He paused. "I haven't even checked. It's possible my blood is still radioactive, it's only the Hulk isn't able to come out." He would need blood samples and a microscope. He wouldn't be able to tell, his body had been one way too long, so only a test would do that.

"It makes sense. They don't want us to be too powerful. If our Beasts could handle things thrown our way easily, it's not exactly a very good experiment." It would be better to essentially defang them. "Everyone else has lost their powers the same way, but for us it's removing a living entity that used to share our body." So it wasn't the same as simply losing powers, whether you were born with them or not. This would take a more precise touch, and a more precise choice. Unless he was overthinking it, which was always, always possible.

"I'm not sure how we would ask anyone that."

"The same way you find human subjects for any study," she said, clicking her incisors against her bottom teeth. "You ask for anonymous volunteers. The problem is that it's crazy embarrassing for a lot of people to admit. And our sample size is probably too small to get anywhere."

No way Fucky would volunteer that information.

At least, she didn't think so. Admittedly, he was from Bruce's world, so maybe that provided some kind of cache, but she didn't want to assume. Nor did she want to speak to him ever again, as it was.

"Still," she sighed. "We could get so fucking much done without having to worry about IRB review." She offered him a lopsided smile. How she missed the days when IRBs were the biggest obstacle she was facing.

Another world. Another life. Literally.

"It won't be anonymous from us. It is asking a lot from someone. You and I might have our reasons to be more open about it, but not everyone will feel the same." Bruce got the sense he and Sam were both pretty level headed about their powers, and maybe very aware of the danger inherent in them. He didn't want to talk about the Hulk, but he knew it was important. "Normally I'd want to respect everyone's privacy, but we're in a situation here where people might have to be willing to get a little embarrassed for the greater good." Good luck convincing anyone of that though.

He laughed. "It's a slippery slope to be a scientist without an IRB review, but yeah, in this place, we'd never get anywhere." It was nice to have someone speaking his language who wasn't Tony. "It's interesting, we have a good amount of scientists here, for such a small population." It wasn't like they were in huge amounts or high demand back home. The only time he'd find himself in a room full of scientists is if he was at a conference, not in some supernatural multiverse survival world. "It could be they want us to try and figure it out. Having a lot of people here with no scientific curiosity might lead no where."

She didn't like the idea that they were playing into the Overlords' hands. But she wasn't sure she could buy the premise that they'd just been kidnapped to solve a mystery. It felt a little too science fiction.

Admittedly, her life already was a fucking messy mix of science fiction, fantasy, and horror.

But it probably wasn't healthy to think of life like a genre.

"I've been here going on two years," she said. "And while I'm not big on the social sciences, I have noticed that a lot of social mores and rules are kind of suspended. I came out as a vampire and no one cared. No one's scared of me. We're all just working toward a greater good." She sighed. "All that to say, I think we could get volunteers. If there are any to have."

Was she proposing a research study to her? Did she have to get down on one knee?

"Everyone here seems to come from some unusual background, on the whole. I haven't met anyone yet that made me think they'd be afraid of vampires or the supernatural. Maybe because of where we are, or maybe because we all have some qualities in common. Like an interest in survival and an acceptance of the strange." It didn't mean they all were supernatural themselves, but he did feel like there were patterns going on. Their kidnappers had to have a precise reasoning for why it was happening. Or he was overthinking. Bruce was always overthinking.

"I agree. There's no harm in asking and explaining why." Bruce was all about research studies. While he wasn't very good at dealing with people in general, he was confident he'd be fine once they had a focus and purpose. "We'd need the equipment. Someone else asked me about being able to check their friend's blood, I don't know why yet, and said maybe the bunker had equipment to do that."

"I'd love to be a part of that," Sam said, before realizing it was probably a little insensitive. It wasn't on purpose. She just really missed doing science. And this was something she was actually good at. "I can help rig up some equipment. When you live in a post-apocalyptic world, you get good at improvising tech. And I can read blood like the funny pages."

Why did she say that?

Sam cringed.

"I mean...you know what I mean."

She really just wanted to...belong. Serve a purpose. Maybe even be fucking useful to someone.

Bruce isn't sure Jessica would want anyone else to be involved, he got that sense from the conversation, but that was just one person's caution. Other people might not mind. "Tony and I are both good at improvising too, between all of us we might be able to handle that. It might be smart to raid the bunker, see what in particular we could work with." Bruce hasn't been down there yet, which is an oversight that he's aware of. He's nervous in enclosed spaces, although he doesn't need to be anymore, since there's no monster to rip it to shreds. It'll take a long time before he gets used to no Hulk.

He isn't bothered at all by her blood reference. Or her being a vampire. "I think in general, we should check everyone's blood who is willing. They've done something to us. Taken things away and can give new abilities too, from what I've heard." Bruce is interested in puzzles, and his interest in science comes from the desire to see how life works. Humans, animals, plants, the world around them, it's a question mark. And now they have more of them. "I'm not sure to what end, what we'll learn from it, but it's better to know than not know."

The ultimate end was always control. Or at least feeling in control. Sam couldn't say that in so many words. But the idea of just being able to find an answer felt like the first sense of forward motion she'd experienced in months.

But he had a bro of his own. And Sam knew how it was. Given the choice between hanging with her or hanging with someone from home, they always picked someone from home.

She didn't see herself doing research any time soon.

Fuck, she missed Grace. And would have missed Avery too. If she weren't still so furious.

So she shrugged. "I'm here if you need me."

Bruce pauses, tilting his head at her. It's hard to get a read on a stranger, although he's a very perceptive person. "I said all of us, not the two of us." He and Tony did have a tendency to work together as if they were one entity. Seeing them together in their natural habitat was more like a scientific dance than two colleagues doing their own parts of a project. He can't deny that working with them could make someone feel left out, but it doesn't mean no one else is welcome.

He smiles at her. "It's your idea, Sam. I'm here if you need me."

It was honestly the kind of thing Sam needed to hear more often. She knew that the people here largely weren't dicks and weren't trying to exclude her on purpose. But it still happened. Just like in any high school, minus the...well, no. Not minus the raging hormones.

But definitely minus the zits.

"Our idea," she said diplomatically. Nothing would please her more than working with someone. Especially someone as cool as Bruce.

"Our idea," he agrees warmly. It seems his hunch was the right one, and he's glad. Sam is a nice young woman and clearly a bright one too. Bruce knows a little bit about women in STEM being overlooked, and he would never do the same. Seeing Betty's struggle was hard, and he can only hope things have gotten better since then. It's been a long time since he was involved with anything other than running and fighting.

"We can divvy up tasks. One of us finds equipment that might work or can be rigged with supplies, the other goes looking for willing test subjects. Do you have a preference?"

Sam sucked in air between her teeth. "You should probably be in charge of finding the test subjects." Over-inflated though her ego could sometimes be, Sam knew her own personality well enough to know she couldn't handle any of the HR portion of the program. "I can reach out to Tony to work on the equipment," she said. "Unless you think he'd respond better to you asking."

She was more of an engineer than a mechanic.

And more of a biologist than an engineer.

"I can do that." Bruce hesitates at the next part and then nods. "You should. He'll do anything I suggest, so it'd be good for you to at least give your point of view and bounce some ideas off him." Tony will roll with what his platonic life partner wants no matter what, just as Bruce always drops everything to help him on his projects. That's who they are. It seems a good idea for Sam and Tony to talk if they're going to work together in the future. "He and I have times where we share a brain, so outside voices are helpful."

Bruce picks up a book and waves it at her. "I'll start on my end, you start on your end, and we might get something started soon. On top of all the other projects. This place is not going to be boring for us any time soon."

[ooc: leading to a wrap soon if that's okay with you!]

She nodded. The idea of interacting with people gave her the wiggings, but she could swallow it to at least approach Tony. For better or for worse, he seemed to be into fixing everything that was broken about the hell hole.

Not everything could be fixed, of course. But at least they could diagnose the problems.

"Cool," she said. Which was probably the first, last, and only time anyone had said as much about jenky scientific research.

She smiled anyway. "This'll be...cool."

[ooc: We can wrap now if you like!]

[ooc: yay thank you!!!]

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I'm waving through a window, oh, can anybody see, is anybody waving back at me? [OPEN]

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