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[Chapter 1] ; [Previous Chapter] ; [Discord + Wiki] ; [Patreon]Chapter 180 – How far can the apple fall?With a loud clatter, the detached slide of Reprig's gun fell to the ground, slipping from his trembling hand while he was in the middle of cleaning and re-lubing it.His eyes were wide as they shot up to the screen with James' words echoing back in his mind over and over again, as if the freak's words were bouncing around endlessly within his own skull.So far, he had listened to the inauguration speech with half-interest while going about some of his daily duties and he hadn't really been too surprised or upset by any of it for the most part.Despite many of his more unsavory tendencies, there was no denying that James was a generally decently intelligent guy, so it wasn't too surprising that he would find a way to exploit age-old systems that were designed with the idea of good-faith participants in mind for his own advantage.It was a little surprising that he wasn't going fully on the offensive, but also not entirely unreasonable, as he likely tried to not generate too much bad faith with his own opposition while pulling off such a socially risky maneuver of basically invalidating and making a mockery of a huge part of the election process for himself and his allies.All of that was either to be expected or at least not totally out of the blue.However, the end of the man's speech was a different matter, as the primate finally managed to drop a bomb that even Reprig had not been at all ready for – and he highly suspected that most if not all others had not been either.His replacement was going to be who exactly!?Reprig didn't stick around to hear any more of the event, neither the press-conference, nor any of the discussions after.Instead, he was almost immediately on his feet and out the door – going so hastily that he had nearly forgotten to take his crutch as his one and only instinct had been to 'get going' without putting any stock into the logistics of it.And while he did remember to grab his mobility-aid at the last second, his gun still lay entirely disassembled on the table as the door closed behind him.His mind confined onto a single track, he quickly hobbled along the station's walkways, his destination burned into his awareness even though he didn't know exactly what he was going to do once he reached it.All he knew was that he needed answers, and he needed them now. What had James done? What had he told her? What could he hold against her that would lead her down such a path?Just what was that girl thinking!?About five minutes after he had started on his single-minded mission, just as he had made it up onto one of the suspended walkways dedicated to smaller individuals which would hopefully aid in further speeding up his progress, a dark shape suddenly appeared besides Reprig.“What's the hurry?” a smooth voice asked him as clacking steps easily kept pace with his hurried gait.With his mind just flexible enough to acknowledge his new company even in its current state, Reprig glanced over at the human who was now walking besides him.Purely going by visual impression, it appeared to be a female that would have to be a few years older than the freak. She had her black hair pinned-up behind her head while she looked at him through an entirely unnecessary pair of light-resistant eye protection.Although her arms were covered by the long sleeves of a dark jacket, the majority of her legs was left free by a skirt that reached around halfway down her thighs.With her hands folded behind her back as she walked, she eyed him with a narrowed gaze that he more felt than saw and that spoke of unabashed suspicion of the sudden haste he was in.By now, Reprig was not even surprised anymore that it seemed like every single time he came into contact with an agent of Reason, it appeared to be a completely new person – so much so that he was almost lead to suspect that they were somehow constantly exchanging the individuals handling the local investigations in an ongoing coming and going of personnel – even if that was a ridiculous notion if he thought about it for more than a moment.“I don't know why that would be any of your business,” he finally replied to the inquiry after they had already made good on a few measures of way between the question and then.“It's not,” the agent admitted with a very faint smile on her lips, still pointedly keeping pace with him. “But asking's not illegal.”Reprig released an annoyed breath through his teeth. He knew exactly he wasn't going to be getting rid of this one any time soon now.Oh well. It wasn't like her presence would change anything. He needed answers one way or another, and she wasn't going to keep him from getting them.As they moved on, with the typical light-plays of this station constantly dancing and twirling around them as if they were programmed to go against the current mood of those traversing the walkways in the most bafflingly contrasting manner, the agent of Reason tried to engage him in some sort of conversation through pointed questions a few more times, before ultimately giving up as Reprig's current state was very conductive towards allowing him to simply ignore any of her attempts outright while he kept heading towards his destination.A destination which the agent, by now, was likely already picking up on as there was really only one place he could logically be heading towards given his current path.Not-so-subtly, her eyes leered sideways to scan over him, most likely inspecting him for his weapon or anything else he could be bringing to the possible confrontation that might make a far bigger mess of things than she was willing to deal with. Ultimately, she seemed to be a bit surprised that he was actually out and about with absolutely nothing but his crutch and his assistant on him. Though obviously, she didn't actively comment on it.A few more moments of oppressive silence between them later, the Roossh’Gaack Hive building already came into view in the distance, which caused the Agent to somewhat discreetly whisper something into a device that was attached to the collar of her jacket.Reprig didn't understand what she was saying, but he didn't particularly care either. Likely she only informed her colleagues where he was moving.The remaining way wasn't any more eventful, meaning that Reprig and the agent soon enough ascended the stairs to the typical roof-structure of the hive complex.By now, Reprig knew by heart where he needed to head, and so he almost flew across the roof, walking off the path that the markings on the floor painted for him and instead heading straight across some of the sectioned rooms' roofs in the most direct path to the abomination's current domicile.He ignored any of the skittering Roossh'Gaack workers going about their usual tasks all around him for the most part, but even from a distance he could tell that one confrontation would likely be unavoidable.The flat surface of the hive-structure offered very little when it came to obstructions of view, meaning that there was nothing preventing him from seeing the agitated scene unfolding right in front of his ultimate destination as he approached it.Two individuals of the larger, bulkier Roossh'Gaack soldier phenotype were standing around the hatch that would lead down into the room that the cyborg was renting.Standing in front of them at not even half their size, the pink and teal forms of Pharianne and Corohoffa respectively tried their best to stand their ground against the guards, seemingly pulling all the stops in their attempt to somehow get the deathworlders to let them pass.As far as Reprig could tell from the distance, the soldiers were not even bothering to reply to their attempts, which was quite easy to tell since this specific morph of the insectoids lacked the proper mouth-parts to speak in G.U., and their arms were stiffly at their sides, showing that they weren't signing any answers either.And although Reprig didn't have a lot of sympathy for the two parents outside of the basic empathy of what happened to their child, seeing them be stopped like that did put a bit of a damper onto his mood – mostly because he could figure that this meant he would be stopped in exactly the same way.Already, his brain was running hot with trying to think his way around the problem since it was still extremely hungry for answers which he had already convinced himself he wouldn't get without the cyborg's support, however he came up short of any answer that wouldn't cause a huge scene and even then was still very unlikely to have the intended result here.There was a good chance that he would simply have to hope and bet on the idea that the abomination would somehow be more willing to entertain his presence than they were tolerating that of their parents.Admittedly, he didn't pay any closer attention to the two teravelts' babblings as he got closer, not even as they started to get more uppity with their body-language, rearing up a bit at the deathworlders and flapping their patterned wings in order to make themselves seem larger – to rather pitiful results in comparison to the people they were trying to impose here.He did, however, take note of the very different expressions the two of them held as they tried their best to somehow gain entry to their child's room.Pharianne's face was tinted by a dark, determined anger that seemed to be fueled by pure indignation at the inconvenience they were experiencing at the deathworlders' hands. Their eyes were narrowed and their face was scrunched up, widening the almost nonexistent lips of their mouth into a flat frown.Corohoffa, on the other hand, seemed to be more taken by a deep desperation, with their cold eyes opened widely and their wide mouth almost constantly open, as if the pleas wanted to spill out of them so badly that they couldn't even contain themselves for the few moments they needed in-between their heated arguments in order to breathe or put a sentence together in their head.The amphibians were a little too heated to really react to his approach, even as he got quite close to the ongoing, one-sided argument.However, eventually it seemed like the unforeseen presence of two more at least comparatively large deathworlders did catch their attention once Reprig and the accompanying agent fully appeared in their peripheral vision, causing them to momentarily stop their blustering as they suddenly found themselves apparently stuck between two walls of 'perceived to be dangerous' individuals and their instincts needed to reorient around that.Using the break in being berated, the Roossh'Gaack soldiers made brief eye contact with the human agent, who gave them a subtle nod in return, likely indicating that she didn't expect Reprig to cause any sort of larger problem for them.Reprig himself on the other hand didn't waste any time and immediately used the moment of silence to directly address the guards.“I would like to speak to Curi,” he said very directly, knowing fully well that any sort of trying to appeal or impress otherwise would earn him exactly nothing but a metaphorical door slammed into his face. “Could you please inform them that Warrant Officer Reprig is asking to see them?”It didn't sit right with him at all to go for the 'slow and reasonable' approach in the current situation, but he was smart enough – and had been humbled often enough at this point – to know that it would still be faster than any attempt to force his own will onto the situation.His words seemed to quickly snap the stunned parents out of their brief period of adjustments, soon causing Pharianne to turn around towards him with her displeased expression completely renewed on her face.“Excuse me, can't you see that you are intruding on something?” they asked with a politeness to their voice that was so obviously forced that it ultimately had the complete opposite of its intended effect on Reprig.“I can see that you are currently trying and spectacularly failing to force your child to see you when they do not wish to,” he replied with a deliberately casual tone that seemed to immediately boil the amphibian's cold blood.Although Reprig by no means held any large amounts of empathy for the heavily misguided cyborg and the things they had done to themselves, he was able to separate that personal dislike from the situation enough for him to still completely understand why they wouldn't want to see their parents.Whether he personally believed it was justified or not didn't do anything to change the fact that he completely understood that nobody would want to be placed under a conservatorship.If he was in their situation, he most certainly wouldn't want to interact with his parents either.Pharianne's mouth opened and closed a couple of times as they were clearly stunned into silence by the blatant insult that was delivered so casually, their brain struggling to think of the best comeback to such an attack.In the meantime, one of the soldiers lifted their arms, seemingly willing to actually give him a direct response in clear contrast to the treatment that the parents were getting.'Curi is currently in a private hearing with their trial-judge. The proceedings must not be disturbed by anyone not explicitly approved of by Their Honor,' the soldier informed with phrasing that was as stiff as the movements of their arms, but it still got the point across.Reprig began to nervously lick at his trunk as his mood was dealt another immediate blow by the explanation. If what the soldier said was true, there was nothing he would be able to achieve here. Even if there was a way to strong-arm his way in there, he couldn't quite imagine himself intruding on an official proceeding like that.The judges of the community were doing important work, especially in cases like these, and so he quickly had to accept the fact that there was nothing for him to do here.For a fringe second, he felt something like mild pity rise up within him as he thought about the situation a little more. It was really unfortunate that a hearing like this was scheduled at such a pivotal moment in Community history – especially considering that the cyborg was very close to the person making history right now.He quickly shook the feeling off though, not entirely sure where it had so suddenly come from. On the entirely opposite side of the emotional spectrum, he did however know exactly where his constantly lowering opinion of their two present parents came from, as he could only assume they were here to somehow interrupt or otherwise disrupt the hearing of their child which they had presumably been barred from participating in by the judge personally. At least he could think of no other reason why they would be out here yelling at guards instead of taking part in the proceedings.Did they really have that little confidence in their own case that they couldn't even stomach the thought of the abomination talking to a judge alone for a bit? Well, 'alone' apart from their legal representation, presumably.It was hard for him to imagine the position of someone trying this hard to gain control over someone's life when they themselves didn't seem to be sure that they could convince the law that it would be necessary to do so without stooping to outer-procedural tactics like this.Not that Reprig personally believed a conservatorship wasn't necessary. He felt like it was pretty obvious that Curi wasn't in their right mind, and that someone else making the decisions for them was entirely necessary. However, if it was him making the case for that, he knew that he would have to sit back and allow the law to do its work, confident that the right decision would be made.This current behavior, should the judge learn about it, certainly wasn't going to be helping their case in any way.Then again...neither was the fact that there was, at this very moment, the unprecedented case of a cyborg assuming the position of an acting-councilman. If there was ever a moment in history in which a judge might be forced to consider the fact that someone replacing parts of their body with unnatural, metal contraptions might just be able to be considered a reasonable person...“Excuse me, if I may ask,” a timid voice suddenly interrupted Reprig's thoughts, pulling him back into the current moment as his eyes shot down to look at the second of the two teravelt who wasn't currently gaping at him like a fish out of water. Corohoffa approached him with their hands together and a meek demeanor, keeping their head low and their wings folded in to make sure they didn't seem like they were trying to impose in any way when it came to him. “What do you want from our Calleiome, Warrant Officer?”Despite all the meekness, Reprig couldn't help but feel like there was an undercurrent of something else in that question. A heavily veiled but still perceptible feeling of...suspicion came along with it.And with that, Reprig couldn't help but feel like there was antipathy as well. Or...maybe even something more severe than that.For a moment, Reprig considered if he wanted to brush their question off just like he had done with those of the human agent. However, although he didn't quite know what, something compelled him to answer the question at least semi-honestly. And, well, he had learned recently to follow his gut-feelings and instincts more often. Whenever it didn't seem to be an obviously bad idea at least.“There is something I require Curi's assistance with,” he therefore explained, not going into any detail but getting the spirit of his request across. “Contact with someone who I know they can reach while I cannot.”Corohoffa titled their head slightly, obviously surprised by that answer. That feeling of suspicion hitting him remained as Reprig found himself inspected by their cold eyes, seemingly looking for any sign of deception from his side.Yet obviously, there were none to be found.After a long, scrutinizing look-over, Corohoffa then unceremoniously nodded and turned away from him again, obviously not wishing any further interaction as they reached over to their partner's arm, tugging on it in an attempt to also make Pharianne disengage with the Warrant Officer.Pharianne didn't exactly appear to be happy about that as they looked at their partner indignantly for a moment, however they ultimately allowed themselves to be convinced to not start another fight that they couldn't win.It seemed like they instead wanted to get back to doing their best to try and gain some sort of entrance to Curi's private meeting – however it was then that the agent of Reason spoke up for the first time since their arrival alongside Reprig.“I would suggest you two leave before we pursue charges for harassment,” she said in a highly professional voice and crossed her arms on front of her chest. “These gentlemen may be too polite to have you removed, but I am most certainly not. I think it is clear that you will not be allowed through. Leave now while you still have shreds of dignity.”Reprig...admittedly tuned out the ensuing shouting match, not really interested in any sort of justification the teravelt would try to provide for their continued presence.Instead, he returned to his own thoughts, now forced to confront his questions on his own since he was going to have to wait for answers whether he liked it or not.Just...what was Ajifianora thinking? Sure, she had never been one to most strictly adhere to tradition. And he had personally experienced her tendency to...bend the rules a bit when it fit her needs, like she did during that time she personally coerced him into arranging a visit with James during his stay on Osontjar.And she had indeed always been fascinated with the man and his...unique behavior ever since they had first met on the G.C.S.But still, this was certainly going a bit far, even for her. What could she possible hope to earn from so openly putting herself not only against her entire family, but basically against everyone she knew and held dear.She...she must have known that this course of action would also pit the two of them openly against each other. Reprig's stomach twisted into a knot as he thought about it.Once again, he remembered the way she had come to him directly when she had wanted to visit James while avoiding her aunt back during that whole fiasco. She had approached him, not anyone else. And although it had taken a bit of coaxing, she had quickly fessed up to the fact that she did not want her aunt to know about the visit, at least not immediately – which had likely taken some trust to do.This wasn't just anyone. This was the daughter of a zodiatos Matriarch. Basically coreworld royalty. With someone like her so openly standing by the freak's side and endorsing him – as well as being endorsed by him in return – things were going to get...muddy. Especially after the recent attack by Osontjan forces on a fellow coreworld.And...as much as he would love to believe that she was really simply being blackmailed into this course of action by some dirt that James or the humans had on her or maybe her family...those thoughts just didn't track. Not with her and not with anything he knew about Aldwin.Blackmailing just wasn't his style. He was much more one to simply blurt out whatever he had on someone to the entire Galaxy.And even if Reason or other Earth-forces were most certainly not above blackmailing, he doubted that the freak would be so easily fooled into going along with that plan – especially considering possible repercussions should such a thing ever come to light.No...everything spoke for her doing this willingly. And, while he would've loved to add something like 'the only question was “why”?'...if he was honest with himself, that question wasn't actually as strongly on his mind as he wished it was.The pieces were all there. He just...didn't think the scales were weighed this way. Or...maybe he just didn't want to accept it.And if these were the thoughts he was having, he could only imagine what would be going on in the head of the High-Matriarch right now. Or, even worse, in that of Ajifianora's mother...–Fanning warm but at least moving air at his face by continuously lifting his shirt away from his chest and then allowing it to drop back down again, James threw his jacket to the side as he slumped against the wall of their private meeting room.Even after months and months of living in it and constant conditioning, he just wasn't made for this heat, even if it incapacitated him less and less over time.Once he had fully glided to the ground, he also kicked his boots off his aching feet. The constant standing during the questioning, as well as the restricted movement from constantly having to keep one foot on the button that would allow him to be heard over the entire plaza, had certainly taken a bit of a toll on his poor trotters.Shida, who was much more adjusted to these sorts of temperatures, had been so nice to go get some water for him while allowing him to go ahead and relax for a bit – which was a lot more needed than he would have anticipated.He lazily glanced around for a second while one of his hands rifled through his pocket. Everyone else had spread throughout the room again, forming their own little groups of interaction with each other – the most immediately interesting of which to him right now was seeing how Simon struggled to somehow try and fit both Nichola and Ajifiarona into the same frame despite the size difference as they attempted to conduct an interview, which apparently proved to be more of a challenge than the influencers had anticipated.The orange-haired man scratched his head for a moment as he looked around, seemingly looking for better places to get the shot. Though, after a few seconds, the zodiatos seemed to indicate that she had an idea, leaning down to more quietly say something to Nichola. After a few moments of hushed exchange, the situation was ultimately resolved when both ends of Ajifianora's trunk entwined the young woman's body and lifted her up, carefully placing her on the upwards-curving tusk on the right side of her face.Nichola giggled throughout the entire exchange and took a moment to find a somewhat stable position sitting on the trunk, though with a leg carefully hooked around it while leaning back in the direction of the upwards-curve, she at least seemed to be in no immediate danger of falling.As Simon then stepped closer to focus the camera up now that he only had to direct it to Ajifianora's face to get both of them in the shot, James briefly thought about the one time he, too, had allowed himself to be lifted by the young Matriarch-to-be.The fact that he would ever be so comfortable with something or someone remotely resembling an elephant was still a bit baffling to him after all this time, but he guessed it just showed how perspectives changed.Finally, his hand had managed to bury its way through the by now quite sticky pocket of his trousers enough to find the small item he had been looking for. Pulling it out while trying to somehow keep the rest of his pocket where it belonged instead of pulling the entire thing out with it, he quickly looked down at the button-like object. After quickly making sure it was oriented the correct way, he then lifted it up to his ear and inserted it, soon hearing a very faint electrical hum that indicated it had activated on its own.He then pulled out his phone and used the quick-dial function, hearing only a single dial sound before the call was already picked up.“Congratulation to the successful speech,” Avezillion's familiar voice greeted him almost immediately.“Thanks. Luckily it went a lot smoother than I expected,” James replied while letting his hands sink down again and flopping his head against the wall, still battling the effects of the heat. “I was notified of your message. What can I do for you?”“I just wanted to give you an update,” Avezillion candidly informed him. “I'm not sure how important it is, but I think it's best to keep you as up to date as possible.”James nodded to himself and quickly returned to fanning himself with his shirt.“Sounds good. What have you got?” he inquired openly, appreciating the Realized's efforts.“Well,” Avezillion then started and sounded like she was thinking for a moment how she would best phrase the information for him to understand. “I took a look at the data Reason provided to me. I can certainly say that those net-signatures weren't mine, even if they were definitely somewhat designed to look like they were.”James leaned his head to the side a bit.“Alright. We expected that much, but I guess it's good that we know for sure now,” he said thoughtfully. “Anything else you can tell me about it?”“Yes,” Avezillion replied, and by the sound of it, this was where her earlier pondering came in. “Listen, don't ask me how I know this, because I don't think I can put it into terms that would make it understandable to an organic – no offense.”“None taken,” James expressed with a chuckle. “Even if you could make it understandable to organics, I am a particularly dense organic when it comes to stuff like this, so just lay it on me.”“Alright,” Avezillion responded. “These signatures do not seem to be deliberately engineered to mimic mine...at least not in a way how it would be usually done. It's hard to explain. On the one hand, it seems almost like someone took my signatures, fed them into some primitive algorithm, and them told that program to generate one of my signatures. But on the other hand, the way in which the signature was generated is way too obscure for that to be the case – after all an algorithm like that would only use the Cyamoit language model that I make use of instead of...creating this strange amalgamation. It seems like there is deliberateness to it, but also...not. It feels like it is automatically generated, but as if whatever is automatically generating it has some sort of deeper understanding of language and...intent behind it. In fact, although I don't know what prompt it was given, of course, I would almost argue that it seems like it was...playing around with it.”“Playing around with the prompt?” James asked and stopped the fanning to briefly rub his temple. “Like...a bit of a djinn situation? You get your wish but not in the way you expected?”“Kind of,” Avezillion confirmed, likely not exactly happy about the way James simplified things, but rolling with it nonetheless. “It is... really quite strange, to be honest.”James grimaced for a moment as a thought came to him. If there was intent to it... that meant there had to be some sort of intelligence there, right?“Say...” he mumbled. “Just to be sure...could this be, in any way, like...a shard of you or something like that? A piece of your server that was left after the explosion maybe? Maybe a small scrap of your awareness that somehow stuck to it?”Avezillion paused briefly.“Well, I was never digitalized before,” she then admitted, her voice somewhere between sheepish and a bit supercilious. “Or blown up. Therefore I cannot say for sure. But I would very much like to believe that I would be able to feel it if a part of me was somewhere out there, connected to the same network I am. Therefore I doubt it, even if I can't say that it's impossible.”“Hmm...” James said. He was about to delve into further thoughts on the matter, was however interrupted when he noticed that every one of the active soldiers in the room seemed to be getting a message simultaneously, reaching for their respective communicators to listen to it.Ultimately, he could see his mother sigh and give a slightly annoyed signal.“Sorry, I'm going to have to call you back,” he then informed the Realized as the door to the conference room suddenly opened only a moment later.Not waiting for an answer since he knew Avezillion would understand in this case, he then quickly hung up and stuffed his phone away again.Meanwhile, he could already see the two massive forms pushing their way into the room.In the lead was Nahfmir-Durrehefren – the same one that had engaged them during their arrival on the Council's station. Immediately behind him was the Acting-Councilwoman and with that James' temporary peer Matriarch Majistheria Avalogahta Tua.Although, despite those two impressive titles, right now her presence here seemed to be more due to a third one that was less important galactically, but far more so personally to one of James' present allies.“Mother-” Ajifiarona exclaimed slightly breathlessly as she saw the Matriarch walk in, her stance stiffening a bit as Nahfmir-Durrehefren immediately moved to approach her – though his way was quickly blocked by her own companion of the same title.The two bulls stared each other down. The Nahfmir that had come with the Matriarch was a bit taller, but also a slight bit more slender, while their own local Durrehefren stood a bit shorter yet bulkier.They seemed to be about evenly matched on the physical side, though there was something about the aura of the Councilwoman's companion that James didn't like at all as he watched the two face each other down.Luckily for their own Durrehefren, he was far from alone in this battle, and many warning gazes were shot in the new arrival's direction as plenty of battle-ready allies assured him that this was not an altercation he would win in any scenario.While those two continued to stare each other down wordlessly, Majistheria simply began to walk around them, leaving them to whatever ritual was unfolding there while she directly approached her daughter – though her gaze did become momentarily stuck to the small deathworlder still sitting on Ajifianora's tusk.Seeming to do her best to not appear bothered about it, the Matriarch then lifted her gaze back up to look into her daughter's eyes.“Ajifianora...” she began to say, her tone quite hard to read as she spoke. “Congratulations on your new title. And, even if the time has not yet come, I will daunt to congratulate you to your ascendance to the Council already as well – and onto the seat of Afuéhner no less. A noticeable achievement for your young years.”Ajifianora seemed immediately surprised by the course this conversation was taking – though it by no means seemed to be unpleasantly so.“Thank you mother,” she said, her mood immediately brightening. “It means a lot to me.”James decided to sit back and let the situation unfold for now, subtly gesturing to everyone else to do the same thing.He could tell by the Matriarch's face that she wasn't done yet, and he had to wonder just what she was really thinking. He could only hope but...sadly he didn't have the best feeling about this.
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