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Lt. Ransomite
checking out monitor p
1d6 + 2 (recon bonus) = 8
HP: 50/50

Ransomite would have cringed at the phrasing from Eternal Alkmene if he hadn't spoke similarly himself. Not at his pulpit, of course, and not in front of superior officers, of course. "I am alright, sir." Was that the proper titling? He didn't know this eternal's name, and didn't know if Eternal as an address would breed insult or respect. Sir was neutral.

Sir would not get him in trouble.

Fulgurite walked off to pull the power source out of the turrets, but the brute force idea he had ultimately won the day. He let out a sigh of relief when the turrets collapsed, though quietly said, "Thanks," to Fulgurite despite.

They were being ordered around by their general to move to the next room. Best to do that before he was questioned.

He moved to the next area, blinking in minute surprise at how modern this locale looked. It felt like he had stepped into an office covered with chrome and screens. What was he supposed to do here? All the screens looked disconnected. Perhaps there was some way to bring them back?

Reasonable enough, he thought, as he whispered to himself with every step he took. Those distant stars caught his attention within the center of the circle. His mumuration was cut as he looked closer, and he let out a quiet sound of curiosity instead as he touched the P at the center.

When Larimar checked the four files, he would find that the first one he checked contained a schematic. This one looked like a trap made with a metal frame and glass underlay with etched tubules. At the center of the device was a trap that, when sprung, would collect all the energy in the area. The schematic detailed each part to be used, the max and min weights for said items, testing information on durability and efficacy, and notes added by another user that indicated which parts were the first to fail in trials. Later amendments were made to the draft that made up for its shortcomings, and finally, an approval code by one General Galvorn that indicated production would start immediately.

The second file was a different schematic – it rendered a weapon that looked much like a normal spear, save that it contained a hidden chamber at the butt of the weapon for a retractable blade. Weapons testing indicated that the springload was robust enough to push the blade through flesh at point blank. This one received an original seal of approval by the same General, though the file went on to show later iterations that tried to enchant the spear to be 'stored' inside of an object as an additional safety measure. The file went on between two unnamed engineers as they postulated ways to use storage technology similar to subspace. However, they encountered difficulties with getting civilians to manifest enough magical ability to tap into that pocket of subspace, so the iteration was abandoned.

The third file was heavily damaged, like someone had attempted to restore a deleted file. It had the trappings of an Information branch investigation into a civilian named Arnaud, and only mentioned that there may be more to him than was told to the investigator.

The final file was some kind of a log taken by the facility itself. The video required Larimar's input to play it.

BREECH DETECTED flashed across the screen. It went dark again, then brightened up with various camera feeds showing teams of knights running through the halls. They were led by a Mercury Knight who was just beginning to grey. She looked grimly determined, though she appeared not to notice the camera systems that tracked her. No sound accompanied the feed; either it never recorded sound to begin with, or that part of the file had corrupted. In the next cut, the cameras showed her and her squad reaching the same area in which Larimar crouched with the terminal, though she was on the ceiling (or the true floor, as Mizuki understood it). Several of the knights tried to bludgeon the terminals, but to no avail; finally, the group was called away and a Jupiter Knight came forward. His movements were difficult to see, but he did something to the console and retreated from it quickly. Afterward, the whole area burst into volatile electricity.

As the Jupiter Knight did so, the Mercury Knight who led earlier stood before the pair of doors with a forcefield. She etched out her planetary symbol over it which came to life with a bright blue glow. The footage thereafter was lost to corruption. Perhaps there was more in the following room.

As the others filtered into the new room at Larimar's behest, Seraphinite [4] would find that some of the terminals had slowly begun their boot processes, whether by some fluke or some knack for detecting an increased chaos presence in the area. R&D PERSONNEL ONLY displayed across most of the screens, though one had glitched halfway through its permissions check and the words dragged down the screen. This one – Seraphinite's terminal – defaulted to a screen that read 86,704 FILES AVAILABLE. No restrictions were mentioned.

The terminal waited for someone to input a keyword or file number.

Spectrolite was engulfed by a monochromatic field when she touched the P symbol on the door. In that vision, she saw the room crowded with knights of all stripes and denominations, who collected in a half-circle around the Mercury Knight in the center. Knelt on the floor before her was a Negaverse Lieutenant, who had his hands raised in the air in a universal sign of surrender.

"I don't know the password," he said.

"Call someone who does," the Mercury Knight responded. "Tell them that, if they want their Lieutenant back alive, they'd better give us the code. If not, well… It'll take time to hack the terminals, but it won't take me forever. Not that you'll be alive to watch me."

"I don't – I don't think it works that way."

"Then tell me how it works."

"I don't know for sure, I've only heard one of the tech guys hypothesize about it. He said that the terminals respond to a level of chaos like it's a clearance level. And then the terminals can read part of the starseed like a fingerprint. He said he thought it was pretty superficial, because that's the only way it could identify people by name."

The Mercury Knight crouched, then seized the Lieutenant's hand and dragged him to a standing position. "So you're telling me that you're our access code. Fine, then. Get to work." Turning him, the Knight shoved him toward the bank of terminals.

The monochromatic field retracted thereafter, leaving the room far emptier than it had just looked.

Ransomite [8] touched the symbol, spawning another monochromatic field that consumed only the monitor itself. What he saw was some kind of a video feed from when the strange building was more widely used. He would recognize the room in which he stood as the same general setup to the one in the video, though the collection of metal and glass chairs they had were neatly pushed in on the screen.

Standing at the far end of the room were a General and a Captain, each seeming harried in their discussion.

"I know, but they've breeched the rest of the facility," the General said, his arms tucked over his chest. The pair were looking at the large terminal, which showed them the paths of the intruders through the building. In the corner of the screen was a 3D map of the complex with various blinking dots throughout its blueprint. "They'll make it here. I know they will."

"What do you want me to do about it, General Galvorn, Sir?" The Captain, a petite girl next to the broad-shouldered and towering General, looked up at him rather than at the screen.

"Wipe the data. We can't have our work falling into enemy hands. Have your Lieutenant scrub all the handhelds, too."

"I hate to question you, Sir, but are you sure you want to do that when the terminals won't respond to an Order signature?"

"Absolutely. I know these knights, Captain. They will stop at nothing to get their hands on every last scrap this plant has to offer. The data is more valuable than any weapon we have ever crafted."

The Captain nodded. "That's going to take time. Do you think we'll have enough of it before they break in?"

The General paused. His shoulders rose and fell as he seemed to go reminiscent. "I'll distract them. It should be enough if you and your lieutenant are quick." The video clouded over with static, and the monochromatic field faded immediately.

Fulgurite [5] would find that the terminal had slowly begun its boot process. It seems that their general proximity to the terminals was enough for the electronics to detect them and power on accordingly. The glass plate before this one was heavily fingerprinted in areas that one would expect a normal keyboard would have the most use, suggesting that these might not be that separated from desk work in a normal facility. They may have been touchscreen as well, but the operating system these terminals used did not make much use of that technology unless there were schematics on display.

The keyboard lit as the terminal started up, displaying keys and their outlines in small threads of light on the glass plate. The glass plate did not appear to be connected to anything; either it used power wirelessly, or it had some sort of battery or other charging capability that wasn't readily discerned.

These terminals, however, did not welcome him by name in the way that the others did. Seraphinite would find the same. Once R&D PERSONNEL ONLY flashed across the screen, the terminal spat out more load jargon before it finally stated UNAUTHORIZED PERSONNEL DETECTED. The terminal had gotten stuck in a loop, stating the same phrase ad nauseam until it tiled across the screen.

Lieutenant Spectrolite
HP: 50 / 50


Spectrolite's breath caught in her throat as the color vanished into greyscale around her. It took no time at all for her gaze to snag on the collection of knights, her pulse nearly choking her at their presence. Her free hand shot to cover her mouth, crouching lower to avoid being spotted by the group--but none of them seemed to hear her squeaks of alarm or scuffling of her boots. Through the slim spaces between bodies, she could see another Lieutenant like herself. He wasn't... he hadn't been with them. Wait. None of the group she'd come with where here.

Perhaps a bit slow on the uptake, Spectrolite cautiously stood, beginning to realize it wasn't... like some teleportation magic just happened. It was like watching a video recording.

She realized the Mercury Knight was saying something about a code and.... well, the Lieutenant's life wavered on if they got it or not. She couldn't blame the guy for giving her the information--call her a horrible soldier, but Spectrolite would rather live than die protecting someone's information at this point. At least surviving meant getting the chance to try and right wrongs.

But she listened, curious about how these systems worked. The tech guys--she could only assume they were also Negaverse agents--didn't even know how it worked...? So these systems weren't built by them? But the agents used them... huh. Levels of Chaos acting as clearance levels, starseeds being fingerprints... so that's how they logged in.

The vision faded rapidly after the Lieutenant was shoved towards the terminals, and she shivered as she retracted her hand far from the simple little P symbol. "Oh that was... that was weird..."

Seeing another agent caught up in a monochromatic field (Ransomite), she couldn't help but trot over to him. The moment the field dropped, she immediately started up. "Hi! Did you just see a greyscale vision? What'd you see?"

She couldn't help but be excited, since... well! She'd never had a vision of anything before! Sure it wasn't her magic, but it was cool! "I just got hit by one, too, when I touched a symbol by the door." Her brow furrowed and her head tilted slightly. "A... P? I'm not sure what that is, though."

Spectrolite was... not especially good about looking up information in the database...

Lt. Ransomite
debriefing spectrolite and scanning for any other symbols
1d6 + 2 (recon bonus) = 8
HP: 50/50

The fact that a moment of curiosity resulted in visuals appearing magically in front of him should not have made Ransomite jump, but it did all the same. His cursing afterward was purely internal as he hastily recomposed himself before anyone could notice how on edge he seemed. He was more than familiar enough with magic at this point for it to not come as that big of a surprise, and yet.

And yet.

So he turned his attention to what was happening in the visuals covering the screen. All the better to help him pretend that everything was fine. It was fine. It was fine--

Back to the terminal. There was a map in it, from how it looked. One "General Galvorn"--who?--had been tracking knights trying to break into the facility. ...Was the enemy able to get into the Rift? Was this place not in the Rift back then? A slight frown turned down the corners of Ransomite's mouth as he kept watching.

'Order'? Made more sense than 'White Moon', he guessed--

That information got filed away in Ransomite's brain for later. He needed to pay attention to what he was seeing and try to retain as much of it as he could. He didn't want to count on an ability to replay or record it. General Galvorn. A map. The terminal's data had been entirely wiped. The general had planned a distraction.

Speaking of distraction. To his credit, Ransomite did not jump this time when approached by another agent. He cleared his throat, mental wheels spinning to take the mouth-sounds he'd heard and translate them into words, words he could process and form a response to. Like he was expected to.

Had he touched a P? Ransomite buried the impulse to say that he had touched many a P in his time. That did not stop the subtle twitching of his face, especially the oh-so-slight widening of his eyes and the blink-and-you-miss-it quirk upward of the corner of his mouth.

Forgive me, my Lord--

He'd blame it on the stress--

"I, ah, also touched a P symbol." Heh. "From what I saw, it's a knight symbol of some sort." He waved vaguely at the terminal. "There was General Galvorn speaking with a captain, telling them that Order knights were invading and to scrub all the data, including on handheld devices. This terminal was tracking a map."

By the end, he was projecting his voice a bit. He'd delivered the info to at least one other person, but hopefully other people heard. Just in case, or something. That was what he was supposed to, to be a good agent. Right.

Ransomite crouched to look for any other gouged symbols in places that were harder to see immediately, replying with, "hopefully the superiors heard me, but they should know if they didn't." He'd make his search quick, hearing Faustite's instruction to wrap it up.

Captain Seraphinite
Looking up the keyword MAP and addressing the room 1 + 1 bonus = 2 FFS SERA--
HP: 100 / 100


Seraphinite brought out his tablet, quickly jotting down the words Faustite suggested. "Will do, I'll update you once those searches are done." Hearing the half-youma General somewhat out of breath, though, made him pause a tick before asking, "General, are you alright?" He didn't know Faustite, and to be frank, a question like that is more what he'd reserve for Jet... maybe Aquamarine. Mostly because he knew the former would be concerned about the latter. But if the fiery General wasn't doing well, he at least felt it was right to make sure the guy didn't need backup.

Setting his tablet next to the keyboard-like structure, he began to type in the first keyword--MAP--into the terminal.

When Fulgurite called over to him, the man turned slightly to listen before nodding slightly. "That's the screen I was starting to see, too, before the terminal glitched out and logged me in despite not being R&D. General Faustite mentioned getting some of the Mauvians down here--" Movement on other screens cut him off, and Seraphinite glanced about. More of the terminals were beginning to glitch, showing the same simple keyword or file lookup system, and the same crazy number of files they could search through.

He looked back to the Eternal, nodding his head towards one of the working terminals. "Try one of these glitched ones."

Looking over to the rest of the room, he called out, "If you're not doing anything, take a look at one of the terminals with a search function available. Try looking up the keywords Galvorn, Arnaud, password, breech. And map, in case my search doesn't work out."

At least if more people could try to access the terminals, they might be able to gather more of that information all the sooner. Though, he wondered if being a Negaverse senshi would cause the terminals to react different from an agent.

Eternal Fulgurite
looking up Arnaud
HP: 100/100
Action: 3 + (2 for recon if it applies) = 3 (5)

Of course, the Mauvians were the Negaverse's super hackers. He shouldn't have even been surprised, considering all the other s**t they made. Even managed to make it so Faustite stopped setting all his damn tech on fire.

He lifted a brow as Seraphinite started listing off some keywords and the other screens started to let all of them log in.

Handy.

"Sure. I'll look up Arnaud." He wasn't sure who that was, but definitely sounded like a civilian name. No military title in front of Arnaud really sounded like anything believable. Galvorn, however, could be a mineral. That he'd believe.

In front of a terminal, he started typing.

As Ransomite [8] looked around, he would find that another Mercury symbol was carved behind one of the monitors, and glowed very faintly. Beyond that, a Pluto symbol (as Fulgurite had explained) had been carved into a now-broken pile of glass on the floor. Further examination would reveal that the symbol was in pieces, much like what had once been a keyboard, so the symbol was completely dull. Perhaps, if they reassembled enough of the keyboard to make a working symbol, they could see what this one had to offer.

When Seraphinite [2] looked up a map, the system indexed a file that most closely matched his criteria. However, as he opened it, much of what faced him is the same glitchy mess that Tama had originally pulled off the first terminal interface. They had learned nothing more from their map keyword search.

Spectrolite's [6] search was more successful, but perhaps it had not turned up the information that Faustite was looking for. Rather than a bank of passwords, Spectrolite discovered a policy in place regarding passwords, established at a time that had been corrupted in the file. Much of it was bone dry — explaining how each password must be so many characters long and have so many capital letters, numbers, and symbols. Certain symbols were excluded. Passwords must be changed every so many days. Notably, the most recent update to the file had a single, very pointed message:

Galvorn, stop declining your password change. Everyone can read your email by now.

Fulgurite [3] found that the name Arnaud didn't turn up much. If anyone in the facility knew who that name referred to or what it meant, they didn't bother cataloguing it in their database.

Galvorn was a name that the database recognized, Seraphinite [4] would find. What was found resembled a front-facing personnel file in that it described Galvorn, but only from his best side. Only at a distance.

General Galvorn was recorded as the head of this facility and the primary individual in charge of operations. He was purportedly invaluable at a multilevel standpoint — his main focus was plant operations, but he also dabbled in security and research & development. His personal youma was Forgemaster, a many-limbed youma that was one of several who oversaw weapon production. He was also the one to suggest putting youma to use with standing orders, which allowed the plant to perform at its increased output (when it was active).

Some of the data was glitched. There was a historical blurb in the file, saying he was the head of some operation, though what that operation was and what it accomplished were replaced by a string of nonsense numbers and symbols.

"Seraphinite," Faustite's voice came through the Captain's tablet. "If you're still there, I want you to look up Triss and Gale."