Penumbra: Gift Horses and Mouths

North Room - Four Corners Hotel: Atsehi Mesa - Quaquan

This room has the same yellow adobe walls as the rest of the building. There is a large open window giving a southern view of Four Corners and the lands beyond the mesa. A large rustic four poster bed is draped across the tops of the posts with a finely woven bug net that can be pulled down to protect the sleepers from Quaquan's biting night feeders. The bed faces the window. There is a large dresser with many drawers for the quests clothes. On the north wall is a beautiful well equipped bathroom, tiled with the matching hand painted pattern of the ones that border the room’s walls. On the one unbroken wall is a hand painted mural of a wide expanse of rich green plains where a herd of deer graze in the far distance. One old doe peers at the viewer with large liquid brown eyes, frozen by the artist's hand in that moment just before flight. In the foreground near the bottom of mural, in a tree, a squirrel bounds along a branch.

Penumbra is standing at a table in the room, pouring himself a glass of water from a topaz-hued ceramic pitcher, his back to the window so that he can face the door as the visitors arrive.

Samantha opens the door, stepping inside the hotel room and looking around with a hint of unease. "Hey-- wanted to say thanks for the heads-up back there on people looking for me," she starts, watching the man in front of her intently.

"You're welcome," Penumbra says, then gestures to a chair at the table. "Please, have a seat. Sage, you too. Either of you thirsty?" He takes a sip from his glass of water and then regards the liquid with raised eyebrows. "This is probably the first water I've had in a year that hasn't been run through a recirculation system aboard a starship or space outpost."

Sage Evesviia follows the woman in the door, grins at the man and nods. "Sure thing," she replies to his offer and moves over to a chair. Samantha gives an ironic half-smile, stepping inside the room further and taking a seat at the table. "You never appreciate some things until they're no longer so easy to get," she notes, nodding a little. "Water'd be good about now," she agrees.

Penumbra nods, pouring two more glasses of water. He slides the glasses across the table to the women and then takes his own glass and paces toward the window, gazing out toward the south edge of the mesa. "Samantha, the two men who attacked you after you got here ... who were they? Why were they after you?"

Samantha raises an eyebrow, glancing from Sage and back to Ian. "No idea, random assholes," she replies with a shrug, slouching in her chair and reaching for the glass.

"Random?" Penumbra tucks his tongue up under his upper lip, then takes another sip of water while he ponders. Finally, still watching the landscape, he continues: "Your former crewmates aboard the Athena seemed rather concerned about your welfare. Now we have random attackers chasing after you. Are these random attacks liable to continue on every world the Orphic visits?"

Sage Evesviia looks at Samantha as she looks at her, listens to Penumbra and says quite innocently, "They sure did seem to be waiting for us."

Samantha takes a sip of water, eyes flicking to Sage for a moment before returning to track the proprietor of the roaming calvalcade. "Really? How sweet of them to be concerned. I'll have to drop them a letter," she responds. "Since it is the first time something like this has happened, I can hardly imagine a repeat performance," she continues.

"Why do you suppose your captain on the Athena was so intent on getting you back?" Penumbra asks, turning so his back is once again to the window. Glass in hand, he walks toward the table. "Normally, I really don't care to ask too many questions about people who want to start a new life with us. But, under the circumstances, seeing as how you are running around with an assumed identity, avoiding Athena personnel and coming under random attack from not just the odd mugger on Tomin Kora, but a pair of determined attackers on *Quaquan*, an attack that put Sage in as much jeopardy as you, I think it's time for you to spell out precisely what sort of trouble you've gotten yourself involved in and perhaps provide some clues as to how the trouble might be solved. Do you owe money? Have you angered a crime lord? I can help if you give me information."

Sage Evesviia sits back and sips her water, content to just listen to the two speak.

Samantha nods once, as if a question had been answered for her, and sighs. After a moment of fiddling with the glass between her hands, she raises one of them, running a hand through her hair, highlighting the dangling datacord connected to her jack for an instant. "No, and no, and why are you being so generous?" she asks, dropping her hand to the table again, and lifting her eyes to consider Penumbra again.

"Gift horses and mouths, Samantha," Penumbra replies. "Gift horses and mouths." He takes a sip of water, then settles into a chair at the table, across from Samantha. "Perhaps you'd be less worried if I made it sound less generous: Explain what's going on and I'll help you. Don't, and I'm cutting you loose. Simple as that."

Sage Evesviia stops with the glass at her mouth and peers over the top at the man and then Samantha. She raises and eyebrow and waits silently for the woman's reply.

Samantha narrows her eyes at Ian, expression skeptical. "Simple. Sure," she mutters, shaking her head. "Fine, try this on: I stole something that I can't give back, and some people would very much like it back," she says, wincing just a little. "Of course, I couldn't exactly go back to Waldheim right now, even if I wanted," she continues bitterly, eyes dropping to the table briefly.

Penumbra frowns, shaking his head. "You're going to need to be a little more specific. Who. What. Why. That sort of thing."

Sage Evesviia listens with interest, takes a couple of sips of water and sets the glass back on the table.

Samantha winces again, briefly tensing, and then shakes her head. "What: the tech in my head-- you can see why I'm not keen on giving that back," she answers, and then pauses. "It's quite the nifty little gadget, and apparently it doesn't quite work right for anybody else," she continues carefully, stringing the words together as though feeling her way across a minefield. "And that's about all I can tell you."

"So how much would it take?" Penumbra presses. "The people who want this tech, surely they can reproduce it with the proper financing. So ... how much?"

Sage Evesviia stares at Samantha's head and narrows her eyes.

Samantha stares at Ian for a long moment. "Are you suggesting you would finance it?" she asks finally.

"I'm suggesting it's not outside the realm of possibility, if I know more about it," he answers. "*What* is it? What does it do? And how much would it cost? I will certainly confess to a capitalistic motivation. If this is a useful and potentially popular technology, I could make arrangements to benefit financially from my investment while getting you out of this bind."

Sage Evesviia leans her elbow on the table and rests her hand in her palm as she looks from one to the other as they speak.

"Useful and potentially popular," Samantha repeats, as if tasting the words. "Probably. We're talking about a datajack that's based on nanotechnology, with some interesting... sensory effects," she answers slowly. "And we're talking about a lot of money-- to be very honest, I don't know how much, simply that it might give some governments pause in their consideration of the investment," she continues, an odd look of triumph flashing across her face for a moment before she shrugs. "I never looked too closely into the price tag."

"And you said it hasn't worked in other attempted applications?" Penumbra says, scratching his chin. "That might make it impractical to invest in further development."

Sage Evesviia leans forward a little as Samantha explains the technology. Her eyes narrow, "So you got those nano things in yer head? And what sort of effects? Like good ones?"

"It's never been successfully implented with full range functionality except for me," Samantha replies with a slight shrug, before turning her eyes to Sage. "Depends on the programming. Whatever experience is coded in is fully immersive. The ability to tell the virtual from the actual is... difficult," she explains.

Penumbra nods. "All right. So, who developed this? Someone on Waldheim?"

"Oh," Sage replies and sits back in her chair. "Interesting."

Samantha nods, watching Penumbra carefully, not volunteering anything more specific.

A sip from his glass, then Penumbra gets up and walks to the window again. "Find a way to contact the developer on Waldheim, Samantha. Determine the amount they'd consider fair to proceed with development *and* leave you alone. Then get back to me."

Sage Evesviia seems amused by this direction for some reason and looks to Samantha for her response.

There's a long silence after that, before the sound of Sam's chair scraping backward announces her movement and she stands up. "And if I don't or can't?" she asks.

"If you don't or can't, that makes you a threat to my business and my personnel," Penumbra responds. "It's one thing to come work for me and start a new life without being hunted. But people who are actively hunted mean a major liability for me. I don't like liabilities, especially if they can be remedied one way or another to everyone's edification."

Sage Evesviia sits and thinks for a few moments and looks directly at Samantha, "If yah want I can go find out for yah." She grins and shrugs.

Samantha nods, expression shifting for a moment to something a little softer. "I can appreciate that," she replies. "And I wish I'd met you under better circumstances-- if I can't find an answer, I won't contact you again," she says quietly, before looking over at Sage. Her lips quirk upwards, and she crosses her arms over her chest. "And what, you're going to march right up there and ask?"

"Sage, let her handle it," Penumbra counters, shaking his head. He then looks back to Samantha. "If you can't find an answer, I want you to contact me. I'll still do what I can to help, but I may not be able to hire you on. That's all."

"Just offering. No biggie," Sage says with a shrug and picks up the glass for a another long drink of the water.

A bitter half-smile forms for a moment, and Sam shakes her head. "I'll see what I can find out," she says, dropping her eyes. "I appreciate the offer-- really, I do. But I'm not sure you really understand the problem. Actually, I'm pretty sure you don't, and there's not much I can do to fix that," she replies to Sage, and then turns to head out.

Penumbra nods, watching Sam head for the door. He pours more water into his glass and then looks toward Sage, still gripping the pitcher. "Refill?"

Sage Evesviia watches the woman leave and holds out her glass. "Sure," she says with a small smile. Samantha closes the door quietly behind her.