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[Hank's looking a little more haggard than usual when he makes this post. He's tired and fucking wore out from a long stretch of just being perpetually pissed and sad. And goddammit, he wants his hope back, but it's been sliding.]

[He's still fuckin' trying, though.]

[He positions the phone so it's showing an old-timeyish looking Detective's office. We're talking he went for the Sam Spade aesthetic. He plants himself in a desk seat.]

So, I know I just fuckin' talked about getting a promotion. But I had some things go wrong with my last case. [Some big things. People kept going missing, for one.] Connor got assaulted by a decorated officer. And while he's getting what's due uh... I don't know. I figured it'd be better if I got him out of there while he was recovering emotionally. And this fuckin' job would require less walking.

[Those are his excuses? Real reason number one? Connor can't understand all those extra languages at the moment. Real reason number two? Being in the middle of the police station when his year runs up doesn't sound like the best plan. And for some people? Seems like it's not taking a year.]

[He sure as shit would like to stop losing fucking friends. Thanks.]

[Hank turns himself in his chair.] This is my new private detective's office. So now I get to take pictures for paranoid fuckin' people looking for reasons for divorce. I'm really goddamn excited about that. [He smears his hand down his face, then scratches his beard.]

But uh. It was time I said good-bye to the job. [He'd always said this was his last chance to be a cop, and here it is. But damn if the heaviness of that loss isn't weighing on him too.]

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Uh, some weapon's smith guy approached him. Said he wanted to barter for parts and he got his chip out for him. Drifter, I think his name is.

[Hank's never met him.]

Apparently he doesn't have one, either. A woman posted to the bulletin board, said she was looking into ways to disable chips if they couldn't be removed. I know another one's looking into methods, too.

[He grabs a post-it to write down Tannis and Lorna's respective contact information down on, having to look it up in his trust paperback novel of note storage.]

Drifter. That man's more useful than I realized.

[Loki has. He nods at the information, smiling.]

Hank, I believe this might be the happiest I've been all month. [Not that Loki is ever particularly happy.]

Small favors, I guess. We're gonna have to be careful not to get caught unchipped or give the fuck an excuse to look.

[He doesn't know about the current language snafus. If he did, he'd thank god for the appropriate timing of it.]

I found out another good thing- well, okay, it's partially a shit thing but there's some good in there.

This whole 'plague', it wasn't natural. It was always manmade- or AI made. The city was quarantined while everyone was dying, and there's a map of the city that one of the Heart people made mentioning a 'fence'.

Now, since the fucker is a quarantine fence, I'm betting it's made to keep people from getting out especially. But it's been a long time, and hell, it might be somewhere we can retreat and regroup to if we gotta.

[So, small favors. That fence needs checking out at some point, but he's just focussing on the park at the moment, until he finds out for sure what's there.]

[He looks thoughtful for a moment, contemplating the words and the implications. Yes, removing the chips was preferable, but what if there was another alternative?]

Perhaps...though I wonder if it's possible to reprogram them, the chips. They clearly have quite a bit of functionality individually. Perhaps removing them or disabling them isn't the only option.

[ He has to think on the details, or contact Drifter to talk them over.

Besides, what Hank said next was far more interesting.]

There may be others out there, beyond the fence. [He nods.] A good point. Do you have this map? I could look into this fence, with a few others. [He's not stupid enough to go without backup.]

Yeah, I left a copy of it at the bar. I didn't want it here, just in case I got unexpected visitors that I actually minded.

[People just be teleportin' into his head and his house. At least he likes most of them.]

I think reprogramming is what the Lorna woman's aiming for. Not sure about Tannis. Probably something similar.

[He considers something else.]

I do still want to try and reprogram those guys. It'd be better in the long run. But uh... if we gotta bring 'em back before there's trouble, you mentioned you could change memories? Mess around with them a little?

If it's possible, they really shouldn't be allowed to remember they got questioned.

[Though generally he doesn't think the Head gives that much of a fuck about them. They also can't keep them indefinitely. They can't let them go alive knowing what they know. Wiping or blocking their memory is the best choice.]

Edited 2020-02-18 10:17 (UTC)

[He nods.] I'll have a look, then. It sounds worthwhile, given our need for an escape route.

[It sounded too good to be true. He wagered there was likely to be some sort of pain involved in the process, but he was used to pain.]

I'll look into contact her as well. I grow tired of their chains.

[There was a note of hatred in his voice, of the emotions he was keeping tightly in check.]

It's possible I could make them forget, but my spells don't work on machines. Remember that.

Maybe true, but the clones have been susceptible to other people's powers. So it's at least worth a shot. Thank god they're organic enough for it to fucking matter sometimes.

[He rubs the back of his head uncertainly, exhausted and exasperated. But still plunging forward.]

Since I'm pretty sure the Head is watching us. All of us. I was turning into a liability at the station. But there's a woman there pretty respected, her name is Karen. If we can figure out how to reprogram Suzaku and Travis? Fuck... she'd be perfect to help us out.

[And the police station, if they need to turn anyone, should be one of the first places in his opinion.]

They're organic?

[It's the first he's had confirmation on that fact and he blinks.]

My spells should work on them, then. [He nods.] Karen, you say?

A significant bulk of them is, yeah. I think that's the only way he could replicate abilities in mutants and shit.

[He's accepted at this point that mutants are a real thing, his mind doesn't even drift to the fictional implications anymore.]

From what I could tell Karen's genuinely a good cop. Not overblown or anything. And she had an encounter with some of our residents early on- the iterations dragged in some guys that were 'suspects' at the park bombing.

Jason was one of them. I think Nida and Seifer were there, too. But she was the interrogator. Real straight and narrow but even with Jason's attitude, she didn't hold him more than necessary.

She was always pretty on top of everything while I was there.

If she's so dedicated, how can she be trusted?

[Loki finds it slightly questionable to put their faith in someone who seems to have the Head's agenda at heart.]

A really dedicated cop will put the needs of people before the needs of politics.

I mean, she can't help what she is without being deprogrammed. [All clones are pretty much loyal to the Head by default.] But otherwise she's willing to give even problem ass people the benefit of the doubt. Being a dipshit doesn't make someone a criminal. She gets that.

You seem to have put a great deal of faith in this woman.

[He's not certain he'd do the same. Granted, he didn't have much faith in anyone. In Hank he had more than most, but he knew better than to trust the man fully.]

That is, of course, assuming she wasn't programmed to lull people like you into a false sense of security.

I think it's less absolute faith and more...

[He spreads his hands out.]

Fuck... Just the lesser of evils, I guess.

[He'd been happy to find a police department that hadn't been pointedly corrupt. But by the Head's control? It was corrupt by default.]