Doug and Kevin - assistance
Jul. 2nd, 2022 09:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
xp_cypher posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
xp_logsDoug drops by Kevin's office with an offering and a request for a favor.
Doug approached the door to Kevin's office with a bottle tucked under his flesh-and-blood arm, an offering for the older man. The fingers of his nanite hand flexed slightly, thumb tapping against each finger in something of a nervous tic. Seeing the door ajar, he rapped his fingers against the jamb and nudged it open wider. "May I come in?" he asked a bit hesitantly from the threshold.
Kevin looked up from his computer, with a bit of a quiet expression. "Ramsey. Come in. I'd offer you a seat but... I think you can figure it out." He said, typing quickly.
Doug set the bottle - a sixteen-year Macallan - on the corner of the desk nearest him and dropped his hands into his pockets for lack of anything else to do with them. "I'll try not to take up too much of your time, but I'd like to ask a favor," he began, getting directly to the point. "It's powers related - more yours than mine." Which probably didn't clear things up at all. "Has to do with the arm," he elaborated, holding up the nanite hand and wiggling the fingers.
"Something to do with your synthpaw? I think that might be past my tech level." He tapped a few keys and pushed the computer back. "Glasses are on the sideboard, assuming you want to join me."
"That'd be great," Doug acknowledged, moving to snag a pair of glasses from the indicated sideboard. "So it's less about the technical side of things." He might have rehearsed this a few times before coming over. Not so much because Kevin made him nervous, but more that the topic of the nanites and how he'd come by them still wasn't always the easiest for him. "So, given that I talked the nanite swarm out of Fixer's control by encouraging them to assert their own priorities, I don't exactly command them so much as work with them." He waggled the hand, which was currently in its 'default' black and copper appearance, back and forth, letting Kevin see that the traceries and patterns would occasionally change. "Which has led to a few of the occasions like Holi when they just take it on themselves to try a new appearance out."
"That's got to be a little unsettling. Having to negotiate with your hand for what you want it to do." He poured a pair of heavy scotches. He figured after this long at the HFC, Ramsey could hold his own with afternoon drinks. "So what can I help you with? Program management suggestions for staff? Some kind of leadership studies for nanites. Do they know Vince Lombardi?"
Doug snorted. "Lombardi's a little before my time, I would have gone with Phil Jackson." He took a long sip from the glass. "Thankfully it's not all negotiation and consensus - the regular, day-to-day autonomic stuff just happens. Like I don't have to approach them with a 'please make a fist now so I can punch this mook'. But in a bigger sense..." He wiggled his fingers. "Making and maintaining a coherent, reproducible form." He was pretty sure he didn't have to spell out to Kevin why he'd come to him for potential advice or assistance. "Around the mansion, it's no secret, but when I'm out in public, it needs to look like a prosthetic, or even flesh toned if they can manage that." Hence why he had resorted to long baggy sleeves and even gloves at the few Hellfire functions he'd been to lately.
"Ah, so you think my shapeshifting process is something you can potentially mimic into making them look the way you want them to look." Kevin leaned back in his chair. "I'm not sure that it is really replicable."
A shrug from Doug greeted that. "Not looking to mimic your process," he told the older man. "I get that your process might not be replicable, and what I'm trying to do isn't precisely the same. More..." He took another sip of scotch to give himself time to organize his thoughts. "Looking for the benefit of your experience as a sort of starting point as I figure out what's going to work for me."
"The problem is that a lot of what I do is reflexive. It's like... trying to explain how to swallow or breathe to someone who has never done it." He looked into his glass for a minute. "Visualization is part of it, I suppose, for the more custom processes. Seeing what I want my body to do in my head as I adapt to a new shape. It's actually easier for me to switch bodies whole than to start mucking about with just shifting my hands or something."
"Hm." Doug thought a bit more before replying. "So in terms of visualizing, how in-depth does it usually get? Do you tend to sketch the broad strokes and then the rest gets filled in as you go?" He wasn't sure whether he was asking the right questions of Kevin, but to some extent finding the 'right' question wasn't as important as just having a conversation that might spark an insight into his own situation.
"Utility over appearance most times. I need to think about what I want it to be able to do."
"So function is the usual focus." Doug held up his hand and looked at it assessingly. "Almost seems like the opposite in my case," he mused. "I'm not trying to do anything particular with it, and the main concern is not giving away that it's anything other than an ordinary arm."
"There's another possibility." Kevin paused, furrowing his brow for a second. "The nanites are reactive, right? They do what they do because you have a clear understanding of how your hand and forearm are supposed to work. Like a... well, like an operating system they follow."
That definitely was a thought. Doug pursed his lips and tilted the scotch back and forth in the tumbler, watching it as he considered. "So you think that if I develop a clear understanding of the appearance I would like them to keep, that they'll go from there?"
"Something like that. Here-" Kevin got up and rolled up his shirt sleeve as he came around the desk. As he got closer, he pressed two fingers into Doug's neck lightly for a second. It was odd. He could feel everything about Doug, including the point that the arm ended, but he could also vaguely sense the nanites with his powers. He assumed that wouldn't be the case. His left arm shifted in front of Doug, shifting to the stump. He held it up for a minute.
"Now watch this." The transformation process was always weird to watch with Kevin. It wasn't so much a process as a blur to witness. Doug saw Kevin's arm replicate the look of his own, with the obviously artificial nanite exterior. This time, the transformation was slower, so he could watch as starting from the line of the stump, the nanite exterior shifted steadily up until it reached the tips of his fingers, leaving behind a largely normal looking arm: his arm, in fact.
The copper-on-black traceries on Doug's arm swirled and drifted for a few moments as Doug observed Kevin's replication of his form, and then slowly patches of peach-color skin tone began to grow in several locations. "Thank god I'm not very hairy," he decided as he watched his arm begin to match. Up close, the nanites wouldn't necessarily be able to duplicate every aspect of living tissue, but the facsimile they created would certainly pass muster from a casual inspection.
"Not bad. If you want a tip, you might be able to get it more realistic with time, but stick to that. You'll pass a long range, and at short range, if you keep your hand stiff, people won't be sure if it is a prosthetic or not and will immediately look away due to social conditioning."
Doug nodded. "That's a very good point." Weaponizing social discomfort was always a solid tactic. The lesson and advice had certainly been worth the cost of the Macallan. "Much obliged," he told the older man with a salute from his glass.
"Of course. If I didn\t focus helping based around what gave me the most advantages to deploy you in the field, no one would believe it was me." He said wryly, with a nod and a sip from his glass.
Doug approached the door to Kevin's office with a bottle tucked under his flesh-and-blood arm, an offering for the older man. The fingers of his nanite hand flexed slightly, thumb tapping against each finger in something of a nervous tic. Seeing the door ajar, he rapped his fingers against the jamb and nudged it open wider. "May I come in?" he asked a bit hesitantly from the threshold.
Kevin looked up from his computer, with a bit of a quiet expression. "Ramsey. Come in. I'd offer you a seat but... I think you can figure it out." He said, typing quickly.
Doug set the bottle - a sixteen-year Macallan - on the corner of the desk nearest him and dropped his hands into his pockets for lack of anything else to do with them. "I'll try not to take up too much of your time, but I'd like to ask a favor," he began, getting directly to the point. "It's powers related - more yours than mine." Which probably didn't clear things up at all. "Has to do with the arm," he elaborated, holding up the nanite hand and wiggling the fingers.
"Something to do with your synthpaw? I think that might be past my tech level." He tapped a few keys and pushed the computer back. "Glasses are on the sideboard, assuming you want to join me."
"That'd be great," Doug acknowledged, moving to snag a pair of glasses from the indicated sideboard. "So it's less about the technical side of things." He might have rehearsed this a few times before coming over. Not so much because Kevin made him nervous, but more that the topic of the nanites and how he'd come by them still wasn't always the easiest for him. "So, given that I talked the nanite swarm out of Fixer's control by encouraging them to assert their own priorities, I don't exactly command them so much as work with them." He waggled the hand, which was currently in its 'default' black and copper appearance, back and forth, letting Kevin see that the traceries and patterns would occasionally change. "Which has led to a few of the occasions like Holi when they just take it on themselves to try a new appearance out."
"That's got to be a little unsettling. Having to negotiate with your hand for what you want it to do." He poured a pair of heavy scotches. He figured after this long at the HFC, Ramsey could hold his own with afternoon drinks. "So what can I help you with? Program management suggestions for staff? Some kind of leadership studies for nanites. Do they know Vince Lombardi?"
Doug snorted. "Lombardi's a little before my time, I would have gone with Phil Jackson." He took a long sip from the glass. "Thankfully it's not all negotiation and consensus - the regular, day-to-day autonomic stuff just happens. Like I don't have to approach them with a 'please make a fist now so I can punch this mook'. But in a bigger sense..." He wiggled his fingers. "Making and maintaining a coherent, reproducible form." He was pretty sure he didn't have to spell out to Kevin why he'd come to him for potential advice or assistance. "Around the mansion, it's no secret, but when I'm out in public, it needs to look like a prosthetic, or even flesh toned if they can manage that." Hence why he had resorted to long baggy sleeves and even gloves at the few Hellfire functions he'd been to lately.
"Ah, so you think my shapeshifting process is something you can potentially mimic into making them look the way you want them to look." Kevin leaned back in his chair. "I'm not sure that it is really replicable."
A shrug from Doug greeted that. "Not looking to mimic your process," he told the older man. "I get that your process might not be replicable, and what I'm trying to do isn't precisely the same. More..." He took another sip of scotch to give himself time to organize his thoughts. "Looking for the benefit of your experience as a sort of starting point as I figure out what's going to work for me."
"The problem is that a lot of what I do is reflexive. It's like... trying to explain how to swallow or breathe to someone who has never done it." He looked into his glass for a minute. "Visualization is part of it, I suppose, for the more custom processes. Seeing what I want my body to do in my head as I adapt to a new shape. It's actually easier for me to switch bodies whole than to start mucking about with just shifting my hands or something."
"Hm." Doug thought a bit more before replying. "So in terms of visualizing, how in-depth does it usually get? Do you tend to sketch the broad strokes and then the rest gets filled in as you go?" He wasn't sure whether he was asking the right questions of Kevin, but to some extent finding the 'right' question wasn't as important as just having a conversation that might spark an insight into his own situation.
"Utility over appearance most times. I need to think about what I want it to be able to do."
"So function is the usual focus." Doug held up his hand and looked at it assessingly. "Almost seems like the opposite in my case," he mused. "I'm not trying to do anything particular with it, and the main concern is not giving away that it's anything other than an ordinary arm."
"There's another possibility." Kevin paused, furrowing his brow for a second. "The nanites are reactive, right? They do what they do because you have a clear understanding of how your hand and forearm are supposed to work. Like a... well, like an operating system they follow."
That definitely was a thought. Doug pursed his lips and tilted the scotch back and forth in the tumbler, watching it as he considered. "So you think that if I develop a clear understanding of the appearance I would like them to keep, that they'll go from there?"
"Something like that. Here-" Kevin got up and rolled up his shirt sleeve as he came around the desk. As he got closer, he pressed two fingers into Doug's neck lightly for a second. It was odd. He could feel everything about Doug, including the point that the arm ended, but he could also vaguely sense the nanites with his powers. He assumed that wouldn't be the case. His left arm shifted in front of Doug, shifting to the stump. He held it up for a minute.
"Now watch this." The transformation process was always weird to watch with Kevin. It wasn't so much a process as a blur to witness. Doug saw Kevin's arm replicate the look of his own, with the obviously artificial nanite exterior. This time, the transformation was slower, so he could watch as starting from the line of the stump, the nanite exterior shifted steadily up until it reached the tips of his fingers, leaving behind a largely normal looking arm: his arm, in fact.
The copper-on-black traceries on Doug's arm swirled and drifted for a few moments as Doug observed Kevin's replication of his form, and then slowly patches of peach-color skin tone began to grow in several locations. "Thank god I'm not very hairy," he decided as he watched his arm begin to match. Up close, the nanites wouldn't necessarily be able to duplicate every aspect of living tissue, but the facsimile they created would certainly pass muster from a casual inspection.
"Not bad. If you want a tip, you might be able to get it more realistic with time, but stick to that. You'll pass a long range, and at short range, if you keep your hand stiff, people won't be sure if it is a prosthetic or not and will immediately look away due to social conditioning."
Doug nodded. "That's a very good point." Weaponizing social discomfort was always a solid tactic. The lesson and advice had certainly been worth the cost of the Macallan. "Much obliged," he told the older man with a salute from his glass.
"Of course. If I didn\t focus helping based around what gave me the most advantages to deploy you in the field, no one would believe it was me." He said wryly, with a nod and a sip from his glass.
no subject
Date: 2022-07-03 06:04 am (UTC)"He could feel everything about Doug, including the point that the arm ended, but he could also vaguely sense the nanites with his powers. He assumed that wouldn't be the case. "