thisavrou | Video:

[ U H. ]

Like...plastic surgery or something like that? Or are you talking about something more extensive?

[Hi, this is awkward.]

Uh...like pretty extensive plastic surgery. Yeah...[He rubs his palm over his cheek.] Really extensive.

Why? There's nothing wrong with you.

[ And is now really the time to be contemplating a nose job or something worse? ]

Yeah it's just...

...you know how some people get tired of the way they look and want to shake things up, dye their hair, get a piercing, whatever...yeah...it's kinda like that. Only...more.

[When he first started he used the justification that it was good for his job of spying, gathering intel. Their enemies couldn't find him as easily if he kept changing the way he looked. He still tells people that's his reason. But it's become a compulsion now, like the sunglasses and the lying. He can't stand to get too used to his own face.]

Doesn't that seem a little...extensive to you? You're asking to completely change your face.

[ And, let's face it, that's indicative of a whole lot of issues she didn't actually think Deacon had. Is she fit to judge, though? ]

...Look, it's your face and your own reasons. It just sounds dangerous to me.

[It's strange having people who know him but are new to his whole face-changing thing. Back home HQ just rolls their eyes and goes with it at this point.]

Some doctors have this medical tech, Old World stuff that makes the procedure pretty safe and fast. Pay 100 caps and sit in the chair one hour and done.

And for me especially it's--

[Locked to Ava]

Sorry for the secrecy, but this is something I want to keep quiet. I probably don't even need to keep it a secret here, but you get so used to hiding something for your own safety and the habit sticks, you know, even past when you don't need to anymore.

The thing is, I'm not human. [Deacon is a liar is what he is. It's not even a lie he can maintain since as soon as he's actually in the medbay for any type of medical care it'll become obvious that he's as human as anyone. But it's never been about making any particular lie stick, it's about avoiding the truth by burying it under mounds and mounds of falsehoods.]

The truth is, I'm a synth--an android made by this group called the Institute. They've been developing synths for generations, making them more and more human until now it's almost impossible to tell them apart. The Institute is pure evil and uses the synths as a slave army, they kidnap people and replace them with synth infiltrators, so the humans of the Commonwealth live in fear of synths and will kill any synth on sight if they discover one. And the synths who escape the Institute are hunted down by their former masters. So you see, being a synth on the run isn't exactly something you want to advertise back where I'm from.

I change my face so the Institute won't find me. It's safe for me because, hell, it's not a real face anyway. Everything about me is artificial.

[This is one of his favorite elaborate lies, generally reserved for people he likes, people whom--back home where synths are hated--he trusts not to turn on him when he reveals the "truth" of him being a synth.]

[ A...what? That doesn't make much sense to her, not when she can smell Deacon's blood, knows he has it in him. But then, do synths have fake blood? Synthetic blood? And how can she ask any of this if he isn't supposed to know what she is or what she can do? She debates pressing further, back and forth, but mostly because it all just worries her. Kidnapping, replacing? A slave army? Even if Deacon's not a synth - and he very possibly is, for all she knows - that sounds horrifying, just like when he told her about Super Mutants.

Ava is silent for a time before she speaks again. ]

No, I guess it's not something you'd want people to know. Especially not in a place like this.

[ Which means he trusts her, she guesses, and she feels guilty. He doesn't know anywhere near the truth about her. ]

All of you is artificial? So you...don't bleed or have bones?

[ Smooth, girl. What a question. ]

If you cut me I totally bleed. [To paraphrase Shakespeare in a way that probably would have the Bard rolling in his grave.] Sweat, tears, spit, the Institute perfected all the bodily fluids, even the gross ones. Their synth spies have to be able to live among humans in close contact for years without getting caught out. My bones are metal, though. And my inner workings are mechanical components instead of organs. No real heart, no stomach, yadda yadda.

[He's not used to lying to people who can hear heartbeats.]

[ And almost all of that makes sense, actually...until that last part. No real heart. A part of her wonders if he merely means that his heart is fake, made to pump the blood through his system. But the other part of her knows his heartbeat, has heard it, and she knows that it must be a very convincing likeness to fool someone like her.

That, or he's lying.

Ava doesn't press either potential. Instead, she's quiet, considering. ]

So you don't get hungry? Or it...all gets disposed otherwise?

[ That's odd, if it's true. ]

But this Institute. They sound-- Are synths common back home? How big is this Institute? What will they do if they find you?

The Gen 1s and Gen 2s don't eat. They're more like robots. But Gen 3s can be programmed to feel hunger and tiredness and pain and all of it. The whole homo sapiens experience spectacular, even the inconvenient and gross parts. The most advanced Gen 3 types can be programmed to think they're human, start a life, settle down, get married, and never realize differently.

[Then, bleakly.] Until the Institute comes knocking.

If the Institute catches a runaway synth, they reset them. They'd wipe all my memories, my personality, there wouldn't be any of me left, just a blank slate for them to rewrite new directives onto. Runaway synths are rare. Not many manage to escape. Most synths people come across are ones that are still firmly under the Institute's control, which just makes the good citizens of the Commonwealth hate all synths. No one knows just how many synths the Institute has. They're always building more. And no one knows for sure how big the Institute is either. Sometimes it seems like they're everywhere. They're probably not as big as people think, but their tech is so advanced compared to anything else anyone has that fighting against them sometimes feels like those old myths where someone tries to challenge the gods and gets swatted like a bloodbug.

That's awful, Deacon. I'm so sorry.

[ Because even if he isn't telling her what part of that is his story, she can sort of guess. Or assume, really, since he's given her very little to go on. No matter what's true, he clearly has been affected by this. ]

Were you a runaway or...? How did you end up finding out what you were?

[ Assuming he is a synth, which she'll go with for the time being. She wants to trust Deacon, even if his information is dodgy. ]

You don't have to tell me if it's...if it's painful. The Institute sounds like it's run by fucking assholes.

It's okay. I don't actually remember much of it directly, so I can't really feel it, you know?

[He swings his arms nervously.]

I ran away. I was never a sleeper agent or anything; I always knew what I was. There's this group called the Railroad that helps escaped synths. Most of the time they get the synths the help out of the Commonwealth entirely, far away from the Institute's reach. They can erase a synth's memories and wipe away the trauma give them better memories instead, a whole new life. But they only do it if the synth requests it. Most do. I did. Only back when I did it the Railroad was still pretty new to that tech and it was...let's just say it was a learning experience for everyone.

[ And he just let them try it on him? Ugh, just hearing about it gives her the shivers. He let them poke around in his head and... ]

And it didn't take super well, I'm guessing.

[ Or else he wouldn't remember what happened to him. It makes her sad. ]

Is the Railroad still running, or has the Institute ruined them? I mean-- You made it seem like the Institute has a lot of power. Is the Railroad still able to help synths?

Oh yeah, the Railroad is still alive and kicking, saving synths and being a pain in the Institute's ass. [And Deacon's damn proud of it. None of that is a lie.]

But it's been a near thing. The Institute has tried to wipe us out for decades. They came scarily close to succeeding a couple times, too.

And you're running out of places to be where they won't find you.

[ That's...terrifying. Constantly running, never knowing if the Institute will be right over your shoulder... She doesn't envy that kind of life. She doesn't know how bad that can be - even the Camarilla looks out for her in some small way - and doesn't want to. Deacon hasn't had it easy. ]

Are there a lot of you? Will they be okay while you're here?

We keep discovering new crooks and crannies to hide. We're like radroaches--only prettier. But every time the Institute thinks they've stomped us all out, we go scurry and hide someplace safe and then come out again when the lights are off.

But yeah, we're kiiiind of understaffed right now. [They lost a lot of good people when the Institute took out the Switchboard a few months back.] It's hard to recruit good talent when you're a secret organization. We'd place a job ad in the classifieds but that'd basically spoil the whole "secret" part, and we wouldn't want the Institute to crash the interviews.

But no one's indispensable. Every time someone goes out on a mission, everyone knows that they might not come back. HQ will miss my awesome skills of course, but they'll keep going without me.

I think that's all you really can do. You can't exactly announce your presence or draw attention to yourselves. Still, it sounds like you're having a hard enough time without the Institute constantly coming down on you everywhere you turn.

[ No one's indispensable. She supposes that's true, even if she doesn't like the idea. Every mission has a high chance of death. ]

What do you do in the Railroad? ...If you don't mind my asking. Are you, like, a bodyguard or a spy, or a tech because you're a synth?

Yeah, most people don't like synths so when it's not the Institute trying to kill us all, it's the good people of the Commonwealth forming a lynch mob against the synths we're trying to save.

I'm not a tech. Some synths are good at technology and some are total crap. I'm closer to the total crap side. Funny enough, our main tech guy is all human and our top synth agent is awesome at breaking things with extreme prejudice and a minigun.

I'm just a runner, which is pretty low on the hierarchy but it's an important job. Runners are the organization's messengers and couriers, so I get around a lot. [He was a runner, once. About twenty years ago.]

Sounds like an incredibly dangerous job, too. For all you know, a message could be faked or you're wandering into a trap. It really is like a suicide mission, isn't it?

[ Ava's quiet for some time, processing everything he's saying. It's a lot to take in and she wishes she could say that the idea of androids or robots looking perfectly human is far-fetched. But hey, she's seen and fought a gargoyle, so. ]

How can you tell that someone's a synth? I mean, you don't look like anything except human. How do normal people figure out someone's a synth if they looks like you?

We lose runners more often than we'd like. Promoting someone from tourist to runner is always a mixed feeling. Like "Yay, another person joining the party! ...man, I really hope they survive." But as far as danger goes, runner is safer than being an agent or a heavy. Especially a heavy. Glory--she's our synth heavy--pretty regularly will face off against twenty raiders single-handed. Runners are trained to go around trouble, but heavies face it head-on. Their job is to smash trouble out of the way, and trouble usually smashes back.

[Deacon intertwines the truth and the lies. Honest about the Railroad and synths, and lying about himself. It's good to talk about the Cause with someone who has no learned bias or prejudice. And it's safe to talk about it here; the Institute's reach is long, but it sure as hell doesn't stretch to outer space.]

It's super tough to tell the difference between a human and a synth. Synths have mechanical components deep inside, but if you go digging for them, by the time you find them you've pretty much killed the synth. And if the person turns out to be human, you'd have definitely killed the human.

But synths keep the exact same appearance they were created with, unless they go in and have surgical alterations done. If someone's watching closely for a couple years, that can be a big clue when extra wrinkles totally fail to show up. Oh, and we can't gain or lose weight. I can eat all the Fancy Lads Snack Cakes I want and not put on a pound. It's awesome.

That's why I have my face done regularly. I can let people think I'm just, like, a crazy human with issues and a scalpel addiction, but really it's to cover the fact that I don't age.

And you use heavies to protect your people and the synths you help, I'm guessing? Or they're the first line of defense if the Institute comes knocking.

[ Doesn't mean runners are completely safe and she can just imagine how dangerous it is. Still, for her to voice concern right now might show too much presuming, and she's content to listen about other worlds - especially one that may or may not be her future. ]

So things basically just turn into a witch hunt, right? People accusing each other of being synths if they think something's weird. You have to be pretty paranoid and attentive to look for wrinkles or...anything like that. That's a lot of effort to go through.

[ She...sort of sighs and sounds totally disgusted. ]

That's...so gross, even if you can't gain weight. All that eating.

[ Someone wasn't into too many sweets even when she was a human. ]

Did the doctor here contact you? Will they...need to know what you are so you can get this done?

A witch hunt is a pretty accurate description of it. Anyone acts slightly off and they could get accused of being a synth, even if they aren't one. Sometimes...things get ugly.

[And he's going to leave that topic there and talk about food and surgery instead, and not about synth-hating lynch mobs.]

The snack cakes are two hundred years old and kind of irradiated too. And I still can't get enough of them. It's bad.

The doc said I'm low priority, so it hasn't come up yet. I figure I'll have to tell her before the surgery, but with lots of people here, like, missing limbs, I'm waaaay down on the schedule.

That is even worse. Oh my god, Deacon, at least try not to irradiate your insides or something.

[ Synth or not, that's so gross and unsafe. ]

Do you think you'll be okay until...until she'd be able to look you over? I mean, as far as I know, the Institute's not here. Not unless the Moira suddenly brought people in without us knowing.

Yeah, it should be safe here. It's almost freakishly safe; I'm not used to it. Even if someone from the Institute did show up, they are seriously outnumbered here. And they'd be stuck here, too. They wouldn't be able to drag me back, and if they tried to make me their slave here on the ship I could tell them to fuck off.

I could probably announce it to the whole network "Hey, secret android here, what's up!" Hell, I think half the ship's crew are robots or AI and everybody seems pretty chill with that. But you keep a secret like that, one your life depends on, for such a long time it gets hard to get out of the habits: changing my face, lying, all of it.

Maybe, in retrospect, the Ingress did you a favor by bringing you here. Not saying some asshole from your world might not show up - but still, you have an advantage here. Especially if you know more of what's going on here than they do.

[ A secret your life depends on... Yeah, she knows what he's talking about. Ava goes strangely quiet for a few minutes, before finally saying: ]

I'm not going to tell anyone. Institute or no Institute, it's not going further than me. I promise.

[ He might not realize or understand or even trust that she's going to keep her word. But she knows so, so well the fear of someone finding out the truth. It gnaws at her stomach to know her own truth could be so easily discovered. She knows she can't hide it forever in such close quarters. Still, Deacon's secret is safe with her. ]

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ersatzeverything - 2016-04-12 02:36 (UTC) - Expand

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tags this back forever later

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