Narvinektralonum (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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the_last_resort2015-01-09 10:42 pm
timesbureaucrat) wrote in the_last_resort2015-01-09 10:42 pm
Open Log
Who: Narvin and OPEN
What: Narvin at work and off work (Also, Gallifreyan food is mostly terrible.)
When: Month 11, Day 14
Where: Museum Laboratory and Xyma's House Restaurant
Notes & Warnings:
The lab was different with Dr. Bishop gone. (Quieter and tidier for one thing.) But he'd been hoping to exchange notes with his colleague on the spawner technology. Now that was impossible. So he was on his own with the spawner. He'd borrowed one of the original spawners from the museum collections--an ancient relic excavated from the ruined city, not one of the new commercial spawners created by reverse engineering the old alien tech--and was carefully hooking up a Gallifreyan interface screen to a few of the spawner's diodes.
So far, people have just mimicked the technology. But Narvin wanted to know how it works, and know it well enough to start making significant alterations of his own to the tech.
Xyma’s House didn't have the homey restaurant atmosphere of F'nayalip and Joe's All Day Eats, but Narvin didn't care about homey. What Xmya's House had that brought Narvin there was an extensive menu off off-world cuisine, including Gallifreyan nutritional disks: tasteless round bites with the texture of styrofoam coated in plastic. The colourful shells made them appear almost interesting, but it was all a lie. The colours were coding to indicate what assortment of minerals and nutrients were in which disk.
It was a little taste of home, and Narvin came at least once a week. The server didn't bother to give him a menu any more, just placed the order as soon as Narvin sat down. They didn't take any preparation, so a plate of colourful disks reminiscent of oversized skittles was placed in front of him. He delicately stabbed a green one with a fork and contemplated it before sticking it in his mouth.
What: Narvin at work and off work (Also, Gallifreyan food is mostly terrible.)
When: Month 11, Day 14
Where: Museum Laboratory and Xyma's House Restaurant
Notes & Warnings:
The lab was different with Dr. Bishop gone. (Quieter and tidier for one thing.) But he'd been hoping to exchange notes with his colleague on the spawner technology. Now that was impossible. So he was on his own with the spawner. He'd borrowed one of the original spawners from the museum collections--an ancient relic excavated from the ruined city, not one of the new commercial spawners created by reverse engineering the old alien tech--and was carefully hooking up a Gallifreyan interface screen to a few of the spawner's diodes.
So far, people have just mimicked the technology. But Narvin wanted to know how it works, and know it well enough to start making significant alterations of his own to the tech.
Xyma’s House didn't have the homey restaurant atmosphere of F'nayalip and Joe's All Day Eats, but Narvin didn't care about homey. What Xmya's House had that brought Narvin there was an extensive menu off off-world cuisine, including Gallifreyan nutritional disks: tasteless round bites with the texture of styrofoam coated in plastic. The colourful shells made them appear almost interesting, but it was all a lie. The colours were coding to indicate what assortment of minerals and nutrients were in which disk.
It was a little taste of home, and Narvin came at least once a week. The server didn't bother to give him a menu any more, just placed the order as soon as Narvin sat down. They didn't take any preparation, so a plate of colourful disks reminiscent of oversized skittles was placed in front of him. He delicately stabbed a green one with a fork and contemplated it before sticking it in his mouth.
no subject
"Well, since fixing your problems is the path to fixing my problem, I am, as the saying goes, at your service. What seems to be the matter?"
no subject
"A good detection system will be a favor to the Blood Pack. They use the caverns more than we do, can loot the spawning rooms. It's a fair trade, because the Orions want to try and find an intact and safe spawner to use to create endless slaves."
It would be good business, if one of the more advanced spawners could be honed for that. "Good" business, in that it would be lucrative and profitable, but it was too dangerous for Chau's blood. So far he'd lived under the radar, quiet. But something like this could easily drag him and Garona out into the open.
"What I gave you lets you go invisible for five minutes. You'd have that long to get real damn close to a working spawner without being seen. They're in short supply, so that's all I can get you. We find out how to detect the spawners at some sorta range, we give it to the Blood Pack, we let them bust up the spawners so the Orions can't start a business."
Because then the Quarantine would never lift, and it was getting expensive to get supplies. He tilted his head. "You think you can do that, sweet pea."
no subject
...Sweet pea?
His eyebrow quirks in puzzled surprise. It's not often...or ever...that people call him sweet pea.
"I can do it, but I have two conditions. One: '...Sweet pea?' Can't I be called something a little more dignified? And two: When the Blood Pack are off running around doing the vandal smashing they're so good at, I'd like them, if it's possible without excessive risk, to bring me an intact but deactivated skeleton spawner for the lab. I can assure you I want it for a more virtuous cause than the Orions."
no subject
But this will require Narvin to engage with the Blood Pack, and he wasn't going to guarantee his safety if he pissed them off. Chau knew when to treat violent souls with respect. He had been to prison.
"I don't care about virtuous. I care about whatever causes not being on this planet when you go through with them. You make mistakes, you threaten the quarantine. And Gallifreyan or not, I don't trust you or anyone else not to make mistakes playing around with something like this. Learn what you can but don't fuck it up here." He didn't even know Narvin's capacity for messing things up, but he did know this was volatile technology.
"As for the nickname? I call people whatever I damn well please. Don't think you're stuck with the one." He didn't earn his rank for nothing. He might have smiled at Narvin earlier, but the nod and smile he gave the waiter was tight-lipped to hide his golden teeth.
no subject
Narvin put his hands on the table top and laced his fingers together. He muses to himself that it's a good thing that he wasn't from a low-light species, or else to work safely with the spawners he'd need to borrow Agent Kay's eyewear.
"Oh, I'll be careful with my research. I have no intention of becoming a skeleton's victim. Or getting blown up by alien technology. How much light is required to keep the spawners from their hostile spawning?"
no subject
He canted his head. Of course Narvin hadn't, he knew that. But the words were pointed out.
"You're lucky that I'm a kind and generous man." As far as bosses went, anyway. "If you were talking to Jabba the Hutt he would have gutted you for insubordination. Just say what you need to, ask what you need to. It's a good habit to get into, especially if you come across higher ranking members of the Orions."
Though, truthfully, Chau did mind snippy people less than most. The warning is genuine. "Average light. The same that keeps them from spawning in other dark places. It's something that the museum doesn't know yet."
no subject
At least Mr. Chau, unlike Jabba, didn't consider mouthing off grounds for being thrown into a pit of hungry targs or whatever Jabba's latest entertainment of choice was.
"Am I expected to call you 'sir,' then? It's much better than 'the Mighty Jabba, wise and merciful' I suppose."
He finally picked up his fork again, green food disk still impaled on it, and put it in his mouth, chewed, swallowed.
"I'll keep the advice in mind," he said. Holding his tongue wasn't fun, but being disemboweled by Orions would be much worse.
no subject
"So what do you got that's useful? No petty bullshit. I want the good stuff." The stuff that he can use to his advantage, especially in finding new places to position his operatives.
no subject
He leaned back in his chair and organizes what information he's acquired by other means into neat little mental piles.
"I know a great deal about Wynter, the newest security officer. He's inexperienced. All book learning and training in controlled environments, very little field experience. I believe Peter Bishop has been looking for his father, Dr. Bishop. If you or your people have information on Dr. Bishop, where he is or what happened to him, his son might be willing to buy. I suspect that Dr. Belloq is stealing artifacts, but I also suspect you already know that. He also recently hired Jade to document the dig, but I'm not certain if she's in on his thievery or not."
left words out!
"You just gotta use the right words or look in the right places."
Which, getting Narvin to use the right words was kind of hard. "Play up that cultural idiot bullshit. It makes humans sympathetic and they'll want to get close to you so they can help you out. Act a little bit like a douche, let someone school you a little, and eventually they'll start to open up." He decided on what he wanted to take back with him and put the wine menu down.
"The Wynter guy's got Time Lord abilities, right? Best to give him a little range and let circumstances take care of themselves." If he was inexperienced, at least Chau had the warning to lay low. But that meant Jabba was an open target.
no subject
He thought of Chief Kay explaining things to him, wondered if he should mention any of it to Mr. Chau. After a moment, decided not to. It wasn't as if Kay really opened up anyway. The man was like an Alvarrixian oyster. He didn't open up easily or readily.
"Wynter is a Time Lord, yes, with all that implies. And very eager in his work."
no subject
His food came finally, and he held his lips carefully with his gratitude, not looking fully at the waiter so they couldn't see the scar- there were several reasons that Hannibal Chau didn't like appearing in public.
"Be polite to your superiors in this business because the only way you maintain obedience among criminals is to remind them that disobedience is worse than prison. Obedience gets you a lot of fringe benefits. When you're out there, a little bit of assiness gets you anger, and then sympathy for your uncertainty.
"Be careful with that sympathy, though. You start believing in it too much, you lose your advantage. The fact of the matter is they give it to you because they think you're an idiot and an asshole and it feels just so good for them to think they're changing the world." Chau knew. Chau was an asshole, and he knew that people liked to have their ego stroked by thinking that they chipped away from his protective veneer.
no subject
"I disagree that impoliteness is the same as disobedience, however." Even now he couldn't stop arguing a little. "Well, maybe to someone like Jabba, and if I ever find myself face-to-jowl with him I'll use all the appropriate obsequities, but wouldn't you rather have an employee who was competent and loyal than one who was falsely polite?"
no subject
"Your disagreement is noted," he said with a serious expression, taking a single, thinly sliced bite.
While he would put up with a small level of banter- he was who he was. A boss who had to maintain impressions. Talked back too much, and someone might start disobeying. They'd side with the other party, and he couldn't have that. He knew about Narvin's friendships, too. Allies were allies, and unless they became a problem for him directly, he wasn't going to act on it.
no subject
He cleared his throat and let his hands rest in his lap to reestablish a calm and unconcerned demeanour.
"Thank you. ...sir." He hadn't called anyone sir since Coordinator Vansell had died. The word felt strange on his tongue.