5th Contraption || Just Another Day on Horror Cruise

[pineapplesalmon]

Who: César Salazar and YOU
When: Early September
Where: Around the ship (Calgona to Cabins, Atrium Lounge, Laundry to Cabins, Closed: 102)
What: César is Jinx's new canvas after falling asleep post workout, César says hello to CR in the atrium, César says hello while carrying laundry in a horrid basket, and a backdated morning after zombies for the Triad and Boy
Warnings: None but will add them to threads as needed

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Tagged, You're It [OTA, Walking between Calgona and the cabins]

César sometimes falls deeply asleep for a nap on one of the Calgona's massage tables post after-workout shower. Look, he can sleep on his face and stomach, can you blame him?

Nor can we blame Jinx for what she does when she finds him. A fresh white t-shirt and light gray lounge pants make an excellent blank canvas and a good way to deliver a hint that she's missed talking to him. By the time she's done, César's clothes are far more... colorful.

On the seat of his pants are two smileys that compliment the stars on either of his cheeks. Down the legs and arms of the shirt are more stars, zig-zags, and swirls. On the back of his shirt is a brightly colored:
JINXWASHERE
... someone should let him know as he walks back towards the cabins. Please?

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Say Hello [Established CR, Atrium Lounge]

The atrium lounge is a good place to run into others and stop himself from hermiting like he has in the last handful of months. When he spots someone he knows, César stops what he's doing on his tablet and stands, waving.

"Long time no sea!" The worst part about the pun isn't that it's not noticeable but that his player typed it by accident and died inside.

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What's in the Bag? [OTA (see options), Between Laundry and Cabins]

It's César's turn for Laundry Day. Which means he's carrying back neatly folded laundry in a fabric basket made from various Tommy Bahama Shirts with handles from a tote bag. This means that César's made an absolute monstrosity of a laundry basket. Yes, it was done on purpose. Yes, César thinks he's funny.

When he sees someone, he stops walking and smiles warmly.

A. If he knows that someone, he'll great them in a time of day appropriate greeting ("Morning!" "Afternoon!" "Evening!" "Hello!") and ask, whilst meaning it: "How are you today?"

B. If he doesn't know that someone, he'll still greet them appropriately ("Morning!" "Afternoon!" "Evening!" "Hello!") but change it up, instead asking: "Oh, are you new? I'm César Salazar. Are you settling in okay?"

((OOC: The image was done in Paint so liberties were taken as it was made from various Tommy Bahama Shirts.))
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The Morning After Zombie Apocalypse [CLOSED, Backdated, Rich, Johnny, Watson]

The triad dads could've lost Rich. They didn't, but it could've easily gone another way. So all four of them are crammed together into one bedroom, the bed (with Watson and Johnny) and the couch bed (with César and Rich) shoved alongside each other.

César startles awake when Rich kicks him in his sleep sometime in the late morning hours. "Mmmfph?"

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Message Received [Closed to Jinx]

César seeks Jinx out once he's gotten a new t-shirt and a pair of sweatpants. He knows where she lives, so he'll walk right into the theatre and call out:

"I got your message!"

Comments

[pineapplesalmon]

"Girls just want to have fun sometimes. Texting me would've meant her not being Jinx."

César looks through the pictures with a quiet little 'nice' as he admires the handiwork, and he almost doesn't hear Darcy's question. He straightens a bit a couple of seconds after it's asked. A moment's thought of what to say as he puts his phone back in a pouch.

"They don't, no. I made mine do it for a completely mundane reason." He shrugs, looking a tad embarrassed. "I miniaturized a projector and an anti-gravity device so I could give presentations anywhere there was a blank wall. Which was really useful for facilitating discussions or when projectors sometimes broke."

[saltwaterlungs]

"Do you know if she can be a little less Jinx sometimes?" Darcy huffs, because usually letting someone be theirself doesn't extend to pranks and explosions.

That train of thought derails as soon as César mentions a fucking anti-gravity device and her shock is immediately visible.

"What?! Dude- you can't just drop that you made a fucking anti-gravity device like that- what?!"

Darcy's been told minimal information about César; somehow him being a mad scientist has yet to come up.

[pineapplesalmon]

"She sleeps sometimes." César quips.

Then, he laughs at that reaction. "What, Rich didn't mention that? I showed him a while back. And I used someone else's design—I only miniaturized it. Anti-gravity devices are fairly common back home."

[saltwaterlungs]

"No?! He said you were a nerd, he didn't say anything about this?" she laughs a little in disbelief. Of course it's possible that he's fucking with her, but he's been pretty earnest with her about everything else so far.

"So you must be from the future then?"

[pineapplesalmon]

"... Huh. Guess he was being discreet." Rich can be discreet, believe it or not. "I'm from 2013, but technology is way ahead of what seems to be the norm in other timelines. If only I knew why it diverged so rapidly, but no one knows enough about history for me to compare changes in the far past."

He shrugs. "I've created a lot of other things, but... I don't like to talk about it too much because otherwise it'd seem like bragging."

César will, however, back up what he said and pull out his phone, doing a sequence of movements until... he lets go of it in mid-air. "See? Perfect height for presentations. Also, I wanted to see if I could do it."

[saltwaterlungs]

"Woah," considering that she herself can levitate it probably shouldn't be this impressive, but Darcy stalks around it anyway, feeling the air under it as if to check for wires or something. It's just cool, a floating phone is just an objectively cool thing.

"It's not bragging if you actually made the things, ehn? What else have you made?"

Darcy nudges the phone to see if it moves.

"I'm not really going to be a lot of help with that either. I only like old history, not like... modern shit."

[pineapplesalmon]

It does move a tiny bit, and keeps moving for a little while before César stops it with his hand with a chuckle.

"We could be here all day if I started listing off the stuff I've made." César laughs, a bit embarrassed as he takes his phone and turns it off and puts it away. "I'm... ah, interested in old history. Our technology timelines seem to diverge in antiquity so far as I can figure."

(And it's partially his fault, not that he knows.)

[saltwaterlungs]

"What's your favourite thing you've made, then?"

Darcy's ears go a little pink, having to admit-

"I mean- mostly what I meant is that I had a phase when I was a kid where I was super into knights and stuff. I don't remember a lot of details now, and I'm pretty sure a lot of it was made up. So."

[pineapplesalmon]

"... I think my lab. I have everything I need in it for most of my builds or experiments, and, well, it can also fly and go nearly the speed of light. Made the travel part of family holidays quick."

A laugh. "I had a time where I was really into ancient Rome because of my name. It's the Spanish version of Caesar. So I get you."

[saltwaterlungs]

"Huh," Darcy's just going to... Chew on that for a bit. Because y'know, it's the coolest shit she's heard.

"Rome is kind of cool. Sucks that you're named after a dick though. I was named after one of my great-grandad's war buddies. It's... sort of family tradition. My parents picked it before they knew what I was."

[pineapplesalmon]

Just ask for a picture and then you'll realize how not cool it is. It's a fancy tin can on wheels.

César laughs. "Yeah, that part does suck a little. ... and that's a good family tradition. If I ever have a kid who needs a name, I would try to pick something gender neutral."

He grins a bit wider. "Better than my baby brother, who was named after a quote because of a family friend being nerdy. 'I am Caesar, not Rex'. My parents thought it was funny, so it stuck."

[saltwaterlungs]

Darcy did have her parents to thank for that, she supposes. It's nice to have a name that fits her without gendering her one way or another.

"Wow, that's... hilariously dorky. Mum always said I didn't have siblings because she used up the one name she liked. I'm pretty sure it was a joke, but. What's your brother like?"

[pineapplesalmon]

"Loud and passionate!" César has to spend a moment laughing. "He's sixteen. Very much a teenager. Very opinionated but in a good way. Heart of gold. Looks before he leaps. Makes the best faces—far, far better than mine. Smart with incredible moments of stupidity."

Oh, no, he's pulling out his phone and showing Darcy a picture of him and Rex, which happens to be the screen saver this time around. The boy looks similar to César, enough that they're clearly related, especially with both of them standing next to each other.

"But that's just his personality!" His entire face is lighting up, talking about Rex. "Because of some nanomachines in his body, he's a nearly indestructible one man wrecking crew able to turn parts of his body into giant robot parts and various other machines."

[saltwaterlungs]

"I can see why you adopted Rich, then," Darcy jokes. Because yeah- on paper, that sounds a lot like him in some ways.

Still, it's sweet to hear César so enthusiastic about his brother. Darcy doubts she would've been that enthused if she had siblings. The mention of nanomachines earns him a pair of raised eyebrows however-

"That's really fucking cool- I had a friend- well, a Krewemate back home who could... sort of do similar? It was like- he could grow extra metal arms to use like, extra guns or whatever. It was kind of awful to look at, but kind of cool, too. The leader of my Krewe had to put a ban on Terminator jokes around him, because he was sensitive about it or whatever. Also Ghostbusters jokes."

That much was mostly to stop Avery. Dude loved his bad jokes.

[pineapplesalmon]

An amused nod. "They're similar, certainly. But also very unique in their own ways."

César's brow does furrow somewhat. "Rex isn't that sensitive to those sorts of comparisons, but 'freak' is a whole other matter...."

[saltwaterlungs]

"I don't think anyone likes being called a freak. So... having cool robot powers like that wasn't a like, common thing?"

Look she has no frame of reference for what César's world is like.

OH GOD IT'S A MINOR TEXT WALL Jesus César I just wanted to write a quick tag

[pineapplesalmon]

"Rex is both unique... and not unique." César figures it's something he can reveal, because Rex will likely never end up here with them, and his emotions do a full shift from happy to, well, serious. "He's a human EVO, an 'Exponentially Variegated Organism'. There are other animals, plants, and even some bacteria that fall under that umbrella. There was an accident at the facility I was working at after we were endangered by our funders and inactive nanomachines—called Nanites—were spread across the globe. Those have incomplete code, so when they activate... they cause mutations."

César pauses for a moment, if only to give breathing room in the explanation. "Rex is different, though. He was fatally wounded when a group aligned with our 'benefactors' attempted to use the nanites for other purposes besides just curing diseases, preventing starvation, and healing wounds. You only have minutes before a lack of blood flow starts damaging the brain and death becomes permanent, and a hospital wouldn't have been able to revive him in time...."

He looks a little bit devastated. "So we injected him with nanites from the first batch, which had completed code. And he lived. His abilities are unique because of his nanites and... a few other reasons that I won't go into."

A shrug, and then he crosses his arms, shaking his head. "One of the projects I was working on was to fix things, to set things right... and then I got pulled to here."

César pauses for a moment, then adds, expression growing... disappointed in humanity. "The word 'freak' is now a slur for EVOs. It was quick, simple, and since it was in use for other things, doesn't get treated as hate speech."