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ATTENTION TRANSPORT COMMUNITY:

Hullo there from your neighborhood detainee! I realize a number of you may have forgotten about us in the past week, but we remain cheerfully under lock up in the West Wing where we've sat for going on eleven days awaiting you lot to get your shit together so we can get this nonsense sorted. Now some of you may be unaware under what terms we agreed entered holding. In the interest of full disclosure, I shall outline those here:

1. We were to be granted protection from the general transport population until justice could be served.

2. We were to receive a fair trial and face whatever sentencing the transport population deemed fit despite the overwhelming lack of civil structures to support fair sentencing.

Despite CI Small and the Transport Police Force's valiant efforts, these terms have not been met over the past eleven days. Members of our group, supposedly under the protection of the police force, have been assaulted. There has been very little communication to us about any forthcoming trial; we have been assigned a lawyer and promised that we won't rot, but all evidence (network postings and otherwise) points to the contrary.

Very few of you know me personally, but I can tell you right now that I'm not the most patient sort you'll ever meet. As of this moment, we are being held here entirely under good faith. But allow me to make this infinitely clear:

You have no code of conduct or system of law.
You have nothing to charge us with.
You have no jurisdiction to hold us now, much less indefinitely.

And as of right now, I'm feeling a lot more vulnerable in a small room than I am protected. The personal benefits of me waiting here while you sort out a system of rules that we can be grandfathered in to breaking are beginning to look very bare indeed.

So as of now you have one week from today to figure out how you plan to deliver us a fair trial (as I think none of us would be content to see this brushed under the rug). If December 6th comes and goes, I'll be petitioning CI Small to release any of us who agree to absolve her and the transport police force of any responsibility for bodily harm rendered to our persons that might occur when released into the general population (given that many of you are apparently eager for our blood, though none but our own was spilled over the course of the base's lock down). If you'd like to do something about this, I'd recommend putting your heads together and getting it sorted sooner rather than later. Holding us here like animals when we've technically broken no laws and done nothing to set back the war effort - made infinitely clear by the AI's latest transmissions - while you run round going on about betrayal and what-if's is irresponsible at worst and unethical at best.

Warmest Regards,
C.C.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[He's bent over his tablet, which means taking the hit along the broadside before he sees it coming.]

--Jesus Christ! [He snatches at the pillow, but pointedly doesn't throw it back. He does however level a glare across the way at her.]

What?

[ very carefully not looking at him as she lies back down, because she needs to keep everything in check right now. ]

How about you try asking us before you talk for us, huh? Might help a little.

[He bristles, shoulders all taut and face pinched - because he's right, goddammit. But she's not wrong either.]

So you'd rather rot away in here while they pretend to be principled?

[ she stays completely still, in contrast, because she refuses to accept anything less from her body. ]

It's been eleven days, jesus, try real prison sometime. Get some stamina.

Oh for fuck's sake-- This isn't about how long or short it's been, Max.

[He chucks her pillow back at her then, though without much force.]

Then what, it's the principle or something? I mean, I'm about as far from a fan of the police as it gets but they're doing their best to give us a fighting chance at least.

I don't get why you're so determined to fuck it up.

At what point did I say anything about the police that didn't give credit where credit is due? [Because she's not wrong; Roslyn Small has been paddling upstream astride a log and somehow managing to convince everyone it's a freighter.]

What part of any of this was about the short term? If we're playing the long game, then we had better play it to the end. Letting people conveniently forgot about us doesn't change anything in the long run.

Okay, so you do that for yourself, but you don't speak for the rest of us unless we say you can, because if you get me stuck in here even longer I'm going to be pretty pissed.

[ It's all very very flat, because otherwise it would be an active threat and he's - her friend, even if they haven't really been talking, he's one of the only friends she has. She doesn't want to threaten him. ]

Edited 2013-12-03 03:34 (UTC)

Fine. [Where she's flat, he bites back. He's never been good at letting things lay.] Why don't you just dump us by the roadside, then? There's nothing stopping you or anyone else from jumping ship.

[ wow no sorry Charlie you hit buttons ]

Don't you fucking dare. I don't jump ship and I'm not a traitor and I fucking resent every goddamn implication in that sentence.

[He spreads his hands, head cocked at a sharp angle and chin raised. You wanna go, Kearney?]

Then stop being so damned taciturn for once in your life! I'm not a mind reader, Max. You say you want left out of it, then I'll bloody well leave you out of it!

Well neither am I right now! I said consult us first. Don't go kicking a hornet's nest without at least bothering to give a warning to the people who are going to get stung. That's it. That's all I was saying.

[ she doesn't really want to go, not with the way her hands are tucked behind her head still, staying exactly where she is on her bed. ]

Edited 2013-12-08 02:46 (UTC)

[He wishes she was. Getting into a bit of trouble and a black eye is easy, simple. There's nothing there that needs to be understood; it just is. Shouting at her while she's got that level tone and her bloody hands tucked behind her head -- that's infuriating.]

Consult you? So you can say, what? That we do nothing? That we sit about while they sit on their hands? I mean sure, that's only fair. Why not! It's not as if there's anything riding on this. It's not as if they can't be trusted to get their heads out of their asses long enough to make sure we don't just rot here. No, I'm sure they wouldn't want that to happen. I mean, they've such a stellar track record for decisive action!

So we get a goddamn voice, because isn't that what you're about? Everyone gets a chance to participate in fixing a situation that sucks for them? [ Well, yeah, it might be infuriating, but she's kind of terrified of the possibility of hurting anyone if she loses any control at all so that's not a thing that can happen. ]

I hate it in here, okay? I have fucking - experience with prisons, and I hate them, and I want to get out pretty fucking badly, but you're just throwing a temper tantrum on the network and acting like that will get you what you want and you didn't ask any of us first and that was shitty of you.

Fine, you know what? In the future when I'm doing some bloody heavy handed political maneuvering - as no one else is keen on it -, I'll make a point of telling everyone you're not interested first. That way if you want to say something for yourself, you just have to say it.

[He sets his jaw, drops his hands - his teeth on the verge of grinding.]

--Call it whatever you like, but if no one's going to do shit then I sure as hell will. As otherwise they'd apparently prefer to keep us in here until he just tear one another apart.

This is heavy handed political maneuvering? Do you even know what those words mean, put together.

[ Just sputtering disbelief, pushing up on one hand for a little bit. ]

I thought you had a little more common sense and patience.

Really? Because what else would you call this? You've been here as long as I have, if not longer Max. You know what these people are like - shit, you know what we're like. If no one's pushing the bloody point, it'll never get made!

[He's done being patient.]

This? I call this yelling at people, which as everyone knows is always totally effective and makes people do what you want!

God. I've blown things up in a more politically useful way than this.

[He goes sharp, quiet - though it's not a kind of silence that suggests she's made her point so much as it is a moment where he's stubbornly digging his heels in: settling his weight, his metaphorical center of gravity. When he speaks, it isn't low but it is a growl - hard and blunt like a hammer.]

Think whatever you like.

[And he turns then, flicking his tablet back on, and away from her.]

You couldn't stop me doing that if you actually tried.

[ Rolling over on her side to face the wall instead of him. Goddamnit, Charlie, you are irritating as shit some days. ]

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