forgivetheinsubordination | IC Contact

[In the midst of all the chaos, he's forgotten that he meant to contact a certain Turian in regards to a certain thing.]

FROM: crichton.john@cdc.org

We need to talk when you get a minute.

FROM: vakarian.garrus@cdc.org

Yeah, sure. Headed to the safezone for a meal, wanna meet up there?

FROM: crichton.john@cdc.org

Works for me.

FROM: crichton.john@cdc.org

Do me a favor and chase off your many admirers before I get there. ;)

[And that will be the last message John sends before he heads toward the safe zone. He'd never spent a long time in there because it was hard to think with all the noise, not to mention the fact that it made him feel much like a cow being herded for slaughter.

But Garrus seems like a good prospect for information, if anything Shepard told him was true. He's come to trust her word a little more these days.]

[Garrus is leaning on a wall near the doorway when John arrives, keeping an eye on people but also keeping a decent distance. He's not sure what Crichton means by the admirers line, but he figures being separate will do it. Besides. No Noh-Varr here at the moment makes that lack of admirers easy to obtain.]

Hey, Crichton. I'm here. You wanna go for a walk, or...?

[He doesn't answer right away -- he glances around the roo mto take stock of everyone who is there before focusing on the much taller alien in front of him.]

No. Here is fine.

[There was more to focus on in a large area, enough noise that people would ignore two more people talking in a corner. He gestures to pull away from the doorway a bit and props himself up against a wall once he's comfortable.]

Saw you been busy. How you doin' with all this insanity, big fella?

['Big Fella' gets an amused mandible flicker from Garrus. That's much better than ET or Garry. He can live with it.]

Doing. Mostly a lot of babysitting babysitters.

[He's not serious. Green's job is important, and he doesn't think of all of the crew as children. There's a fair bit of herding, but that's just a part of things.]

How are you doing in Grey? You looking for something to do?

[The comment about grey gets a scoff, one that may or may not be slightly sardonic. It definitely has a 'lets not talk about it' implication to go along with it.]

Actually, I might have something for you to do. Depends how much you trust me.

[This is the part where John folds his arms across his chest and lowers his voice a bit, reaching up only to scratch at the meager stubble on his face.]

Shepard told me you were a cop in a past life.

[Shepard. That's not a complicated topic at all. But if she did trust someone, trusted them enough to tell them about Garrus, then that puts some serious points in John's corner.]

If Shepard trusts you, then I'm listening. And I was. That's when she met me, when I was still playing good cop, bad cop with all sorts of scum.

[As he talks, Garrus drops his blackglass into an armor compartment. There's something about the way that the human's voice has dropped that says it might be prudent to not have the creepy charm out right now.]

So what can I do for you?

[He looks up toward the corner of the room briefly before looking back up toward Garrus. He's gotten the information about the decoy by now -- he doubts very much that the new kids were involved.

At least, not directly.]

So you're military, and you were a cop. You gotta know as well as I do that whatever's attacking folks wasn't here before we got back from that planet. Someone set those kids up.

[And judging by the way he's occasionally glancing to Garrus' left or his right, he suspects they're still on the ship.]

You see that video they posted the other day?

[Set the newbies up. It's entirely possible. Garrus had kept an eye on the new kids, but it's not he really had suspected them. They had nothing to gain from the attacks, no agendas to settle just yet. But he hadn't considered the possibility of someone timing this to put blame on the new guys.

He's looking past Crichton as he considers this. At least a couple of reds had fallen for it, by the fact that they'd been harassing new kids. That alone isn't conclusive, but at the same time, Garrus will follow any leads that come up. He's pretty low on them.]

I saw the vid. Followed up by asking if there's any footage of the container that got destroyed, haven't heard back on that yet. Saw that the vid didn't show enough of anything. No pre-footage of the attack itself, no coverage of the corridors around that. And I... Can't really expect them to show the attack on the network. Some people lost friends, and showing the scene to all isn't right. But if it had been available, pretty sure we would have been told.

[Not completely sure. But in theory that would help them do their jobs, so in theory it would help to tell them about any other clues around.]

What's this got to do with setting up the new kids? Or is it unrelated?

[There are a lot of people with abilities on the ship, and Garrus has read through all of the files but he can't say he's got them all memorized.]

Aside from the fact that they're a convenient scapegoat, I don't think they're involved. But the power goes out, suddenly we find a container blown open, and Mothership don't know a thing about it -- and she's the pilot.

[Or if she did know, she wasn't telling him. That's fine, it doesn't shake his suspicion any. John is so certain he's right about this thing that it would take some pretty hard evidence to the contrary to shake him off the trail.]

Nobody can figure out what's attacking us, or how it got here, or if its even just one thing doing it. We could get a lot of that info if we knew why the cameras ain't picking up the problem.

[There's a pause that hints he's getting to his point -- another slightly nervous gesture across his mouth hints that its not something he wants to say outright.]

Last I checked, we got someone who's supposed to be in charge of all that.

Edited 2014-12-22 11:51 (UTC)

[Garrus doesn't look at John when the last point is stated, instead gazing at a blank spot of wall as he tries to follow that. Someone in charge. Crichton suspects someone in charge is responsible for all that's going on. Does it follow? The timing was when everyone was distracted, there are clear holes being exploited that shouldn't even be there. But there are two people when it comes to internal threats. He reaches down into one of his armor compartments to pull out a small throwing knife.]

Are we talking something sharp, [he taps the blade,] or something sticky?

[Because despite how Dagger spoke about more people surviving than were supposed to, Garrus is pretty sure Dagger isn't planning on just killing people for the fun of it. Honey, though. Honey he doesn't know. Honey was obnoxious and trying to pick fights at a time when all Garrus wanted to do was sleep for a year, and that's left a lingering negative impression.]

I mean, I'm following the train of thought. Just not sure which station it's docking in.

[On the subtlty point alone, John is already thankful that Shepard had advised him to turn to Garrus. Most others had taken some hand-holding in that department, but the turian is quick enough that he doesn't need to lay his neck on the chopping just to get his point across.]

I was thinking sharp for a while, but history has me leaning sticky.

[He flicks his eyes upward again and lets his hand fall from his mouth.]

I ain't got anything solid on it for obvious reasons, but our benevolent Pumpkin King seems to share my thoughts on the matter.

[Waving a knife around is about as subtle as Garrus has ever been in his life. Garrus nods, slipping the knife back in its place. Honey then. Though thoughts on that get derailed by him trying to figure out what on Palaven a Pumpkin King is.

A few seconds stretch by before Garrus shakes his head.]

You lost me at pumpkin king. Not that it's necessarily crucial.

[Ghost, if he had to guess. Pumpkins were food, Blue distributed supplies, and king indicated rank.]

What do you need of me? Or rather, what angles don't you have covered yet that you need someone to poke their fringe in?

I don't know. With everything that's goin' on right now, nobody can find anybody and nobody can get the right kind of answers to support the right kind of solution. Or what sort of solution we can even hope for.

[Now, his arms drop a little lower. They've gotten the hard part of the discussion out of the way. Fact of the matter was that John had nothing concrete to go on, and with nothing concrete to go on, there was nothing they could do.]

Knowin' what was in that crate would help -- maybe some kind of manifest. Or where it came from, that would help too.

[The suspicion is already present in Warriorhead. All he has to do is march up with actual proof, and they could find her and shut her down.]

Most you can really do is keep an ear to the ground.

Mm. Makes sense. Especially if there's more than seemed to be.

[Everyone would look for the thing with claws. What if there had been a package in there too? The creatures could be a smokescreen, a distraction.]

You think the manifest would be legitimately filled out. Then again. Best to fill out right, just in case it gets checked. And it's gotta be filed somewhere. You wanna ask after that, or do you want me asking?

[His gaze goes back to Crichton.]

Because chances are you've already been asking a few questions. Spreading it out can't hurt.

[This bought of silence is longer. The more people he involves in this, the more dangerous it gets for everyone.

But Garrus is right. He's asking too many questions. Still, Garrus' talents we're better focused elsewhere. At the end of the thought, he shakes his head lightly.]

No. Spreading the blame just means less people to take care of the issue when it shows up.

Edited 2014-12-26 00:39 (UTC)

[Garrus bends his head in acknowledgement.]

All right. Let me know what you find, and I'll do the same. Dig, take a look around.

[There's a beat as he stretches and considers what else he can say safely. Does Crichton know about Honey's speed?]

Catch the races at the pitstop? And not just the vehicles, the footraces. Pretty impressive.

[If they're really up against her, there's nothing they can do to catch up if she takes off running.]

[There's a weighted pause as John considers what Garrus has said. Its not often he meets someone who is familiar enough with being careful enough to speak around the actual subject in hand without necessarily changing the subject.]

I didn't. Sure did see that giant ball runnin' folks over though. Would've preferred the races.

[He scratches at his neck and sighs.]

Anyway, I don't want to take up too much of your time. But keep in touch, if you find it.

[Garrus is not sure if he just smoothly managed to be sneaky, or if he was just confusing. It's the problem that comes from being awful at subtle. All he can do right now is nod, though. Trying to draw too much attention to it would do just that - draw too much attention - and Garrus already knows that anything said can at least be overheard by Dagger, just as anything on the network can at least be seen by Ghost.]

I'll keep an eye out, and stay in touch. Good luck, Crichton. Call me if you need anything. Even if it's just something to add to the task load so you're not bored out of your mind. Green can definitely use more people.

[And that's a boring enough closer that maybe someone skimming over audio files will just move on.]

IC Contact - Consignment

day 74

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