synopsychic | (no subject)

[There's something a bit rough and tired to Malik's mental voice, even as he speaks with crisp efficiency.]

The Defenders and Miners are wrong, and you do not have all you should. I do not know what everyone has been told but hopefully this information will not be too late to help.

The Automata do not seek to destroy the grid or infect the rest of the network. They are trying to stop the Cryptos from escaping and have been trying to do so since the beginning.

Nothing anyone has told you of them is likely true.

[He pauses before continuing again.]

What you need to know is this.

There is a covert team of automata who are trying to preserve the grid. They are under the directive of a... I am not sure that pair is the right word? The Users they are following the directive of are some sort of creature and two who were once one.

[He doesn't know anything of Trumps or tarot, being from the middle ages is difficult sometimes when having to deal in symbology.]

I will not argue over the fact that they are dangerous. The desperate acting against overwhelming numbers tend to be.

I can answer what I know of, and offer what conclusions I have come to.

One of which is that the Cryptos are far more of a danger than I think anyone realizes.

...I will also need a sword once I return to the grid if any have one to lend.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It seems like they do have allegiances, at least. Magician and Hermit. Lovers and whoever their partner is. But yeah, it seems like pretty much what we were afraid of.

[He sighs too, audibly frustrated.] And I had little hope of escaping being marked, but I had hoped it would be when I was at least aware of myself and what was happening - at least then I might have been able to learn something.

[He hesitates for a moment, then locks the conversation between the two of them.]

To be honest, I almost didn't share this information at all, considering how divisive it could be. But then Malik beat me to it. Given the conversation so far... I'm afraid my fears may have been well-founded.

Wait, she marked you and put you in 'hard-reset' to Investigator state?

[After a moment though he ploughing ahead:] Nevermind, it seems like someone's getting marked every Jaunt now. I'm more worried about what happens when all the Trumps have gotten their pieces together. Do you think they might want to pit us against each other like ROSE and the Lovers are doing here?

...Marked me, changed me back into me. And then killed me. [He can't help sounding a little like how he feels - confused and frustrated and hurt at what's happened. Still, the conversation going on right now is more important than thinking about that again.]

That's what I'm worried about. And if they start to put us in situations like this... it honestly might not even be that hard. [Armin would like to believe otherwise. But there are too many strong personalities with far too radically different perspectives for harmony. When the situation is more black and white, a 'save the world from evil' kind of situation, it's fairly easy for the Travelers to agree. But unfortunately for all of them, few situations are that simple.]

Yikes.

... Are you okay? [Because that's rough. Really rough.]

I think we need to update everyone on this when this Jaunt is over. We need to try to get everyone to work together, somehow. Otherwise it's going to be a battle royale, which is kinda bad when we've got a lot of kids around.

...I'll manage.

[He's a soldier. It doesn't matter what shape he's really in - he can't let himself be weak while there's still danger.]

That's what I was thinking too. I think we may have learned more about the Trumps this jaunt than we have in the rest of the time since I woke up in that morgue the last day of Moebius. [It slips out without thinking, and though he can't suppress a shudder when he hears the word Moebius slide out of his mouth, he tries his best to ignore it.] Even without the concern about working together, this would warrant a lot of discussion.

...At least none of them have been marked yet, as far as I'm aware.

Seems like you have to interact with the Trumps to some degree to get them to... mark... you.... [He slows as he gets distracted, hand rising to the back of his neck where he'd been itching a bit a while ago.]

... Uh, so if we keep the kids away as much as we can from any unknowns or Trump-ish people in Jaunts, they should be safe. Hopefully.

It seems like it, yeah. [He nods at the idea.] It's not much of a plan, but it'll do for now.

We do what we can, right?

[He simply nods, distracted.] For the more immediate concerns, we need to figure out what the cryptos want, beyond simply finding their user - and why the Lovers wants to trap them here.

Maybe their User programed them to be a potential threat to the Lovers?

[Armin frowns.] But what can be a threat to one of the Trumps?

...I don't think we're going to get anywhere by guessing.

You're right, but where can we even start to investigate?

I guess we need people talking to the cryptos, if they're willing to share anything - unlikely. Barring that, we might need people to follow and spy on the cryptos.

As for myself... I'm going to find ROSE and talk to her again.

The Cryptos are pretty hard to keep track of. Seems like they're either always on the move or putting up as many defenses as possible to keep outsiders out.

Are you sure talking to ROSE again is a good idea?

That will make it more difficult - but we need to figure them out somehow.

...no. But given what we might learn from it, it's a risk I have to take. [No matter that he's terrified of ROSE. Tactically speaking, that doesn't matter. He's a soldier, and he'll do what he has to.]

How about I go talk to her? She doesn't have anything against me as far as I can tell.

[Armin shakes his head.]

She only had something against me because I - my infiltrator self - attacked her. And I think she was mostly reacting to what was happening. Now that she's marked me... she should consider me as at least nominally on her side, if the experiences others who've been marked are anything to go by.

[He also hopes he may be able to leverage at least a semblance of cooperation for an answer or two, since she's marked him but given him no reason to follow her. But he doesn't want to talk about that on the network, for fear she may be listening.]

...And beyond that, we shouldn't risk anyone else becoming marked.

Mm, you have a point there.

Alright, just try to be careful. No reason to poke at the Trumps mid-Jaunt only to have things explode on us, right?

I'll be as careful as I can be. But who knows when a chance like this will happen again?

[Could be next jaunt. Could be never.]

Yeah, I know. Keep us updated, yeah?

I will.

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