Act 1-2: Roger the Negotiator

[Roger Smith]

The lazy spinning of a fan overhead, barely even serving to move the air in the musty little office, provided the only real sound. Elsewhere, the murmur of voices and babble of activity of a precinct running itself ragged occasionally drifted in through the grimy frosted windows. An old radio sat in one corner, flickering lights on it showing it was turned on but silenced, the volume knob firmly set to zero.

A paper cup sat on the corner of the desk, over which Roger Smith and his one-time friend Dan Dastun stared at each other in silence. Steam from the 'fresh' coffee lazily curled up from the cup, the faint draft of the struggling ceiling fan making it waft away to one side and curl lazily over the desk.

The conversation had been violent, loud and short when they had met. Roger finding out that Dastun was going to be his superior here, and Dastun finding out Roger would be working under him. It had been disgruntled and unpleasant on both sides, neither man being all that pleased. Roger would wager he was the more displeased of the two, given his own personal issues with the way things had worked in Paradigm -- and seeing Dastun here, knowing his work ethic and his adherence to the word of law, was already making his mood take a nosedive.

"Roger Smith..." Dan Dastun sighed heavily, lifting a gloved hand to run over his scarred, bald head. "Of all the people to run into, and here of all places." He rested both hands on the desk, covering the ream of paperwork and mess of scattered notes laying askew on it. "What did you do this time, to get sent down here?"

From where he sat, Roger Smith just shrugged. "I haven't done anything. Not yet, at least." He drummed the fingers of one hand lightly against his knee, shifting in his seat. "This is where they gave me directions to come to, when I took their offer of employment."

"You. Accepted employment from a place like this?" The surprise was evident in the man's tone and written all over his face. "I'm surprised at you, Roger. I would've thought your morals wouldn't let you."

The negotiator's hand clenched, squeezing at the knee it rested upon and a tight, thin-lipped frown plastered itself onto his face. "It didn't let me. I'm not exactly here by choice."

The officer sighed, shaking his head. "So you have already picked up on it. How similar this place is."

"Be useful or get out." Roger Smith forced a smile. "That was the impression I gathered. Just like Paradigm. 'Obey or find some other work'."

"Not quite like Paradigm..." Dastun looked aside. "Similar, but an entirely different kind of unpleasant. You'll learn soon enough just what you're dealing with. With that luck of yours, you might even survive when you do." He heaved a sigh, leaning back in his chair and reaching for a mug of stale, cold coffee sitting at his elbow. "But in the meantime, I'm not all that sure what I should even do with you."

Roger matched his old friend's posture, leaning back and draping one arm over the back of his chair, folding one leg over the other. "You've never been so indecisive, Dastun. What would you do if I was any other new recruit shoved into your lap to deal with?"

The disgruntled cop scowled at that, tilting his head back and downing the remains of the cold java in his mug, before slamming it back down on the desk. "That attitude is exactly why I don't know what to do with you!" he barked, eyes glaring pointedly as if he intended to knock the suited man down with the sheer force of his gaze. "That attitude and the rest of your insufferable demeanor! I know you, Roger Smith, and what you're like. How you operate. You won't fit in down here. It's too violent for the likes of you."

"Just because I'm a gentleman doesn't mean I can't handle violence." Roger's expression remained neutral, tightly controlled as he deflected the frustrated outburst without so much as flinching. "I have my ways, even if I don't respond to violence with more of the same. But you should know better than most that I'm no stranger when it comes to that sort of work. I don't enjoy it, and if there's another option I'll use it." He slowly shifted to plant both feet on the floor with a soft thunk that almost echoed in the otherwise quiet office. "But don't undermine my skills like that. Words can do more damage than all the bullets in the world, if the right ones are used."

Dastun held his stare for several seconds. Then half a minute. Then a full minute. A lazy squeak from the fan overhead, a fizzling pop of electricity from the radio in the corner, and an excited babble of activity from outside came and went, and still they both remained silent, having a heated, aggravated conversation without words.

Finally, after several minutes, it was Dastun who broke the stalemate with a heavy, tired sigh, slumping in his chair. "Do you still have that...damn robot?" He blinked tired eyes, mouth twisting as he forced the next words out. "That...Megadeus?"

Roger Smith brought up his left arm, pulling back the sleeve to show his watch. "I can still pilot it. But I don't have it just yet." He threw his left arm out in a shrug, sleeve falling back down over the watch. "Still a recent arrival. Something of that complexity would be a bit beyond me at the moment, don't you think?"

"How the hell should I know?" The man turned his face down, reaching to start gathering and organizing the mess of chaos littering his desk. "I've been here longer than you have, but I'm just a Secondary, Roger." He pulled the paperwork he'd been tending to before this unexpected meeting together, tilting and turning the pages to line them up. "I can't manipulate Omnilium freely like you can. The limits of what it can and can't do aren't exactly something I have any real idea about." He tapped the ream of papers on his desk to straighten then out, looking up at the other man. "For all I know, you could have that Megadeus waiting outside in the parking lot right now, fully armed and ready to destroy half the city."

The negotiator lifted both hands in a helpless shrug, eyes closed to hide the amused twinkle in his eyes. "It's just as much of a mystery to me, old friend. I haven't experimented much with it beyond working up to summoning my car."

"That thing?" Dastun slapped the mess of papers into a folder, shutting it with more force than was necessary. "Fancy as that damn car of yours is, you're painting a target on your back if you drive that thing around down here. Just begging to have someone break in or steal it for parts."

Roger just shrugged again. "It can be replaced." Though such a thing did remind Roger that he would need to do plenty of work to the Griffon. Restore its armor functions, along with its weapon systems and remote control, maybe install some sort of tracking beacon or camera, in case it did get stolen...ah, so much work to do. But security and peace of mind couldn't be given enough effort, as Dastun was obviously trying to point out in his own gruff way. "Besides, are you saying that someone would really try to break in to the lot of a police precinct, in a place like this?"

"The Empire isn't exactly well-liked down here, Roger," Dastun grumbled. "We barely keep it together, and don't have much in the way of support. There are rebels, criminal groups both organized and not, and gangs...they control as much of the city down here, if not even more, than we do. Sometimes you can't even tell which parts of the law are on their side and which aren't anymore."

Roger just gave a low whistle to that, lifting a hand to rub at his chin thoughtfully. "That bad down here, is it? And I thought we'd only have to worry about the corruption from the government and criminals in higher office, not from actual criminals on the streets and in the shadows."

"Crime is everywhere, Roger. You should know that. It goes hand in hand with Corruption, but they aren't always so intimately related. Sometimes people are just left with no other choice, sometimes they have all the choice and still turn to such underhanded actions." He slammed a hand down on the desk. "Everyone is equal before the law in the end. It's all a matter of finding the proof to make them remember that equality."

"Still the same as ever, Dastun..." Roger shook his head, the smile on his face only growing more broad. Still the same old rabid, justice-obsessed bulldog he had always been. Never content or agreeing with the state of affairs that Paradigm had foisted upon the city, but he never made his distaste openly known. He would always do his best, interpret orders loosely from time to time to make sure things went as smoothly as possible and save as many lives as he could, but he could never actually disobey an order. He was too much of a good soldier to avert the law or chain of command directly like that. So for him to be so adamant and open about there being corruption and crime even among his own ranks, let along his superiors...it must have been very, very bad indeed.

"So, then...back to the matter of what to do with you, Roger Smith." Dastun's chair creaked as he leaned back, eyeing the negotiator with a steely, gleaming eye. "Until you figure out how this city works, we can't have you running off on your own. Prime or not, you'd end up dead and leave a bad reputation not only for yourself, but for this precinct. And we can't have much more bad press thrown our way." His hand curled into a fist, knuckles pressing against the desk as he scowled deeply. "So that means placing you with a partner."

Now it was Roger's turn to scowl, as he stood up and leaned forward, hands resting on the edge of his superior's desk. "A partner? You know I work best alone, Dastun!" His eyebrows knitted together, eyes narrowing darkly. "You should know very well."

The battered old policeman met the stare with his own unflinching response. "I do know very well, Roger. But I also know things you don't know. About this city, and about how you'll fit in. You'll get a partner, only temporarily if you can prove to be as quick a learner as you usually are. You'll get your act together or you'll get taken apart."

Roger glowered in silence for almost a full minute before the tension bled away from his posture. He hated working with a partner, but he had to admit that Dastun was right in this instance. This wasn't Paradigm, where he knew how everything worked and how he could go about things. "Fine...just tell me who it is."

"Don't worry. I'm sure you'll get along fine." Dastun shoved a folder across the desk toward Roger. "Go get your gear and uniform. I'll get them briefed on their new assignment and have them come track you down when you're ready to get started."

"First day on the job...both hiring and jumping right into the field." Roger shook his head, tentatively picking up the folder. "Expedient."

"We don't have the luxury of lazing around, Roger." Dastun waved a hand dismissively. "Now go on, get out of here. We've both got work to do now."