nexus_sages | A question of safety

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A question of safety

This Winter has been a harsh one, and the Nexus' resident rogue shows signs of it. Where before Amelia had been comfortable enough to walk about the Nexus with relatively few weapons on her person, she now carries her full armory every time she steps out of the inn she currently calls home. For weeks she's been pondering how to tackle a problem on her own. Now she's come to the Forum to seek advice, as anyone who's been here long enough usually does.

"I've had many thoughts and worries relating to the safety of myself and others after certain events in the last several weeks." Her lips draw into a thin line and she crosses her arm in front of her chest. That's enough context for everyone who might answer, surely. "What do you do to feel safe? Or, rather, when your safety is threatened, how do you respond?"

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"I keep this on me, for one." Jim removes the phaser from it's holster and offers it out for Amelia to see. For a world that doesn't even have guns yet, the phaser must seem a very odd choice of weapon. It's impossibly light, for one thing.

"But when fight or flight is triggered, I tend to fight." Unless it's a giant Jim-eating-monster. Then running is definitely the way to go.

There's a face Amelia hasn't seen for a while. She nods to Jim and carefully takes the phaser from him. She's been doing plenty of reading lately about weaponry, bu t she hasn't gotten past projectile weapons yet. This phaser is on a completely different level of understanding for her. "How does it work?" she asks curiously.

"I tend to fight as well, when it comes down to it. But in times like these, when there's no one to fight and there's just the feeling of something being not right... I don't know what to do." She sighs, her face softening a bit as she does so. "The worst part of all of this is that I'm not worried about myself. I can take on anything that comes at me. But I can't protect everyone else if something happens when I'm not around. How the fuck am I supposed to protect someone I care about if I can't get to them?"

"Think of it like a crossbow, except lighter. Aim and pull the trigger." Jim licks at his lower lip, before adding "Don't actually do that at anyone. It's set to stun, and since that doesn't really hurt folks I don't want to take a chance of it actually hitting someone if you shoot it at someone. But you can fire at the sign or whatever. It won't hurt anything."

Jim listens to the rest of Amelia's concerns with a small nod. As the man responsible for his entire crew, he knows this fear all too well.

"You do the best you can to teach them how to protect themselves. You be there as much as you can....but at the end of the day, you either make peace with the fact that you can't be everywhere at once and can't save everyone....or you resign yourself to having to mourn every time you can't save someone. I'm not very good at making peace, but I'm also a pretty fucked kinda guy."

"Aim and pull the trigger..." That sign is an ugly sight. Amelia takes aim at Naugus 'improvement' and fires. The sudden burst of energy, the sound, and the feeling of the electrical discharge in her hand causes her to jump and gasp loudly. "Whoa!" Her finger comes off the trigger and she inspects it a little more carefully. "And this... can kill people?" The sign sure as hell didn't care about the shot, but the sign is eternal or something.

His answer gets a wry smile. "I'm at least as fucked, then, because I'm worried about an entire world that no one can find right now. There are so many things here that my world wouldn't understand, that it would revolt against. I fear what might happen... if I were to let something through." It's not something she could really stop, but that won't stop her from blaming herself if something did happen.

There's astonishingly little recoil on the device, but given the nature of what's being fired, this makes perfect sense.

"The settings can be changed to lethal, yeah. But I've only ever had to do that once. It's primarily a tool of self defense. Stun an enemy long enough to get away, or subdue them. Starfleet isn't into murder or military action."

It does make sense - to someone who understand more physics than Amelia.

"I can see this being very useful." She continues looking the device over as she speaks. Nothing about its mechanics make sense to her. Maybe someday she'll get far enough in her personal education to understand. "How does it feel? To be stunned, I mean." With Jim, it seems best to make that distinction.

"Well...not good. It causes no lasting damage, but it works by..." He pauses, realizing suddenly that if he explains it properly it won't make any sense to her whatsoever. He licks at his lower lip for a moment before wincing.

"It temporarily paralyzes the muscles to keep you from moving. The lethal setting is the same, except it also keeps you from breathing or your heart from working." Jim folds his arms while he thinks.

"It's more discomfort than painful, but it is definitely not fun to suddenly be immobile. Often people pass out from the sudden lockdown on their body."

She shudders slightly before handing back the phaser. If the weapon is that dangerous, and she doesn't fully understand how it works, she doesn't want to hold on to it anymore. "Remind me never to be o the receiving end of it, then, because that sounds awful."

She pauses a moment before asking, "Are you all right, now that you're back in your own body again?" Don't think that she didn't notice the huge meltdown you and Naugus were having when Harrow was putting up flyers, Jim.

"I've had worse." Jim replies with a shrug, but he chuckles all the same. "Yeah, it's not pleasant. But I'd rather be on the receiving end of it than any lethal weapon."

The question regarding his body makes Jim nod.

"Glad to have it back. Naugus didn't do any lasting damage to it, thankfully."

"...lasting damage?" This seems like a dangerous line of questioning, Amelia. Maybe you shouldn't-- "What the hell did the gremlin do to you?"

Or, you know, just go for it. That's cool, too.

"I don't...it's not really something I want to go shouting around about, yanno?" Plus, you don't just tell a lady that kind of thing. But she asked? And really, he has to wonder if Felix is going to be upset too.

Damn.

"For a guy who comes form a world full of anthropomorphic animals, he sure as hell didn't like my hair. He shaved me. Everywhere. If he'd touched my head though, I'd have killed him in his sleep."

"Everywhere?!" Her eyes widen and then narrow as she thinks about Naugus being that much of a dick. "He really is the worst, isn't he?"

Either the revelation doesn't phase her or she's extremely good at hiding her real emotions about it. Either seems entirely likely at this point.

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A question of safety

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