Participants:
| Scene Title | Human Curiosity |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | Two Yamagato engineers in a meeting of minds, accounting for what to do about when people are curious about… Things. |
| Date | April 12, 2018 |
Yamagato Building, Engineering
Leroy has a reputation for many things. Some might say it's primarily his brilliant work, which he's dedicated a lot of time and energy to, in his quest to try to get a step ahead of the technopaths. A very uphill and difficult endeavour.
Others might say it's the fact that he insists on sleeping in the office lately, instead of using his ridiculously swanky multi-million dollar apartment that he gets for free.
Tonight is no exception, he has a bunch of blankets and pillows under his desk, and even though most of the employees who are here because this is a great job have gone to enjoy their multi-million dollar apartments that they get for free, Leroy is napping under his desk so that he can get right to work in a few minutes.
He's already been sleeping for an hour.
Having a tendency to wear crocs when he's working late at night, they're sitting just outside of his desk, and he's wearing a black shirt with the Are You Afraid of the Dark logo on it, with a pair of blue jeans.
Technically, Marlowe should also be headed out of the building and down the way towards her own swanky apartment. But tonight, she’s still nose-to-the-grindstone working on a few things, and considering her paygrade, she earns it with being in the workrooms later than some other employees. The Yamagato building has plenty of amenities anyway, including showers or a gym, and that’s where it appears she’s come from with her hair pulled up to a messy bun, Yamagato tee and comfortable yoga pants.
In her hand, a sparkly covered tablet is playing something into the wireless Bluetooth earbuds that hang over on both sides, causing her head to bob and her lips to move as she quietly sings along. She’s moving along the computer desks as if in search of the right one like Goldilocks, but upon encountering a dark shape beneath one of them, the woman startles. And maybe lets out a sharp squeal of surprise as she jumps back two feet.
Whether or not this wakes Leroy, she has her hand to her chest and slowly leans forward again to examine the crocs and the ankles attached to them. “Bikkuri shitaaa,” Marlowe murmurs to herself.
Leroy groans, starting to wake up from the sound of her surprise. He climbs out from under the desk, and the first thing that enters his field of vision are her yoga pants. "Damn." And then, as he fully comes to his senses, he looks up to see who it is. "Sorry, been sleeping under here to get work done. Been taking power naps for days so I can simulate not sleeping."
Sleep probably doesn't work that way, but he's sure been trying. "You okay?" he asks, stepping into his crocs. "I'm about to phase these crocs out, I keep getting caught by people I don't want to see me in crocs."
“Yeah, you just startled me,” replies Marlowe with a soft exhale of breath. “Can you sleep in here? I think I’d be a little freaked out,” she notes with a nod to all the darkened monitors sitting atop the desks. She leans up against his desk, pulling out the couple of earbuds so she can hear him better. When he mentions the crocs, her eyes slide down and then up with an amused smile. “Nah,” she notes with a shake of her head, “You could keep them. They look comfy.” Her fingers tap along the surface of his desk. “Are you set up at Cresting Wave too? What floor are you on?”
"Third floor. I've heard all about your work, hard not to." Not that Leroy is exactly slouching himself, given that they work in the same office space. But he takes a seat in his chair and looks around at the black screens. "I'm not so scared. Lots of advanced electronics, in the most secure building on the planet short of a military barracks."
"I know we work on some of the same stuff sometimes, but I know we don't really, like, talk like that…" He lays his head back, closing his eyes with a slight groan. "I keep avoiding my apartment. There's so much I want to do. I don't give a shit about work hours, I have projects I want to see happen. You get that?" he asks, looking for some solidarity.
"It's hard to relax when you're on the verge of changing the world. Most people don't get it." He sounds a little sad at that, shrugging. "We've been in the same company for years, and you know why we don't talk? Because I think we both get it, we both want to see the future, and there's people here who just seem like they signed up for the apartment sometimes."
"That's why I admire you." he says, sincerely. "You're like me, you know you'd work here for free. We're living the dream here, and it's not the fucking apartment."
“You should at least keep an extra change or two in the lockers then,” advises Marlowe with a crooked smile for the man. “I get it, too, working on projects til the coming of the sun, but… I like my apartment. Also, you know how much space is up there. I use a part of it as a workspace. You could throw a lot of pillows around in it and put a desk up there too if that’ll make you feel more comfortable.” Her crooked smile remains there, teasing lightly.
She ducks her head, though, regarding what he’s said about hearing about her work. “You’ve been on a few key teams, I’ve seen your name a few times,” she says with a sidelong glance to him. “I wouldn’t say I’d work for free,” she then redirects, feeling the flush of her cheeks at his talk about him admiring her, “I mean come on, I know my value.” And apparently it’s a rather high one, in her own eyes. “But yes… We’re working on some world-changing stuff out here. Some world-building stuff too. It keeps the hands busy, you know.”
She then pushes off the desk and turns, facing him in the chair. “So what are you working on now?” she prompts, adding with another light tease, “Besides your beauty rest, which, P.S. it’s working.”
"I like my apartment too, it's just… a lot. I don't exactly have parties up there. I might try the workspace thing. I built a supercomputer in my college apartment, the electric bills were fucking insane." Leroy smiles, hitting a key to wake his computer up. "You must sleep fourteen hours a day, looking like that." he retorts. "Utsukushii dayo." is further added, in Japanese.
"I'm working on planning out a grid of drones that could possibly replace these shitty ass cellphone towers and switch the city over to VoIP. I'm trying to work out the security holes, which is very, very tricky. But if we're got solar powered drones flying around the city, I think it'll be a cheap and quick alternative to creating a communications network." he explains, while showing her a 3D mapped out grid he has going on his screen.
“Therein lies the challenge, then,” Marlowe remarks with a tilt of her head on the part of supercomputers, “putting it together so that it’s an energy efficient, low-impact on resources, yet powerful computational device. And making it do something cool.” But that’s just personal projects, so she waves off the thought with a slight gesture of her hand.
The Japanese use earns him a quick smile, though her response is still in a comfortable English. And a wag of her finger. “Stooop,” she laughs, “You are going to make me think I can get away with that much sleep and it’ll mar my work ethic.” And speaking of work ethic, her attention shifts to the screen when he powers it on, and she nods slowly to the explanation of what he’s got up. “AH and UN have solar power capability, but then I haven’t gotten around to figuring out a more stable energy packet that isn’t going to weigh them down. What are you going to do to prevent mechanical issues in the field? Or… human curiosity?” She glances over at Leroy, a brow arching up.
"My ideas for dealing with human curiosity aren't all the greatest in the world, yet. I had one idea similar to traffic light cameras. Someone messes with it and it takes their picture or a video, sends it to us, they got busted for tampering with Yamagato property." Then, Leroy rolls his eyes, adding, "Of course, then we'll get people yelling nineteen-eighty-four."
He continues, typing and clicking around things while using keyboard shortcuts. "I've also considered using machine learning algorithms to make them better at staying out of danger, avoiding flying too low during high traffic times, different things like that."
Of course, she does bring up another good point. "Mechanical issues isn't as complicated as the other issues. We get a nice little black box signal and someone goes out to get it back. But I'm thinking they'll work like public trains, we rotate them out little by little every day or once a week, however much time ends up being best to wait."
He's distracted from his work again, though, looking over at her with that coy smile. "I wouldn't question that work ethic in a million years, it takes a lot of work to do the kind of work you do and look like that. Me? I just sleep under a desk and everything just kinda works out."
Curiosity is a euphemism, as Marlowe seems to indicate with a thoughtful 'hm' to his explanation. "That would require outfitting all the drones with a video surveillance device and live upstream to ensure an accurate capture. And Jiba's not tethered to outside Yamagato Park," she ponders aloud. "The international red tape alone would be… substantial." She frowns slightly. Clearly, not the one to handle said red tape, she nonetheless appreciates the fact.
"But I'm interested," she quickly follows, "for what you're using to program for obstacle avoidance. I was using algorithms from another source but… I'm not the computer whiz. You'd probably be horrified by it, I'm sure." Here, she grins sheepishly.
The grin doesn't exactly abate, but turns wry with his regard of her. "It's just some contouring," she says with a wider smile and a slight slip of her tongue in mischief when she laughs at her own joke. Her hand reaches up to push back a longer lock of hair that falls out with tilt of her head. "Anyway, though, sleep is good, sleep is what keeps your mind sharp and clear. Who am I to argue with that?"
"I'll let them figure out any red tape. I'm not sure what the end result of this will be. It's not really one of my primary projects, but it seemed like something easy to go after." Leroy admits, turning in his chair to face her. "If you need help with obstacle avoidance, I'll give what you're working on a look. I usually code everything myself, or heavily modify something if there's already functional code to use."
"You've got contouring alright." he continues to tease. It's easy when you've seen someone so frequently for years, even if this is probably their first real conversation. He reclines a little, looking around a little lazily. "We're the only people crazy enough to be here this late."
"I'd say we should do something fun, but my idea of fun feels like going back to my actual bed and actually sleeping." he finally admits, in tired defeat. "Maybe you should too."
Not that she was expecting a real rejection, but Marlowe is nonetheless surprised when Leroy offers to share his software programming. "Hontou?" She smiles more genuinely and less teasingly, and bows her head with gratitude. "That's awesome. I'll check it out when you send it, see what I can do with it." There's a lingering implication as she lifts up her tablet to tap a few notes to herself, setting a reminder to contact Leroy. If there's any questions.
His teasing brings her attention back to him, and the woman's smile slips back to something wry. Knowing. Flattered. "Now Mr. Jackson, that sounds dangerously on the edge of a comment to be made to HR," she notes with a crook of her finger in his direction. "And no, you are only one crazy enough to be sleeping here when there's a lovely apartment waiting for you just down the way." She chuckles softly, pushing off from her lean on the desk top and gathers the tablet back into her arm.
As she does, she turns to look at the seated man, his t-shirt's words getting one last scan before she smiles crookedly. "You could try sleeping in your actual bed some time," she agrees. And once she's stepping away, she says over her shoulder, "Soshite tabun, atashi mo sono beddo de neyou to suru yo."