Scorn made 'friends'. They didn't feel like friends, she in fact, had none. But she needed help-- and protection. So she made a deal. Part of this deal involved coming into a lab once a week and having batteries of tests and questions asked her. What harm could this do? The girl has 'henshined' herself down to her dress and hair decorations- as she normally does-- the hat and broom only come when Combat or soul draining is a thing.
She arrives into the lab in Easter Corporation looking a little confused. A little nervous. and a little unsettled. The raven is perched on her shoulder- as always. He doesn't look happy. Scorn turns to her companion, and says. "I don't like this, that is true, but this is what we need to do." she insists to the Crow.
Corvus rolls his eyes as best as ravencrows can. "This isn't fun. I want it done." insists.
Scorn looks around.
"Hello, I am here! Is anyone there? If this is not the place, then it must be a in a different space." she says.
Takashi Agera, Eclipse R+D, walks into the Easter Corporation labs. While he's disguised as Riventon, rather than his normal henshin, he's wearing a lab coat and carrying a clipboard. He knows people react better to you when you look like you know what you're doing, and thusfar he has that down. "Ah, Scorn!" he says, with his carefully manicured upbeat tone, walking into the room and closing the door. "It's good to see you again; you looked less well at the end of our last meeting, but I knew you were strong enough to come up positive!" His demeanor is a vast change from how she has met him in combat.
"Hopefully the testing we do here can help both you and us; together we can grow in strength in ways that we couldn't do alone. That's the system Eclipse has been built on, after all, and we're doing quite well with it."
Scorn looks at the boy as he enters with wide eyes for a moment, it takes her a moment, but a glance of recognition glances over her face, and a bit of relief- and a blush, as she calms down, "I'm sorry for the rhyming, it's such bad timing! But this how I talk when I am nervous." she says. Desparia's report mentioned as such, anyways.
"I'll try to speak slower..." she says with a pause. "So what I need to say isn't obscurbed by riddle or rhyme." she says.
Corvus looks at Riventon with a suspicious look, but says nothing.
"What exactly does this testing entail? This isn't something I can fail?" she sighs a bit as she falls back into the ryhme- with a look of accepted defeat.
He laughs. It's not a cruel laugh, but a kind one. It's very fake, but convincingly so. Takashi might be bad at dealing with people, but time and effort have at least made him good at faking it.
"Don't worry, Scorn. It's not a classwork test, nor is it for a grade." he adds, smiling. "We're largely curious about the nature of your powers; and one thing I'd like to do is see if we can't improve your success in the field, keep you protected from nastiness like what happened to you when we worked together last."
He walks over to some very strange looking equipment, and begins to transfer some information to his Device from the machines. "It's mostly quite simple - in a way the testing began as soon as you walked into the room. I could bore you with the details, but... I don't think that would help you much." he adds with another smile.
Scorn looks at Riventon with a look of suspicion as he talks. The testing began when she entered the room? What does that mean? No one was here. Was it one of the various mydraid of machines. She walks over, as she splays a hand through her hair a moment to see what it is, Riventon is doing exactly.
"I guess not." she says as delibratly as she can.
"Bah this testing. When we should be resting." insists the Crow.
"I'm told I have potential, but was told it's central, to studdy and learn, so I don't get burned." she winces again, and says more delibrately. "Desparia is going to be teaching me, if she can. She needs to know...." she pauses. "the results of some of these tests before I continue with something like that." she frowns.
"Mostly it's just been readings." he says, after a moment of silence. He nods a bit. "Yes, most of this data will go back up the chain to Desparia!" he adds with another smile. "That way she can consider the best ways to improve your abilities - we're all peices of one big machine!" A pause. "I guess it's just been you and your rhyming friend, so that might not immediately click for you." As she watches on, Riventon is using his mental connection with his Device to copy what looks like an endless string of unintelligible, unnotated numbers. "A lot of what I do is turn this into something that makes a little sense." he adds, seeing her confusion. After a while, he backs away. Standing under some sort of odd aparatus on one side of the room, he smiles.
"Alright, Scorn; could you please make an attack against me?" he asks, one hand held up, ready to shield.
Scorn frowns, Corvus? A friend? Hardly. Just an means to an end, she thinks in her head. She takes a deep breath. "Yes, it's always just been me." she says deliberatly as she can. Then the boy walks across the room, under some weird machine, and she blinks. "Attack you!? What a fool! What will I do if I hurt you, too!?" she suddenly asks with a shocked expression. Regardless. She frowns a bit. "But if attack is what you want----"
She places her hand out and a broom just sort of appears in it. She aims it, stick portion forward, at Riventon...
"Grant my Heart's Desire.... Soul Rend!" she calls out as a black wind suddenly escapes from her postion, towards Riventon. It's power, butting and infused with a wave of darkness--- it also doesn't feel pleasent- though Riventon's very nature probably actually protects him from falling into despairing thoughts-- Darkness doesn't Fight Darkness very well.
"Are you okay?" she asks, after sending the wave.
She takes a deep breath. "So... um.. you're--- Hannah's-- Miss White's-- friend... right?" she asks a little sheepishly suddenly. "Do you know if she's okay from last night!? It gave me quite a fright!"
Riventon nods, and as Scorn raises her broom a line of several Round Shields rises up in front of him, ready to take the brunt of the attack. Even still though, Scorn's Soul Rend is an impressive weapon, and the barriers give way one after another, massively blunting the attack but eventually the blast of power gets through to him. He holds up well against it's actual damage, but even he can feel the despair, the negative thoughts reaching to him. For all his dark heritage, he is also still quite human, so while he doesn't get it to the same degree as the others, he can still hear those voices, nagging at the back of his head.
"You'll never be good enough." "You'll dissapoint your Father." "Your Mother's sacrifice will be in vain, because you're too weak to make the use of it." Those words nip at the corners of his mind, and he falters for a moment; before the torrent of his own pride pushes them away. Even still, it takes him a moment to get his footing. But his Device and his machinery are abuzz with information, so it was worth it. He grits his teeth for a moment before speaking.
"Impressive." That's an understatement; the power she wields reminds him that he has so much further to go. "I am fine, though... as for Miss White, I've heard rumbings around here about what happened, which is a good sign; if she was out of comission they'd have clammed up. But I'm not sure what her status is. We're... allies at times, co-workers perhaps. Friend... is a strong term. I think we'd both like to be friends, but our work can get in the way."
Scorn keeps her broom in her hand, just in case. She looks down and says. "Oh, I see." she says lowly under her breath. She takes a deep breath and steadies the broom upwards. "Most of my.. attacks are like that. I'm able to bring some people to thier knees most of the time with them--- but It's hard fighting multiple people at once..." she sadly admits. "---and many seem to resist it." she says.
"I--- one of them tried to me-- after some red one put something on my head. It felt like I was being ripped from the inside out. That's no way to win a bout!" she huffs.
Corvus keeps perfectly quiet. He is suddenly wearing a grin of smug satisfaction for some reason.
"She said something about...sealing... or something." she says.
Riventon thinks about it. Not having been the victim of one of Sailor Mars' seals yet, he can only make an educated guess based on his data. "Well, you're... somewhat linked to your powers now. They're a part of you, I'd imagine, so if she's trying to 'seal' those powers, it'd be like she tried to seal an arm or leg away from you - very destructive, very painful. Sadly, our mutual enemies continue to come up with new ways to try to swim against the unstoppable current."
He smiles again. "I think... that's all for today. There are some other things I'll want to consult you about, but I can't really make much progress until I make sense of the flood of data you just gave me." he adds. To himself, he thinks 'and between sanitizing any information that might prove /too/ useful out of the report headed to Desparia and the rest of Eclipse'. "You've been a most agreeable subject, Scorn." he adds, giving her a small dose of praise. "Is there anything you'd like to ask of me? I'll answer what I can, if so. Also... if you ever need an ally for one of your little adventures, don't hesitate to call on me. Some things can only be truly tested in the field!"
Scorn blinks, that's it? She was expecting more, with a look of confused puzzlement. "That's all for today? I can go away? This wasn't too much trouble...." she muses to herself. Her broom dissapears into a puff of smoke and feathers--- as the feathers dissapear into motes of black. She takes a deep breath.
"There's a question that I've been wanting to ask..." she says with a delibrate pause.
She seems to trail off... "Nevermind... it isn't important." she says as she frowns--- maybe she'll ask Desparia-- she has to meet with her soon this week, too. "I'll ask.. Desparia." but then she pauses again.
"I never got your name." she asks. "What is your name?" she asks.
"Riventon." he says, clearly. "But I also go by the name Mr. Black ; works well for my partnership with Ms. White. I'll answer to either, so pick your favorite." he adds.
Yeah, today is just...preliminaries, mostly. I have to establish a baseline... look, I told you it was boring!" he laughs, this one a bit more uneasily than the others. "We'll do this sort of thing again soon, but for right now don't worry - you did a good job and even just this should give us some ideas on how to help you do even better."
Scorn seems to pause, giving Riventon a glance up and down. As if looking for something, or judging him suddenly. The pause is long, awkward. "Alright then." she says quietly.
"I'm... going then. I need to plan and rest. Go ahead and run your tests. I think what you know is best." she says with a sigh.
She uncermoniously leaves the room, and dissapears down the hallway.
"What a bore, What a chore!" says Corvus.
Scorn merely keeps quiet. It'll take her some time to get used to all these... people.