towerofanimus | [OPEN] How much of it's genetics? How much of it is fate?

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[OPEN] How much of it's genetics? How much of it is fate?

Characters: jade!Eridan & YOU!
Setting: Workshop
Format: Starting with action, but I'll match you.
Summary: Eridan emerges from his self-imposed exile for a while to clean his rifles.
Warnings: Eridan's deadpan. Potential violence if he gets pissed; lots and lots of rifles. Gamzee. Gory, ironic death via Gamzee. Goddammit, Gamzee.

[He started off with one. And then he doomed himself a few times. And well. It wasn't like he could just let them go to waste, when they started piling up.

Laser rifles need a different type of maintenance than the usual kind, but it's still maintenance in the end.

So there's a sullen troll, half hidden behind a pile of guns, carefully cleaning one by one. It's a methodical and repetitive process, but it's not like Eridan seems to mind too terribly. He's just minding his business, but hey. Maybe if you ask very nicely, he'll give you one.

Maybe.]

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Oh. Alchemy. Right. [Equius has built several guns in his life, of course. Most of them were modified so that they could be operated by machines, not by hand, but he was still familiar with... about half of the parts that Eridan outlined. He kept listening as the explanation went longer, and made a point to commit those care and use tips to memory. A lot to learn. He was probably going to ruin a few guns. But... well. His gaze shifts to the pile of laser rifles for a second.]

[It's not like he doesn't have plenty more practice models, right?]

Uh, yeah. I know how regular rifles work, kind of. They were mostly attached so that a different mechanism replaced the trigger, since none of them were actually handheld. ...And, obviously, no lasers. [Lasers are expensive. He wished he could work with lasers.]

Yeah, I didn't have the fancy laser stuff back home. Would have made my life easier, I guess.

[He snorts, taking the bolt action and using those claws to push the rag into every little nook and cranny.]

On the other hand, not having ammo constraints in the middle of a fucking horde wave would have probably made me less good at aiming. You know how it is, when every shot has to matter, you get real fucking good at not missing the mark.

[Arrows aren't that different in that respect. Then of course his eyes gleam a little at that piece of information.]

What have you worked with before?

[A lot of time during the explanation was spent watching Eridan clean the gun. Maybe it would look weird to someone else... but, to be honest, Equius seriously just wanted to know how Eridan cleaned the gun. He was probably doing it wrong this entire time.]

Oh. Just, you know, normal magazine-operated rifles. And other types of guns with bullets as well. But they were built into robots, because I was... [He sighs and looks somewhere that isn't Eridan.] ...not really that good at shooting them, myself. Or, rather, not as good as the machines were if I programmed them properly. It was easier to let the computer do the work.

[Eridan doesn't really notice where Equius attention is, because he's focused on what his own hands are doing and trying to slow down a little. He's used to doing this almost on reflex by now.]

No, I mean. Calibers and stuff. All that stuff changes how you handle each individual gun, and how to care for it and how much you're going to hang your head into a wall when dealing with it. Though programming machines to shoot them is pretty damn impressive. There's a lot of variables to screw up there.

[So hey, he does look up a moment to give Equius a very admiring look.]

Oh! Oh. Uh, generally the parts are kind of mixed and welded together until they work properly, but most of the rifle arms were about .30 caliber. [He shrugs.]

[...]

[And then promptly looks away again.] Well... there was a formula I made, really, it took forever to get the accuracy even at a passable level. Eventually, all I needed to do was weigh and measure a few things, but...

[Did you know Eridan could whistle? Because he just whistled at you.]

Niiice.

[That's a lot of teeth. He tends to grin with lots of teeth with talking about guns. This is totally a normal, sane thing to do, of course.]

I saved .30 for rainy days, and mostly stuck to .22 and 5.56 for every day shooting. You can get some pretty damn nice shots with those, but it takes practice.

[He pats Equius's arm, sympathetically.]

Weighing and measuring a few things is also a thing you do, when shooting with these. The difference is that you need to get used to how the math feels in reality.

[No, he didn't know that Eridan could whistle. Nor did he really want to, but details.]

...I-it was on hand.

[Really. .30 just happened to be the most common caliber of gun around there for whatever reason. He seems intent on repeating this until Eridan understands that he had no choice but to use such a weapon, and more importantly, it wasn't anything special.]

Yes, I know.

The same thing happens with arrows, but... guns are harder somehow.

[Eridan won't care how incidental it was, it was a nice choice. So there. He gives a melodramatic sigh instead.]

Advantages of living in a city, I guess.

[He shrugs.]

They're not really harder, just... different. You'll see. The balance centers are different and that tends to throw the aiming off. It happens even between different types of guns.

[Oh. That sigh didn't really sound too pleased. Uh--]

Sorry.

[He shut up again in time to listen to Eridan thoughtfully. It was a little bit sad how much this had failed to register on his previous attempts to fire a gun, now that he thought about it. Just another reason he needed Eridan to help him out if he ever planned on doing serious damage to... well, anyone.]

Yeah... I can adjust those things fine on a machine, but when it comes to using it myself, well...

Hey, nothing for you to be sorry about.

[Eridan offers a lopsided smile.]

It's all about practice, really. Once you get the hang of it, it gets much easier. Your arrows were probably the same, right?

I... yeah.

[GDI Eridan, stop being right. ...Except don't. His life would pretty much be over if Eridan wasn't there to be right all the time.]

Uh. Thanks. For... doing this. I know you're busy.

I really appreciate it.

[GOLLY GEE DARN that wall sure is interesting today]

It's okay, I don't mind.

[Excuse him while he busies himself looking at the gun in his hand and purposely not at Equius in any shape or form.]

...'s not like I don't enjoy spending time with you.

Yeah. I mean, I like spending time with you too. But I know you have other things you could be doing right now.

Like cleaning these guns.

[He finally stops acting like a wiggler and focuses on the gun in Eridan's hands, and then his own.]

Anyway, uh... what model do you think we should start with?

[Eridan grins a little.]

Yeah, hon, but you're selling yourself short if you think I'd rather clean guns than spend time with you.

[He sobers up a little then, pointing to the bolt action.]

I think this one will do. Have you ever used bold action before?

[He looks at the bolt action for a second, thoughtfully, and then shakes his head slowly.]

No. I don't think so.

Yeah, I didn't think so. They don't make much sense for an automatic firing system. Oh well.

[He brightens a little, shrugging as he pulls it out from his own rifle and then carefully pulls it apart.]

I picked bolt action because I need a rhythm to the shooting and continuous laser beams kept screwing up with my accuracy and I have a mild psychosis about tempo, but that's just me. In an actual bolt action rifle, you have to push the spent round out of the barrel and set the new round in place. The magazines aren't all that big, but they make up for it by being a lot more powerful compared to how much they weigh and they make for excellent sniping rifles, because they're far more stable than automatic rounds. And again, personal preference, but I'm from the school of shooting that says that good aim and using one bullet is better than spraying entire magazines and hoping to god you've hit something by the time you run out of ammo.

Psychosis? [That's an interesting choice of word. Granted, Equius is nowhere near as versed on Eridan's actual sanity levels than he actually should be.] Um. I guess I can see where you're coming from, Time powers and whatnot... just switch out 'mild psychosis' with 'mild headaches'.

[Okay, that was a bad attempt at humor. Really bad attempt.]

...Well, that's not really personal preference, I don't think. It's just common sense. Wasting bullets is stupid.

[Eridan grinned a little at that joke. Better make it a joke than actually discuss the fact he's batshit crazy.]

Thank you.

[That is very, very heartfelt.]

I'm sorry to report common sense is the least common of all senses.

[And look, he can do fail jokes too!]

[See, Eridan, that's the kind of thinking that leads you into that awkward situation where your current boyfriend isn't aware that you're secretly a murderous psychopath.]

And this is somehow news?

[Slightly less fail of a joke. Slightly.]

[Oops.]

Well, no, but it's still something that makes me facepalm until I break my shades.

[~~FORESHADOWING~~ Wry smile is go.]

Well, what can you do.

[Speaking of shades, he casually reaches up to adjust his own. Never mind that as it turns out, this pair is broken anyway.]

[Though mostly it's to hide his face behind the ever-expanding mane as he grins.]

[Seriously. Jesus Christ, man, you need to cut that sometime. It's creeping up very quickly on your shoulderblades.]

[That's not a mane, man. Gamzee has a mane. Gamzee has a mane that snarls and eats small animals if left unattended. Equius has... an unconventional hairstyle. That's all.]

Deadpan.

[He says, well, deadpan.]

Also maybe getting a camera to record it for posterity. Because that lack of sense usually ends up in disasters, and disasters are hilarious on video.

[...why are you dating this moron again.]

[Uh, no. They're both manes. Equius' just has the decency to be thick enough that it can fall normally.]

Are they? I usually leave around that part.

[Why are you dating this moron is a better question.]

[Another nice one is "how did this conversation even happen".]

[How do all their conversations happen? They're dumb and open their mouths, and then dumber and don't close them.

...do you want Eridan to brush your hair, Equius? He's got experience brushing hair. ~~And at least yours won't come alive and try to bite his hand, one hopes.~~]

That's probably the smart thing to do, to be honest, but when one can't leave, one makes the best of it.

[He shrugs, shoving a rag into the space left by the bolt action.]

Anyway, bolt action really is pretty damn good for accuracy. I mean, I sacrificed a bit of power in these when I changed from continuous laser beam to these, but hey. It's a laser gun. The difference is noticeable in the results as much as you'd notice the difference between cooking something with a flamethrower or cookign something with two flamethrowers. You end up with something that's dead, charred and not giving you shit anymore, so. Eh.

[Ahaha, just try to brush his hair, Eridan. Just try.]

[~~No, really. Try. Please. He doesn't do it for himself.~~]

[Not being able to flee from an undesirable situation? Unthinkable. In Equius' experience, there's almost always some way to flee -- and if there's not, then sitting in a corner and blocking out all physical and mental stimulus while whimpering like a stupid little grub works just as well.]

[He actually snorts in amusement at the flamethrower analogy.] I guess that's true. I'm tempted to say otherwise... because, well, I spent far too much time working on the combat engine of Sgrub...

[...and he may or may not still think of some enemies in terms of hit points.]

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...what the fuck, I swear I tagged this yesterday 0_o

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