Kimiko is the tick, the duct rat, the vermin living in the sewers, sucking little sips of lifeblood from the station's guts. She's too clever and too quick and to paranoid to become what Jade is.
But she does understand what Jade is, more than Hypatia does, maybe more than anyone does, except...maybe Sollux.
She's spent years waiting for a moment like this. Hypatia is not Kim's enemy, not as she sees it. Or rather, Hypatia doesn't usually make herself into Kim's enemy, for all that she's tried countless times to kill her. Kimiko doesn't blame her; she's the sacrosanct tapeworm. Nobody likes gastrointestinal parasites. But this operation is a little too bold for a tapeworm approach. Kim's never done this before, openly defied Hypatia beyond what is necessary for her continued survival. But then Jade moves into range and there's no more time for nervous waiting. After all, this is science, and science has no margin for cowards.
When activated, the hyper-wire Ellicot-Chatham-Faraday cage eliminates every external signal from accessing whatever's inside; Kim activates it and the field springs up invisibly over an area the size of a football field. It's enough of an alert that she won't be able to stay long, but the secondary effect is that without the mitigating force of Hypatia's direct intervention, Kim can temporarily exert her own control over the drones and machines and doors within the cage.
Control over Jade.
A quarter-hour won't buy enough time to escape, won't buy enough time to do more than mine Jade's prosthesis and cyberbrain for all the terrabytes she can download, but while she's working she'll be able to keep Jade from being forced to kill her, can give her a moment's rest, and can make her forget all about the subtle little mechanical tracker Kim will integrate into her systems.
The trap goes off. The doors all open in unison with the drones all dropping to the ground. And Kim darts out of a sewer-grate and into the open, blindly sprinting towards her friend Jade who is the weapon, the guard dog, and hostage.
no subject
But she does understand what Jade is, more than Hypatia does, maybe more than anyone does, except...maybe Sollux.
She's spent years waiting for a moment like this. Hypatia is not Kim's enemy, not as she sees it. Or rather, Hypatia doesn't usually make herself into Kim's enemy, for all that she's tried countless times to kill her. Kimiko doesn't blame her; she's the sacrosanct tapeworm. Nobody likes gastrointestinal parasites. But this operation is a little too bold for a tapeworm approach. Kim's never done this before, openly defied Hypatia beyond what is necessary for her continued survival. But then Jade moves into range and there's no more time for nervous waiting. After all, this is science, and science has no margin for cowards.
When activated, the hyper-wire Ellicot-Chatham-Faraday cage eliminates every external signal from accessing whatever's inside; Kim activates it and the field springs up invisibly over an area the size of a football field. It's enough of an alert that she won't be able to stay long, but the secondary effect is that without the mitigating force of Hypatia's direct intervention, Kim can temporarily exert her own control over the drones and machines and doors within the cage.
Control over Jade.
A quarter-hour won't buy enough time to escape, won't buy enough time to do more than mine Jade's prosthesis and cyberbrain for all the terrabytes she can download, but while she's working she'll be able to keep Jade from being forced to kill her, can give her a moment's rest, and can make her forget all about the subtle little mechanical tracker Kim will integrate into her systems.
The trap goes off. The doors all open in unison with the drones all dropping to the ground. And Kim darts out of a sewer-grate and into the open, blindly sprinting towards her friend Jade who is the weapon, the guard dog, and hostage.