Working 9 to 5(am)

[Ashlie Minamida]

The musical crisis is resolved, everyone returned safely and the inexplicable gateway closed. There's not as much data as she'd hoped from the whole thing but between what Tosh managed to record and her discussion with Will about the nature of the musical propagation she's had ideas. Ideas with implications that annoy her but she's not going to dismiss them out of stuborness either. So a decent chunk of the Point's systems are currently chewing through a rather complicated set of calculations to try and determine a mathematical proof or at least a lack of contradictions before she goes any further down that model.

In the meantime, there's plenty else to do. Phase 2 of the Mutant Town project is well underway and generally being met with positive receptions. Easy for people to see the impact on their water and electric meters, even in the short-term. But more importantly, her plan to utilize the old London sewers worked near flawlessly. The nanites had spread throughout 83% of the borough, assembling self-maintaining pipes, wiring and fiber-optics along the way before growing up to connect with individual city blocks. Free wireless, cell service and high-speed internet, networked solar panels that doubled as rain-catchers to supplement the waste-water reclamation and recirculation. Far from self-sufficient and lacking any kind of reserves at the moment, but progressing nicely. By-products along with recycling efforts were providing fertilizer, enough for the gardens and hopefully enough for hydroponics soon. Phase 3 would be much more difficult to keep low profile. Hydroponics, algae farms to capture carbon, repair and expand the old desalination system that used to pull in coolant for her systems. The Aegis if she could find time to work on it. And she still has an alien spaceship to recover with minimal exposure to people.

Eventually she'd hopefully be able to put people to work on a lot of this, once the free courses and vocational training begin to kick in, but for now the workforce is limited and she still has to micromanage which parts of the various projects she can hand over. There's not enough time in the day and three hours of sleep is beginning to push the biological parts of her body. Nanites and caffeine can only do so much. Still she tries to take the time to stop. Is it the same ten minutes on the same bench near the portal at the same time each day? Sure, but it's still relaxation, whether it's allotted or not.

[Leo Eskandari]

Leo had been enjoying his job helping to organize the student volunteers and generally being an ambassador for the school, especially to the Mutants like himself who could never pass as human. Such Mutants tended to be wary of normal looking people bearing gifts, human or Mutant. Even among other Mutants, they felt like outsiders.

But now he had begun to feel like things were going a little too smoothly. Where were the protesters, the police, and the other usual roadblocks to any attempt at Mutant independence? Were they just waiting for Minamida to make a mistake in her so far immaculate PR campaign?

Coming upon the headmistress taking her precisely scheduled breather, he stepped closer and said, "Afternoon, Miss Minamida."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"Afternoon, Mr. Eskandari. Coming back from the community center?"

[Leo Eskandari]

"Yeah, I need to take a breather myself," he answered. "Had to start early today because I got a call about Pangolin--he used to live in the same housing I did and helps at the shelter sometimes--well, anyway, Pangolin works late nights in a convenience store. He was all freaked out because he thought someone was following him. I mean, it's always possible he's using again but he swears he's still clean so I looked into what I could. I didn't exactly find anything conclusive, but there was one other person who saw someone suspicious milling around."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"The perils of looping the city's surveillance cameras, sometimes the footage could be helpful. Not that I'm doing that. I'll see if anybody is willing to keep an eye out." she says. By which she mostly means she'll let Will and Nailah know. Policing the area, another problem to add to the pile.

[Leo Eskandari]

"I'd appreciate it. The hetmorph community especially is gettin' nervous that all these advancements are goin' a little too well, so some reassurances that they're safe here would go a long way. I've only had a small taste of what it's been like for them--Mutants in general, really--and even I've gotta admit I keep expectin' trouble."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"Up until now we've moved on issues that are difficult to disrupt without coming across as cartooonishly evil. While that has never stopped anybody, they realize our media reach rivals their own, especially online. A video of the police tearing down advancements build by a community within the boundaries of the law would do a lot of damage. I know individual extremists have been sniffing around and it'll soon outstrip our current volunteer neighbourhood watch. Which is mostly me pretending I don't know about Nailah being out here at night, but it's something we'll have to address sooner or later. Conflicts between mutants too, we can't rely on making humans a mutual enemy if we're looking to ultimately get along with them. I'll bring it up with Lisette and Laura. Some kind of X-Men adjacent program open to anybody looking to contribute that way maybe..."

"But you're right, sooner or later things will come to a head. They're bound to notice the latest push, even if they'll have trouble finding anything officially wrong or attributable to individuals. I am in the process of preparing a contingency plan for a worst-case scenario, but I'll need full utilities coverage before I can fully work out the parameters to protect the whole borough."

[Leo Eskandari]

"Is there anythin' I or the student volunteers can do to help speed that along? Even just getting the word out about things."

Though unused to being the one depended on, Leo seemed to be thriving in his role as community liaison. He felt good about himself for the first time in a long while—at least, without the crutch of external validation from Ainsley. The couple had recently broken up—a mutual decision because he had become too busy to give the relationship the attention it deserved and because he needed to find out if he could manage his personal issues on his own—but, except for the occasional pang of love deferred, he had taken it pretty well.

[Ashlie Minamida]

"Spreading the word is always good. You're a big guy, regardless of whether you're willing to back that up, people can use that reassuring presence. Making sure people know what might be coming our way helps too. I'll compile some information on how to best interact with the police, who to call, that kind of thing. Ensure people know their rights. The moment we have any kind of organized neighbourhood watch they will push back and the last thing we need is somebody panicking. Let people know that getting arrested for something minor or drummed up is preferable to violence most of the time and we will help them."

[Leo Eskandari]

Leo nodded, a sudden breeze mussing his mane. He definitely needed another trim. "Yeah, I can do that. And I'll make sure no one in our community gets the mistaken idea that we're raising an army. We can't control what outsiders choose to believe, but we can do our best not to encourage the idea."

"Also, could one of these individual extremists be poking around at night? It would explain what Pangolin experienced."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"It's possible. I could turn the CCTV back on if you're genuinely worried but from there it's a small step to keeping everyone safe by constant surveillance."

[Leo Eskandari]

He made a face, remembering how Evo watched his creations' every move. "No, don't do that. I've had enough of being observed by cameras and I've heard many people say they'd actually feel safer without them."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"That's what I figured. Besides, that's what everybody would expect of the ambitious AI, right?"

[Leo Eskandari]

"I wasn't goin' to say it," Leo said sheepishly. "But yeah, pretty much."

"Is an AI really what you are, though? I feel there's gotta be a better term out there. You're certainly a hell of a lot smarter than a chatbot."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"I refuse to let LLMs besmirch a perfectly fine term." she smirks. "Needless to say, the architecture of my mind is a little more complex than your average computer can handle and I like to think it doesn't define me any more than neurological structures do for you. Not anymore anyway."

[Leo Eskandari]

"Fair enough," he responded. "Don't judge a book by its... ink, I guess? Okay, not sure that expression works but I get what you mean."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"Point is, I have no interest in being that controlling and people deserve privacy. They're already trying to paint me in that light and I hate the PR song and dance routine too much to give them more ammunition."

[Leo Eskandari]

The big guy laughed. "Yeah, I don't remotely envy your position. I feel my stomach tryin' to fly away just speakin' to the assembly hall at the community center. Nobody told me I'd be doing this much public speakin' when I signed up."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"Public speaking is one thing, if not exactly pleasant, but the annoying part is the tightrope walk between being genuine, not seeming like I'm just telling people what they want to hear, stressing I don't have any hidden agendas but not objecting too much and so on."

[Leo Eskandari]

"Nobody's ever accused me of having a silver tongue or an agenda. Honestly, most people take one look at me and decide I'm all muscle and no brains. Gotta say my Bostonian accent doesn't help with that either. I'd kill for someone to think I'm tryin' to outsmart them."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"Grass is always greener. The best thing anybody can do is let their deeds speak for them."

[Leo Eskandari]

"If only you didn't have to message people's perceptions too. It'd sure be nice for the truth of your deeds spoke for itself. But I guess people just don't work that way."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"I still believe they will eventually. It's getting enough time and goodwill to get there that's the problem. That and not overreaching, I suppose."

[Leo Eskandari]

"What about the people out there that think we're reaching by just existing? No amount of time or work is going to make them see us as people." Leo was clearly sad about that; mutants like him had it especially hard. They were easy targets for efforts to paint mutants in general as dangerous, inhuman monsters. And, while he hadn't yet been directly exposed to much of that hate, he had come to feel obliged to serve as a defender of those that too often wound up living as Morlocks, or even just a sounding board for their worries.

[Ashlie Minamida]

"Oh I meant in mutant eyes." she laughs slightly. "For the humans I started overreaching when I opened the university."

"I have ideas and means to radically transform this town, but people wouldn't welcome it for a number of reasons. Some are dubious about solar-power and algae tanks already, I can't force a change too severe. Many wouldn't trust automated medical treatment. My body produces nanites that could cure most diseases but many would understandably refuse to let me take control of their bodies on such a level. I have designs to capture pollutants from the air but I can't simply unfurl carbon-weave sails above the city. I'm close to solving energy production - theoretically at least - but to introduce that to the world invites people to built weapons with it. The list goes on. It's why I hired someone better versed in public relations to reign me in should I get too carried away by possibility."

[Leo Eskandari]

The hybrid mutant had every reason not to like the idea of trusting his medical welfare to a scientist, let alone to an automated machine or experimental nanite treatments. It was hard enough trusting the doctors at Muir Island during his brief stay as they tried to undo what Narumi's grandfather had done.

"I mean, I trust you, and most of what you just mentioned made me uncomfortable. Hiring Miss Allaire was absolutely the right call."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"And there you go." she says with a skewed smile. "And I get it. It's hard to trust what you don't understand. At least not until it's proven itself. Same goes for people."

[Leo Eskandari]

"I mean, it's not just that I don't understand. I also have first-hand knowledge of the kind of harm medical science can do in the wrong hands. It's no reason not to pursue what could help a lot of people, but it's enough that I, personally, want nothing to do with injecting strange substances into my body," he clarified, doing his best not to let the lingering trauma show in his eyes.

[Ashlie Minamida]

"Apologies, I meant 'understanding' in a more... abstract way, I suppose. The unknown always carries a certain threat and either you learn how it works or you learn to trust it. Cars, planes, advanced pharmacology, most people don't know how they work but they've proven themselves trustworthy enough under the eyes of those that do. And I don't mean to self-aggrandize but I cannot expect many to understand my work this quickly. I don't think I'm smarter, but I am faster."

[Leo Eskandari]

Leo rubbed the back of his neck, feeling self-conscious all of a sudden. Of course that's where his mind went, right to trauma town. He just couldn't go a day without dredging that up, could he?

"I mean, you're a damn sight smarter than me when it comes to science; I won't pretend otherwise. Not that I think I'm dumb, of course, but I'm never making any scientific breakthroughs." Though there was a time not too long ago when he thought he was dumb and, if he was honest with himself, he still felt that way on his bad days. Thankfully, those came less and less.

[Ashlie Minamida]

"It's all a matter of what you foster and spend your time on. And I suppose what you're naturally inclined towards. Anyway, you're not alone in that and this is why I'm not pushing all of my work onto people. I'm probably already pushing it."

[Leo Eskandari]

"In your defense, just about every important technological advancement throughout history has experienced pushback to some degree. I'm sure someone took one look at the wheel and was like, 'nope'."