for soresumaster

[morally_cryptic]

[ooc: continuing from this thread]

Anakin frowns and crouches down by the device, running the fingertips of his recently re-attached prosthetic over it (he didn't bother putting the glove back on).

"I didn't mean actual cracking, Obi-Wan. But...the construction is strange. A lightsaber's overkill but some kind of blowtorch might work."

Comments

A++

[soresumaster]

"'Not a bomb' is a good start," Obi-Wan says. He passes a drink over to Anakin as well.

"Any clues as to who made it?"

[morally_cryptic]

"Like you said, it seems to be pretty old. It could've been drifting for a while..."

Anakin gratefully takes the drink and has a few swallows before continuing, "no markings on the exterior I can find, probably for the same reason you couldn't cut it open. Also if it is some kind of recon probe, whoever was using it probably didn't want to show off their identity to the world. The inside, though," he points at that little panel he'd finally managed to wedge open before remembering Obi-Wan was there. "Should be interesting."

[soresumaster]

"Oh, well done Anakin," Obi-Wan says. "Do you mind if I have a look while you finish up?"

[morally_cryptic]

If there's a sudden echo in the Force like Anakin's mentally preening himself well...Obi-Wan shouldn't have praised him. Obivously.

"Suit yourself."

[soresumaster]

Obviously. And yet, he cares deeply for Anakin, and is, in fact, proud of him, of his skills and talents, even if it is... unbecoming to express as much. He shakes the thought away, and slides down into the bay, carefully approaching the probe.

"Thank you, I will," he says.

[morally_cryptic]

"So polite," Anakin teases while he finishes his meal. "Just don't break anything while you're down there."

[soresumaster]

"I will do my best, but I make no promises," Obi-Wan replies. "And Anakin, you know it hurts nothing to be polite."

...that his habit of minding his manners has irritated no few foes over the years doesn't hurt either, mind.

[morally_cryptic]

"So you keep telling me."

It's not that Anakin's manners are terrible, it's just that he sees fewer situations where particular attention to them is warranted.

[soresumaster]

"One of these days, one of the things I 'keep telling' you will stick."

Obi-Wan crouches beside the open panel, and peers in, careful not to actually touch anything. The light angled on the opening reveals neatly pinned wires, in an oddly silvery colour that well-matched the rest of the interior that he could see, and behind the wires... He frowns. Another shell?

[morally_cryptic]

"Oh, the important stuff has," he responds cheerfully before finishing his drink.

Which is just in time for him to catch Obi-Wan's frown. "What is it?"

[soresumaster]

"It looks like there's another shell inside, under the wiring," Obi-Wan explains. "Different material; it's hard to make out, though."

[morally_cryptic]

"Huh." Anakin grabs a light and hops back down into the bay so they can hopefully get a better look. "Must be why Artoo couldn't get a good scan."

[soresumaster]

"I think you may be right," Obi-Wan says. He shifts smoothly to one side as Anakin comes over, leaving precisely the right amount of space for him so that they can both see inside.

[morally_cryptic]

He shines the light into the hatch, "well, if it's some kind of shielding that might rule out recon probe. I mean, it has to have sensors somewhere, right?"

[soresumaster]

"Unless they can read through the shielding, and we cannot, yes."

The inner shell gleams softly, reflecting less of the light than it should, a dark grey like storm clouds about to burst.

[morally_cryptic]

Anakin wrinkles his nose. "I'd be both annoyed by that and intrigued."

[soresumaster]

"So would we all, I think." He tilts his head one way, and then the other, as he prods carefully at it with the Force.

"I don't get a bad feeling about it," he says finally. "But there is a sense of... Hmm. Waiting?"

[morally_cryptic]

"For what? Us to find the right key?"

Might not actually be the worst idea. Depending on what constitutes key here.

[soresumaster]

That sounds oddly right to him, and so he nods.

"I think so, yes."

[morally_cryptic]

"Well," he brushes his fingertips over the thing's hull again. "No keyholes. If it's a passphrase we might be here a while trying to guess it." And that was only if it was created by a species whose sounds humans could replicate. Which wasn't a given when they didn't know where it came from.

"Waiting how?"

[soresumaster]

"Patiently," comes immediately to mind.

[morally_cryptic]

Anakin just barely resists the urge to facepalm (in true mimic-Kenobi fashion) if only because he's still holding the light.

"Patiently. Okay. Very helpful. Hold this."

Which would be him passing the light into Obi-Wan's hands.

[soresumaster]

Obi-Wan takes it, and automatically re-angles it for Anakin's benefit. The inner shell shimmers a moment as the light shifts over it.

"Patient, anticipatory, but as if it's in some kind of-- of deep sleep, or standby mode, or whatever the computer equivalent would be."

[morally_cryptic]

"Hibernation?"

Maybe he should be using tools again but Anakin tends toward being tactile so he reaches in past the wires to touch the fingers of his left hand to the shell while at the same time touching it through the Force as if that might give him a better handle on it.

Then again, it's not like it's the first time he's done just that with a machine.

[soresumaster]

"Hibernation...?" he muses, and finally nods once, sharply. "Yes, that's it. Hibernating, and waiting for... Something, anyway."

When Anakin reaches in, Obi-Wan braces himself, just in case, ready to pull them both back if he needs to, but nothing happens. The shell is almost-- inert, like some sort of heavy shielding material, though it is not opaque to Anakin's Force-probe: The shielding is nearly half a meter thick, and dense with circuitry, and inside are a number of things that, while not, as such, alive, whisper through the Force of the potential for life.