Indie, selective, low activity RP blog for OC, Rex Poindexter. (Please read rules and relevant verse info before interacting.)
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RULES || PROMO || VERSES
// Watching the TV win Tumblr Sexyman 2026 by a hair is genuinely so funny and in-character, like he got Mike to cast the vote three different times or something.
I feel obligated to draw him, but it seems too off-topic for this blog so it might be the push to make a separate art blog if I can figure out a url.
// I'll get back to regularly scheduled RP stuff, I'm just being a nerd lately. Too much excitement over computers. But if anyone wants to know about running virtual reality on Linux, I'm here
// Thinking about the verses where Rex/Wren can physically interact. Circus!Rex does the awkward side hug because he’s conditioned to feel like he’s unworthy of affection. Meanwhile, Delta!Wren is a bonecrushing bearhugger because he knows his strength and still wants to be a menace. He might not have upper arms, but he can manage.
Already, Wren is starting to feel like a tourist, the way he’s gawking around the cabin. He makes brief eye contact with pilot, resolving it with an awkward smile and nod. He makes sure to close the extra pair of eyes for politeness’ sake, before he moves where Mr. Ant seems to want to corral him. When the aircraft starts to rise, Wren stiffens instinctively. He reaches for a hold that isn’t there, being a helicopter different from his own, but manages to stumble into a luxury window seat. Talk about an impression. At least there’s a break coming up.
In fact, where’s the camera? (Ah. He doesn’t envy the little darkner scurrying on like an action movie star, stooped over to catch their breath.)
In spite of himself, Wren is smiling. He’s like an oversized kid at the theme park aerospace exhibit, as he settles into a chair three times too big. He listens, following the TV's gesture towards the view. He makes a low whistle, pressing closer to the glass. There’s an entire city twinkling on the horizon, sprawling out over the purple hills. It’s been here this entire time, just out of his reach.
“Now, TV… that’s a lot for a radio guy,” he jokes. You know what they say about the relationship between video and the radio star. Hopefully, things won’t come to that.
The music swells. One he figures out the genre of the tacky soundtrack, Wren quickly disguises a laugh as a cough, adding, “Looks like I’m not in Broadband anymore!”
Even as he settles, the exhaustion creeping in, his eyes are still full of wonder. He's a little misty, the more he’s thinking about Broadband. It's like his city out there... but it's not. The more he looks, the more dissonance he's starting to feel. The more it starts to hit him: the whole thing is real. There'd better be someone to take care of Jiffy. And Maud had better find a way to cope without him, until they've found a replacement. He's not sure which feels worse.
Wren doesn't know whether they're still rolling, so he's going to play it casual. He shakes loose before the waterworks can get him, and looks up at the host’s eyeless face. He hesitates with a quirk of the brow. Are those antennas his actual eyes? And would it be impolite not to crane for them?
“Say, do you prefer Mr. Ant Tenna?” An extra glove slides out of his cuff, and gestures off to the side. “Or something else?”
// Rex: *relaxing, low-power mode in the sky network*
Random electronic junk:
System.NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object.
at ÎÎÏÌÎÍÌÌÍÌÌÏÎÏÎÏÏÍÎÍÌÎÍ.OnEnable () [0x00000] in <00000000000000000000000000000000>:0
at ÏÍÎÍÏÎÌÍÏÏÍÍÎÏÎÎÍÌÍÌÌÎÍ.ÍÌÍÍÍÍÍÏÎÌÌÎÌÌÎÎÍÌÎÎÎÍÏ (System.Boolean ÌÍÏÌÎÍÍÌÏÏÌÌÍÎÍÏÌÍÌÎÌÌÍ) [0x00000] in <00000000000000000000000000000000>:0
Rex: "Gotta love these cheap motels..." *shoving a metaphorical pillow firmly over his metaphorical ears*
Rex has gotten used to the chitchat of broken devices. Since bringing new life into the greater sky network, fragments of old programs and memory codes have been mostly bugging him. It’s like what humans would describe as tinnitus. Easy to ignore... until a change in frequency.
What begins as a whisper grows into a roar.
There’s a new signal, a new stutter of long-broken code, that's been nagging at him. It’s like an itch he can’t scratch, disturbing his dormant state. He was curled up cozy in this smaller network he's made, but it’s been getting worse all day. Rex he sighs out his existing processes, rolls over, and tries to swat it away from his memory cache. He doesn’t need to think about it. It’s just another satellite in range, he’s certain, and it’ll blow over in a couple hours.
A couple hours later, it’s ringing like an alarm he can’t find. Rex’s processes are in full swing. There’s no real information he can extract from this field of junk, even as he cycles feverishly between units like a snake chasing its tail.
With a sharp thunk, an orange streak flashes by one of his units. It clears a softball-sized hole through the casing. Flooded with warnings, Rex rushes to another grid. “Shit,” he thinks, as soon as he catches a moment. He’s the prime target for an atmospheric event.
He’d hate to be up there right now, but he’s gotta get a better view. He concentrates, generating a small instance to scope out the mesosphere. There’s a low satellite he knows and sorta-working tower. It gets the job done, enough for the panels to shudder at an angle and eke out a snapshot of the Earth.
The ‘image’ loads in with garbled characters. His machine vision can tell the shape and size of something that’s moving. He doesn't know what it is, but it looks like the whole thing is getting closer and closer. Maybe it's a car, because cars are the things he can most confidently recognize... or maybe it's not. That doesn't matter. In about 32.7 seconds, roughly 3 miles of sky network and anything else in this path is toast.
The working sky network expands threefold, as Rex panics. He needs all the resources he can to think. What can he do? And what about the Office?
A second instance of him spawns, traveling the network in a matter of milliseconds. He screeches to a halt near the Office, scans for devices, and jumps to the nearest he can find. There’s no time to load a friendly avatar, as Rex takes advantage of that free Wi-Fi and spams Thursday’s phone with a series of texts. By the time she can see the brightness in the sky, her phone is buzzing with warnings.
1-800-100-1000: Danger
1-800-100-1000: From space
1-800-100-1000: Take cover
1-800-100-1000: 30 seconds
Rex's connection to space cuts that instant. One of the movable arms of the satellite is knocked clean off by a hair-collision. Both objects hurtle down to Earth, where they diverge away from the dangerous zones and explode on the horizon.
// Mainverse Rex is just a network so he doesn’t have much of a home, but would anyone be interested in some settings notes for his AUs? Like Circus!Rex and Delta!Wren for sure have more of a daily routine and space to be in. They could spark plot ideas or otherwise be a nice reference point for their characters and interests, I dunno.
// Well, between messing with VR and learning to 3D model while simultaneously participating in Artfight, I’m a little distracted. But I’m open for new threads.
// Having set up VR for the first time in the last few days, I think encountering Rex would be a uniquely unsettling mascot experience. There's no real sense of separation with VR because everything in the world feels correctly to scale and perspective. Most users also like to keep their avatars shorter so they're less likely to be jumpscared by clipping into door frames or loom over people.
When you think about it, Rex is actually scaled to 7 feet/ 2.1 m tall and his proportions are way cartoony. You can't see it when he's on a flat screen, but he has quite the digital presence. He's a little uncanny. If I turned the corner and ran face-first into him, I think I'd be scared.
"First of all..." Wren hesitates too long, as the host cuts into his explanation. He moves along with a polite nod, mirroring his smile. He holds that thought. He's not sure he's in the headspace for a head-scratching debrief over his Ham knowledge anyhow.
He's also distracted by the invisible crowd. The sound causes him to glance around the barren environment. His lips press together in a micoexpression of confusion, a failed calculation on how a crowd could manifest on an empty boardwalk... but he quickly resumes his professional smile. He's not going to ask how that works.
"Of course! Thank you, Mr. Ant Tenna," he chimes in, "I'm looking forward to it. Don't know what I'd do without ya." Pleasantries, like second nature.
There's a lot for Wren process. Thankfully, the hand on his shoulder and the step-around is enough of a cue for him. That's his exit. The most he has to do now is grin for the camera, rendered almost plasticine as he proceeds into the light. The high-beams of the nose-mobile and the host himself shine down on every speck of dust and dirt, every deepened crevice on his face.
Wren finds his footing and pulls himself up to the side ladder of the helicopter with a grunt. With his back turned, his expression relaxes. Hopefully, he's entering a space to relax. They've gotten their news story, right? The whole ordeal does make a pretty good story.
He looks over his shoulder, and with a mustered half-smile, waves past Mr. Tenna. It's a farewell to the camera, or crowd, or whoever they are. He heads in at last, with a quiet exhale. The entrance is so tall, he doesn't need to duck inside.
gummygunk
vaporwave
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2087
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