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[faceguy]

Hello? Hello? ...Ah-ha, just kidding! Leave a message after the beepity beep~

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Action | Early March, after Danny's post

[effiomsfavorite]

[Huvrye doesn't know nearly enough about this world's technology - namely, the internet. Sure, he'd gotten a brief explanation, and he'd picked up a bit from usage, but the fact that seeing privacy settings in action had taken him by surprise told him he definitely had more to learn. He can't have deep or dangerous conversations out in the open - not where everyone can see and react accordingly. He needs to know more about how all of this works.]

[He picks an evening when Leo doesn't seem to have much homework to ask. He is not expecting the conversation to span more than an hour and to cover factors he'd never thought of, let alone ask about (and he's fairly certain that "what Leo thinks is important" and "actual security risks" is a venn diagram overlap that is not a circle). Probably a good thing that he's not keeping Leo from his homework with this. He's still trying to wrap his mind around a few things.]

So you can just comment anonymously on some places, and people can't figure out it's you? You're sure it's secure?

[faceguy]

[Getting tech support from Leo is definitely a questionable decision, but Leo does at least know the ins and outs of the internet better than Huvrye, so he can teach what he knows. And then some. He likes feeling helpful!]

Yeah! Well, I mean, if you’re too obvious people may be able to realize it’s you, and it’s possible some sites will track your IP, but for OurPowers you shouldn’t have anything tying directly to you. And the IP address isn’t that helpful on its own, and you can easily get around it anyway.

[Maybe a true master hacker could figure something out, and Leo can imagine there are more people in the universe than just his brother that would dox someone over a petty argument, but he doubts most people would bother.]

So if you’re going to be talking any more trash about Fantastic, do it anon.

[Like Leo has been doing, but he doesn’t say that.]

[effiomsfavorite]

[It's either Leo or Mark, and Huvrye has leaned too heavily on Mark as of late to want to put yet another thing on his plate, so Leo it is.]

[After about the first fifteen minutes with no end in sight, he'd started writing down terms to look up later, if only too keep this from getting too off topic. "IP address" gets added to the bottom of the list.]

So it's good for venting, but not for planning, and it's only secure to a point.

[The point at which he lets something identifying slip, but he can watch out for that. He pulls up a specific conversation on Danny's OurPowers post and shows it to Leo - namely for the privacy settings.]

And how secure are these? If someone thought there was a conversation there that they couldn't see, would they be able to find it?

[faceguy]

Not unless they’re an actual hacker. And even then it depends on how good they are, and how good the website’s defenses are.

[Like he’s pretty sure Donnie could make it nigh impenetrable if he were here, but he’s not.

Leo does note the conversation with interest - so Danny and Huvrye are planning something against Fantastic, too. He doesn’t mention his own conversation with Accelerator yet; he’s not sure Huvrye would approve of their activities.]

But still… I think if you really want to plan an offense against one of the Alliance’s top dogs, it would be better to move off an app sponsored by the guilds. Ever heard of Discord, Huv?

[effiomsfavorite]

[So the answer is not secure enough, depending on the person.]

And we have no guarantee the guilds don't have a hacker on their payroll.

[He never knew the specifics of how Interground got found out in Lasardhi - only that it was his fault, his mistake that got them killed. If he's going to be on the side of a resistance here, he needs to make for absolute certain that it doesn't happen again, which means patching up holes in his knowledge and maybe being a little extra paranoid. OurPowers can't necessarily be trusted. It's entirely possible nothing online can be trusted, depending on how prolific these hackers might be.]

[That train of thought gets paused at Leo's question, and Huvrye blinks. He knows the definition of discord, but he's pretty sure that's not what Leo means here.]

Probably not the one you're talking about.

[faceguy]

It’s an app; you can send messages and make groups - servers. People mostly use it for gaming groups but I don’t see why you can’t use it to organize some revolutionary activity.

[He can teach him better how to use it later.]

There’s other messaging apps too. We can find you one you’ll like.

[He lounges back on the couch, looking at Huvrye curiously.] I guess I’m not surprised you don’t have these specific apps, but did your world not have the internet at all?

[He knows it’s relatively new even on Earth, but he’s never lived without it.]

[effiomsfavorite]

Right. Okay.

[More things he needs to learn. It feels like every time he knocks one off the list, three more take its place, but at least he is learning. Maybe everyone else has heard of Discord, and it'll be more secure to talk there. As long as he's the only one behind, that's fine - he'll just work harder to catch up and be more careful in the interim.]

[He just blinks at Leo's question. On the one hand, he'd thought it'd have been obvious; on the other hand, Leo hadn't been here when Huvrye had first arrived, and he'd gotten his crash course on modern-for-this-world communication elsewhere.]

Nope. No internet, no computers, no phones like this. [He gestures at his phone.] We mostly used alchemy, and radio if we needed a hard line for any reason.

[He holds up a hand, palm out, and an alchemical array glows red above his palm, concentric circles and lettering forming neatly in the air. It's a partial array - there's no connection point, no intended recipient - but that doesn't matter when it's meant to be an example. He's not about to make a functional array with no end point, because that's a security nightmare waiting to happen and he's not going to take the risk of someone (either someone from his world who'd arrived unbeknownst to him or a person with compatible powers) connecting when he's not aware of it.]

[faceguy]

[Ooooh, fancy magic! Or alchemy, whatever. Leo leans in to get a close look before Huvrye gets rid of it.]

Okay, that’s cool, and something we didn’t have [Well maybe Yokai do, but Leo doesn’t know.], but radios are pretty old-school for my world.

[Leo isn’t even sure he’s ever seen one. Maybe a walkie talkie at best.]

Sounds kinda lame. No offense. [He adds that quickly.] I’m just glad I was born when the internet was already invented back home.

[effiomsfavorite]

[He lets Leo inspect the array, wondering not for the first time if anyone here would be capable of learning alchemy the way he knows it. He doubts it - alchemy draws on aura, and he's not much of a teacher as it is - but it's still an idea.]

[And then Leo offers his opinion. Huvrye gives him a flat look and pulls on the edge of the circle, dispersing the array.]

Alchemy is less of a security nightmare.

[The internet may be capable of more overall, but alchemy is a lot less vulnerable when it comes to private conversations. (Which isn't exactly useful when nobody else can use it, but the point still stands as far as he's concerned.)]

[faceguy]

There’s more to life than military efficiency, Huv.

[He rolls his eyes, just to complete the gesture, even though it doesn’t have any heat.]

What do people in your world do for fun? Read books? Cool alchemy sports? Mid-air jousting?

[Huvrye doesn’t talk that much about his home world, other than occasional references, especially to this Yin kid he’s heard about. So Leo is genuinely curious.

(And also starting to reach his limit of focus on the whole internet explainer thing. This is his bid for a break.)]

[effiomsfavorite]

[Huvrye raises an eyebrow but says nothing. Leo's been through a lot, but he's still a civ and a kid; he's allowed to think like that.]

[(Leo still thinks he's talking to a person, after all, and not a weapon designed and built with military efficiency in mind, and Huvrye isn't planning on disillusioning him anytime soon. Or ever.)]

[Leo changes the subject, and Huvrye follows it. He's got enough to go on for now; he can do his own research when Leo's asleep tonight, or follow up with someone else if need be.]

Cool flying sports.

[The correction comes with the edges of a grin that settle into a smile.]

We have movies, though they look a lot different from the ones here and they're only in theaters - I think it's mostly just rich civs who have TVs. There's always books and the radio, though.

[He doesn't talk much about his world because it's a nightmare, and the more he talks about it, the clearer it'll be that he was never a civ and didn't have the sorts of experiences a normal person would have. Leo's not an idiot; Huvrye's pretty sure Leo can put the pieces together if he has enough of them, so he hasn't been providing many of them.]

[faceguy]

Flying sports? Okay, you gotta tell me about that.

[Thankfully for Huvrye's cover, nothing he says that time tips Leo off to anything amiss. He's fully distracted by wondering what flying sports look like; is it like basketball in the air, or something else entirely?

Books and the radio are things he can imagine without Huvrye's help so he doesn't ask about them yet.]

Text; dn: Accelerator

[levelshift]

Hamato, I found more suspicious news stories about Fantastic.

[He's sending some links along and that's it, that's the whole message. Extremely sociable, this guy.]

brb punting

[effiomsfavorite]

Okay, there's a few.

[What follows is an explanation of several flight-based sports, provided by someone who gets the idea of all of them but isn't really into the details. It's clear he knows them, in the way a human from Earth might know baseball or basketball or soccer, but he doesn't really play.]

I'd offer to show you, but I don't think we could find the right space around here, and also you don't fly.

[faceguy]

[Yeah, links, uh-huh, cool cool cool, but can we back up a second????

Leo sees "Hamato" and feels a chill come over him, because he knows he never mentioned it.]

cool thx
whats that tho haha
some kind of nickname?

fitting sports terminology

[faceguy]

[Leo listens with interest - even if Huvrye doesn't have much first hand experience, it's still fun for him to hear about them. Leo likes sports, after all.

He smirks at the end.]

Hey you don't know, maybe I've been holding out on you.

[He hasn't, but he says it anyway.]

Was that Yin guy you've mentioned into sports?

[It's a little bit of a non sequitur, but Leo is interested, since he's pretty sure they're around the same age. And Huvrye doesn't talk about home a lot, and he's nosy.]

[levelshift]

[That... is a very strange reaction to something that should be totally normal.]

What are you talking about? I call most people by their last names.

[faceguy]

[Ah, so he does know exactly what it is. Great.]

im talking about how im very sure I never told u my last name

[levelshift]

Oh.

I ran into your brother when I was in Washington. He told me a bunch of shit, including that.

[faceguy]

[...

...

...]

which brother

[There's so much to process here but he's starting with this because he needs to know if Accelerator means Donnie or if another one of his brothers has popped up in freaking Washington without him realizing it.]

[levelshift]

Donatello.

[Just going to full name him.]

You're right, he's smart.

[faceguy]

[Okay, so not a different brother. At least there's that.

BUT!]

so u met donnie in washington and u knew he was my brother and u didnt think 'hey maybe I should text leo about it'???

and do you care to elaborate on the "shit" he told u?

[He's not even going to comment on the "he's smart" part because it's self evident but also he's feeling like Donnie is actually pretty dumb right now!]

[levelshift]

I figured you two would run into each other eventually. I'm not going to hold your fucking hands.

[He sends that, but at the same time....]

Did you find him?

[Lmao. Yeah.]

Shredder. Some family crap. I can go into more detail if you don't care about texts. [Or rather, having all this sent over OurPowers.]

[faceguy]

[Squint! You know what though, he doesn't have it in him to dwell over Accelerator's weird mood swings about this.]

yeah I found him, thx but no thx

[After he'd been scrounging around for a few days and was exhausted and hungry, but Leo isn't going to say that.

Especially because Accelerator just reminded him of something important. Ugh, they need to move to a different app for text communications than OurPowers.]

its cool, I think I can put it together from that
geez
I know he loves the sound of his own voice but he didnt have to give some stranger our life story

[No offense except at least a little offense!]

[levelshift]

[Great. Look at them, two capable turtles.

Hmm. Well.]

I was asking him a lot of questions. I could've stopped at any time, but I didn't.

[He'll just throw that out there. Leo does have a point, though.]

And to be completely fair, I told him some shit about myself, too. If you really want things balanced I can repeat it all for you. I don't care.

[It wouldn't be completely balanced because Donnie told him way more personal stuff than vice versa, but this is one of those situations Yomikawa talked about where he can be slightly less of a jerk than normal. Pay back a tiny fraction of the interest on that immense debt he has.]