Ambrosia Software Web Board: "The Buildup" - Ambrosia Software Web Board

Sundered Angel cuts Avatara off with a wave of his hand.

"It doesn't matter. I can tell you've buried it. Here- 30 000 in Iridium Bars. I hope that covers your expenses."

He rises, and motions to a message on the sole screen alive in the silent bar.

"They're in trouble. If you value free speech, democracy, and racial equality," he gives a wry grin, "or just don't feel like having the galaxy wiped out, I'd suggest you join in. The choice, of course, is yours."

The stack of Iridium bars glitters softly on the table.

------------------
Sundered Angel,
The One and Only
Ares Webboard Moderator, and all-around Nice Guy

(seeing as how I missed it...)

*Avatara grabs the bars and shakes his head.*

"No, I'll have to pass on that. I don't think my ship could be of any use there. Besides, I have a pressing matter to attend to."

"Very well, I may have something for you to do in the future."

*Avatara briefly turns to look out the viewport and when he turns back, Sundered Angel is gone. Sighing, Avatara stands up and walks to the Azurewrath. Inside, he powers up the engines and blasts away from the bar, soon jumping into hyperspace.

En route to his base of operations, Avatara sits back and sifts through the galactic news, thinking of what to do. He comes across a report detailing the StarLance and its Gaitori fleet, and their next destination. Avatara smiles as he reads it, most of the Gaitori fleet would be with the StarLance, leaving their back door open to pirate raids...*

------------------

The small, battered fleet is taken, by flight or by tow, slowly back to the base on Tetrik V. Commander 8 Lightnings, appalled at the loss of his escorts, and the cost of the repairs he is going to have to pay if he wants half of his fleet to fly again, decides to spend some of his limited budget.
He climbs into the Endurance and sets a course for Cicion's bar.

------------------

"Anything that can be achieved using magic can be achieved using technology." -Salrillian Illegal Publicist ekt-Herna in his last message to the Salrillian public.

Scene: Dominus Plaza.
Over a dozen thousand metal cylinders cover the ground, and a large color guard of Taeskor Commandos and Pure Taeskors stands, silent. Over a million people are either present or watching on the tri-dee. Nerec does the Phylydion salute, and the soldiers follow, as well as most of the people in the crowd. "Today, we celebrate the full, rich lives of the many brave men and women who died in the service of the Phylydion Imperium, and the Galaxy as a whole. Without these soldiers, the day would have been lost, as it would have without any one of the many militaries that pitched in with the fight. They died with honor for all of us. Also, the noble Salrilian renegade known only as "Slug". He dealt the final blow to the Starlance that pushed it back into its own forsaken dimension. We honor him as well, and I now honorarily present to him the Octagonal Sun, the highest honor the Phylydion Imperium can bestow. In Slug's memory, and in these warriors' memory..." he breathed "Fire" into his comm unit, and the Phylydia, flying high overhead, heard it. Cicion was aboard.
"Sir, signal has been given."
"Gunnery, fire." The Phylydia's forward compression cannons fired into the atmosphere at a very shallow angle, so that they flared up with the heat and then skipped out into space. The crowd saw it with crystal clarity.
"To end on a lighter note: The flagships of the Imperium and the DGA fought side by side near the end of the battle, and it was their teamwork that allowed Slug to make his final run. We believe that this marks a new era of peace between our people and theirs. We are opening up commerce and trade of all types, and we hope that it will continue. Thank you."

Darkk returned to Nijayias Prime.

"Ah, [sarcasm]my lord Taeskor[/sarcasm], I would like to know why you summoned me."

"Darkk, you can't leave your job like that!"

"Oh, I didn't know we could use first names, Vivion."

"I do not; Darkk is your LAST name. I'm noting that in my report."

"Heh. You demonstrate your inexperience on the subject of Nijayias too often. I was born a member of the peasant class. Nijayias peasants HAVE no last names. Just A name."

"I was never informed of that."

"You mean you never tried to learn it."

"Darkk, being insubordinate like that..."

"I report directly to the Octicon."

"I'm a PURE TAESKOR! I deserve respect! I AM A MEMBER OF THE NOBILITY! I WILL HAVE YOU REMOVED!"

"Be calm. I needed to blow off some frustration from not being able to prevent Slug's death."

"You ARE an emotional species. OK. For now, I will tolerate your behavior, as the Octicon wishes. But I'm conviced you're hiding something, and I will inform the Octicon of any further irregularites."

"Very well. I will try to be more ... cooperative."

[Don't have the Phylydians get worried, Cicion. Nobody should be worried yet. So far, it's just an overzealous beauracrat, and can be easaly discounted. Sorry I couldn't come up with a better name.]

------------------
Me: You ******* IDIOTS!! That planet was INHABITED!!!
Them: Ooops
Me: Let's resume this disscussion near airlock 13.
[immediatly following the first disrupter missle test]

The Endurance flies down to a pad near the bar. 8 Lightnings steps out.
He enters the bar and says, "Give me some'a the strongest stuff you've got. I lost 10 good men yesterday..."
He then drops into a chair and considers how he could ever pay for the repairs for his fleet. And how he could prevent something like this from happening again...

------------------

"Anything that can be achieved using magic can be achieved using technology." -Salrillian Illegal Publicist ekt-Herna in his last message to the Salrillian public.

"mmm-mmm good. Banana-Beefsteak Milkshake. Who the **** comes up with this ****?"

Pharris shook up the can and shoved it into the holder on his belt, twisting it till it clicked. He took a sip from the straw in his helmet. He nearly gagged.

"Holy Christ that's vile!"

He ripped the can out of its holder.

"Chief! I want the Galley pressurised in twenty minutes! We're not eating this **** all the way back home!!"

The chief engineer floated out of the crawlway, into the passage.

"Well, I found the broken seal, unfortunately she's leaking pretty bad. Looks like Storage rooms 9-15 are not gonna be presssurized for long. I'm going to try and get life support to salvage whatever air it can before it all vents."

Chief bent over one of the terminals and began typeing, but in zero gravity, he hung at a ridiculous angle, and he kept on pushing himself off of the keyboard. Pharris threw the can of emergency rations at him. it bounced off of his helmet, spinning off down the hallway. He turned around and looked at the Captain.

"What?"

"I don't care about the damn storage rooms, everything is in containers anyway. I want my gravity back!"

"Aww, come on skipper, this is much more fun, don't you think?"

The Engineer performed a neat summersault. In mid air.

"Yeah yeah, whatever. Forget the leaks. the crew's all on the Rescue vessel, leaks can wait. Get us off of emergency power. Then we can patch the leaks and start fixing this pile of crap. Oh yeah, gimme a working comlink, long range, preferably."

"Here, take mine. It should still be charged"

The comlink floated gently over to Pharris

"Thanks a lot chief. If you need me, I'm on the bridge."

Pharris hit the button on the door, but it flashed red.

"Uh.. skip... that's all pressureised, you gotta go that way. Just clip on the the safety line and you'll be fine."

Pharris looked at the massive, charred hole in the side of his ship. A thick yellow cable was loosely tied to a bent, mangled pipe. He tugged on it to test it, pulling the pipe clean off.

"uhh... chief...."

"oh, the cable! Just tie it around any old thing. It should be ok."

Pharris couldn't help but feel silly pulling himself hand over hand across the outside of his ship to reach the bridge. He saw the space tug and the UNS rescue vessel carrying his crew and his crippled ship towards the newly arrived Human gateship. At their current slow pace it would take at least another ten hours, but he didn't want to take any risks with his damaged ship. The Ishinian gateship was recalling in hundreds of relief vessels from all over the Galaxy, while the Human Gateship had formed a static jumpgate with the Proxima Centauri Shipyards, and was sending the wounded for treatment, and damaged ships for repair. The massive donation of relief supplies was UNS's attempt to compensate for their minimal contribution during the battle. Apparantly, they had suspended their hostilities towards their once rivals, even going so far as to lift the price off of his head.

Finally, Pharris pulled himself through a hole in the bridge windows.

"X, what the hell did you do to my ship!? I leave you in charge for a few hours and... well look at it!!"

"It's not my fault you took us out here in this "Nijayais Spec" hardwear. This thing is like a dixy cup compared to the Barbarossa. Shows you for trusting military shipyards

"Whatever you say, punk. You can start turning down free ships whenever you like. All I know is that the only reason the Barbarossa was so hot was because it spent years getting torn to shreds and being rebuilt. This'll be a nice warm up job for the Engineers, once we get back to a shipyard."

"I know. Its just she isn't the same, skip. She fights differently, she flies differenty, and her hull can't stop missiles worth a damn. She needs some work."

Pharris grabbed the corner of the Helm console to pull himself back to the rear doors. As he did, a large piece of it came off in his hand. He looked around the bridge, seeing the scorchmarks everywhere, then back at the neatly punched hole in the window.

"You're damn right she needs work..."

"I can explain, skipper it-"

"I don't even want to know... Wake me up when we get to the gateship so we can get aboard the rescue ship with the rest of the crew. Where's the airlock?"

"Back there, the door with the sticker on it."

Pharris opened the radio room that was now serving as a temporary airlock. He pressureised the room, and pulled himself through the second door. He took off his helmet and took a deep breath. For the first time in seven hours, he was out of his cocoon. He took off his tanks, and attatched them to a chargeing station. He floated gently to his cabin. He popped the door, pulled off the pressure suit, leaving it floating in a messy clump while he fought to get comfortable strapped onto his bed, not that he fought for long, he was so tired he was asleep in a minute.

------------------

StormBreaker entered the system.

"Pharris, there's a call for you." the XO said.

"Ϩǰ, why'd you interupt my sleep like that!" Pharris shouted back.

"It's Darkk. He offered full repairs if you'd just talk to them for a bit.
Darkk must have lost it..."

"Really."

"He said something about 'wanting to apologize' and your guess is as good as mine."

------------------
Me: You ******* IDIOTS!! That planet was INHABITED!!!
Them: Ooops
Me: Let's resume this disscussion near airlock 13.
[immediatly following the first disrupter missle test]

(Um, the Humans don't have a Gateship. They use jumpgates)

------------------
Those who make up the rules, do not play the game. We, however, do.
-Imperial Captain Alexi Darvonsal
StarLance

[Perhaps the new President of the UNS ordered one built. (hence the parts shortage) Jumpgates and Gateships can work in conjunction with eachother. The gateship can act like a mobile jumpgate, so you can send ships to it from any jumpgate that it decides to connect to.]

The Stormbreaker pulled the battered ship into the docking bay, setting it down gently on the floor. Pharris, his XO and the engineering team climbed out through various hull breaches, lining up behind Pharris as he greeted Darkk.

"it's good to see you again, Admiral. Too bad you missed the battle, You should have seen it, it was quite a show."


Darkk walked up to the ship, he could hardly believe his eyes. He put his hand against the side of the ship, running his fingers over the now brittle armor.

"What did you do to this thing?..."

"that's a long story Darkk..."


------------------

8 Lightnings got up, went back to his ship, and headed off. "Now who can I terrorise and steal money from today..."

------------------

"Anything that can be achieved using magic can be achieved using technology." -Salrillian Illegal Publicist ekt-Herna in his last message to the Salrillian public.

(If you come to the bar, come to the actual Officer's Club Bar thread. And DArekk, you could've at least given the Taeskor a Phylydion sounding name. And WHY is it that everyone thinks that Phylydions have short, explosive tempers?!)

------------------
-Traek Cicion of the Taeskor
"Never tell me the odds!"
-Han Solo
"Then we'll do it real quiet-like."

Quote

[OK, I'm don't have quite the concept of what a Phylydian name is. I'm not an english major. Gimme a name and I'll edit it in. As for the temper, they seem sort of on edge and I'm try to paint <insert name here> as objectionable. ]

------------------
Me: You ******* IDIOTS!! That planet was INHABITED!!!
Them: Ooops
Me: Let's resume this disscussion near airlock 13.
[immediatly following the first disrupter missle test]

Darkk listened to Pharris's XO and chief engineer's accounts of the battle while walking through the Barbarosa II.

"Pharris, I want to level with you." Darkk said quitely.

"I was wondering why you gave me a free ship." Pharris replied.

"You were a beta tester for that ship class. The final design is now finished, thanks to you. You were very important to our work."

"You had us risking our necks in your prototype?!?" the XO spat.

"Yes, I'm sorry, but I'll make it up. I'll upgrade it to the finished version. With the special weapons."

"Special weapons?" mused the chief engineer.

"Yes, we've developed our counter to the compression cannon. The fluctuation beam. It destabalizes shields like you wouldn't believe. Just my way of thanking you for your help. Anything else I could do to make up for this? Within reason, naturally."

------------------
Me: You ******* IDIOTS!! That planet was INHABITED!!!
Them: Ooops
Me: Let's resume this disscussion near airlock 13.
[immediatly following the first disrupter missle test]

"Don't worry about it Darkk, there were no casualties, only five wounded, they're being patched up as we speak. Now about your ship, as long as you're upgrading the design, X, the chief and I have compiled our own list of "improvements" to ship. We were going to do a total refit, armour, power supplies, sensors, the works. As well as some design points I think you'll find interesting. Most of them would be way too expensive to incorporate on a mass produced ship, but I think you'd find them helpful nonetheless. consider it our bug report."

Pharris handed a data disc to Darrk.

"That's two hundred pages of notes, ideas and concept diagrams of our own improvements. You might think about showing that to your design team."

Darkk put the disc into his padd and began scrolling through the pages.

"Wow... some of these look pretty drastic..."

The chief smiled "Well, we want the thing to work just right. You have to remember, we're almost always outnumbered, so we need every advantage we can get. Half of Pharris's legend was spot welded onto the hull of the hull of the Barbarossa by yours truly." The Engineer smiled, patting his chest proudly. Pharris interrupted his gloating:

"as I was saying, all we really need is an empty hangar bay somewhere and a cargo shuttle or two to scout for parts. I've got my engineering crew, so all I really need is parts and tools, and a place to sit tight for a few weeks."

Chief couldn't help laughing.
"Weeks?! try two months, skipper, have you seen this?"
He punched his fist through the armour that had been almost a foot thick before the battle.

"Holy ****, What did that?" Dark pushed on the mangled hull plate.

The engineer crumbled a piece in his fist.
"I think it was the plasma cannons, but I could be wrong, half the plate on the ship is corroded just like that. I think the armour doesn't like deuterium plasma... it's on our fix list"

"I guess we'll have to do some more to that final design.."

------------------

"Thanks for the data, Pharris." Darkk said. "I'll put it to good use. And, for services rendered, 150,000 from the Phylydian Treasury, Nijayias Protectorate Militia Account."

"This should pay for some tools and materials!" said the chief engineer.

"Oh, and I can provide a space for you to work. We've got some docks from the glory days that aren't in use due to the small size of the militia. They should be fully functional. We wouldn't mind one of our friends using them for a bit when we don't need them. If you want, I could take you there now."

------------------
*Error: target is violating the laws of physics*
*Error: target is locally exceeding c*
*Error: target is clasical scale yet Hiesenburg uncertain*

"Trent, get your butt over here!" yelled an unseen voice from across the room. Sighing, Officer Trent pushed back a report to the select committee on interstellar terrorism, and headed to the 2D screen, where a group of his colleagues were watching something.

And in Galactic News today, the unveiling of the Slug Memorial on Salril Prime was interrupted by a shocking suicide bombing. As the ribbon was cut on the fifty metre long silversteel statue, a guest shrugged off heavy security and charged the unveiling party, detonating a nuclear device within ten metres of the statue.

Initial reports name the bomber as Lieutenant J. Whitmoor, retired Liberation War veteran and personal aid to the Human Ambassador to Salril. While his motives in the attack remain vague, surviving equipment records him as yelling:

"The Golden Dawn draws nigh! Crumble, cities of the arrogant! Only the angelic fire can cleanse your sins!"

The Salrilians have withdrawn their Ambassador to Earth in protest, and other Embassies have issued statements condemning the attack and the government "responsible for this atrocity". Social Security agents on Salril are investigating lead-ups to the attack, and currently suspect a concerted conspiracy. What becomes of this, remains to be seen.

In other news, surging Vanadium prices are causing power problems for isolated Luna mining communities...

Officer Trent sat down heavily

"What do you think?" queried a friend.

"It's them again. The Order of the Golden Dawn. And they've grown stronger..."

The drydock was massive, originally constructed to facilitate the repair and refitting of Nijayais Interstellar Navy's largest carriers. It was a gigantic structure, and it was entirely self mobile, designed to pick up disabled ships where they lay, and provide a stable platform for their repair in a controlled enviornment.

It was in a mooring orbit, along with several others like it in what used to be the third largest shipyard in the galaxy. The Ferapont system contained many Huge construction facilities, Spacedocks, Dry docks, docking hangars, fighter bays, everything. It had once been the home port of the entire western fleet. Now, it was shut down. The once thriving planets in the system that had at one time benefeited from the millions of jobs needed to run the facility were now deep in recession, the shipyards were long silent.

Stormbreaker sailed into the system, entering orbit alongside the mobile drydock.

"This should provide more than enough space for you and your crew. The crew cabins are probably still furnished, and it probably has more than enough fuel to provide power for the next few months. You're welcome to use any of the transports in its landing bay if you need to "go shopping", As long as you don't take it out of orbit, you can do what you like on board. Most of these havn't been boarded for at least a decade, Ferapont has become quite deserted since its peak. It used to be one of the most wealthy systems for light years. Now, it doesn't get much traffic. I doubt you'll be noticed at all. and even then, people are used to the militia useing these as repair bays sometimes too."

Darkk looked at the tremendous mass of starbases that sprawled across the entire system, escorted by entire fleets of mobile docks, huge resupply ships, tankers, all remnants of the navy that had once needed all of these vessels to support its fleets, that now could't afford to fly all of the ships in its arsenal, let alone the field resupply ships that had once allowed armadas to campaign for years on end. He sighed. Without needing to be ordered, Stormbreaker hailed the mobile drydock, starting its generators, computers and life support systems. The drydock opened its massive doors, the opening dwarfed the gunship that was lowered into the huge bay. Tractor moors locked it in place, and the huge doors sealed behind it.

The Stormbreaker slid up and docked with the drydock, extending a docking collar, Pharris's crew crossed into what would be their new home for the coming weeks.

"Thank you for all your help, Darkk. I don't know where we would have found a better place. Hell, I'd still be back on earth fighting contractors to build my ship! With this kind of facility, we'll have the ship back together real quick."

"Well, its not exactly like we're in desperate need of these facilities right now, though we may, someday. Until then this is yours. Feel free to call me if there's trouble. Sorry to run off like this, but I have some important business to attend to. See you around, Pharris"

"Goodbye, Admiral Darkk"

The hatch sealed, and Pharris watched just long enough to see stormbreaker jump to lightspeed. He turned around and began walking to the Crew Quarters to get settled. There would be plenty of work to do later.

------------------

Dark watched Ferapont reciede in the window. In his young years on a backwater refueling outpost, going to the nearest major system, Ferapont, had provided some of the happiest times of his life. He could feel the hatred of the renegade Phylydians. In him. In his people. In every Nijayias. He would find a way to make them feel the same loss.

In any case, Pharris had helped immensely. There needed to be a strong militia. What to name the new class of gunships... "Pharris" in Nijayias would be too obvious. Pharris backwards is "Sirraph", a Salrilian name, ... then translated into Eleejeetian, and then into Nijayias becomes "Riaxx". Perfect.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

2 days later on the Nijayias/Obish border:

The StarLance's attack on obain had left it almost totally open to the worst scum of the universe. The pirate fleet, crewed with all manner of villians from known space, that was now skirting the boarder was about the most obsolete group of near-derelicts in the galaxy. There were more than 30 of them, but they were in such poor condition the Gaitori wouldn't consider them fit for anything other than target practice.

A single gunship aproached.

"This is Captain Ahdriadd of the Nijayias Protectorate Militia. If you do not surrender and accompany me to our handling facilities at once, you will be destroyed." Said the warship's commander.

The pirates, feeling overconfident due to their numerical superiority, responded with all the guns on their ships.

The gunship promptly accelerated to superlight. At first, the pirates thought the ship was running: no ship they knew of could fight propperly at FTL speeds. Even the audemedon had given up on that. But this was ... different. Darkk had found a solution, using the collective skills of the crew's minds to set up the run - it would never work for turrets or weapons not FTL, but the new fluctuation beam, as good at killing as a compression cannon, was tearing the ships like wrapping paper on a birthday. It was over in 3 minutes. The pirates never touched the ship.

Ahdriadd slumped in the command chair. Intraveinous fluids had to be administered. It was the hardest thing he had ever done. The new Riaxx class was powerful, and useful, but the hyperfighting trick was next to impossible. Serving as a "subserver", as StormBreaker would put it, was too much for almost anyone.

Darkk felt this from afar, and smiled. He could do better. A fleet coordinated in FTL attacks could be 50 times as effective as an ordinary fleet. That was important, for the NPM could only field 500 major ships at any point in the future for which projections exist - currently, the fleet had 200 ships cruiser class or larger, and no carriers, destroyers, or gateships (except the StormBreaker). This little trick would only get easier with time. Soon, there would a real need for it.

------------------
*Error: target is violating the laws of physics*
*Error: target is locally exceeding c*
*Error: unable to determine if target exists or not*
*Error: target cannot be hit*

[This message has been edited by Fleet Admiral Darkk (edited 11-10-2000).]

The Khada class fighter dropped out into a fleet of debris. 8 Lightnings looked out through the cockpit window at what had once been a pirate fleet. On long-range scanners he picked up a rapidly disappearing gunship running a NPM ID.
What in the quadrant is Darkk up to? he thought, and set course to pursue, glad that the Endurance was still flying as fast as usual...

------------------

"Anything that can be achieved using magic can be achieved using technology." -Salrillian Illegal Publicist ekt-Herna in his last message to the Salrillian public.

Darkk stretched out through the minds aboard Ahdriadd's ship.
Something ... was ... wrong ...

Darkk wanted no evidence of what really happened. If it got out, the Phylydians would want it, and the Salrilians would panic. Darkk didn't relish the idea of trying this on a so soon, which would be the ultimite consequense of the discovery.

Ah, he reasoned, there was no evidence hyperfight existed even if the remains were documented and the ship followed. A gunship flown by any really good pilot would win that fight. And Ahdriadd normally was a very good pilot. No one would find out.

[No one should find out. This is part of the uberplot, like Sargatanus's testing earlier.]

------------------
*Error: target is violating the laws of physics*
*Error: target is locally exceeding c*
*Error: unable to determine if target exists or not*
*Error: target cannot be hit*

The scanner lit up with the specs of the gunship it had determined so far. 8 examined the weapons and shield systems carefully. So, the Commander is one Ahdriadd, hmm? Oh, well, let's see where he's going today. Better than going back to the bar and drinking myself to death...

[OK, I'll be careful not to find out then. But I still want to come to chase the gunship, having nothing else to do...]

------------------

"Anything that can be achieved using magic can be achieved using technology." -Salrillian Illegal Publicist ekt-Herna in his last message to the Salrillian public.

[This message has been edited by 8 Lightnings (edited 11-11-2000).]

The air over the Nijayias Imperial Palace seemed calm - seemed.
Suddenly, on the landing pad, hidden from prying eyes by the tube it had come down, the shuttle's stealth field disengaged and it popped into visability.

"Empress Kelyra, I bid you welcome." Darkk said.
"Darkk, I told you, I'm not able to be Empress!" she replied.
"I can fix that."
"What do you mean?"
"Genetics. A normal Nijayias has 22 gene sites that control powers, either making the necissary enzymes or not. Thus there are about 22 major divisions in the normal power scale."
"That's common knowledge."
"But that's NORMAL. The royal family has 120. I'm a mutant, I have 230 - and all are for power, no defective genes there."
"So you should be in charge. You've got more than anyone."
"Except, genetics can be altered. Come on. I've managed to clear some space for you, and no one will see you come in."

Kahlad came down, and they went in. They walked through empty corridors, then entered a series of mantinance acesses. Darkk removed part of the wall, and they stepped into a dusty room that hadn't been used in centuries.

"Here you go. This is the main room of a suite that got hidden in some rebuilding or another. I found it years ago, and kept some things in one of the bedrooms. I cleared it out, and you can stay here for the forseeable future." Darkk explained.
"What about the dust?" Kahlad said.
"Easy," said Darkk.

A screen lowered from the celing, creaking and groaning. It charged up, then the dust lept up to it (not antigrav or anything exotic, static electricity; how Swiffer™ works). It then moved back up into place.

"I've brought some of your old clothes up here, and I'll use the messege tubes to send you food. You could hide for years here." Darkk said as he stepped out, replacing the panel.
"Very well," Kelyra whispered.

Darkk walked back into the corridor. His "supervisor" was there to greet him.

"Darkk, where have you been?" he asked.
"Around." Darkk responded.
"I wanted to talk about the military situation."
"You always want to know when it will be necissary for the Phylydians to come and save us. Crime is practically non-extant, the militia is handling piracy, and nobody's invading."
"Darkk..."
"I'm sorry. Did I imply you were impatient?"
"Just go away."
"Very well."


------------------
*Error: target is violating the laws of physics*
*Error: target is locally exceeding c*
*Error: unable to determine if target exists or not*
*Error: target cannot be hit*

The Endurance dropped out in a Nijayias system, close behind the gunship. The scanners lit up with sensors and small science ships that would penetrate the small Khada-class fighter in under a second. And then he'd have the resident fleet upon him. The wreckage of the pirate fleet came to his mind again. What to do now...
Blast, this is too dangerous.
8 Lightnings noted the location of the system in the navicomputer and made a note next to it. Then he set course for the Salrillian border.
I'm sure they'll have some patrol ships to terrorise...

------------------

"Anything that can be achieved using magic can be achieved using technology." -Salrillian Illegal Publicist ekt-Herna in his last message to the Salrillian public.

Darkk watched slowly as the computations slowly plodded on, deep in StormBreaker's core. Genetics was so tricky, not like quantum physics. That was natural. "Ah, well," he thought, "time to catch up on my reading."

As a natural consequence of having even a partial hive-mind, the Nijayias had no great literature. They didn't even have interesting literature. So Darkk grabbed a human book from his collection. He liked especially the roaring 20s novels of the USA portion of Earth, and so chose The Great Gatsby. While doing so, he found himself staring at another book, The Last Command. This usually ment that Darkk had detected something subconciously but couldn't figure it out. He'd have to read the book to find out what about it was so special...

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Turik Nebula had been for centuries a place nobody went. The area was declared unnavigable, and even the audemedons never ventured in. Pirates, however, did.

For the Riksha, an ageing Gaitori frigate, not surprisingly run by primarily Gaitori, but containing the diverse mix of rouges from all species that pirates usually employ, it was a normal patrol. The 2nd watch had just ended and the 3rd watch was feeling bored. They wouldn't be for long.

Suddenly mass and magnetic readings began to spike. At first they thought they were about to hit a planet. Then the readings began to show more detail, and it became apperant that there was a fair-sized group of starships presant. Probes were dispatched, and 20 minutes later the ship's overlord was called via hypercom.

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Darm, an ageing Cantharan, had managed to become a very self important pirate overlord without becoming an important pirate overlord. He was at first very annoyed with being called in the middle of the night (local time), but decided not to execute the captain of the Riksha or any of its crew.

He had a lot of men, but few ships capable of combat against a modern vessel on any terms. These ships would make him go down in history. If he needed more men, well, he could bully around some other pirate overlords. This would be grand.

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Darkk flipped to a page explaining the Empire's use of the lost Katana fleet and stood bolt upright. He had suspected human sci-fi had been influenced by resident Nijayias, who were there all the way up to 3 years before the Cantharan invasion. In any case, there was a similar event in his history.

Slightly before Darkk entered the navy, there had been a massive shipbuilding and engineering project to create a large and completely redesigned fleet. There was a war with the Sals at the time, and it wasn't long before Salrilian sabatoge blew the whole plan out of the water. They used Mind Rippers to drive the crewers crazy during the ceremonial formation flying, and the gateship took them on an unknown course into the unexplored space.

Darkk was terrified at the prospect. Anyone finding it would have the necissary firepower to overwhelm Human or Nijayias space without any existing fleet. It would be horrible. Fortunantly, he remembered that it had split into five sections when it jumped. It would take time to locate all of them, even with the data from one group. Unless, of course, that group contained the gateship. Not much time to prepair...

[Let me get the next 2 posts on this. I want to get it fleshed out.]

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*Error: target is violating the laws of physics*
*Error: target is locally exceeding c*
*Error: unable to determine if target exists or not*
*Error: target cannot be hit*