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Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Sat Sep 26, 2009 8:39 am
by jedion357
OOC: in light of working late tonight and extra tomorrow I'll post this stuff I wrote last week for an introductory post in this chapter (plus it should be obvious by now that posting late into night isn't working so well for me).
Plus there is a short running poll for the players to choose an acting 1st officer over in general discussion.
Your free to wrap up stuff in the other game thread and I'll lock the thread in another week.

So here goes:

It was just past “siesta” in Clarion’s long fifty hour day when several chronocoms chirped with alert messages.

Dudd was trying to go back to sleep and being unsuccessful.
Tanar was going over astro charts and reviewing data on White Light’s interstellar transit routes.
Alyssa was in the middle off an intense workout pushing her self to go far beyond what the doctors might have approved of.
Ike was enjoying a sonic shower set to massage, having just risen.
Grelude, with his room’s windows fully polarized and his lights off was “field stripping” his issued laser in total darkness just for the fun of it.
Ajax was in the chow hall having AS (After Siesta) breakfast and thinking the new cook needed to be re-assigned to civil engineering to work at the waste recovery plant or maybe he had just been transferred from the waste recovery plant to work in the kitchen.

The time stamp on the chronocoms was 29:37 and the terse text message read, “Deployment Alert: report with space locker to Criswell field, shuttle 1134, departing for Clarion Station at 30:45.”

The message didn’t leave much time but it wasn’t like Royal Marines carried a lot of personal luggage anyway. The marines hand loaded their own gear and strapped into jump seats on the assault shuttle. Dudd played class clown trying to crack jokes to lighten the mood till Midshipwoman Blue gave him a stern look.

At the Clarion Station air lock they were met by Spacer Niss with a detail of cargo handling robots.
“If you’ll come with me to Briefing 3 the robots will handle your space lockers.”
Niss declined to answer any questions and escorted the marines to and elevator then through “Marine Country” portion of Clarion Station to Briefing 3.

After ten minutes a human woman with the rank of captain walked in.
“Be seated. I’m Captain Zyrova, I’m commanding officer of the CMS Pelican. You’ll be delighted to learn that you all have been transferred to my ship. No doubt the assault scouts most of you were due to serve on will suffer from the loss.”

She waited for her audience to digest that before continuing, “With the losses suffered by the Royal Marines in recent …events…. The Pelican is extremely short handed.”
There was emotion in the word “events”: anger, pain, sorrow; it was hard to tell what exactly but it was there.
“It’s been a long time since the RM posted so many raw from the academy to one ship but it can’t be helped so your tour on the Pelican will be old school and a bit of a baptism by fire so to speak. We’ll be lucky to even get enough warm bodies for boarding parties so officers will fill in there as well. This is a Queens ship and we will all do our duty or I will know the reason why is that clear?”
“Yes Sir!” chorused those seated.

“Another thing, anyone caught whining about the loss of a berth on an assault scout will be introduced to the joys of overhauling a nuclear torpedo stuck in a rad suit for hours on end. The Pelican is the finest bird in space and well able to club any assault scout like a baby cactus wumper.”

“Now, we were originally detail to replace two sensor platforms that mysteriously stopped transmitting and investigate why. However, there’s an emergency on Wandren at the Streel Mining Facility. The ag ship that delivers their monthly food and supplies is overdue and their food reserves are running out. I know some of you have personal issues with Streel but the miners on Wandren are Her Majesty’s subjects and the Queen has asked if we’d be so kind as to deliver some emergency rations. There will be no issues or problems with mega corp personnel on this mission.”
Captain Zyrova stared straight at Alyssa Blue till she gave a barest head nod.

“Unfortunately the sensor platforms are already stowed in the main cargo bay and that doesn’t leave a lot of room for e-rats. Midshipman Clanton, you’ll organize stripping out all the furnishings in the troop quarters and stowing them somewhere. Since we’re not transporting any ground troops their quarters just became back up storage for e-rats. That means hand loading the cargo through the air lock in zero g so get on it, because were undocking in four hours.”
“Midshipman Blue, we’ll be piggybacking a shuttle for this mission, you’ll find a shuttle at air lock 043 on the out station rim. I can’t spare you a flight engineer so get it pre-flighted, fuelled and be ready to dock with the Pelican in four hours.”
Midshipman Tanar, along with assisting with the cargo loading make sure we have updated astro charts from System Control as well as the all data available on the missing ship, the SCS Cloverdale, in particular or on her class of ship in general.”
“Everyone else assists Mr. Clanton. Dismissed”

OOC: The action here isn't terribly exciting just necessary. leave a BIC post if you want but I'm going to dump the next post advancing things.
As per the little bit of calculations I did travelling to a stellar body out around 4AU with an ADF of 1 and staying under 1% of light speed was going to take way too long so were using micro jumping within system I think I saw somewhere in the zine that jump speed was 180 hexes and at 10 minute KH turns that should be 30 hours to reach jump speed. In addition since this is 100 years after the first WofWL advances in astrogation mean plotting a jump is 1 hour/light year and by default a micro jump is an hour to plot.

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Thu Oct 01, 2009 8:52 am
by jedion357
IC:
Tanar had done the computation for the micro void jump out system to the vicinity of Wandren 29 hours ago and had set up a computer routine to continuously update the data since that time. Yet the captain had insisted on fresh computations before jumping and it turned out there was a 0.137% deviation in the two calculations. It was not enough to greatly impact the final result but Tanar guessed there was no harm in the double check. After all it wasn’t like it was 100 years ago when a 5 LY jump took 50 hours to calculate.

“Micro jump calculations recomputed and updated to helm, Captain.”
“Please inform the crew of void jump with a 1 minute count down.”
“All hands, all hands, void jump will commence in one minute on my mark, …mark.”
“Very good, Mr Daagron. Ms. Blue be so kind as to give us a verbal count down from 10 seconds and initiate void jump.”

Tanar listened to Alyssa’s count down and clenched his stomach muscles against the coming nausea and disorientation. After the micro jump he dug his nails into his palms till it hurt and willed his body not to wretch. Behind him he could hear the captain sip her tea from a squeeze bulb as if she hadn’t even been affected. Shaking his head he jumped right to the calculations to confirm their location. They were spot on give or take 10,000 km. He reported their position and punched up a course for Wandren.

Tanar announced, "Course plotted and helm updated, captain. ETA at Wandren in 30 hours."
While Alyssa busied herself setting the Pelican onto the new course Tanar punch up the ship's listing on Wandren.

It reads, "Wandren, the outermost planet of the White Light system, is theorized to be a captured planet and not native to the system. It has a wildly eccentric orbit and had been the site of a number of scientific expeditions.

There were several abandoned base camps dotting the surface, one of which was now operated by the Royal Marines as a science station, supply depot, and outer system monitoring station.

Once Streel’s banishment from doing business on the surface of Clarion became permanent the company established the mining operation on Wandren. By Federation law the Queen could not banish them from the system entirely. Streel hasn't even bothered with disguising the mining operation as anything other than a cover for their usual banking operations. Streel had set things up so that citizens of Clarion could transfer money to numbered accounts held on Wandren to avoid paying taxes on Clarion. It was a calculated measure to snub the Queen after she pushed through the permanent ban on Streel. Many a patriotic citizen considers transferring money akin to using the term,Gollywog, so people who do transfer money remain silent about it. While initially few citizens of Clarion availed themselves of the banks on Wandren pirates, criminals, and other scum have embraced the Wandren branch banks wholeheartedly for their anonymity.

The mining operation is barely a break even proposition employing over 3,000.
Most miners are middle class Clarionites."

OOC:
1. Item of business: need an acting 1st officer; players choose and I’ll write it in as if the Captain chose. I’ll start a new poll in the general discussion folder for voting and discussion on the issue.

2. Your shuttle is a very vanilla model of shuttle nothing too exciting- I didn’t work up stats for it yet but let’s assume it’s a very basic HS 2? with a cargo hold and 2 weapons- pod lasers most likely (anything that has unlimited ammo) I’ll entertain suggestions- I just haven’t had the time to nail this element down yet. Could go with chemical rocket or atomic for ease of use.

3. Your objectives are:

a. Deliver mail and re-supply to the RM listening post on the far side of Wandren (just a pro forma delivery because the site is here) someone who wants can jump on writing a basic post for the interaction with the NPCs (3-4 of them) stuck in this Siberia like assignment getting some mail (assume some packages from home as messages can and do travel via subspace) plus some other basic re-supply. They not only run the listening post but maintain a small fuel and assault rocket supply for the RM’s Assault Scouts plus other spare parts in a supply bunker.
b. Deliver the e-rats and emergency supplies to the mining out post and banking center.
c. Find out where to begin searching for the ag ship
d. Evaluate the situation on Wandren.

4. You have 2 other warm body NPCs without ships skills for boarding and security actions call em Spacer Boris Ventura (human) and Spacer Woop Slayerian (Yaz) I’ll get them together in the next couple of days. Woop is a fairly typical marine but Boris is a very big big boy who spent time training with heavy weapons (think Jesse Ventura in the Predator movie).

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Thu Oct 01, 2009 3:37 pm
by Shadow Shack
" I know some of you have personal issues with Streel but the miners on Wandren are Her Majesty’s subjects and the Queen has asked if we’d be so kind as to deliver some emergency rations. There will be no issues or problems with mega corp personnel on this mission.”


No problem whatsoever, Grelude thinks to himself. Streel turned his applications down time and again, he's almost looking forwrd to the encounter. Streel may be a big fish in a small pond back home, but here they're a small fish in a big ocean.

need an acting 1st officer


Hah, I have a tough enough time FOLLOWING orders, never mind issuing them. I nominate Tanar, he's a wise-ass. Besides, as 'gator he's already fluent at telling people where to go."

c. Find out where to begin searching for the ag ship


Grelude approaches his C.O.

"Sir, I have info that the Liberators at the Roost most likely acquired their shoddy weaponry from someone in the belt-ops. If this is another CLF move, the ag-ship might be there."

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Thu Oct 01, 2009 6:48 pm
by Will
(While being briefed)

Captain Zyrova wrote:“Now, we were originally detail to replace two sensor platforms that mysteriously stopped transmitting and investigate why. However, there’s an emergency on Wandren at the Streel Mining Facility. The ag ship that delivers their monthly food and supplies is overdue and their food reserves are running out. I know some of you have personal issues with Streel but the miners on Wandren are Her Majesty’s subjects and the Queen has asked if we’d be so kind as to deliver some emergency rations. There will be no issues or problems with mega corp personnel on this mission.”
Captain Zyrova stared straight at Alyssa Blue till she gave a barest head nod.


"I will obey the Queen's orders," she adds,"and fight the Queen's enemies. Is there anything more you want?"

(In the shuttle, preflighting and docking it)

The shuttle was similar to the Dart-class ships Obar Enterprises had manufactured for several other militias, as well as for Spacefleet, even to the point of being Void capable, and the twin pod lasers were an especially nice touch.

A solid little ship, far more responsive than her old Harridan FGR.2...more importantly, she was in a starship, and it was hers, at least for a few minutes.

The controls were extremely intuitive, and responded with only the slightest touch, docking with the Pelican happening almost instantly, and smoothly.

Just one more thing:

"Ship, do you have a name?"

"This ship is CMS809592ZedAlfa. No other designation for this ship exists," the computer responded.

"Record new designation,"Lyssa insructed the comp." Same registry number, but your name is now CMS Golden Hind."

"Confirmed," the ship told her. "Ship is now CMS809592ZedAlfa Golden Hind."

"That's better," Lyssa said.

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Thu Oct 01, 2009 6:59 pm
by Will
(The micro jump)

She'd watched Pelican travel through the Void, many times when she'd been in the Guard, but actually taking her through a jump...she tried to curb the giddiness taking hold of her, as Pelican slipped through the Void by her hand and young Tanar's direction, Lyssa flipping the ship and beginning the decel burn into Wandren orbit even as Tanar reported the ship's location, and the computer started nattering on about everything concerning the frozen ball of rock they were headed for, including the bits about how Streel, with the help of the Council of Worlds who it partly owned(along with the rest of the corps), was defying the will of good and decent people with their slave-labor mining and money laundering operations.

Vog the Federation, Lyssa thought to herself,We should just nuke it until it glows warmly, and all survivors shot in the dark. Any Clarionite on the planet, knowing who runs it, is not one of the Queen's subjects, but one of her enemies, and killing them won't cause me to lose any sleep, nor will simply leting the voggers starve. Hells, letting a few hundred of them suffer and die might be what's need to buck their ideas up.

She keeps this thought to herself, as she minds her boards.

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Thu Oct 01, 2009 7:13 pm
by Will
(Finally, in the shuttle bound for the RM listening post on Wandren)

Loaded with mail and other goodies from home, the Golden Hind detaches from Pelican, with Lyssa at the controls, young Tanar at astrogation, Dudd manning the engineering station, and the others securely belted in for the trip down.

"Mister Tanar," she says, as she settles into an orbital insertion vector for the base,"please advise Wandren Base of our ETA, and keep a watch on radar and passive sensors. Everyone is to consider themselves in Indian country 'til further notice."

Which may not have been Captain Zyrova's intent, but this was Streel's territory, and Streels were worthless bastards, who'd proven their hostile intentions not just towards the Crown, but the entire Frontier as well...just 90 years ago, Headow had helped his half-clan brother try and clamp Laco and most of the Frontier under his Sovreign Domain Authority jackboot, coming within an ace of taking Gran Quivera and Morgaine's World themselves...and, Streel and PGC both had been helping the real threat, Jack Ryan and those miserable vogging Innies, try and form their own empire, taking almost the whole Frontier and the Rim, with Clarion forced to lead the fight to overthrow them.

Only delaying the inevitable.

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Thu Oct 01, 2009 8:26 pm
by BD Cerridwen
"Huh, so that's what a void jump feels like," comments Ajax to Spacers Ventura and Slayerian. The disorientation clears quickly for the athletic marine.

"First one, eh kid?" asks Ventura with a grin. "Gotta say, you handle it better then the Slay-Meister." The big human jerks a thumb towards the yaz who is using a 'void bag'.

"I knew I shouldn't have ate those salamander eggs just before the jump," says Slayerian as he wipes his muzzle.

The three marines unbuckle and stand. "So now what do we do?" asks Ajax.

"Number one, get some air freshener in here before the air recyclers spread the puke smell throughout the ship!" jokes Ventura. "Then we check our extra cargo, make sure it didn't shift during the jump. After that, we hang loose until one of the officers give us some crap detail."

The three enlisted men travel about the common ship areas, making visual inspections of the cargo. Then they go down to the armory and collect some laser rifles with simulator lenses and do a little target practice. Soon enough, Ike puts them to work cleaning latrines or helping in the galley, before being released to get some sleep before the trip planet side.

Upon awakening, Jax dresses in his BDUs, combat harness and gas mask, then chokes down some rations before reporting to the armory again for weapons issue. He takes a laser rifle, replaces his laser pistol with an electrostunner, an albedo screen, a power backpack, 10 power clips, and 2 each of smoke, tangler, and frag grenades. He also volunteers to take the radiophone and IR goggles. Given the extreme cold, he also packs the standard military arctic suit (if available). This might be overkill, but it's like Drill Sergeant Decker always said, "Better to have it and not need it, then to need it and not have it." (If standard procedure requires spacesuits for this trip, Jax puts on the armor and packs the spare LS pack and patches too).

He boards the shuttle as the computer intones, "Welcome aboard Cm809592ZedAlfa Golden Hind". The enlisted men look at each other. "We're aboard the Gold Butt?" They laugh as they take their seats in the airlock. Once they are strapped in, Ajax toggles the intercom for the bridge. "Alpha team ready Captain," he says, using the traditional title of a ship's commander regardless of actual rank.

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Thu Oct 01, 2009 9:25 pm
by jedion357
OOC: Wandren has no atmosphere, vac suits are recommended.

BD Cerridwen wrote: "Gotta say, you handle it better then the Slay-Meister." The big human jerks a thumb towards the yaz who is using a 'void bag'.

nice play on words there: had me laughing.

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Fri Oct 02, 2009 7:13 pm
by BD Cerridwen
OOC: Yes, I am quite proud of that one. ... Even if it is likely that I stole it from someone else. :D

Still OOC: Scratch the arctic suit. ++vac suit, armor, spare LS, and patches.

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Sat Oct 03, 2009 4:31 pm
by Will
Gods, what a bloody miserable hole, thinks Lyssa to herself, as she brings the Golden Hind on final approach to Wandren Base, setting her down gently on the base's scuffed-up and half frozen over landing pad.

After the drives close down, she says to the others,"right, everyone into spacesuits and armor; those of you already in suits, seal 'em up. It's cold and airless wasteland outside. Alpha Team, secure the landing area, please, and before any of you even think it, just remember we thought we were in friendly territory back at the Roost and the Spacer's Club."

She then lowers the Hind's cargo ramp, at the same time she heads aft to the spacesuit lockers to suit up, the other crew and she offloading the base's mail and other goodies at the same time Ventura reports over comms,"Landing pad is secure, Mid, no hostiles in sight."

"No one but us chickens," she hears Slayerian comments, as the rest of the crew join him, Ventura and Syranno on the tarmac.

An explorer, its exterior clearly indicating its better days are behind it, rolls up to them, a cheery voice asking over comms:

"Someone call for a cab?"

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 1:01 am
by Will
"I'm Junior Lieutenant Karl Jeffers," the bearded, bedraggled man in the Royal Marine BDUs says, after Lyssa and the others step through the space-modified Explorer's airlock into the interior of the vehicle,"commanding Wandren Base."

Lyssa nods her head slightly, as she unseals her suit and takes a seat on one of the benches on either side of the Explorer behind the driver's seat.

"Our bots'll offload the bigger stuff," he explains, Dudd bringing the mailbag with him, as he sits down, Lyssa handing Jeffers a hand computer with a form to sign and thumbprint, stating he'd received the mailbag and its contents unopened, the same form Lyssa herself had signed and thumbprinted before leaving the Pelican.

"MIlitary does love its paperwork," Jeffers comments,"don't it, Mid?"

"Aye, sir," Lyssa replies, Jeffers adding,"no need to stand on ceremony here, Mid, we four have been stranded on this bloody rock for so long, we've mostly done away with all that."

With that, Jeffers turns back to the driving controls, and, with a "hold on, everybody," launches the explorer into rapid motion, driving across Wandren's barren surface into the base's garage, Jeffers waiting until the door completely closes and the area repressurizes to tell the others,"you can remove your suits, now."

"You're with Pelican's crew, right?" he then asks, as they exit the vehicle and step onto the ferrocrete floor of the garage area. "Hope she brought food, cos the natives here are getting plenty restless."

"They whore for Streel," Lyssa says, as they step through a hatch into a room full of monitors, holoprojectors and workstations, "I say, let 'em starve."

"No moral uncertainty with you, is there Mid?" Jeffers says, just the slightest hint of sarcasm coloring his voice.

"All loyal subjects know their duty to the Crown," Lyssa replies coldly,"and who their enemeies are, sir."

Always end with a 'sir.'

Jeffers bristles at this, as the sole other occupant of the room, a skinny, blondeman, stomps his foot and snaps to attention.

"My exec," Jeffers says wearily,"Midshipman Arnold Rimmer; it being siesta, we're the only two up, York and Vine are asleep right now, they'll be up in a couple of hours to relieve us."

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 4:13 am
by jedion357
BIC: Tanar had consulted Clarion Station's data base of ship registeries concerning the SMC Cloverdale and it told him everything he already knew. The Cloverdale was a Streel flagged ship and a the Pollux Class ag ship. The registry did have its drive signature so that was something. The Cloverdale had undergone a number of inspections by RM crews including a med rescue of it's horticulture expert by the Nightingale and despite that there just wasn't a deck plan in the data base. Yet he didn't want to get off to the wrong wing with his new captain by not having the schematics requested so he kept quizzing the database doing a search for similar drive signatures hoping to find something close that might be the same class that did have a deck plan on file. It wasn't likely since ag ships just were not as numerous as freighters but he had to try something.

It didn't take the computer long to locate a number of freighters with similar drive signatures; the Castor Class freighter. Doing a search fu of the net on Clarion Station told him that both classes were built on a modular design. Yet he still couldn't find a deck plan for the Castor Class. When he down linked to the Academy's library on the surface it cross linked to a reference in the Port Royal Public Library. An article in Space Architect , a trade journal for ship engineers, from twenty years ago was extolling the virtues of modular design and had schematics of the, then, proposed Castor Class.
Tanar growled, "Only the head module's decks are in the article. I guess that's something but no telling how the Pollux Class has been reconfigured in twenty years."

IC at Wandren Base:
Lt. Jeffers was giving the one credit tour to Tanar and Alyssa while Ventura and Slayerian stood watch on the landing pad. Dudd had expressed concern over the telemetry kick in the secondary boost stabilizer and was trying to run it down (in all likelihood it was nothing and the dral was just looking to avoid suiting up and going outside.

"Those are Mac's tomato plants, he's into hydroponics, and swears he can taste the difference between real fresh food and stasis screened fresh food. Anyhow, he grows just enough to make a big pot of sauce and put on a pasta meal once per week. Its good for morale and he's good about not making a mess in here with it."

Wandren base was little more than a landing pad, perimeter fence, out buildings on the surface and tunnels beneath. Most activity at the base occurs underground, using meters of rock for insulation against the cold. Lt. Jeffers lead them from the generator room down another corridor to the command center. It was clean and neat but that was most likely because of a janitor bot.

"Now, the Pelican is detailed with running down the missing Cloverdale? If they're this overdue, I'd say recommend bringing body bags as its likely pirates got her. They'd been keeping too predictable of a schedule. For years she seemed to be immune to piracy but since most pirate outfits trying to operate in White Light use the banking center on the other side of this dirt ball it wasn't likely they'd antagonize Streel. It's a shame to as a ship that size can barely produce enough to feed all the people at the Streel site; they've been cutting it close for too long."
Tanar spoke up, "You seem to have detailed information on the Cloverdale?"
"Not really, just her drive signature. The enlisted personnel used to run a pool to see who'd spot her first on the scanners, that was till she got sloppy and started arriving like clock work. Mac spotted the pattern first and made out like a bandit."
Jeffers chuckled to himself thinking of a private memory before continuing, "Anyway for her hull rating she should be able to only feed 3000 a month and that's about what they have over there for personnel. It leaves them no slack in case of trouble. Sure they get supplies off the ships they trans-ship their mined ore with but I doubt they maintain much of a reserve."

"The administrator over there is a career screw up that hasn't done enough to be fired yet. He delegates the actual running of the place to his head of security, Richard Yennech, and some dral named Norcoran. The security chief is a real piece of work and I think Norcoran is a bean counter."


OOC: When the bots are done off loading the shuttle you can return to the Pelican to assist in off-loading the e-rats

IC aboard the Pelican:

Ike was supervising moving case upon case of E-rats to the air lock. Which meant he, Niss, Ajax, and Grelude were playing bucket brigade. They each had their mag shoes on and were chucking the cases down corridors and ladder wells in zero G. He suspected Grelude was having too much fun putting some muscle behind each throw but the job was so mind numbingly boring that Ike welcomed the inherent danger of a case of E-rats flying at his head to keep him on his toes. That was till his chronocom beeped and he nearly got brained.

It was the Capatain, "Mr. Clanton, would you and Mr. Syranno come to the bridge if you please."

On the bridge, Captain Zyrova, replayed a recent com message from the Streel company doctor. He was requesting a couple cases of Anti-tox to treat "mine fever" from some sort of environmental toxin that has a number of miners in the sick bay.
"Have you ever heard of mine fever?" asked the captain of Ajax.
"No sir."
"I'm a little suspicious so when Midshipwoman Blue returns with the shuttle load two cases of Anti-tox for the trip to the surface but don't release them till you evaluate need yourself and report back to me."
"Yes sir."
"Mr. Clanton, they also asked if they can send up their shuttle to help off load the food. The situation may be more desperate then we thought so I’m going to allow it. I want a security detail at the air lock and all SOP observed.

Ike passed the scanner over civilian then said, “Pass over the vibro knife.”
“What knife?”
“Don’t try to lie to a dralasite, buddy, you’re lucky I don’t brig you for attempting to enter a Royal Marine ship armed.”
“But that’s not a weapon, Come On! Just give us the food!” he shouted as he made to push past Ike.
He never got far as Grelude stunned him before he could take more than half a step.

Ike’s side arm was already leveled on the shuttle’s pilot, “Get this vogging trash of the Pelican, Now! Otherwise I’ll brig you all.”
“But what about the food?”
“Oh you’ll get the food. Spacer Grelude here will assist you with that.”

As the shuttle crew was just reaching the other side of their hatch a case of E-rats flew down the air lock like a cannon ball. He kept up the firing cases through the air lock only letting up when the cases started backing up into the air lock itself.

“Too bad Ventura is on the surface, Sir,” commented Grelude.
“Why?” asked Ike.
“I bet he’d enjoy this game too.”
Even Niss’ polyvox chuckled at that.

The final communication from the shuttle came with the sound of food being chewed by the pilot while trying to talk and Ike just shook his head.

OOC: When the RM shuttle returns from the surface (which should be soon unless Alyssa or Tanar have any questions for the Lt.) a party can take a final load of E-rats down and investigate.
The Streel facility has multiple landing pads with one being an elevator down to an underground hanger that is air tight. Your team is cleared for that pad, to facilitate off loading. Leave at least one other NPC aboard ship with the Captain.

The major NPCs are
The Administrator, Darlick Pendergas (H)
The Security Chief, Richard Yennech (H)
The Bean Counter & admin assistant, Norcoran (D)
The Doctor, S’lenick (V)

You’ll be met by Norcoran and Yennech, who will bring those going into the main facility to a hover car for the 1km trip down a mined tunnel.
The main facility is the admin center, miner housing, infirmary, company store (20% markup) and other necessaries. The banking center is attached by a short plexi-plastic tunnel and is domed. It has executive housing and such but they won’t take you there.

People suffering from Mine Fever are red eye, twitchy, cant sit still and constantly scratching.

Load up with what gear you want, I plan to at the wts to the equipment list in the ships armory and do the record keeping on all the NPCs and PCs eventually to see if anyone is overloaded.

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 9:30 am
by Will
OOC: Can we load up the shuttle with Wandren Base's assault rockets and nuke the planet from orbit?

Just to be sure?

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 12:38 pm
by jedion357
Will wrote:OOC: Can we load up the shuttle with Wandren Base's assault rockets and nuke the planet from orbit?

Just to be sure?


OOC: unless I missed something I only thought the Torpedoes were nuclear tipped to which the Pelican already has those.

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 2:26 pm
by Will
Double post.

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 2:31 pm
by Will
OOC: I always thought they were, but the TOM doesn't say one way or the other....just joking anyway.

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 3:42 pm
by BD Cerridwen
OOC: Beam me up Scottie. One minute, I think I'm taking the Gold Butt to the outpost, the next thing I know, I'm on the Pelican slinging chow. :lol:

BIC: Medical relief mission, thinks Ajax as he plans his kit. Space suit, patches, spare LS pack, med-kit (minus the medscanner and the heavy autosurgeon), at a minimum. Of course, he's already wearing his issue skein suit and combat harness. He opts for a triscanner, gas mask (in case the condition proves to be airborne), a water pack and a day's worth of rations (in case foodborne), and an electrostunner in the place of his laser pistol. He also packs 10 power clips, loading one into the stunner. To top it off, he takes a flashlight, a notebook and several pencils, and a radiophone. He checks with the Captain to get a schedule of when the Pelican will be within range of the radiophone.

Before boarding the shuttle, Ajax visits Medical Officer Dieter Gerard (if he's aboard ship, that is). "I'm about to head down Doc. I'll use my tri-scanner to sample the air and relay the readings back to you, along with any med-readings that I take. I've got radiophone 4 with me, they said the number is in the Pelican's comm system, so you can call me to give me additional instructions." He also has the doctor run a complete medical scan on him to serve as a baseline. It won't do the ship any good for Jax to bring some foreign virus on board.

He rides the shuttle down, is met by the hover car, and rides into the miner camp. As the airlock fills, he takes his first tri-scanner reading while holding the device in front of an air vent. He sets the scanner to detect as wide of a range of particulates as possible. When the scans are complete, he jots the readings into his notepad. He removes his suit if the scanner indicates it is safe. The hatch opens and he is greeted by a pair of humans.

"I'm Darlick Pendergas, mining administrator," says the first. "And this is my security chief, Richard Yennech"

"Good to meet you. I'm Spacer Ajax Syranno, medic. I understand that you have a strange illness going around."

"Spacer Syranno? Not doctor?" asks Mr. Yennech condescendingly. "We need an experienced doctor, not some punk kid fresh from training."

"Yes sir," says Ajax, a little shocked by the bold faced accusation. "Experienced doctors cannot risk exposure to unknown diseases. Now, which way to sick bay?"

A security robot escorts the marine to the sick bay, the tri-scanner taking two new air samples in route. Ajax records these on his notepad as well. Upon arrival, he introduces himself to S’lenick, and hands over the requested medicine. The Vrusk doctor gives a quick run down of several cases of the disease while Ajax takes notes. When finished, Jax asks to interview and scan the patients. He asks each of them several questions such as:
  • What have they been eating and drinking?
  • What meds (legal, prescribed or neither) they have been taking?
  • What duties do they preform?
  • Have they been exposed to any unusual minerals in their duties?
  • Have they been using new masks, gloves, clothing or gear of any kind lately?
  • Is there any new machinery at the base?
  • Has a new mine shaft been opened lately?

He takes notes of all of the responses, ignoring Doctor S’lenick's comments about having already asked these basic questions, and watches for patterns to form. He asks follow up questions as needed. Whenever he has a chance, he dials up the Pelican and relays his notes to Dieter.

It's not as exciting as Scout work, but it also beats cleaning toilets or handling cargo. Ajax views it as a chance to exercise his investigative skills.

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 4:06 pm
by Will
Anyway, BIC:

Jeffers wrote:Now, the Pelican is detailed with running down the missing Cloverdale? If they're this overdue, I'd say recommend bringing body bags as its likely pirates got her. They'd been keeping too predictable of a schedule. For years she seemed to be immune to piracy but since most pirate outfits trying to operate in White Light use the banking center on the other side of this dirt ball it wasn't likely they'd antagonize Streel. It's a shame to as a ship that size can barely produce enough to feed all the people at the Streel site; they've been cutting it close for too long."

Tanar spoke up, "You seem to have detailed information on the Cloverdale?"

"Not really, just her drive signature. The enlisted personnel used to run a pool to see who'd spot her first on the scanners, that was till she got sloppy and started arriving like clock work. Mac spotted the pattern first and made out like a bandit."
Jeffers chuckled to himself thinking of a private memory before continuing, "Anyway for her hull rating she should be able to only feed 3000 a month and that's about what they have over there for personnel. It leaves them no slack in case of trouble. Sure they get supplies off the ships they trans-ship their mined ore with but I doubt they maintain much of a reserve."


"So the Streel bastards can put the screws to their captive population at times like this," Lyssa remarks.

"Yeah, what Mac—Chief Samwise MacKenzie, our Bosun and sole maintenance mech—thinks too, and he's had more space time than the rest of us put together," Jeffers replied," so I tend to give his opinions some creedence."

"Though," he says,"if that was their game this time, then someone really vogged things up."

"It is altogether suspicous," the aforementioned Bosun says, the tall, black-skinned, overweight, bearded and dreadlocked Human male says as he enters the command center,"'specially wit' those two sensor platforms down, and de emergency 'ere croppin' up same time Pelican s'posed to go out and replace dem."

"Mac, it's early, even for you, mate," Jeffers comments.

"I sleep when I sleep, I wake when I wake, Karl, you kno' that, mon," Mac replies, adding:

"Sides, I finally figure out why the targeting servos on the heavy laser turret were actin' up, and I got up a lil' early to fix it."

"Were y'tellin' t'Mid 'ere 'bout our Streel friends?" he then asks.

"Yeah, yeah I was," Jeffers says, telling Lyssa and Tanar:

Jeffers wrote:"The administrator over there is a career screw up that hasn't done enough to be fired yet. He delegates the actual running of the place to his head of security, Richard Yennech, and some dral named Norcoran. The security chief is a real piece of work and I think Norcoran is a bean counter."


"Have you run a background check on this Yennech?" Lyssa asks.

A tall, Yazirian female, Pasamoria Clan, according to the pendant hanging round her tawny-furred neck, enters the command center, her uniform IDing her not as a Royal Marine, but as a member of the RCMC's Special Branch.

"Our intel officer, Corps Sergeant Major Jezzica Pasamoria, RCMC Special Branch," Jeffers says, the RCMC CSM replying:

"We ran a make on the Yannech,when he first got here, and the only verifiable facts we could come up with were that he was born on Pale, and that he's Veilia Clan. Rest of his file's sealed, per the Council of Worlds. We tried comming the planetary head of Silver Twin in Valentina, and his answer boiled down to 'it's above your pay grade.'"

"Typical Feds," Lyssa remarks, as Jeffers consults his chronocom, telling Lyssa and Tanar,"the bots have finished offloading the rest of our supplies, andSir Elli wants you back to the Pelican, ASAP."

"Our cue to go," Lyssa says, Tanar and she leaving the command center, led by Jeffers, the base commander adding,"we'll upoload all our intel to the Pelican to help you guys out looking for the [i[Cloverdale.[/i]"

"Thank you," Lyssa replies.

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 4:24 pm
by Will
"Sounds more like corporate clinical trials gone awry," Lyssa says when she hears of the supposed outbreak of mine sickness.

The Captain shakes her head.

"Why is it the corporations are at the bottom of everything with you, MId?" she asks.

"Cos they usually are, sir," Lyssa replies, remembering to end her answer with a "sir."

"Either them or the Feds," she adds,"and if they aren't, then they're mixed up in it somehow, sir."

The Old Man dismisses her, and young Syrrano has the anti-tox and more e-rats loaded by the time she enters the Golden Hind's cockpit, the shuttle undocking from Pelican and heading towards the Streel mining camp.

A mob scene greets her when she lands, Lyssa telling Clanton and Grelude,"no throwing rations at them like they were dogs, or I'll personally turn you both into airbags for hover cars, savvy?!"

"Good," she replies, before they have a chance to...just because Streel treated them like they were subhuman didn't mean the Royal Marines had a right to.

"However," she adds, noting the cordon of Streel Security shocktroops round the starving miners, and the Velia Clan Yaz leading them,"while our orders are not to start a war, by the gods, I expect you to end one, if need be."

As she powers down the shuttle and disembarks, she notes that the Streel thugs are all armed with gyrojet and automatic pistols and rifles, and they have MGs set up, hellbent on re-enacting Hamilton's Massacre.

"Spacer Syrrano, I beleive you have duties in the camp's medcenter. Please, keep an open channel. The rest of you lot, start handing out rations!"

Re: Chapter 1: Wanderings In the Dark

PostPosted: Sun Oct 04, 2009 4:27 pm
by Will
BD Cerridwen wrote:OOC: Beam me up Scottie. One minute, I think I'm taking the Gold Butt to the outpost, the next thing I know, I'm on the Pelican slinging chow.


OOC: You didn't know the Pelican had a bap bin?! :lol: