Elite roleplay: Off station

OFF STATION

Your ship, deep space, anything that is not happening inside the Citi Gateway or Ingaba...

General Roleplay Etiquette:

1. Control only the actions of your own character(s). (AKA: God Mode)
This doesn't matter how small the action is, even if it is as simple as scratching their nose or a direct reaction to something else that just happened. This applies to everything from casual conversation to full blown fight scenes. If you'd like someone to do something specific, PM that person, however keep in mind they are completely within their rights to say no. Especially if said action is inappropriate to their character and/or circumstance.

2. Don't brute force your way into another persons RP.
Approaching with a conversation starter is fine, or indeed some other small action. However charging in, guns blazing and disrupting the flow of another person/pair/groups conversation/arc is about as rude as doing so in real life. If something is going on that you'd like to participate in, be subtle about it. Put out a gentle hook for someone to take, but again, be aware that said hook may not be taken. If you fear it was simply unnoticed, PM the person or people it concerns. Or even leave a message in the OOC forums.

3. Good grammar and spelling is preferred.
We're not asking you to be perfect, but please at least demonstrate willingness. no1 iz gna tak u srsly usng txt spk. There's a wide variety of people here, many who speak English as a second, or even third language. There are even some with varying degrees of dyslexia and/or likely other issues that affect spelling/grammar. We accept them all here. However, people who aren't accepted, are those unwilling to accept polite correction. Remember that even a small thing like the placement of a comma, or the wrong use of there/their/they're can completely change the definition of an entire sentence.

4. Accept constructive criticism gracefully and politely.
If someone spots an issue with your writings, they may wish to help you improve that writing. They may do this through PM or even publicly air their thoughts on the OOC forum. If they have taken the time to be polite and explain what is wrong with your writing, the best way to behave is to respond in kind, using the same manner they have approached you with. It means they have taken an active interest in what you have written and wish to see more. Basically, you have a fan!

5. Don't take the actions or opinions of things done IN RP, to be directly relevant to the writers thoughts or opinions.
Basically, if some ones character calls your character a jackass, it doesn't mean the writer thinks you are a jackass. It's a ROLE they are PLAYING. Watch a movie. The argument between the characters isn't an argument between the actors involved. The same applies here.

6. It's not a popularity contest.
Your RP might be bustling with participants. You have 3 people off station in a fire fight, while another 2 are infiltrating the darkest areas of the station, meanwhile a group of 4 others are tracking your movements in an effort to stop you. Good for you, I'm sure it will be a thrilling read! But you know what? Sometimes the absolute BEST work, comes from two RP characters having a simple heart to heart. Both are valid, both are great, but NEITHER is categorically better than the other. Period.


Inara RP Etiquette:

1. Respect the setting and rules of the universe.
Inara is an Elite: Dangerous 3rd Party Tool. The RP Forums are set in the Elite: Dangerous universe. Elite: Dangerous has rules, as any fictional universe does from Lord of the Rings to Star Wars, or Game of Thrones to Star Trek. If you intend to RP within the Elite: Dangerous universe you are bound by the history and rules of that universe. Simply put, this RP forum is bound by the same rules as the game, so if it can't be done in the game, it is not permitted here. This applies to things from a 50Ly Jump Range on a normal, unmodified Sidewinder, to the destruction of entire stations.

2. Respect the characters created by others.
We have a wide variety of characters already here. It's expected that some will be similar, just as it's expected that two characters will be vastly different. Opinions of each persons character will naturally be varied, but all are valid provided they follow the rules of the universe. You are allowed to interact with, or avoid interaction with, any character in the RP forums. But you have no right to belittle others for their creation. You are not an authority figure on writing, nor are you directly affected by another persons imagination. You might not like it, but you MUST respect it.

3. Be caught up on current events before joining in.
You need basic things like character descriptions in order to interact with them. You also need to know what's going on in the surrounding areas. This is simply because the people you are hoping to RP with, might be gearing up to something that you might not want to be part of. Or simply that the most recent post, out of context, could leave a different impression on the goings on than if you gather that context. We don't expect you to read every single post from the beginning of the forums, just enough to get that basic understanding.

4. Either subscribe to, or frequently check, the Roleplay: Q&A and OOC forum.
People may be discussing something relevant to you there, or even discussing you directly. Perhaps someone asked what the general consensus on the existence or non-existence of a certain object. Or we're just chatting about random gibberish. Either way, be aware of it and use it. If you're unsure about something, such as how guns would look and or behave, or even the music selection, use the OOC forum to ask. We don't have all of the answers, but the collective knowledge and logic usually allows us to overcome an issue and come to a decision on what should be allowed. Frontier Developments, and even David Braben himself, don't have the answers to every possible question that can be asked.

5. Large Scale events exploding out of nowhere are a complete no go.
We get it. Everyone wants their character to be noticed and for people to be tripping over themselves to interact with them. In some audiences, an introduction involving you blasting in for landing in a fiery wreckage of a ship, before cart wheeling out and sword fighting 35 Ninjas before whisking off with the local celebrity for a glorious night of passion, is in fact, cool. This is not one of those audiences. It is generally considered better to build your character up slowly over time. Eventually, you might even have a legitimate excuse to fight those Ninjas. Maybe even with other RP participants by your side.

6. Perfect characters are boring.
The point of a character arc, is that it is in fact, an arc shape. One who is morally unquestionable, fully kitted out and an infinite fountain of knowledge, cannot go through an arc. Give your character flaws. Be it a tendency towards befriending the wrong people, or a bad knee that frequently gives out at inopportune moments. It gives readers something to latch onto and empathise with. You can give your character exceptional capabilities at something, but it requires balance. She's a damn good pilot with no equal, but can't drive an SRV for peanuts. It can lead to some very interesting moments between characters, be it heartfelt or comedic.


Other Notes:
It should be noted that there can be exceptions to these points. For example, good grammar when a character is speaking is actually rare. Few people in real life actually speak with perfect eloquence after all. Or previously arranged actions during a fight scene, such as someone stumbling back after a punch. What's key to remember is context.

All in all, remember this is purely for fun. We have some seriously talented writers here, and others whose writing history starts and ends at high school. But many are willing to help out in whatever way they can. All it takes is that you ask nicely.

Also keep in mind that many people who RP here, also have logbook stories related to the character, or characters, they portray. If it looks like there's an "in joke" going on that you're unsure of, it's probably in those.

In fact, some users have even gone to the trouble of creating "alts" to RP with. If you read back far enough, it's usually pretty clear who has and hasn't, and which ones are the "alts". It's therefore not unheard of to see the apparent seizing of control of other characters. If you do spot one, point it out in the OOC section. If intervention is needed, it will be sorted quickly and (hopefully) politely.

Most, if not all RP participants here have Logbook stories pertaining to their character(s). These are for the reading pleasure of anyone who wishes to do so. While it can be useful to read them in order to gain a bit of backstory on a character you wish to interact with, it should not be assumed that your character shares that knowledge. Within the E:D Universe, these Logbooks either don't exist, or are private diaries kept by the characters. Either way, without explicit statements to say otherwise from the writer, your interactions should reflect that your character is in the dark about any information you, the writer/reader, have gained from reading the stories.
Falcon15e
09 Oct 2019, 1:21pm
The Sauvetage was a Atlas-class transport ship. The size itself rivaled that of the Conduit or even the larger military flag-ships. The ship itself could easily berth well over one thousand passengers not to mention the two-hundred fifty crew to serve them. The ship was so large that it was one of numerous vessels that no longer endured atmospheric flight. The mass simple couldn’t withstand gravity and most of the systems had been designed to provide an artificial environment in zero vacuum. Like modern cruise ships, they were meticulously engineered for their sole purpose: mass transport.

Smaller vessels, typically Anaconda-sized transport ships only fitted for larger passenger hauls would shuttle ships to and from the Sauventage to fill the berths and embark passengers. More affluent guests would often use private shuttles or their own ships to get to and from land-based ports. Marshaller’s worked efficiently and around the clock ensuring that the ship was ready and passengers were stowed prior to launch. The massive ships had three rotations of flight crews on board so one flight crew could fly while two rested. One crew would be back-up for the primary in case of illness or injury and aid in Astro-navigation or ship functions if commensurate with their rank. The third crew would rest. Each rotation was for eight hours.

Captain Egerton was the most senior crew member and had been flying massive space-faring vessels for the better part of 35 years. An older man in his early fifties, he had a shock of white, thinning hair eclipsing his crown and sharp features. He was also very fit and prided himself on his physical prowess. He was generally known as no-nonsense on duty but was also known as being a compassionate, professional Captain and treated his crew with geniality and kindness. As the stewards handled passenger berthing, Captain Egerton sat down with all three of his flight crews, each consisting of twelve officers in total; one shift Captain, and Executive Officer, two pilots, two Astro-navigators, two communication technicians, three engineering officers and a “floater” used for triage between the five stations and on-board service crew.  He sat now in the conference room just aft of the bridge at the head of a large table. His co-captains and their XO’s sat at the table while the other crew members milled about the room. One of the floater crew members placed a thick mug of steaming coffee down in front of him.

“Thank you Lieutenant Jeanine. Okay, this crew briefing is now in session. All sections report.”

Each shift Captain went through and announced that their crew was present and accountable. Captain Egerton turned to his XO.

“How are the crew rosters broken down?”

A young man in his late twenties with a crisp haircut cropping his dark hair and severe eyebrows stood, addressing the room with a data slate in hand.

“Sir, All crews present. Captain Strong, you’re crew is B shift and first up for back-up. Captain Carter, your shift is C shift and first on rest cycle. Captain Egerton, we’ll be A shift and first on helm. We have nine-hundred thirty-six passengers on board, one-hundred twenty of which are intensive care passengers.”

Captain Egerton turned to his XO, “Elton, I’ve told you time and again, please address me as Alan. Thank you much for the brief.” He turned to the rest of the crew members present, “Okay, everyone, we’re in a convoy of three Atlas class and numerous Anaconda and Clipper class ships. Our route of flight will take us from our current system to Maia. From there we’ll orbit accordingly while our ships run through the transit gates so that we may disembark our passengers. Johnston - right?” Egerton said indicating his Astro-navigation officer.

“Aye Sir, we’re looking at 15 jumps. Standard queue protocol with hydrogen scoops every 3 jumps. Time enroute including our queue time will be roughly 24 hours.”

Captain Egerton turned back to everyone else in the room, “Okay folks, I’ve already had a convoy brief with the other ships officers. We’ll remain here for another three hours taking on our guests and then we’ll be on our way. We’re getting escorts on this trip - from all accounts it appears to be roughly fifteen vessels comprised of mostly Cobra’s and a few Anacondas. They’ve been briefed to give way to us, we’ll have right-of-way but should we come under attack for any reason, their wing Commander will take Marshall authority of the convoy. Jenkins?”

“Aye Captain?” A pretty young Lieutenant with a well-tailored uniform and dark brunette hair tied up in a tidy bun stood.

“I’ve uploaded the appropriate frequencies and comms data to your station. I’ll leave it to you to distribute that amongst the other shifts. Okay people,” He spread his arms out on the table, “Any questions?”

Nobody said anything.

“Then to your stations A shift. Bravo shift, your on standby so you may relax while we finish boarding. Charlie shift, we’ll see you in approximately 16 hours just as we’re taking our queue for dock.”

Everyone shuffled out of the room, some remained milling about sipping coffee and discussing parts of the trip with their shift relief or friends.
Captain Egerton lithely raised up from the conference table seat and moved forward through the hatch to the bridge. He sat at the Commanding Officers chair while the rest of his crew filed into their duty positions, taking up consoles and going through various checks.

“Okay people, lets start our systems checks and get tertiary systems online. I want read-outs from your stations as soon as your up.”

Atlas-class vessels such as the Sauventage being the size of a city, often took several hours to start up. Much like an old-earth shipping freighter or cruise liner, Atlas ships were marshaled from their support stations by smaller “tug” vessels into open lanes. From there, all three ships would have to maneuver online and then the escort ships would check in. All this was scheduled to occur in four hours before their first jump was made. Egerton had worked with this company for fifteen of his thirty-five years piloting vessels and had standardized most of the crew-level training. He knew having the crew fully up on all systems within three hours was a tight timeline but well within their capabilities.

Eventually, over the course of two hours, each station had checked-in one-by-one as they finished their pre-flight tasks. Communications was running up to five nets between docking, tug-control and shipping lanes. Astro-navigation meticulously utilized a shared process of computer aided and human-verified interface to ensure their entire route was plotted down to meters. Fuel calculations were ran and verified with the computer. Engineering brought all six of the massive engines, numerous generators, FSD, life-support and nearly one-hundred fifty sub-systems online. The pilots themselves at the flight controls had a one-hundred fifty-six page checklist to run through. Built-in-Test (BIT) checks had to be managed on every moveable external control surface, engine output tests, over three-hundred maneuvering thrusters and Astro-navigation assisted standardized routing verified. The Executive Officer managed progress of each station, time-flow matrix and filed their flight plan. Finally, at the three hour mark, everything was set.

Captain Egerton finalized verifying the appropriate data, routes, convoy status, times, fuel onboard and proposed intake, manifests and passenger safety was complete and then turned to his crew.

“Beautifully done folks. Lets get this show on the road. Lieutenant Blake, take us out please.”

Lieutenant Blake, fresh from the Pilots Federation training academy and recently graduated from the Atlas course, sat in the right-hand chair. He was only twenty five with dark brown, short hair that he wore messy and had an intense glare. He looked like he should be doing holo-vid modeling instead of flying but he commanded excellent grades from the Pilots Academy and was therefore fast-tracked to Atlas’.

“Aye Commander.” Blake and his co-pilot moved their hands down to the Sauventages thrust levers, three large handles set out from the center console and slowly started to apply thrust.

His co-pilot announced, “Maneuver is online and nominal.”

Blake himself reported, “Copy maneuver, primaries are online and tugs have positive control. Vector checks please.”
Astro-navigation followed up curtly, “Vectors are good, airspace is clear and we’re on course.”

Captain Egerton spoke up, “Well done Blake, Command 50 meters please.”

“Commanding 50 meters.” Blake increased thrust while communications sent a digital command to the tugs for 50 meters a second on vectoring from the massive mother ship.

Egerton turned to Jenkins, “Communications, have the other vessels checked-in?”

Jenkins consulted her console data display, “Aye Commander, all vessels have checked in and courses are verified. We’ll be in position in one five minutes.

“Beautifully done Jenkins.” Egerton had done many interesting things in his course as a Vessel Captain but this assignment would be the most demanding. Very rarely were convoys of this size or complexity undertaken and those coveted positions of convoy Commander were even fewer but laid a sweet icing on the cake of an already illustrious career. With the aim to go out on top, Captain Egerton had tendered his retirement letter and at the conclusion of this trip, would forward it to management. His pension would be significant and enough to surprise his sole daughter with a full scholarship to a select, prestigious Imperial Medical University.

———————————-

Slowly, people started to file into the cozy dining room on the Hand. Kai, hair a rats nest of silver, stumbled forward kindly removing the cup of coffee from Silas’s hand. He looked down at his hand in apparent confusion, swearing there was a fresh mug there seconds earlier.

She let her hands linger on his forearm a little longer than usual. Raven, sitting hunched over his mug of coffee watched the exchange with raised eyebrows.

Lambast came through the hatch of the small dining room, tray full of plates and fresh food, eggs (real, not powder), bacon, fluffy pancakes and real fruit stacked up on the tray held out with her right arm and a carafe of orange juice in the other. Silas eyed her hard and exchanged a glance with Kai. He knew that she must have been in excruciating pain doing that but he dare not say anything. She had to do this for her. Raven had swapped his atypical hard glare with a dinner plate glare as the bacon was lowered gently down to the center of the table. He quickly started to meticulously stack pieces of bacon on his plate. His hand froze halfway in transit as Silas cleared his throat.

Raven lowered his hands to his lap, waiting impatiently for his gracious host. “Wait...” Silas said. “Where the hell is Echo?”

Raven now cleared his throat, “Erm, he’s been out working on the Arbiter since last night.”

Echo stood. “The hell? For six hours!”

He moved over to the porthole, “Hol, dorsal lights!”

The dorsal lights on the Python poured on illuminating the side of the Arbiter. Sure enough, Echo was floating in vacuum wearing a pressure suit dutifully working a specialized welder on the side of the Arbiter.

“Can you open comms Holly?”

Holly sighed, “I suppose.” A chirp indicated to Silas that the channel was open.

Silas announced, “Echo, those suits are only rated for an hour in vacuum, get your ass in here and get something to eat, that’s an order!”

Echo turned slowly raising his welding shield then giving a gesture like, “Okay, fine.”

Several minutes later, he was pulling the helmet off with the assistance of Raven who chewed absently on a piece of bacon.
“Told ya he’d be pissed.”

“Yeah, but I needed the jumpstart.”

Silas stormed into the passage. “Your freezing. What kind of stupid stunt was that?”

Echo glanced down to his boots, “Just felt I had to do something.”

Silas calmed a bit, “Okay, get in there and get some food in you.”

Sitting at the table everyone else started serving up and eating. Lambast finally came in carrying a thick wool blanket and wrapped it around Echo’s arms. She ruffled his hair as she walked around the back and took a seat next to him. She looked up, “Well, what are you all waiting for? Dig in. It’s the least I can do.”

After everybody had over-stuffed themselves and the plates had been cleared they sat around the table sipping coffee while Silas filled Lambast in on the rest of the story.

“So we’re going to go get these people right? Before an entire convoy can be slaughtered?” Lambast said as she sat her cup of tea down.

“Well, its not that simple.” Silas began. “None of our ships are outfitted to fight a Thargoid ship. Besides, trying to orchestrate any kind of coordinated defense would be near impossible with that many escort ships and on account of us being fugitives and all.”

“So what’s our options?” Kai asked after a moment of thought.

“Not a lot.” Silas finally answered.  

Raven sat straight up. “Wait....I might have an idea.”

—————————-

The convoy’s just completed their thirteenth jump and slowed to a stop as the other ships arrived and started to sequence in to scoop fuel. C shift had just conducted shift change on the helm and were only three jumps into their shift. They would make the final two after their fuel stop and then start the six hour process of docking all the ships in turn and disembarking passengers. For a short haul, the shift on hand would have just extended their duty day for sake of efficiency but with an operation this large, Captain Egerton was taking no chances.

Captain Carter monitored the the fuel intake via his engineering crew and verified that they still had all the ships in the convoy.
Abruptly Astro-navigation hailed Captain Carter.

A blond woman looked up at the helm. “Sir, we’re getting some abnormal indications on our scanners.”

Captain Carter stood. “What sort of abnormal indications, are we talking piracy?”

The blond looked up, a look of fear in her eyes, “No Sir. They’re...they’re not human.”

Space started to swirl and warp as stars twisted and turned. A deeper black than space emerged from the ether, petals glowed red as multiple ominous, lethal flowers emerged from the roiling ammonia. Slowly, they advanced on the convoy.

Last edit: 09 Oct 2019, 1:36pm
Khelan
10 Oct 2019, 4:44pm
Maul Montresor

"But listen to me venting to you about my bullshit. I haven't even congratulated you yet! I saw Omi's ring when we went to spar earlier. I'm happy for the two of you."


Khelan smiles at Maul.

"Cheers mate, it's something Ah shuda done two years ago instead of runnin aff intae the black but it gave me a bitty time tae chill oot an realise that Ah dinnae need tae resort tae violence everytime something or somewan pissed me aff. Ah also widnae have met ye an hid tae go back tae Hondo City so Ah guess yer responsible fur us getting back together an engaged. So Ah've goat ye tae thank fur that."

Khelan pulls the belt of his robe a bit tighter and re-ties it before yawning slightly.

"Leo, wit time is it?" he asks casually.

"Nighttime" replies Leo "I'd be able to tell you a lot more precisely if you had actually bothered to set the ships internal chronometer."

Khelan sighs and looks at Maul.

"Ah kinda asked fur that didn't Ah?" he asks.
Falcon15e
11 Oct 2019, 11:52am
Ridger picked up the sensor anomalies before the transports. He had employed a common tactic, staging two Anaconda’s either side of the formation and then establishing a diamond perimeter with the Cobra’s. He flew trail in another Anaconda at the back of the Convoy to maintain situational control. Far ahead of the convoy, at nearly 250 light seconds, a lone Cobra played scout, probing out the route for any potential adversaries that might impede the convoy’s progress. Ridger wasn’t unaccustomed to security convoys. It was how he made his money. Once a contract was posted, he would pick it up through his small company and then hire owner/operators through a tight-knit network of mercenaries. Contracts would be drawn up and the legalities would be signed off for a sufficient convoy escort. It was a process he had done for years and this job was no different. What was significantly different was that he had never encountered the illusive Thargoids before. The first indication of trouble was when the scout Cobra blipped out from the the sensors, their comm frequency turning to static.

He hailed the Sauventage, “Sauventage from the Retribution?”

The Comms officer on the Sauventage responded immediately, “Go ahead Retribution.”

Ridger adjusted the boom mic closer to his mouth. “We just lost our scout and we have multiple contacts from our forward elements. Non-human signal sources. Execute our break-up plan. I’m going to shift combat power forward to give you guys a shot to jump.”

Captain Carter responded this time, “Roger Retribution, we need more time to scoop fuel, we have hardly enough to make it to the first system.”

Captain Carter could hear the panic and sense the chaos in Ridger’s response. “Roger...make it quick Sauventage, I’m not sure how long we’re going to last out here.”

____________________

Raven quickly outlined his plan. They would swing into see Crazy Ivan. With an amount of persuasion and loan courtesy of Lambast’s considerable resources, they would be able to get Gauss weapons fitted to the ships and essential repairs completed. Ivan confirmed via secure message that he could have it done in 12 hours for a bonus.

Everyone turned to look at Lambast who shrugged, “Its better to save all those people than hoard a few million credits.”

From there, Kai was able to easily deduce a likely route the caravan would take to get to Maia and they could shadow the route and just be on the ready for any indications of the Thargoids showing up. Raven was pretty sure that by splitting up, Kai and Lambast could easily work on the Thargoids while Silas struck out on the fringe of the system to see if they could find and ships that might controlling the attack. The plan was spastic and full of holes. Raven shrugged, “I never said I was any good at making plans.”

Silas stood, “No, its a good effort and I think we can make it happen. Maybe at the least we can give those transports a shot to get to safety.”

Lambast pipped in, “Maybe but those Thargoids will likely be relentless. I’m not sure they would stop if their target jumped.”

Silas, ran a hand through his beard. “No, probably not. But if we irritate them enough maybe we can give the transports a lead. Either way, its the best shot we’ve got.”

Echo stuck his head into the room, “Bad news. Our timeline just got accelerated. Open distress call on all nets from an Atlas, the Sauventage. They’ve come under attack from multiple Thargoid vessels. They’re asking for any ships within range to assist.”

Everyone stood as one and started to prepare the hand for jump while Raven went over to the Arbiter to get it ready.

“Fuck there goes any chance for preparation.” Kai said as she settled into the cockpit chair of the Hand, quickly running through the start checks. Lambast came through cockpit door a few moments later. “Well, at least we’re not doing a lot of prep to see it wasted. Keeping things loose provides a measure of freedom.”

Kai looked at her, “What do you know? Keeping it loose is my specialty.”

Lamb rolled her eyes.

—————————————————————-

The Thargoids didn’t waste any time, within 3 kilometers to the convoy they started to engage. Swarms of drones peeled away from the larger interceptors and started to ruthlessly rake the Atlas transports. Smaller scouts quickly engaged the Cobra’s and were making quick work of them.

Ridger and his merc’s were well versed in fighting piracy although few of them had any experience fighting Thargoids and cohesion quickly fell apart. Cobra’s fell off line as the minutes ticked by, the scouts and interceptors swatting them out of the vacuum like flies. Ridger fought to keep his crew from panicking as he issued orders to attack the larger interceptors. For the most part, the interceptors completely ignored the escorts, focusing most of their firepower on the larger Atlas ships.

On the Sauventage, panic had broken out amongst the ship. Egerton was on the bridge within minutes of the attack. Captain Carter took up the XO Position while Captain Egerton took the bridge. Although a transport pilot, Captain Egerton had earned his training in the Imperial Navy and quickly started to issue orders.

“Cease fuel scooping immediately, adjust power reserves to shields, bring weapons online and return fire! Focus on those swarms!”

His engineering officer spoke up, “Sir if we cease fuel scooping we won’t be able to jump!”

Egerton shot the engineering officer a stare, “Dammit Lieutenant, if we don’t stop fuel scooping there won’t be a ship to jump. Do it!”

The three Atlas ships lumbered into an open formation, attempting to spread their footprint out amongst the void. They didn’t want to bunch up so they wouldn’t be a single target. The comms officers worked furiously trying to coordinate evasive maneuvering amongst the three vessels while the escorts swarmed the convoy trying to pull the Thargoids away from the larger ships. Some of the Cobra’s didn’t hesitate, jumping to hyper space shortly after the attack commenced. The few that remained fought hard but with futility.  

Ridger made a daring run on the interceptor closest to the convoy, “Adjust shields forward and bring all hard points to bear on that interceptor!” His engineering officer responded quickly, shifting the power reserves.

“Hard points online, ready to fire Sir!” His engineering officer called out.

“Blow them to hell!” Ridger said, leaning forward in his cockpit chair. Crimson energy pierced out into the darkness at the lethal starburst ahead of them. Munitions and beam energy sizzled out, uselessly against the shielding and hull of the Thargoid craft.

Engineering checked his console, “Sir, it appeared to have no effect.”

Ridger sat back. “Oh shit.” The black craft swiveled slowly, turning the large ship to face the offending Anaconda. A black eye at the center stared back as the petals started to glow ominously red. A surge of energy and the Anaconda vaporized in a cloud of fire, molten titanium and atomized gas.

“Escorts are falling quickly!” Captain Carter reported to Egerton.

“I see that Captain Carter.” Egerton responded to his XO. He looked out amongst the bridge to his crew. “Ladies and Gentlemen, we’ve fought hard but I fear this may be our last trip. It has been an honor to serve with all of you.”

The Sauventage co-pilot turned in his chair, “Sir! New ships on sensors! We have re-enforcements!”

————————————————-

“Holly, no fucking around, when we drop, drop us in hot, I want hard points and full shields, any additional pips put into engines but keep me stacked on weapons. Power up our limpet controller and be prepared to deploy repair limpets on the transports as we skate by.”
Kai said as she commanded her seat restraints to tighten.

Holly, all business responded, “Aye Commander.”

Kai opened the comms channel. “Hey Darling, Hand here, I’m not messing with covert. Feds be damned. I’ll keep this channel open so we can coordinate.”

Silas responded back, “Good thinking, we can handle any additional threats if we survive.”

Kai focused ahead, “You better.”

The two vessels dropped out of witch space on top of the star and the sensors immediately went melt-down with the pings off the Atlas distress call. Kai adjusted course and prepared the Hand to drop.

“You ready Sis?”

Lambast looked up from her console. “As ready as I’ll ever be.”

Both ships skipped out of super cruise two kilometers astern of the Transports. They shone silver in the reflection off the star. Debris and clouds of ammonia swarmed the open vacuum surrounding the Atlas ships. Kai felt the re-assuring thud of the hardpoints deploying followed by the cascade of pings to indicate Holly shifted power priorities as directed.

“Sauventage, this is the Hand of Lambast, we’re on station. Give us a SITREP.”

A female voice crackled back in her ear, “Hand this is Sauventage, our shields are failing and hull.......67....percent....critical. Any help appreciated.”

“Roger that Sauventage.” Although Kai hadn’t ever encountered a Thargoid or even really believed in them, she followed the intercept reports with rapt fascination. She knew the Python would be handicapped with any longitudinal maneuvering so she would stick primarily to head-on hit-and-run attacks, keeping her profile low.

A male voice crackled in her her ear. “Hand this is Captain Egerton, stay away from those drones, they’re inflicting a lot of damage!”

Kai keyed her microphone. “Roger Captain, we’re not outfitted for this and in bad shape as it is. We’ll do what we can and try to get you some room to escape.”

Captain Egerton’s voice responded. “Thank you Hand.”

Kai piloted the Python violently, diving down on the nearest interceptor. She got the ship to within two kilometers and then triggered all the weapons. A flood of red super-charged plasma jetted out toward the alien vessel. She pulled the Python up onto the right wing and peeled hard away from the death flower and the Atlas. The Thargoid took a brunt of the firepower and turned away from the Atlas, tracking the smaller Python. A swarm of drones, previously raking the Atlas somehow got the order, shifting course to intercept the Python.

Kai could make out the swarm in her peripheral vision but was blind on the interceptor. She made a quick mental calculation and jinked the Python back left, pulling the nose flat through the turn attempting to turn into the Swarm. “Holly, set warheads to 1.5 clicks and fire!”

Twin concussion missiles lept from the Python and tracked toward the swarm. The swarm made an instantaneous ninety-degree turn, cutting inside the Python. “What the hell!” Kai exclaimed as she yanked the Python back away from them. The concussion missiles tracked true and wiped out half of the swarm. The other half followed her turn at in-human speed, raking her hull as they shot past.

Klaxons went off in the cockpit as Holly started to read back the damage report, “LAMB SHUT HIM UP!” Kaisla yelled in the small cockpit. A moment later, the klaxons and Holly ceased.

The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end as the swarm broke off its second run and propelled back into the black. Out of primal instinct, Kai kicked off the flight assist and twisted the stick hard, sliding the Python through a skidding turn. The nose came around staring at the center of the eye on an interceptor a mere 500 meters off the nose. Lambast froze in wonderment at the close encounter. Kaisla fired. The interceptor, retaliated, assailing the cockpit with a spectrum of colors and turned, as a shockwave blossomed from its core. The Hand shook violently and then all systems died, leaving the ship dead in the water. Kaisla, for the first time, started to panic, bile rising in her throat.

The interceptor erupted in a cloud of fire as several percussion missiles and tendrils of gauss plasma struck the petals. Again, a light show flickered along the hull of the alien vessel and it directed it attention at the new target. A drop ship tore into the firefight, positioning itself between the alien ship and the Hand.

The comms crackled to life, “Leftenant, we haven’t long get your vessel back online, we need the firepower.”

Lambast scrambled to re-energize the Hand after the EMP shot.

“Who the fuck are these guys?!” Kai exclaimed as she turned in her seat to look at Lamb.

“Friends.” Was all Lamb answered. Quickly, Holly initiated a start-up override, surging all the systems on the Hand and quickly rocketing the ship up to 130% heat by rapid-booting everything at once. The power grid on the ship suffered and just as quickly as the systems booted, they faded. With another hiccup, the Hand woke up fully, sensors and HUD interfaces glowing Orange.

Lamb looked up at Kaisla, “You have weapons control.”

Kai fired. The Drop ship fired. The first interceptor erupted in a yellow ball of gas and biological hull fragments as the interceptor tore apart.

“Holy shit.” Was all Kai could say.

—————————————————

The Arbiter skipped through the system in a sweeping arc, Echo adjusting the sensor parameters on the fly.

“Anything yet?” Silas inquired.

“Nothing yet,” Echo responded, still focused on his sensor panel.

“I hope Kai and Lamb are doing okay.” Silas mused from his chair. He didn’t like this plan but he knew Kai was lethal at the controls of a star ship and daren’t challenge her prowess even against the alien invaders.

Raven looked up and motioned to Echo. “Yo, got something. It appears to be a Corvette hanging out over by that asteroid field. Looks like its trying to hide in the gravitational shadow of that small moon.”

“Heat?” Asked Silas from the cockpit chair.

“Negative boss. Its running cold. I was only able to see it from the RF pulse frequencies. It looks like its watching the battle pretty closely.” Raven said tapping the panel.

“That’s kind of a weird thing to do when three innocent transports are getting smoked.”

Echo looked up, “Very weird.”

————————————————————————

Two more interceptors were closing on the three Atlas vessels and forming a perimeter, hearding the three ships closer.

The drop ship and Python maneuvered closer, readying their attack runs.

“One at a time or should we hit them both and count on over-whelming them?” Kai broadcasted to the Drop Ship.

“Negative Hand, we don’t have enough individual fire-power to handle both simultaneously. We might have to accept losing a ship but we must attack united or we won’t bring them down.”

“Copy that.” Kai responded as she adjusted the Python’s weapons systems.

“Hit-and-run tactics like you were doing before. Hit the interceptor, we’ll focus on the swarm with our Gauss cannons. Make your runs at 2 kilometers, then back out to three in case they blast an MP charge. The petals will start to shift color the more you hit the ship. If it starts to shed petals, then we’re getting near but it will just get more pissed.”

Kai started her attack run, “How the hell do these guys know this?” She yelled at Lamb over the weapons firing.

“Practice!” Lamb responded as she worked furiously to manage the weapons stores and re-enforce the Hand’s shielding.

As both interceptors turned to face the Python, Kai saw the Sauventage split from the group and strike out toward the interceptor.

Kai triggered her microphone, “Sauventage, what are you doing?”

Captain Egerton responded, “Giving you and the other ships a fighting chance.”

The last of the escape pods jettisoned out of the Sauventage and four shuttles burned hard away from the massive vessel toward the nearest of the Atlas ships.

Captain Carter turned to shake the Commander’s hand, “Sir, last of the passengers are off on the last shuttle. Only essential crew remain aboard. Its been an honor serving with you.”

Egerton stood from his chair, returning the man’s hand shake before saluting the rest of his crew. “And for me, it has been an honor to serve with all of you on this, my final flight.”

With that, the Sauventage rammed the nearest interceptor. The alien vessel went spectral in color as the petals rapidly charged through a light show. It turned bearing all of its rage against the massive Sauventage. The pilot fought hard, bringing the massive ship around for another ramming attempt. On the final run, the Sauventage managed to tear a thorny petal from the interceptor, causing it to spiral out away from the other two Atlas transports before it focused all of its firepower on its assailant. As the blast started to charge, both pilots bore the throttles to full, lining up their final run. The Sauventage exploded in a bloom of fire that ripped a hole in space-time, eclipsing the light of the nearby star. In a shockwave of brilliant white, the ship erupted like a collapsing star, taking the nearest interceptor and any remaining scouts with it.

Shields on the other Atlas ships fell instantly as the ships were shoved away from the shockwave. Three of the four shuttles made it into the docking bay before the blast hit, vaporizing the fourth. The Hand and the Dropship tumbled away from the last interceptor as their systems failed and shields went offline. The Arbiter was just about to jump the hidden Corvette when the bloom illuminated the craggy asteroid field, glinting light off the lone ship.

Silas craned in his chair, “Holy fuck! What was that?”

“One of the transports going up?” Raven suggested.

Echo craned to see the expanding bloom of light, “We HAVE to go back for the girls!”

Silas focused his resolve on the Corvette. “Focus Echo, else their sacrifice will be in vain.”

Last edit: 11 Oct 2019, 12:01pm
Maul Montresor
14 Oct 2019, 9:11pm
Khelan"Ah kinda asked fur that didn't Ah?" he asks.


Maul grins and nods.

"I suppose you did."

He puts his hands in his jacket pockets and walks towards the door.

"Well, I reckon I've bothered you enough. You should go get some rest. I'll be in my cabin if anything comes up."

He presses the button to open the door and turns around back around to Khelan.

"You know, you and Omi really do deserve some peace and happiness, now more than ever. If you figure out who was behind that assassination attempt back there, you let me know. Those bastards will pay for it."

He turns and exits the cargo bay, heading back to his cabin.
Lambast Mercy
14 Oct 2019, 10:57pm
Captain Trent stood up and moved to the front of the cockpit and saluted the two women in the Python opposite and then turned around and addresses his subordinates. Anna Rice, his navigation officer already had a sly smile on her face.
Trent lent on the coms panel.

“Good work people, that’s a few more bugs on the windshield and a lot of lives saved. As for the fugitives.. .”

The young Lieutenant, Junior Grade new to Trent’s crew raised his hand and interrupted his Captain. He hadn’t been in the cockpit when they first met the Hand.

“Sir, you’re leaning on the open coms sir, your broadcasting to everyone sir"

The captain tilted his head and furrowed his brow.

“Are you taking a jab at my advanced years or just happy interrupting a superior officer Lieutenant Junior Grade?”

Lieutenant Banto put his hand down and leaned a little to look at the ship opposite. The long-haired woman seemed to be waving at him. His captain shifted a little to block his view and continued.

“As for the fugitives,” he said giving Banto a look “it’s a shame we lost them in the fight. With all the escape pods and debris floating around it’s going to be almost impossible to find them”

Lieutenant Banto leaned even further to see pasted his Captain. The Long haired woman was waving like she was ground crew signaling to a landing craft, and the other one was putting one finger to her lips in a shushing motion.

“But sir, it's right there” said Banto pointing at the Hand. Rice covered her mouth to stifle a laugh, but she couldn’t stop her shoulders bouncing. “You saluted them a moment ago sir”

The captain rolled his eyes.

“Let me tell you about the ship we’re looking for. The thing about the Hand Banto, it’s main distinguishing feature, is it black. And the thing about space, the colour of space, your basic space colour, is it's black. So how we supposed to it?”

Banto’s jaw dropped open in confusion. He looked at the dorsal lights of the Hand lighting up its name and ID code. He could see quite clearly into the well-lit cockpit where two white haired women were face palming. Banto looked imploringly at his captain. He had a lot to say but the lack of logic from his commanding officer had broken his ability to respond. Rice decided to fill the silence.

“Sir. I saw the cowards flee as soon as they got power back. No spine for a stand up fight criminal type’s sir”

Trent snapped his fingers and pointed at Rice.

“That’s it Rice, that’s exactly what happed. Good think.., I mean well spotted Rice. No point in anyone looking for the Hand because it's gone. Now, let’s aid the rescue effort”

Trent released the open com and took his seat.

Banto concentrated on his station. He wasn’t entirely confidant they had returned to the right real space after chasing the Corvette. He seemed to be in a reality where he was the only person that could see black fugitive ships.

************

“What a nice man. I’ll have to see if I can’t find him after all this.” Said Lambast.

“Very nice man” agreed Kai “Let’s save some lives” Kai opened coms. ” Atlas fleet, this is Hand of Lambast. We will be looking for survivors without pods moving in a clock wise spiral from current location”

Lambast nodded to Kai and double checked her REMLOK and mag boots as she left for the cargo scoop. She turned back in the door way.

“Kai, it’s alright you know? I peed myself a little when I first got shut down by the Thargoid and I wasn’t even in combat. Your colour is already coming back sis”

“Pfft! I wasn’t scared. Dead sticking a deadly alien enemy in a dead ship?  I call that Tuesday morning. Get out of here” smiled Kai.
It was a lie, it was also nice to know Lamb had noticed and took time to reassure her.

Kaisla’s skill with the stick smoothly delivered every person into Lambast waiting arms, even with the Hand’s misfiring manoeuvring thrusters and wonky main engine. Unfortunately, Lamb had to find a place for the bodies. It took almost ten minutes until the Hand had found someone alive. He was a young pilot from the escort wing and Lambast had to pry herself from his embrace after she had caught him on the cargo ramp.

She took him to a gust room and ordered him to stay in that room until he had gathered himself and could make himself useful. She knew he wouldn’t be of any use, she’d seen that face before. He was deep in shock so she gave him a sedative and contacted Kai.

“I need to prepare the infirmary and guest berths. Give me three minutes Kai”

“Roger that Lamb, I got one incoming now, I’ll be gentle.”

After Lamb had quickly tidied away any belongings left out by the boys, she jogged back to the cargo scoop.  On the way she ran into a man looking bewildered but grateful. He was a civilian from a pod that had been hit by the explosion and cracked open. His eyes were full of tears but they were tears of joy. He was still too unsteady to be of any real use, so Lamb sent him to the Galley to make hot drinks. People were going to need something to concentrate on. Lambast wished she was a better pilot, Kia would be great at dealing with shocked and bewildered people. The rescues had been bad news until now, she had avoided answering Kai’s questions about the people she had scooped, but now she had something positive to report. She clipped on her safety line and contacted her friend.

“I’m back on the scoop. We got a couple of thank yous Kai, keep going”

“Good to know Lamb. Another in forty seconds, get ready”

A flickering light on her right caught Kai’s attention. It was a line of people being led by a person in a space flight suit.

“Holly, give me starboard spots buddy”

“Starboard lights only on exterior illumination Ms Delana”

Kai responded to the distant figure with the same pattern of lights to let them know they had been spotted. She wanted to go get them now, there looked to be five to eight people connected together, but she was going to stick to her search pattern. She’d be able to get them on her next swing out that way.  She was finding it hard to concentrate. The coms panel was alive with panicked sobbing voices from pods and REMLOKed survivors all begging for help. She was doing her best to respond, work out the position being shouted at her, remember them and fly, but she had to let Holly take over answering the pleas for help. It took a harder hart than she had to kill a channel and reassure the next person help was on the way.

Lambast was running between the infirmary and the cargo scoop, but she didn’t let in interfere with Kai’s rescues. She checked in to ask Kai f the lads had made contact yet. Kaisla could hear Lamb was out of breath, but not just from rushing about. Her ribs and fingers must be hurting with all that work. Kai kept checking on the train of people as soon as they came back into view. The leader was looking for anyone else in the area to add to the train. As the Hand approached them, the leader gave Kai a thumb’s up. She waved back and lifted the Hand’s nose while sliding around to deliver the line right into the scoop.

“You got a big one coming Lamb, brace ya self. Looks like a dozen strong people train”

After a long moment, Lambast answered.

“Last one’s in Kai. I’ll be in the infirmary, you’ll have to take it easy until I can get the scooped maned again. I’ll be as quick as I can”

“Roget that Lamb, moving to the next pick up”

The door to the cockpit opened, Kai glanced round to see a man carrying a tray with mugs on it.

“Um’ hi. You want a coffee or tea at all”

“Man, I could murder a bourbon. Hey, you any good with scanners and coms?”

“Er, I didn’t..  I mean I only made coffee and tea and I’m a, well was a shelf stacker. Sorry”

“It’s ok dude, just stick a coffee in the cup holder and get back down the living quarters. Lamb must be overwhelmed”

The guy gingerly put a cup in the holder in front of Kai and lingered beside her.

“Look I just want to say.. “

Kai turned a friendly face towards him. He was an older guy with thinning hair and a portly body. His face was haunted, but he was keeping it together.

“Happy to man. Thanks for the coffee, now if you would clear the bridge unless your gonna man the coms, that would be a great help”

He turned and left while Kai continued to the next area along the path Holly had highlighted for a pick up. Internal coms opened again. Kai’s was surprised to hear a number of voices in the back ground while Lamb spoke. Lamb was saying something about* help* and *a few moments* before she raised her voice in her angry mother tone. Silence prevailed for a few seconds while Lamb sighed, then a child stared to wail.

“Oh, by the Crown, I’ll be back the at scoop shortly Kai. Has EC or the lads called?” Lamb killed the coms.

Sounded like Lambast had her hands full too. Before she could answer, the cockpit door opened again and Kai herd the cup tray rattle. Kai could do without a civilian cluttering up the cockpit, so keeping her voice friendly she shooed the man from the cockpit again.

“I’m good for coffee man and I really don’t need you here right now, Ok?”

A younger more confidant voice than she was expecting answered her.

“Ma’am, your Captain sent me here to assist you”

Kai turned to see who just spoke. A tall dark haired man in with officer’s insignia on his deck suit gave her a thumb’s up. The same as the guy leading the people train in the space flight suit. Kai didn’t know him, but he somehow looked familiar.

“Oh, it’s the heroic space ranger, and she ain’t my Captain pal. Now, what can you do to assist me officer?”

The man took the co-pilots seat and started fine-tuning the scans for life signs.

“Ma’ma, if you don’t mind me saying so, I think that woman is everybody’s Captain. I was Astro-navigation officer aboard the Sauventage. Call me Dan, and eternally grateful. I can operate everything you got on this Python. Adjusting scans for life signs, prioritising for alive but unresponsive along a standard clock wise search path”

He awaited approval from Kai. She nodded approvingly to him.

“Officer Dan Eternally Grateful, you got the coms as well. We got a lot of panicking people that could do with a reassuring voice”

Kai and Dan Grateful hardly had time to share a word. He was constantly on the coms and Kai concentrated on gently delivering survivors to Lambast and her makeshift cargo crew. Even Lambast had stopped updating Kai to leave her to the task in hand other than occasionally asking if the lads had called. After about half an hour, the rescue teams started to arrive and Kai was happy to relinquish control of the retrieval effort to a professional with plenty of experience in the field. It didn’t change the work load much, but it was easy to follow orders in a coordinated group, than trying to handle coordinating with a bunch of well-meaning amateurs.

Ships better equipped took over the hunt for people that didn’t make it to a pod leaving Lambast free to make space for survivors that were starting to fill the Hand. Healthy volunteers guided the pods Kai was now scooping into storage, and released people that couldn’t or wouldn’t stay put. Not all the pods put people to sleep.

The portly guy with the tea tray had visited Kai and Dan every hour on hour with a fresh cup, and last time cheese and pickle sandwiches. Kai found herself watching the clock waiting for the next visit when there was a loud thump on the door and the sound of men shouting. A second bang made Dan stand up.

“Not your Captain took my side arm, and my boot knife.. . .and spaced them”

Kai nodded, that was a perfectly sensible move on Lambs part.

“Hol, open weapon locker B”

A panel beside Dan slid open revelling a long narrow recess with a fair number of weapons to choose from. Dan ignored the numerous blades and reached for a pistol. Something in a mag strap on the bottom of the recess made Dan question Kai.

“Are those bricks? Why are bricks in a weapons locker?”

Kai wasn’t inclined to explain her friends need to be extra blunt on occasion, and diverted the inquiry.

“Pass me a pistol, I’ll back you up if ya need it”

Dan passed Kai a pistol and waited for her to check it before opening the door.  

“BACK AWAY OR I OPEN FIRE”

Dan pushed back a large guy in leather with dreads that looked like a pirate and, covered another man in a ship security uniform kneeling beside a tear steaked guy he was restraining. The pirate backed off with raised hands and Dan shut the door.

“So’right son” rumbled the pirate looking guy “This bloke just wants uz ta go back an look for his kin. You can understand his disposition right?”

Dan held the pistol on him, the pirate smiled and indicated the security officer behind him.

“Arnie and me, I’m Dave by the way, were sent ‘ere by the Rear Admiral to guard the cockpit just in case sommink like this ‘appened”

Dan lowered his weapon.

“Right, thanks guys. Be gentle with him, it’s gotta be tough”
Dan crouched down to talk to the man.
“Sir, there are over fifteen ship out there now, and that number is growing. Everyone that can be found will be found, I promise you. Now go back down and assist where you can, if you can. Ok?”  

Dan got up and turned to get back to work, but Dave tapped him on the shoulder.

“Oi mate, don’t spose I could ‘ava that pistol could I? The Rear Admiral stuck a knife up me nose and featened ta space me if I didn’t give ‘er all me weapons. She even got me ‘old out I stuck up me sleeve”

Dan raised an eye brow at Dave.

“David, I don’t want to get on her wrong side. You can have a weapon, when she says you can have a weapon”

Dave thought about this for a moment and had to agree with Dan’s assessment.

“Right ya sir. We’ll get muggins ‘ere tucked away nicely and be back on guard toot sweet sir”

Dave attempted a salute with both hands and settled on a conspiratorial wink.

“Right, well thank you Dave” Dan pressed the Cockpit intercom “Kai, its Dan Grateful”

The door slid open and Dan saw Kai peering round her seat with the pistol pointed at him. She got back to flying when she saw it was safe.

“We got guards now. A pirate and a ship security officer. Oh, and not your Captain has been promoted”

Kai lined up another pod while Dan got back to work on the sensors.

“Trust Lamb to sort out a shit show and make it run smooth. She must be loving it”
Kai had a rethink. Lambast surrounded by disorganised panicking people all trying to get her attention. Well, she hadn’t heard screaming or explosions, so it must at least be going ok. A few minuets later the door opened again. A hostess trolley followed by the portly guy entered.

“Um Commander, the Captain asked me to give you this”

“She’s NOT my Captain” Growled Kaisla. She saw the bottle of Bourbon in the man’s hand. “But you are a god damn hero, gimmi that”

Kai was about to take the bottle when she had second thoughts.

“Actually, just put a shot in a glass. No, a double. Wait, make that a double double. Ok, just a generous half a glass and no more. I’m flying here. Would you like a wee nip Dan?”

Dan was smiling at the one way exchange, enjoying the man’s reaction and Kai’s almost hypnotised concentration on the bottle.

“I’ll take a measure in a black coffee please Adam”

Adam had no glasses, but Kai didn’t mind a mug instead. He also left a few rolls with green stuff sticking out of them on the dash and left. The search continued for another couple of hours and then the targets with a positive life reading became few and far between. Lambast hailed Kai again, probably to ask if the lads had called yet.

“Kai.. SHUT UP you damn annoying spod”

“Hey now, you called me. What the hells a spod?”

“Sorry Kai, not you. Has Mr. Cousland or the.. .. GET your sticky face off my leg you disgusting creature!.. or the lads called?”

Kai shared a confused look with Dan.

“No Lamb, they haven’t, and frankly I’ve been to buys to worry about it, until now. You know how good they are, they’ll be fine. Lamb, have we been picking up pets?”
The com’s remained dead for a while.
“Lamb?”
Dan got up and checked his side arm and was about to leave when Lamb finely answered.

“Yes we have and the ugly little waist of air won’t leave me be”

Kai had a think. Lamb, despite what she wanted people to think was a closet animal lover. Only one thing could make Lambast that annoyed and not get stabbed.

“Lambast Mercy. Are you shouting at a child we have rescued?”

Another long pause on the com.
“…. No”

“Lambast, you be nice to the kid find a responsible adult, preferably female to look after him or her. HIM or HER. Children are NOT things”

“Alright. I know. God!” Lamb turned off the com.

Dan caught Kai’s attention.

“So, Lambast. Not one of life’s natural mothers I take it?”

“No Dan Grateful, she is not. She has a pet name for children. A shower of barstard. Coming from a woman that usually avoids cursing, that says a lot.

The Hand worked without stopping for another few hours until Lambast, being deliberately calm, called.

“Kai, we’re to the brim down here. We can’t take another pod.”

Lamb sounded deeply tired, and Kai had been rubbing her eyes for a while now as well. A good reason to stop was more than welcome.

“Copy Lamb. What’s our inventory, I’ll contact rescue control once I got numbers”

Lambast told Kai what she asked for but she wasn’t ready for the number of dead. Kai took a moment to compose herself.

“I know darling” said Lambast “I feel it too.. .If that repugnant little paw touches me there again, I will crush it in a door”

Lambasts unique form of childcare brightened Kai’s spirits after the bad news.

“Got it Lamb. I’ll come down and relive you once we’re landed. Promise” Kai turned off the com. “Dan, could you talk to rescue control and advise them we’re at capacity and need to land please?”

“Ay ay Not Lambat’s Subordinate, consider it done”

“Smooth Dan Grateful, ya learning how things are done around here”

“Copy Hotel Lima Mike Seven Five. We saw your thruster and engine problems and have to say that’s some damn fine flying considering the state of your ship.  You’re clear for landing on the Asclepius, pad Zero Four. Ground crew standing by. Thank you Hand of Lambast, you earned some down time. Rescue control out”

“You got that Kai? It’s the one with the big red cross on it” Dan said with a smile.

“Don’t get smart with me sonny Jim. Lambast is defiantly in the mood to space someone, and that could easily be you”

“Back up, just messin. No need to call out the big guns. Seriously Kai, thank you. I wasn’t on the bridge of the Sauventage when the Thargoids attacked, but I know if you and that Dropship didn’t show up when you did, things would have been different. A lot of people owe you guys and the escort wing that didn’t run their lives. Your hero’s today. Really, thank you”

“Alright pal, enough with the touchy feely. You ain’t getting a kiss. But it is nice to get a thank you. We’ve been on the run for a while now. We almost forgot how it feels to be a welcome sight”

Kai put the Hand down gently, but somehow a bit of outer hull and a manoeuvring thruster fell off. Kai got up with Dan and headed for the cargo hatch but she didn’t get far. Dave and Arnie did their best to hold people back, but everyone that saw Kai’s white hair wanted to shake her hand and thank her.  It would have been better if so many people didn’t think she was Lambast, but it was still nice if somewhat daunting. Dan told Kai he was going to help guide people off the ship and report for a debriefing.

“Hey Kai, find me when ya rested. I wanna know what really happened on Vuia Survey. I don’t believe you guys killed over a hundred security and blew a hole in the station to escape. Deal?”

All Kai could do was give him a thumb’s up as the crowd gathered round her. Eventually, Kai made it down to Lambast. She was having the same attention paid to her. Even her cold death gaze wouldn’t put off everyone that wanted to thank her. Kai noticed Lambast was sporting a fat lip and a thigh mounted snot monster. She decided to hang back until Lambast was almost alone. Her friend looked ready to drop, but she held her usual stately manor none the less.

Eventually, all that was left was Lambast, the slime faced kid and a friendly looking nurse at the head of a pair of porters and a gurney trying to tempt the child away form a frustrated Lambast. Kai activated her wrist recorder and walked over.

“How about that weather Lamb. Shure glad that’s over”

“Kai, get the vile little Imp off me”

Kaisla put her hands on her hips and then wagged a finger at Lambast.

“Lambast Mercy. That is not an imp, he is a six year old boy that is scared out of his wits”

The little boy tugged on Lambasts now dirt-stained waistband and mumbled something to Lambast while he licked stuff off his finger that had dribbled out of his nose.

“What do you want now" The boy mumbled again "What did you say, speak up?”

“I said tell her I’m not six, I’m seven” squeaked the boy peering out from behind Lambasts leg at Kaisla.

“No one cares you leech-like pest. If you don’t get off me now, you won’t make it to eight”

The boy looked up with loving eyes and laughed a generous helping of green snot on to Lambasts knee.

“Kai, you promised you’d get this thing off me”

"Lamb, I don't think I can help. He's scare and your natural motherly ways make him feel safe. I think ya better adopt him"

Lambast rocked back like Kai had just slapped her really hard.

"Kai, that is quite possibly the most evil thing you have ever said to me. Get. It. Off. Me. NOW!"

Kai put her finger in her ear

“Oh, sorry Lamb, the umm.. fleet maximum general .. .leader guy is calling. I gotta take this”
Said Kai backing off down the ramp

“Kaisla Delana! You haven’t even got a coms unit on.. .. are you videoing this?”

Kai held the lens up to capture the full fury of a child trapped Lambast as Kai retreated. She activated her REMLOK helmet and mimed to Lambast that she just couldn’t hear what Lamb was saying any more and shrugged an apology. Kai picked up the pace when Lamb started to change colour and give chase as best she could with a blob of human-shaped snot clinging to her leg.

Lambast was a problem Later Kaisla could deal with, right now a hot meal and a warm bed and a massage from Si saying he was alright was all Kai wanted.

Last edit: 15 Oct 2019, 1:45pm
EvilCreamsicle
15 Oct 2019, 4:47am
Falcon15eSilas focused his resolve on the Corvette. “Focus Echo, else their sacrifice will be in vain.”


Echo rubbed his eyes, but the bright colored spot where he had been staring at the bright explosion wouldn't leave his vision.

"Raven, get down to the fighter. We're going to..." Silas began, but stopped as he was interrupted by the temperature alarm, followed immediately by the ship shaking and creaking with a low rumble. Looking down, he saw that it had spiked to 93%, but was now falling.

He surmised it was the shockwave from the explosion.

As the rumble died down, Raven headed out of the bridge, securing his helmet.

"Corvette just popped onto scanners. Heat wave must've been too much for him running silent." Echo said.

Silas shifted in his chair to get comfortable, and in the zone for a dogfight.

"Echo, what kind of shape are we in?"

"I patched up what I could, man, but our left main thruster got knocked around pretty hard, as well as a few of the maneuvering thrusters from flapjacking the Hand. Try to stick to left banks as much as possible to keep the strain off it, and do NOT go full pips to engines unless we're really in the shit."

Silas takes a deep breath and sighs, but otherwise says nothing.

"Loaded and ready to launch, boss!" came Raven over the comms.

"Alright, let's do it bud." Silas says, launching the Guardian fighter.

At this point, the Corvette must have seen them. Silas' hud notified him that the target was deploying its hardpoints, and he could see the contrails as it boosted, swinging its rear end around to make a direct joust at the Arbiter. At the same time, it appeared to launch two fighters from it's belly.

EC leveled his power distribution, shields forward, with enough energy for a joust run and being careful not to overload that thruster.

"Jesus, are you really going to do this?" Echo asked. It was too late for an answer. The shields lighting up cast a soft blue glow into the bridge as the multicannon rounds began bouncing off of it, followed by three intense energy beams piercing the black with a brighter blue light.

Silas answered back, opening up with the Arbiter's stark white beam and pulse lasers. Then came the roar of the class 2 multicannons after they had spun up.

He tried to roll right, to skip between the Corvette's beams, but the maneuvering thrusters couldn't make it happen. The Arbiter took a direct hit from one of the beams for a full second before he realized his gaffe and reversed his roll to the much-more-responsive left.

This was going to be a problem.

Blasting past the Corvette, he flipped the nose up to make another pass at it.

"Raven, how we doing?"

"Shut up." was his only reply.

Raven was too busy for conversation. He was doing a great job distracting the fighters from the Arbiter, but he had his hands full fending two of them off. Every time he could get a line on one, the other would have a bead on him. He was just able to get off one shard cannon volley before he had to dip out and try to change targets.

As the Corvette tried to loop around, Silas fired the vertical thrusters and dipped the nose to stay out of his firing arc, while keeping it in his sights.
He managed to get a good salvo of laser and lead on target, putting a dent in the shielding, but the Corvette was really shield tanked.

At this point Raven finally got around on the second fighter long enough to bombard him with another shard volley, ripping through the fighter and causing it to explode.

"One down." He radioed.
At this point he realized he wasn't being tailed. Shit, where had the other gone?
Checking his sensors, he could see it had broken off to make a run on the Arbiter.

"Inbound guys! Check sensors!" he shouted to the Arbiter, swinging around to give chase.

"Shit, Creamy!"
"I see it." Silas said. He was pissed that he had to break off of the Corvette, and that came through in his voice. He rolled left and pulled the Arbiter's nose up to get away from the fighter just in time to see its plasma fire whizzing past the bottom of the canopy.

The fighter broke off again as Raven caught up and sent some shards his way, but the damage was done, the Corvette was able to use the opportunity to get behind them.

Silas reversed his roll and tried to pull the Arbiter to the right, but the ship was sluggish. The lights in the cockpit flickered as the damaged thrusters strained to do what he was demanding of them.

Silas could see the various beam lasers from the Corvette dancing around them. Just then, a few things happened. The ship jarred, the shields dropped completely, and Silas heard a very disconcerting sound, like a piece peeling off of the ship.

"Shit, rail gun hit, straight through the left side rear to front." Echo called out. "Assessing damage!"

Awesome, Silas thought.

He kicked off flight assist and rolled the ship completely around, putting full pips in engines and boosting straight back toward the Corvette, dumping everything he had into it.

He was able to bring the Corvette's sheilds below 15% before he heard a loud electrical 'pop' from the left rear of the ship, followed by a loud electrical buzzing from the roof above him.

Both Silas and Echo instinctively secured their suit helmets.

That's when the popcorn started. Before Silas could realize what happened, multicannon fire was ripping through the bridge at irregular angles, penetrating the cockpit canopy, before a small explosion rocked the bridge, disorienting Silas and causing the glass to finally shatter.

The explosion had put him in a weird position and the sudden depressurization of the cockpit sucking him forward had caused his ribcage to slam pretty hard into some part of his chair. He had to force himself to keep the ship spinning, even though it now pained him to breathe.

"What the fuck was that!?" He shouted at Echo as he tried to get the Corvette back in his sights without any hud assist, now that his canopy glass was missing.

Raven, having finished up with the other fighter, was now making passes on the Corvette trying to sap its remaining shield. Below 10% now.

***27:38 Life Support Remaining***

Echo, holding pressure on his own fresh new wound, took stock of the ship's new position.

"Comms, gone, left thruster functional but overheating, left multicannon damaged, and out of ammo, and I got hit by something... I'm working one-handed I gotta keep pressure on this."

Silas glances back just briefly, and catches Echo holding pressure to his left shoulder, just in front of his armpit.

"I think the railgun split the ammo storage shielding, then overloading that damaged thruster was enough heat to detonate our ammo rack."

"OK, target the power plant, we gotta hit 'em hard with this next pass or we're fucked! Raven better get those shields down!"

Raven didn't hear this, due to the damaged comms on the Arbiter, but he was already on his next attack run. The Arbiter was in his view as sparks and stray multicannon shots begain to spray erratically from the hull before the explosion. Sensing the urgency to end this fight, he slowed the fighter down just enough to give himself some extra time on target. A shower of blue shards rained down on the last of the shielding of the Corvette as it dipped and rolled, trying to stay out of the line of fire of both ships. The Arbiter was damaged but they had reclaimed the numbers advantage, so now the Corvette crew were on the defensive.

Silas was able to get behind the Corvette as Raven brought the shields down, and dumped the pulse lasers, beam, and the remaining multicannon into the power plant of the Corvette. The beam quickly overheated, and the ship with it, but it was do-or-die time. Silas was grateful his gimballed weapons were still tracking as he watched the lasers and tracers hit their mark through his missing canopy without the usual added context of his COVAS' visual output.

Echo was laser-focused on the module health of their target's power plant, calling out the milestones. 20%, 10%.
The Corvette tried to maneuver away but Silas was able to wrestle the damaged ship to its limits to stay on target, grateful now more than ever for Ivan's engineering abilities.

"0% boss, steer clear!"

Silas heard this and pulled the Arbiter off of its attack course just as the Corvette began to suffer from small explosions rupturing its hull, slowly becoming larger, and ultimately erupting the entire ship into a fireball that, if not for the Atlas explosion they had witnessed earlier, would have been quite impressive.

"You alright Echo?" Silas tries to turn to his friend, but stops as a sharp pain in his chest threatens to take his breath away.

"Eh. Looks like this self-healing suit might actually have the convenient unintended consequence of keeping this from bleeding too profusely, for now."

Silas slows the Arbiter to a stop and opens the fighter bay.

The comms were down but Raven saw the ship's docking request, and the landing guides, and he hurried to get into position to land.

***19:41 Life Support Remaining***

Raven glomps onto the bridge, his mag boots active, helmet hissing as he breathes.

Silas, unable to turn around, attempts to yell back to him, but his injured ribs make it difficult to project that far.

Raven tries to move closer, but sees Echo, who had clearly been bleeding, though it was under control now.

"No, I'm fine." Echo stops Raven from tending the wound.
"You need to get some semblance of comms online stat, we can't just bail on Kai and Lamb without a word, and we'll need to make some kind of request to dock anywhere anyway, even one of those Atlasses."

Raven nods, and sets out to find some tools, as Silas accelerates the poor Arbiter to as fast as he can manage without putting the lot of them in further danger back toward the Atlas convoy.

"We'll come back and look for survivors to question... they're not going anyplace."

Last edit: 15 Oct 2019, 2:35pm
Lambast Mercy
16 Oct 2019, 6:11pm
Raven took the straps off the tool kit stowed beside the co-pilot seat and tried to remember where the coms unit was.

“Second access panel on your left dude”

Raven looked back to Echo who was pointing at the place he needed to be working. At least the suit coms were in order. Echo looked pale, and given his complexion it was weird. His eyes were still dark giving him the look of a guy hadn’t put a lot of effort in for Halloween.

Securing the tool kit again Raven robotically walked over to the Pilots seat and opened the med-kit.

EC grabbed Raven's arm “Raven, the coms. We need to contact someone so we can get docked”

“Right after I give you two something. Look at the face on that” Said Raven pointing at Echo “He looks like a skinny Panda and you look like your straining with a painful dump. Just tell me what to use and then I’ll get onto the ship”
 
He opened the kit and held it in front of Silas. Silas took a deep breath and stopped almost as soon as he started thanks to the pain and conceded Raven's point.

“Echo needs a coagulant, the yellow one and pain killer, um go for the red & blue banded injector”

Raven double-checked he got the right injectors with Silas and set about dealing with the injector-ports on Echo’s flight suit. He made Echo weakly snigger when Raven tried to hold one of the pens in his teeth and then helped Silas who was feebly attempting to reach across his own chest to use his own port. Seeing both of them in that state didn’t do Raven any favours. He exchanged kits and got back to work on the coms.

***17:30 Life Support Remaining***

The release catches on the panel felt hot so Raven went to the other end that would open away from Silas leaned hard on the panel and released one of the catches. A jet of black smoke and a gout of flame winked out of existence in the vacuum. The anti-rattle cushioning around the panel had melted and created a seal for the Arbiters inner workings. A small fire had been burning for a time in there and when Raven removed the panel, he saw more damage than he expected. Including a damaged fire suppression system.

“Well there’s ya fuckin luck” Is all he could say.

“What’s it look like in there man?” Asked Echo.

“Umm, burnt. Defiantly overcooked. Pour some gravy on it, no one will know”

Raven chucked his screwdriver at the deck and scrambled to catch it again. The lack of atmosphere was starting to get on his nerves.

“Let me have a look” Echo unbuckled his harness “Maybe we can .”

“Maybe you can stay put you idiot and I won’t slot things into your new nipple piercing” Raven slapped his forehead, well helmet. Now the REMLOK was getting on his nerves too.

“The fighter! That’s still in perfect condition. We’ll just use the coms on that”

Everyone took a moment to appreciate the obvious as it dawned in their minds like a sunrise.

“I’ll just go do that then shall I?” Said Raven not waiting for confirmation while everyone avoided each other’s gaze for a moment.

***16:00 Life Support Remaining***

Silas pushed the engine harder. It hadn’t seemed so far out when they got here, but now crawling back, the Giant ships may as well have been at the other end of the galaxy. He pressed the coms to talk to Raven and stopped himself. He’d just have to wait. He looked over to Echo who was gingerly experimenting with other ways to keep pressure on his wound. Silas released his harness and tried to stand up. The pain killers would let him, but the grind in his chest made him feel sick and he sat back down. His ribs weren’t just crack like Lamb’s they were broken. The Arbiter was already drifting off course anyway so he grabbed the stick. He looked over to Echo.

“Hey man, I’m really sorry” Echo gave him a quizzical look “I mean, this whole thing and getting at you about the state of the ship the other night then taking on Thargoids and a Corvette, now look at us. I’m..”

“Cut it out man, your starting to sound like Kai. You gonna shave ya beard and think about shoes that match your coat in a minute?”

Silas painfully laughed

“Don’t make me laugh dude, it fucking hurts. And yeah, just had to say ya know.”

“I know man”

They reached over for a fist bump, but both recoiled in pain.

***14:00 Life Support Remaining***

That didn’t sound good. Sixteen minutes was time to get things done and explore other avenues, but fourteen minutes was like, things should be moving because we don’t have a lot of time left.

Just after the eleven minutes warming, Raven moonwalked back into the cockpit looking unwell.  

“Turn on all the lights and anything else that’ll help us get seen. We got a civilian coming in to get us. I couldn’t raise the girls, in fact, it took me a while to get anyone that wasn’t begging for help. It’s a mess out there man, I’m glad we ain’t got communications. There’s people dying on the.. it’s just fuckin nasty”

Silas and Echo gave Raven a moment, he rarely needed one but today had been an exception day.

“How long did they say Raven?” Asked Silas.

“Er, five minutes. I’ll get back to the fighter and keep in touch with them”

“Hang on Raven. Pack up anything we can’t level here, and then get back on the coms ok?”

***10:00 Life Support Remaining***

Raven nodded and left the cockpit.

“Echo get that data downloaded to a portable drive and purge anything sensitive from our computer. I want the Arbiter shutdown and locked until one of us comes back to reboot. Can you do that?”

Echo was tapping away on the keyboard already.

“You think I’m some kind of noobi now? I was on it as soon as Raven said we got a pickup. That’s why you pay me the big bucks right?”

Silas Kept an eye out for anything approaching the Arbiter and got ready to turn on all the lights a fired off a few shots of the lasers when a little white dot off in the distance started to grow. He envied the dots ability to use its FSD. The ship dropped out of super cruise and hung in space. Silas gave the ship every light he could and limped towards it. After a minute or so, a battered old Hauler drifted over to the stricken Arbiter.

The Pilot waved and Silas returned the salutation.

***6:00 Life Support Remaining***

This was getting too close. Echo showed Silas a data stick and slipped it into a pocket on his suit and fastened it. The cargo hatch on the Hauler opened and a person in a flight suit took steady aim at the Arbiter with a mag-grapple. Once that was attached, he reloaded and fired another.

***4:00 Life Support Remaining***

Silas and Echo tried to remain calm, but this was fucking close. They both undid their harnesses as the person on the cargo ramp retreated inside again. The person appeared a moment later with a stretcher and started down the grapple line. Echo and Silas got up and grunting and groaning, climb out of the broken canopy to meet their rescuer. Raven joined them as the person, an old nut-skinned bald man clumped onto the Arbiter.

“You feller’s need a top-up?” Asked the man in a cracked southern drool unhooking an airline from his suit.

Silas and Echo raised their hands and Silas let Echo top off first. It took a while for everyone to get on board the Hauler, Hooler’s Last Hope and as soon as Silas and Echo were exposed to a little gravity, they were treated to pain they didn’t know that had. The old man, Aden Hooler took them to a bedroom clearly shard by an old couple and helped them lay down together, thankfully in separate beds.

Raven stayed on the Cargo ramp as Myra, the pilot and Aden’s wife answered every call she could. Raven was no stranger to death, but this was not the same as killing in a fight against a hostile enemy. It felt like a blessing every time someone he pulled into the little ship took his hand in a strong grip because too many people were being stacked up like sacks behind the cargo netting.

The Hauler docked with one of the Atlas class ships after a few hours. There was hardly room to move as they had rescued so many people and, unfortunately, bodies. Silas and Echo were taken away to be treated and Raven barely registers Silas asking him to retrieve the Arbiter if he could. He must have been looking bad because a nurse took his arm and sat him in a seat. She started to examine him.

“It’s alright sweetheart, I’m just tired” he said.

She put her hand on his “You did good” and then she left to Sheppard anyone else floating about aimlessly out the way. Aden found Raven a few minutes later.

“Son, me’n the wife are goin back out. We could sure use your help”

Raven felt ashamed, but he couldn’t face that again. Not right now, he needed some time to sort his head out. He looked into the man’s eyes but didn’t have any words. Aden just patted his shoulder.

“I spose not son. You look us up now ya hear. I reckon we could do with a drink after all this”

Raven watch Aden leave. A while later, a cup of coffee was pushed into his hand by a man in an impressive uniform. He had to be command of some kind but, he was just walking the rows of rescued people giving out coffee. Raven found his resolve.

“Hey, officer. What can I do to help around here?”

Raven got himself into a tug on clean up duty tasked with moving large pieces of debris and crippled ships out of danger. His skill with a fighter translated quite well to the fine flying need to line up the grapples with a chuck of wreckage or a dead ship. He soon got the hang of dragging a salvaged ship and parking it just where he wanted it. He and his grapple crew worked for hours and Raven was glad of the distraction.

It took an age but, the rescue fleet was safe from drifting debris and many people had, if not a ship to claim, at least property to salvage thanks to Raven and the clean-up crew. Raven checked the time; it had been around eight hours. No wonder he felt so tired.

“Hey guys, my ship is way out there by the outer body, would you lot mind helping me out with retrieving it?”

Pine, or Fresh as the grapple crew called him answered.

“Ok by us Raven, just ok it with command”

After he got the go-ahead, Raven happily pointed the tug at the distant body and engaged the FSD. It was going to be about a half-hour round trip in this thing, but that beat the crap out of the decade-plus it would take the Arbiter to cover the same journey currently.

Raven slid the Arbiter at the end of the wall of salvaged ships he had created far away from the rescue fleet. The pilot of a patrolling security viper saluted Raven. Some people would use any disaster to line their own pockets. Raven was glad someone thought to protect the ships he had brought in, including the Arbiter now.

He docked the tug and thanked Fresh and his crew promising to find them later for a drink and joined the crowd of people looking for loved one's names on the registry board. Eventually, he found Silas and Echo had been moved to the Asclepius, a hospital ship that had jumped in a few hours ago. He joined yet another crowd waiting for transport to the Asclepius. He got seated on the third shuttle and gratefully sat back on the nasty fold-out plastic seat and closed his eyes.

“Excuse me sir” said a woman’s voice in front of him. Raven opened his eyes. “Are you the one from that Hauler, the Hoolar something?”

Raven nodded. The woman put out her hand for Raven and he took it. He was surprised to be hauled out of his seat and squeezed to the point of difficulty inhaling.

“My son is going to be ok” she said from somewhere around Raven's chest. “He’s not well from a shortage of oxygen for so long, but there’s no lasting damage”

Raven tried to explain that he was just on the ramp helping Aden, but she wasn’t having it. They spent the rest of the trip getting to know each other and Raven had another name to look up and have a drink with later.

The Asclepius was teeming with the walking looking for the wounded and worse. It took another age for Raven to get to the front of the line and learn where Silas and Echo were. He joined another crowd waiting for a lift and finely got to the floor he was looking for. He walked passed rows and rows of cubicles with one bed, a seat and a bedside unit. Each one was occupied and Raven glimpsed the result of the good work done by the rescue effort in every tiny room. Then he stopped and went back two cubicles.

Yep, his eyes weren't playing tricks on him. The bed contained a lightly snoring boy of about six, and in the seat beside him was Lambast in a nurse’s uniform with all the nurse.. Raven settled on tools, in the numerous pockets. She also was fast asleep. She looked like she would sleep for a month. Raven had a quick check outside the tiny room. It looked clear for a while yet. He had to know. Slowly and silently, he guided his index finger towards Lamb's lips. He stopped at the corner of her mouth and gently started to push up her top lip in front of her canine tooth.

“Raven?” Said a startled Lambast. An even more started Raven recoiled back and protected his neck with his hands.

“Pleasedontsuckmyblood”

“Shhh. What are you blithering on about?” Whispered Lambast.

“I said I’m pleased I don’t see any blood. When did you become a nurse?”

“I’m a paramedic thank you so very much, and I’m helping out where I can” The situation caught up with Lambast “By the crown, it’s you Raven. Are you hurt? Where are Silas and Echo?”

Lambast grabbed Raven's face and wrist and started examining him.

“Get off me woman. People have been grabbing me all day. I’m not a person that likes to be grabbed” Complained Rave as he fort off Lambast.

Something else dawned on Lambast and she looked at the sleeping child.

“Oh god bless Aislings pert little arse for that. Quick, let’s get out of here before it wakes up”

They both quietly left the cubical.

“This way Lamb. Creamy and Echo are in one of these rooms down here. They are, ok just a bit broken”

Lambast let out a long breath. “I’m so glad you’re all here. I’ll admit I was worried we’d lost you when you.. Raven, what are you looking at?”

“What? Oh sorry, it’s your knees. Never seen them before”

There was a pause in the conversation as the two walked down the corridor.

“Raven, have you ever seen your spleen before?” Asked Lambast in a friendly tone.

“Ok. Point taken. Where’s Kai?”

Another pause.

“Hiding if she knows what’s good for her. .. And yes, she’s fine. For now”


A good few hours earlier.

Grim watched the tug pull away with the Arbiter clamped in the complicated trailer. He released the boot claws anchoring him to the asteroid and activated the jets on his armoured suit. The search reviled nothing of note. He had left a few devices around Cousland’s ship. Even they were less than grim was happy with. Grim imagined it was going to be refitted, so he had to be very careful with the placement of his little helpers.

He turned his attention to the distant Corvette. He’d seen people moving about onboard and a few lights flickered on when Grim set off for the Arbiter. Why did Cousland risk so much to take down that ship? Grim headed for his Python to rearm and get ready to invade the Corvette before it found some power to limp away. Maybe what he found there would shed some light on Cousland’s plan and ultimately lead to his true target, Sen.

Grim picked a number of blunt weapons, he intended to make anyone he had to kill look like casualties of the battel with the Arbiter just in case Cousland and his crew came back for the same reason. He’d have to be careful there, Lambast boarded ships for a living for a few years, it would be hard to fool her. An idea dawned as he contemplated that possibility. Grim collected his remote surveillance gear. If he did well, and Cousland’s people did come back, he would kill five birds with one stone.

Last edit: 16 Oct 2019, 6:24pm
Khelan
16 Oct 2019, 10:11pm
Maul Montresor

He turns and exits the cargo bay, heading back to his cabin.


Khelan stands alone in the empty cargo bay for a few moments before giving the punchbag that's hanging from one of the racks a light thump and then pulling his dressing gown tightly around himself.

"Leo?" he asks

"What's happening dude?" responds Leo

"How lang till the AFMU finishes fixing the ship?"

"Not long now commander, a couple of hours at the most."

"Magic mate" says Khelan with a smile before he heads off out of the bay and up to his room.

He arrives in his room, slips out of his dressing gown and boots and slides into his bed beside Omi.

She stirs lightly and Khelan shushes her before wrapping an arm around her and snuggling in.

"Ah really am the luckiest basturd in the galaxy." he whispers to himself before closing his eyes and falling asleep.
Maul Montresor
17 Oct 2019, 9:26pm
Maul enters his room and throws his jacket on the end of the bed. Sitting on the edge of the bed, he rests his face in his hands. After a moment he looks up and over to his jacket and reaches into the pocket to pull out the list of names.

With a slight smirk he grabs his pad and begins researching the people on the list. Each person on the list was a seemingly successful business person. Their backgrounds were believable enough but totally fabricated.

Scrolling through some of the articles about these people revealed that most of them have families.

"Fuck." Maul says under his breath but still audible.

He lays his pad down and flops back on the bed to look up at the ceiling.

"There's gotta be a better way to handle this."

He sighs and grabs his pad again. Reluctantly he navigates to his contacts and begins to type out a message."

"Are you guys still active? I could use a hand with something."

A few minutes pass before his pad chimes with an a few incoming message.

"Gh0uli3? OMG! We thought you were dead! Where the hell have you been?!"

"Holy shit, he's been reanimated! Sticking true to the moniker, huh? I thought you went dark after that botched job last year but I'm glad to see that you're still kicking, brother."

"Welcome back, Gh0uli3. You know we're always here for a fellow member. What do you need?"

He smiles at the warm welcome and begins to fill his old hacker friends in on his situation.

Last edit: 18 Oct 2019, 3:53pm
Khelan
19 Oct 2019, 12:02am
***** Several hours later *****

Khelan rolls over in his bed and slowly opens his eyes, blinking a few times to clear the sleep out of them. He looks around the empty room illuminated only by the faint glow from a small lamp shaped like a dinosaur destroying a city tower block.

"Mornin 'zilla" he says to the dinosaur before pressing the "O" in the word "Gojira" to turn off the lamp plunging the room into darkness.

"Leo turn on the lights wid ye?" he asks shaking his head to try and waken himself up.

The lights come on and Khelan quickly gets dressed in his remlock suit before pulling an old pair of camouflage pants on over it followed by a faded black hooded jersey with the word "Savage" on the front of it.

"Leo, Where's Omi?" he says as he picks up his mug, drops a tea bag into it and puts it under the nozzle for hot water.

"She's on the bridge" replies Leo "There was an unauthorised encrypted transmission detected somewhere in the ship while you were asleep. She's up trying to trace its source as we speak."

Khelan finishes making his mug of tea, sits it down on the table and sits down to pull his boots on.

"It's probably something tae dae wi Goolie." he says "Ah'll bet he wis tryin tae watch the latest episode of" celebrity sheep herders" oar somethin like that."

"Probably" replies Leo "Omi's just looking into it to make sure it's nothing sinister and none of the ships systems have been compromised or our location revealed. Not that that'd make much difference, she's had me carry out several jumps while you were asleep. At this rate we'll be back at Hondo City in the next few hours. I'd tell you the E.T.A. but you know the ships internal chronometer isn't set."

"It's oan the to dae list, right up there wi learnin how tae juggle an bein nice tae Vera."

Khelan picks up his mug of tea and heads off up to the cockpit.

Inside he finds Omi lent over a screen full of what appears to be encoded data. Her face illuminated by the green glow from the screen.

"Someone was sending and receiving vast amounts of data during the night." she says without looking up "I can't tell what it was yet but there's a lot of it."

"Ah've goat the funny feeling it wis probably Goolie, Vera wis passed oot drunk in her cabin last night. That lassie cannae hauld her drink."

"I concur about it most likely being Maul. Hopefully it's just something innocent and he hasn't done anything stupid like tried to hack into the bank of Zaonce or something."

"No even Goolie's that stupid.... Ah mean Ah'm pretty sure he's no.... Ah think we might hiv tae hiv a wee chat wi him just tae be oan the safe side."

"Leo, Where's Maul?" asks Omi

"According to my internal sensors he's in his bed and vital signs indicate rem sleep, do you want me to waken him?"

"No need Leo, I'll go and do it myself" says Omi getting up from her chair and heading to the lift to the living areas of the ship.
Maul Montresor
19 Oct 2019, 6:00am
The door to Maul's room slides open and Omi walks in. He is sprawled out on his bed in his boxers, snoring.

"Wake up!" Omi shouts causing Maul to suddenly jump awake.

"Omi? What are you...wait am I having that dream again?" He says, rubbing his eyes.

"What were you doing last night?" She asks sternly.

He waves his hands, gesturing at his boxers.

"Well...sleeping, obviously."

She steps closer to Maul and clenches her fists.

"The encrypted transmissions."

Maul thinks for a moment before responding.

"Oh..."

"Oh?" Omi asks flexing her hand so her claw like implants are exposed.

Maul scatters and scoots back up against the wall, grabbing a pillow in a weak attempt to shield himself. But he knew her claws could rip through the pillow and him with ease.

"Yes, "Oh"...as in, Oh yeah, that was me. I was reaching out to a few old friends. I mean, I guess you'd call them friends. I have only ever met one of them in person before...well besides Xero but that doesn't really count. He was a bit of an ass...and ya know...he's dead."

He was scrambling to explain as she was coming closer.

"Listen it sounds bad but they don't know anything about my personal life, that's against the code. You guys are safe, I swear! You have to trust me! These people are good people. I used to run jobs with them, one of them even saved my life last year in a botched job. After that, we cut ties and haven't spoke since."

Omi stops and withdraws her claws.

"Why? Why did you contact them?" She asks still hovering over him.

Maul scrambles across the bed and grabs the list of names out of his jacket pocket.

"This." He says reaching her the note. "These people need to be brought down and we can't just use brute force to do it. We got lucky with Bryce but the other people on that list are going to be harder to get to. They also have families and as we've seen, that complicates things. But if we can get enough evidence on them and prove that they work for a galactic drug empire, then we can turn them in and possibly bring the corporation to it's knees. But it has to be done carefully and methodically. That's why I contacted my old pals from The Network. They can do this. WE can do this."

Omi looks over the list and looks back at Maul. She recognized it as the same list from back at Maul's apartment when Vega had first shown up.

"Okay." She says reaching the note back to him.

"Okay?" He asks as he takes the note, slightly confused. He half expected to be ripped apart by now.

"Yes, okay. But if these people try anything malicious, that pillow won't be enough to protect you next time."

"Now, get dressed so you can join Khelan and I in the cockpit. I'll explain this to him. I can't guarantee that he'll be happy about any of this but I think he'll understand."

Maul sits up on his knees in the bed, while holding the pillow over his groin area.

"Omi!"

She turns in the door frame and looks at him.

"I won't let this interfere with my work for The Black Dragon Society and I promise that whoever sent those assassins after us back there are going to pay. I owe you and your father that much."

Omi nods and exits his room.
Khelan
21 Oct 2019, 11:07am
Khelan sits in the pilots chair aligning the Prid over the star to refuel for the next jump, keeping one eye on the fuel gauge and the other on the internal temperature while the massive fuel scoop under the ship guzzles hydrogen from the stars corona.

"So I found out that Maul was responsible for the transmissions detected last night." says Omi as she walks into the cockpit and sits down in the chair to the right of Khelan.

"Ah thought as much, wit wis he uptae?" grunts Khelan as he raises the nose of the Prid a fraction to keep the ships temperature in check.

"He was reaching out to some of his old hacker friends." says Omi "He seems to think that we might be able to use them to take down that corporation and I think he may be onto something. He's told me that it's not going to interfere with his work with us and we both know that he's not going to let it go and they do need to be stopped."

"Yer right there. Ye heard wit Hondo City used tae be like afore yer Da took over an cleaned up the place. Shite like that's a fuckin scourge that needs tae be stopped."

Khelan pulls back on the control yoke pulling the Prid up out of the stars corona while throttling up to escape from the heat.

"Alright dudes, what's happening?" says Leo "I just thought you might like to know that lovely Vera woman is awake and demanding to be let out of her room."

Omi looks at Khelan her eyes wide.

"You locked her in her room?" she asks

"She wis oot her face oan Leestian evil juice, that lassie cannae hold her drink."

"Well that explains why the monitor is smashed, what else did you do? Take away her phone and viewer privileges too?"

"Nahh that wis Goolie, she hid a wee dig at him an he lost his temper. He needs tae take a chill pill."

Khelan sighs and addresses Leo

"Leo let her oot an direct her tae the galley wid ye? Make sure she drinks plenty of water an gie her a couple of painkillers as well."

"Will do" responds Leo "When she's done will I send her up here?"

"Aye please." says Khelan before he turns to Omi.

"So tell me, did ye just have a wee chat wi Goolie oar did ye scare the ever lovin shite oota him?"

"Guess" she smiles as Khelan aligns for the next jump and engages the Frame shift drive.
Maul Montresor
22 Oct 2019, 5:02am
Maul finishes getting dressed by sliding his jacket over his Winking Cat Thief T-shirt that was already over his remlok suit. He stands in front of the mirror, taking a long look at himself. His hair and beard were in need of a serious trimming and the green dye was beginning to fade causing his natural brown hair to expose itself. He couldn't remember the last time he had taken the chance to seriously evaluate his appearance.

"Looking good." He says sarcastically to himself, finishing with a grin as he walks out of his room.

Vega's door opens at about the time Maul walks by. A hungover Vega stands in the doorway with hair that resembles a rat's nest.

"Ugh..Mornin'..." She says to Maul as he passes. He doesn't respond and continues down the hallway to the elevator and up to the cockpit.

She begins to contemplate why he was being so cold towards her when Leo's voice suddenly comes through the speakers causing Vega to hold her head that was already busting.

"Miss Vera, Khelan has suggested you make your way to the galley. Plenty of water and painkillers await you....well, plenty of water anyway. Not so much the painkillers, more like a couple of those."

Vega leans against the wall as she slides down the hallway towards the galley.

She arrives at the galley to see the water and painkillers already awaiting her. She makes quick work of the both of them.

"Sorry to bother you again Vera, but the others are waiting for you up in the cockpit." Leo whispers in an attempt to not worsen her already existing headache.

"Thank you, Leo." She responds as she sluggishly makes her way to the elevator.
Falcon15e
22 Oct 2019, 9:01am
Several days had passed while the large Atlas ships slowly trudged through real space, allowing their passengers ample time to get stabilized into their various conditions.

Eventually, after family members had been re-located, security services contacted and a full contingent of escort ships re-acquired, memorial services were held by the Atlas crews for passengers and pilots who had not survived the attack. People who wished to attend were carted, wheeled or assisted to the expansive docking bay of each Atlas vessel where hundreds of silver coffins lay stacked in neat rows. Various allegiance flags were draped over a few but many lay bare. The vessel Captains held a brief service before the rows of neat silver containers were mag-lev’ed past the pressure barrier and then jettisoned into space. Hundreds of the boxes all slowly drifted into space from both transport ships and started their final journey toward the system sun.

Several hours later Echo, Lambast, Raven and Kaisla could be found in a little state-room laughing and telling stories of the last 72 hours. The Atlas crews had recognized the little crew for their actions and provided them the finest accommodations on the ship and unlimited access to the galley. Silas punched the key code on the door panel and it slid open. As he strode into the spacious state-room, he promptly got fly-tackled by a silver hair-ed human cruise missile. He winced in pain at the impact and a flurry of mumbling sounded from his chest. “NeverthoughtIwouldseeyouagaindon’teverdothateverorI’llfuckinkillyoumyself!”

He ran his fingers through Kai’s hair and gave her a gentle kiss on the forehead.

“Glad to see your okay too.”

Kai looked away, eyes watering. “Dammit, I poked my eye with your jacket zipper.”

Raven, leaning against the wall. “Uh-huh, sure you did.”

Silas situated himself to address the crew, “So the Atlas crew has requested our attendance on the bridge in two hours. They want to thank us for our assistance.”

Lambast shifted, “I’m not sure why. Its not like we did anything extraordinary?”

Silas, still bear-hugged by Kai tried to free himself a bit more, “Well, apparently we did. The telemetry from the Thargoid attacks was forwarded to Gutamaya. From what the Captain tells me, these ships are still owned by Gutamaya and the transport company is operated by them. Although these Atlas class vessels have been around for awhile, they’re extremely expensive and very few are privately owned. Gutamaya’s own capital ship if you will. From what they could tell from the telemetry feeds, the actions of the Hand and of course the Sauventage and Dropship, were pivotal in the survival of the other two. Given Raven’s work on salvage and our ties to you two,” Silas indicated Lamb and Kai, “They want to recognize us.”

Raven stood up straight from leaning on the wall. “That’s bad. That’s very bad. Should we mention we have half the Federation, a radicalized cult and half the galaxy hunting us?”

Silas raised up his hands, “I explained to them the situation, they’re already aware. But we have assurance from the president of Gutamaya himself, as long as we’re aboard his vessels, then we’re to be treated and protected like royalty.”

Kai shifted a bit, “You know what they say about too good to be true?”

Lambast leaned forward onto her elbows, “True - and normally I would agree. Although, if we’ve saved them as much money as it sounds, then I wouldn’t entirely rule out those being truthful statements. I typically hate to lean on this but I have extensive contacts throughout the Empire. Given how much business Gutamaya does with the Empire, it could be that our security and value to them is not entirely unfounded. After all, whoever is running this clandestine operation is probably as of much interest to the Empire as it is us.”

Raven scratched the back of his head and shifted uneasily. “I don’t much like being indebted to anyone, Empire OR Federation. I would rather us take our personal security in our own hands, say thank you very much and be about our business.”

Silas gave him a level stare. “About our business? Us and what ship? The Arbiter is more fit for salvage than space travel, the Hand is beat up pretty bad and still under repair and the Dracul is gone. Our only other options are all in dry dock hundreds of light years from here. Our best option may be to keep our guard up and see how true to their word Gutamaya is, Empire or no Empire.”

Lambast chimed in, “Valid words. I know my people in the Empire. They may be unhappy taking on the responsibility of ‘others’ with questionable backgrounds and they may have their faults but one thing is for certain, they won’t hand us over to anyone else if the information we have is of any value to them. And I can barter with that.”

The com link on the wall chimed. Silas reached over, pressing the red transmit button. “Hello?”

“Mr. Cousland, the Captain would like a word with you and your party on the bridge please.”

“We’ll be right up.” He released the switch letting out a sigh. “Here we go.”

Several lifts later, the party was met by a Lieutenant by one of the unmarked doors of the cruiser. She had brown hair with blond highlights that was tied up in a professional bun and was strikingly pretty. Her green eyes shone at the party as they approached. “Hello, thank you so much for joining us.” She pressed her thumb to an unmarked, unassuming point on the wall and the door slide open effortlessly. She held her arm out, indicating for them to enter. As the party entered, they noticed that the interior design changed. Although still opulent, the interior took on a more functional feel.

She confirmed the door closed and followed, “Security access to the Atlas ships is as unobtrusive but restrictive as necessary as I’m sure you understand. We don’t want guests to notice that there are crew quarters but at the same time, we can’t have our guests accessing functional parts of the ship.” Crew members passed and provided polite, professional greetings as they went about their tasks.

“Therefore, security access and checkpoints are cleverly hidden to where only crew members are keen as to where they biometric scans are valid. This ensures that security is maintained but it doesn’t pester our guests.” She led the party through several floors and further forward of the ship. They passed the crew galley, crew quarters and engineering stations, finally arriving at the conference room to the bridge. The bridge of the Atlas-class cruisers was spacious and opulent even by space station standards. Like most of its fleet, Gutamaya spared no expense or luxury designing its aircraft. Craftsmanship was not only readily apparent but ever interface was streamlined, easy to use but above all, beautifully functional. The Captain met them in the conference room immediately aft of the bridge.

Captain Ioneer was a junior Captain as far as they went, she was only 38 and had been helming ships for a scant ten years. Although in that time, she had proven to be resourceful, intelligent and excellent at managing a crew. Upon notification that the crew who had defended the Atlas convoy was aboard her vessel, she had immediately gotten them moved to the finest suites on board and given them full access to first class amenities. Were it not for Silas’s insistence, there would be butlers tending to their whims.

“Please, be seated.” Captain Ioneer indicated chairs located around the sleek table. Everyone sat and butlers promptly appeared, bearing coffee and tea. Ioneer took her seat at the head of the table.
“I’ll cut to the chase. I can understand, given your respective situations that you’re probably not very confident that we have your best interests in mind. Although, I’ll assure you, you’ve saved Gutamaya a considerable amount of money and select parts of Ms. Mercy’s Imperial record has been made known to me. I am under strict orders to ensure that you and your crew have any resources you require and a secure place to sleep without having to watch over your backs.”

Lambast nodded her head toward Captain Ioneer, “That’s much appreciated Captain.”

“Don’t mention it. The request was rather unusual, we don’t typically get notifications from Imperial Center although this one was and routed to my eyes only. Now, I’m not sure what’s transpired in the past to warrant such a decree; I know very little of what you’ve all been through recently. I don’t follow the Holo-net very closely. But I’ve been informed that its been significant. Either way, with your permission, we’ll process your biometrics through the ship so that you’re provided access to crew-restricted berthing for your safety. Once we get to Maia, I’ll have to pass you off to Imperial control but I assume you suspected as much.”

This came as a shock to Silas, Raven and Echo who all exchanged worried glances. Kai sat passively and Lamb nodded again, “Yes, I suspected as much,” She said adjusting her tea cup and saucer. “Standard protocol and what-not.” She exchanged a glance with Silas as if to transmit, “Don’t fret.”

Silas leaned forward, pushing the cooling cup of coffee out of his way, “Captain, can you enlighten us as to the status of our ship repairs?”

Captain Ioneer, hands folded in front of her, turned to address Silas. “Repairs to the Arbiter are under-way. Sadly, we’re limited as to the extent we can repair it. We simply don’t have the resources or equipment. Although, our crews are attempting to get it to a stabilized benchmark so that you can fly it to dry-dock. Additionally, after examination of...” She glanced down at a slate in front of her, “The Hand. Our technicians were able to ascertain that most of the damage was limited to electrical caused by the shockwave. Upon plugging in our technicians were confronted by a...Holly...who told them, quote, ‘Bugger off you cheeky bastards, your not getting your filthy mitts on my wiring harness.’ And then the COVAS promptly locked everyone out.” She looked up at Lambast, a puzzled look on her face.

Kai smiled, Lambast rolled her eyes. “I’ll go down with one of your technicians this afternoon and give them whatever access they need to conduct repairs.”

“Excellent, on behalf of the Empire, Gutamaya, the crew and most of all, myself, thank you again for what you did for us and our passengers. Please enjoy your stay with us and if you need anything, do not hesitate to ask.” With that Captain Ioneer stood clasping her hands behind her back.

Lambast stood and provided a short bow and Kai started writing more furiously. The Captain slate pinged and she looked down at it. “I’ll have these delivered to your quarters....although Ms. Delana, I’m not sure we have that much bourbon on the ship.”

Kai looked up in shock, “How could you not have that much bourbon?! This ship is huge!”

The Captain addressed Kai with a worried look, “Ms. Delana, that’s more bourbon than an average person consumes in a standard year.”

Kai looked put out, “Huh...I would address your quartermaster if they only order that much.”

“We’ll get you what we can.” The Captain finally relented. Lambast rolled her eyes again and dragged Kai out of her seat. “Thank you Captain, you’re too kind - C’mon Kai, lets GO.”

The rest of the voyage to Maia went slowly. The party was, in fact, moved to the crew quarters and meal times quickly became an ordeal. They would crowd onto a table in the corner and eventually, the entire ships crew would soon surround the table listening to tales of space battles or participating in food challenges. Lamb had her hands full trying to fend off every male (and a few female) crew members who would take their shot at Kai before she would take her shot at them - typically in the solar plexus. Afternoons were spent with the crews at the ships monitoring repairs. Holly proved to be particularly stubborn and wouldn’t open his interface at all unless Lambast was present. Kai busied herself spot welding patches onto the Python or helping out Silas and his crew on the Arbiter. The evenings passed watching movies or playing card games.

Raven flipped up his welding mask as he dangled from the hull of the Arbiter, a bright yellow tether clinging him to the side. Silas was a few panels lower, elbow deep in wiring.

“Hey boss, what’s the plan for taking care of the imps?”

Silas looked up, wiping his brow with his forearm. “What do you mean?”

“You heard that Captain, as soon as we get to Maia, they’re releasing us to imp control. What’s the plan?”

Silas placed his hands on his hips and looked up at his dangling friend, “What do you mean what’s the plan? Go with the imps.”

Raven dangled there staring at his friend. “Uh...boss, I think that explosion rattled your brains.”

Silas rummaged through his tool box looking for an annoying spanner. “No Raven, I’m just sick of running man. Lamb says she’s got it handled and I believe her.”

Raven triggered the brake on the caribeaner and he dropped several feet so that his face was inches from Silas. “Listen man, I know, we got the shit kicked out of us and then there’s whatever it is going on between you and Kai, but I think its fucking preposterous that you’re just going to take Lamb’s word at - ‘I’ll handle it,’ - personally, I didn’t get to where I’m at by just trusting others to handle shit and I think you’ve lost your fucking nerve.”

Silas glanced up at Raven, twirling slowly upside down, a scowl set into his features. Silas reaches up, triggering the brake near his friends waist, letting the tether unspool rapidly, Raven plummeting eighty-five feet toward the magsteel decking below.

“AHHHHHHHHHH!”

He reaches up, triggering the spool and locking out the brake over-ride on the safety switch panel. Raven jolts to a stop, twirling rapidly while his arms flail. The welding torch dangles on its braided cord halfway between Silas and the inverted, spinning Raven.

“Lost my nerve eh?” Silas says staring down at Raven from the access platform.

“Uh..I didn’t mean it?” Ravens face is quickly turning a shade of purple as the blood rushes to his head.

“Yeah, I didn’t think you did. Listen closely,” Silas leans against the railing, crossing his arms and peering down. “Kai and Lamb have done a lot for us in a very short amount of time. I think they’ve proven themselves enough to be part of my crew and I have as much faith in their loyalty and trust as I do in yours or Echo.”

Raven dangled, trying to catch parts of the Arbiter as he twirled to face it. “Got it.”

“One other thing.”

“Oof- yeah boss?”

“Don’t ever question my nerve again.”

“Got it boss. Can you reel me up now? Boss? BOSS?”

Last edit: 22 Oct 2019, 9:09am
Khelan
24 Oct 2019, 11:20pm
Maul Montresor

"Thank you, Leo." She responds as she sluggishly makes her way to the elevator.


Khelan sits in his chair sipping his cup of tea and eating his bowl of Sugar Frosted Buzz Bombs that he's got balanced on his knees while watching an old black and white TV show about a family of monsters who live together in a large mansion.

"You know you could always put those things on the table beside you." says Omi casually "You don't have to balance them on your knees."

"Aye Ah cud but that wid be sensible." replies Khelan with a cheeky grin on his face. "Besides, somewan cud jump us again, Ah want tae be here just tae be oan the safe side."

"Someone else could always fly for you while you eat you know."

"Wit an destroy ma airse groove? Nae chance. Ah've just goat this chair just the way Ah like it."

Omi smiles and shakes her head.

"Sometimes I think some people must wonder what it is that I see in you." She says jokingly "It's times like this I wonder the same thing."

"That's easy darlin, Ye know Ah've goat tae tuck the end of it intae ma sock."

Omi laughs "Well you will wear socks that stop almost at your hips."

"Shoosh you." he says laughing.

"Or what? You'll spank me?" she teases playfully.

"Nahh, ye'd oanly like that. Ah'll dae somethin terrible tae ye."

"Really? What's that? Are you going to sing at me?"

"Worse. Ah'll get Goolie tae show ye his airse." he laughs

"Well at least it's not yours." She says with an exaggerated shudder. "Theres somethings in this life you can't unsee."

The elevator at the rear of the cockpit beeps and the doors open to let Maul out.

Khelan turns and looks at him

"Alright ya fuckin bellend?" says Khelan with a smile "Yer ears musta been burnin oar somethin."

He gestures over to the co-pilots chair.

"Grab a seat, we're oanly wan jump frae haim." he says

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