OT: Hell is For Heroes.

[AgentZero]

Hey folks, I'm just working on a wee story at the moment. Thoughts and comments are welcome, as always. The story is set shortly after a massive Terran-Tauren War, in which both sides were decimated. That's about all the backstory I've come up with, so enjoy!




Almec Thrusian stumbled though the corridor, dragging a frightened girl behind him as he watched his world falling apart. A girder crashed through the ceiling, and the girl saved him from a particularly messy death by pulling him backwards with surprising strength. They pushed on through the narrow opening between the girder and the wall, rounded the corner and crashed into a suitably terrified Joss Maiken.
“Mr. Thrusian!” Joss exclaimed. “You're hurt!”
“Thank you for noticing, Mr. Maiken,” Almec replied dryly. In truth, he was far beyond just hurt. His right arm seemed to have a few too many joints, every agonizing breath reminded him of his broken ribs, and he was now convinced that there was more of his blood on his clothes than inside him.
“Take her to the jump-pod,” he said through gritted teeth. “Launch the pod and join me on the bridge.”
“We need to get you to Medical,” Joss stammered. “After that we can-”
“No!” snapped Almec. “Take her to the pod. There's nothing that can be done for me now. Either of us,” he added quietly.
“But-”
“I'm dead already, Mr. Maiken, my body just hasn't realized it yet. Now go.”

Joss took the girl by the hand and began hurrying down the corridor. After a few steps he stopped and turned.
“Mr. Thrusian!” he called. “The jump-pod is the only one left. She must go alone, I know, but what of the rest of us?”
Almec's mouth parted in a bloody smile. “Why, we die gloriously, of course.”
Moving as quickly as he could, he made his way to the bridge, stumbling and falling time and time again, each time wondering if he'd have the strength to drag himself up again. But again and again, he pulled himself to his feet, and arrived on the bridge in time to hear the frightened comm officer report the successful launch of the jump-pod. Unnoticed, he eased himself into a point-defense station and took over from the two lieutenants slumped dead at their consoles.

“This is the TNS Galahad,” the comms officer began speaking into her pickup. “Hailing any ships in range. We are under heavy fire. We've lost shields, the captain is-”
“Nobody is coming, Lieutenant,” Almec said sharply.
All eyes on the bridge snapped to him. The comm officer nervously cut the channel, and the navigator seated in the captain's chair rose quickly.
“Sir,” he said nervously. “As the ranking officer here, you should be in command, even if you are ret-”
“Shut up and get out of my chair,” Almec said quietly. The navigator gratefully retreated to his station, and Almec lowered himself tiredly into the command chair. “It's been a while,” his whispered, patting the chair affectionately. “What do you say? Once more into the breach, dear friend?”

“Sir?” Only the comms officer was seated close enough to hear him.
Ignorning her, he spoke so the whole bridge could hear him. “I know what many of you are thinking, and you're wrong. I can't get you out of this. I cannot pull off a miracle escape. I can only give you death.” He paused for breath, and ignoring his body's cries of protest, pushed himself to sit upright. “But I will not give you an ordinary death. I shall give you a death glorious enough to outshine the stars, a death that will be spoken of for generations. And most importantly, I will make damn sure that they-” he jabbed a finger at the tactical plot showing the three vessels chasing them “-aren't the one's talking about it.”

A quick glance at his chair's readouts showed that the Galahad's chase armaments had been completely destroyed. As had most of her broadside. But her forward guns, and most importantly, three of her forward launchers were still fully operational.
“Nav,” he snapped. “Prepare to bring us about.”

Aboard a small canister floating through space, the girl stared out as the Galahad turned with surprising speed to face her attackers. Her forward guns blazed in defiance of the withering fire pouring down on her armored hull. Three sparks of white light suddenly shot out from her, each heading for one of her attackers. At such close range, a missile made an unstoppable weapon, and two of the ships disintegrated into expanding balls of light. The third, heavily damaged, continued to close on the Galahad, who refused to relent, charging straight at her foe. Too late, her adversary realized she had no intent of breaking off and began to turn away. Seconds later, the Galahad slammed into her amidships. There was a bright flash of light that drowned out the stars- and with the crackle of discharging energy, the jump-pod's drive activated, and the girl was suddenly alone in the dark.

[Fyron]

An interesting beginning. I await more. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Oh man. I don't know wether to strangle you or shake your hand.

Oh well. I have two arms. I can do both.

...:D

[AgentZero]

Well, Fyron, as the first person to post any sort of comment, you get a star system named after you. A nice one, even. The status of the Narf system is pending while I await clarification as to whether or not you like the story.

Admiral Angus McArthur eased back in his command chair and surveyed the tactical plot in front of him. His Command Fortress sat at the tip of a cone of fortresses that faced the Pellus System's jump nexus. The fortifications guarded the sole link between the Terran Imperium and the Tauran Sovereignty. This fact alone had kept it safe from the scores of demilitarization bills Congress kept thrusting under the Empress's regal nose. She fought them, McArthur had to give her that, fought them with a ferocity that belied her lineage. Yet even from hundreds of light-years away, he could tell they were wearing her down. Every battle won was another line etched in her face, and in the month between today and her last transmission, she seemed to have aged years. He knew it was only a matter of time before his command felt the cold blade of budget cuts, but still, the Empress had managed a few spectacular victories.

One of those victories flashed into existence at the system's main jump gate. Opening a rift between normal and null-space required astronomical amounts of energy, more than even the biggest ship's reactor could hope to produce, which was why most ships traveled using jump nexuses. The weakness in the barrier between the two allowed ships to make the transit with minimal energy expenditure. Unfortunately, a jump nexus was usually situated on the outskirts of a solar system, which meant ships using the nexus got to look forward to two or three days of sublight travel before reaching inhabited planets. Centuries before, some clever soul decided to solve this problem by building a network of massive bases near a system's core worlds that had the power to open a null-space rift. Thus, all authorized traffic arrived through the gates, and anything coming through the nexus itself was ensured an extremely warm welcome. McArthur tapped a few keys on his command console and brought up a detailed scan of the recent arrival.

The TSN Raezel, new flagship of the Terran Space Navy, named in honour of the Empress, was the single largest mobile platform of destruction ever created. Her firepower rivaled even that of McArthur's colossal fortresses, though she was only about a quarter their size. A smile spread across the admiral's face as her commander requested permission to come aboard for a private meeting. Admiral Ivanov Korjev would be certain to have a few bottles of proper Russian vodka. He keyed in an approval to the request, with an added apology that the ship's liquid sustenance supplies were running rather low, and his smile split into a full grin as the reply came back:
“Acknowledged. Will arrive in +4.00hrs. Liquid sustenance will be supplied.”

Five hours later, two very drunk admirals sat in McArthur's private quarters, two full shot glasses and an empty bottle of vodka sitting on the table between them.
“So, my friend,” Korjev slurred. “Have you heard the latest?
“Latest what?” McArthur asked, sounding genuinely confused.
“News, man, news!” Korjev exclaimed.
“No, no I have not heard the latest news, man, news,” replied McArthur.
Korjev shook his head. “I believe your ancestors were reputed to have a greater alcohol tolerance then what you are showing, my friend.”
McArthur stared at him for a long moment. “That's the latest news?”
“Yes, my friend, it's all over the Terran News Network.”
McArthur stared blankly at the glass in front of him. “By the Divine, my reputation. I'll be relieved of command. Or worse, they'll reassign me to some backwaters-” His drunken muttering was interrupted by Korjev's laughter.
“No, even those vultures at TNN are wise enough not to call your manhood into question,” he chuckled. “It's about the Galahad.”
McArthur's eyes snapped up at the mention of his first command. “What of her.”
“She's disappeared,” his old friend informed him. “Not a trace. Word is that SpecOps acquired her her for a very, very, very black project. She was supposed to arrive in Fyron's Star three days ago. Her flight plan was known only to her captain, so no one even knows where to look.”
“Damn,” McArthur whispered. “I hope she's alright.”
“I believe an illustrious former captain once said of her, 'If we don't show up as scheduled, we're never showing up.”
McArthur nodded slowly. “I'll drink to that.”
The two raised their glasses. “To the Galahad and her crew?”
“No,” McArthur shook his head. “To you pronouncing 'illustrious' with half a bottle of vodka in you.

[dogscoff]

Nice, I like it. I like the pace, and also the element of intrigue. A lot of SE4 fic seems to lack that.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Of course I like it. I wouldn't want to shake you gently by the neck if that first post hadn't produced a multiplicity of emotions. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

[El_Phil]

I like it. Especially the intrigue and things left hanging. Keep up the work fella.

[Puke]

i like it, but im still wondering whos going to play Steve McQueen's part.

[AgentZero]

I can do intrigue? Cool, I never knew. Anyway, here's Part 3, and hey, something big blows up!


The Tauran battlecruiser Zehkleck slipped unnoticed into the Narf Trinary System. Not thanks to any kind of stealthiness, the Taurans wouldn't know the meaning of the word, but due to the simple fact that nobody monitored the Narf System, because there was nothing left to monitor. There had once been a number of thriving colonies in the system, built in the ruins of a dead civilization. But in the dying days of the Earth-Tauran War, a colossal battle had been waged here. A Battle To End All Battles they called it. And when it was over, the Narf System was dead, every scrap of life extinguished from the surfaces of it's worlds.

However, First-Among-Fourths Plaetek had no interest in Narf's scorched worlds. It was far more interested in the wreckage it's ship's sensors had detected two light minutes out from the system's main star. The floor plates rumbled under its feet as its navigator brought the ship up to full sublight.
“Second,” Plaetek spoke to the officer beside it. “What do your eyes see?”
“Very little, First,” came the reply. “Distance still to great. Our ships, definite. Another, near certain.”
“Advise when near certain is definite,” Plaetek instructed.

Several hours passed before Plaetek's Second spoke again. “Another definite. Wreckage now. Survivability probability minimal.”
“Identity?” inquired the First.
“Transponder functional,” replied the Second. “TSN Galahad. Definite.”
Plaetek nodded slowly. “Destruction of our ships, most ungood. First-Among-Seconds will be not-pleased. Loss of target, double ungood. First-Among-Seconds will be double not-pleased. But destruction of Galahad, double double good. Redemption likely.”
The Second nodded in agreement. “Return?” it inquired.
“Return with haste,” the First instructed.
The Second returned to its station and began plotting a course back to the jump nexus. The First settled back on his hind legs to observe it's tactical plot. Tauran plots were a series of two dimensional screens, unlike the Humans 3D holographic 'tank'. Tauran minds did not function well when more than two dimensions were involved, and all their information about the three dimensional space around them was relayed via two dimensional displays. Noticing something odd, Plaetek leaned forward and tapped the tactical plot with a thick knuckle.
“Malfunction?” asked the Second, peering over the First.
“Probability high,” agreed Plaetek. On the tactical plot, the icons representing with the systems three suns were steadily growing larger, even as they moved further away. Plaetek moved to the primary command deck and requested the rest of its officers to report similar malfunctions.
“First!” one of the Thirds cried suddenly. “Malfunction probability zero!”
Plaetek's seven eyes whipped back to his plot just in time to see the three stars seemingly shrink into nothing, then expand again with terrifying speed.
“Flee!” the First ordered desperately, knowing already that it stood no chance of escaping the raging storm of destruction racing towards them. The Zehkleck was a third through her emergency turn when the combined fury of three supernovae ripped her to pieces a split second before ship was vaporized.

Two days later, James Thereaux, sleeping aboard the decommissioned assault cruiser Daedalus was woken from a most pleasant dream by the spectacular death of a star system.

[Ragnarok]

Wow. Most excellent story I must say. Keep it up!

[narf poit chez BOOM]

YOU MANIAC! YOU BLEW IT UP! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

[El_Phil]

BLAM! Sweet, beautifull BLAM.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh Wonderful

More please http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[AgentZero]

Sorry Narf, but you should take solice in the fact that the name Narf will live on forever as the official scientific term for a triple supernova: A Narfsplosion. More to come when I'm not so sleepy.

[TurinTurambar]

Loving the story.

My my. Suddenly a plethora of phan phiction. (<--artificial alliteration... handy ain't it?)

I especially like the alien feel of the communication between the First and the Second. Mind your modifying pronouns in there though m'lad. Coupla slip-ups.

Excelsior!
Turin/threads/images/Graemlins/icon42.gif

[AgentZero]

Right, well I got myself nice and drunk and made a bit more progress on the ole story, so here it is. The following has been edited for language, and following segments will need to be edited for both language and content, but a complete version may get put up onto Spaceempires.net, as long as I don't get too naughty. Anyway, forward, not backward, upward, not downward, and always twirling, twirling towards freedom!

Two days later, James Kagan, sleeping aboard the decommissioned assault cruiser Daedalus was woken from a most pleasant dream by the spectacular death of a star system.

The shrill squeal of the ship's alarm brought him suddenly to full consciousness.
“Status report!” he barked before realizing he was alone on the bridge. Nonetheless, the ship's AI obliged him by activating the main view screen with the ship's cameras centred on the source of it's concern. Kagan,'s brow furrowed as he stared at the star field shinning in front of him, trying to establish what had caused the AI to rouse him from his slumber while he tried vainly to ignore his parched mouth and pounding headache. And then, suddenly, the cause of the AI's concern became blatantly obvious as the entire bridge exploded into brilliant white light. Kagan cried out in pain and pitched out of his chair.
“Filters to max!” he cried, writhing about on the deck in futile attempt to escape from the piercing whit light. “Filters to bleedin' maximum!”
“Filters already at maximum capacity,” the AI informed him emotionlessly.
“Then turn the damn screen off!” he shouted. “View screen off!”
Kagan released an almost orgasmic sigh as the bridge was plunged into blissful darkness, illuminated only by the faint light of command consoles. Slowly, he dragged himself back up to his command chair and activated a communications channel.
“Kaelan, you see that?” he asked, transmitting to the destroyer holding off his port side.
“Jasus, I'm still seein' it, mate,” was the groggy reply.
“So you didn't slip something in my drink after all,” Kagan replied with considerably more relief than he felt.
“Would I do that?” Kaelan replied indignantly.
Kagan let the silence drag out until Kaelan added, “Again?”
“I was hoping you learned from the last time,” Kagan replied with a small grin. “How's the arm, by the way?”
There was a chuckle from the speaker. “Well, I can amuse meself and abuse meself and let's just leave it at that, shall we?”
“So, what are your sensors telling you?”
“What are yours telling you?”
“Mine can't tell their arse from their elbow, that's why you're tagging along.”
“Oh, I beg your pardon, Mr. Got Me Own Assault Cruiser, and here I was thinkin' you had me along for my brilliant wit and unparralled sense of style.”
“I could have brought along a drunk chimp with a learning disorder that'd have more with and style than you, Mr. O'Shea, now make yourself useful.”
“Right so. Looks like the Narf System is after blowin' itself up.
Kagan paused, not quite managing to comprehend what he was hearing.
“What?” he asked. “The stars in Narf were all midlife, and none of them were big enough to go nova. Check your instruments.”
“There's nothin' wrong with me instruments,” was the displeased reply. “All three stars just went nova, and if they didn't do it themselves, then someone else did it for them. Few Nova Bombs and Bob's yer uncle if you ask me.”
“But there aren't supposed to be any nova bombs left,” Kagan replied, confused. “Let alone three of the Divine-forsaken things.”
“Well if you got any idea what would make three midlife stars go pop that doesn't involve Nova Bombs, I'd love to hear it,” said Kaelan. “Probably give you a bleedin' prize or a medal or somethin'.”
“I'm sure,” Kagan replied dryly. “Listen, you head back to Pellus with those sensor logs. I'll meet up with you at Fyron's Star, OK?”
“You sure you'll manage with them bolloxed sensors of yours?” asked Kaelan, managing to sound genuinely concerned.
“I'll be fine,” Kagan told his friend, “As long as I don't run into any anomalies in dire need of a good scanning.”
Kaelan barked a laugh. “Only you could make that sound filthy, mate,” he said. “Take care, and I'll see you in a few days.”
“Cheerio,” Kagan replied with a grin.
On his tactical plot, the small icon representing the destroyer Defiant pulled away from the Daedalus and accelerated quickly back in the direction they'd come from. After a moment's contemplation, Kagan brought his sublight drive to full power, and the converted warship thundered forward. If there were people around here blowing up stars, he mused, then around here was not a good place to spend to much time. Three hours later, he received a message from Kaelan informing him that he and the Defiant had safely made the jump to null-space. Eight hours after that, the Daedalus was approaching the jump nexus when the communications console began chirping insistently, the tone and pitch indicating an emergency message. Kagan hurried over to the comms console and attached the ear piece to the obvious orifice.
“-ello?” a female voice inquired. “Can you hear me big ship? This is little ship to big ship, can you hear me?”
“I can hear you alright,” said Kagan. “But I can't see you.”
“I'm over here.”
“Where?”
“Over here. I'm waving.”
“That's not going to do me a lot of bloody good, now is it?”
“Well, what should I do?”
“Does your ship not have a transponder?”
“Dunno.”
“You don't know? How can you not know if your ship has a transponder?”
“Well, it's not really a ship. More of a pod, I guess.”
“Like a life pod?”
“Dunno.”
“Were you on a big ship before?”
“Yup.”
“And you got shot out of it in a little ship?”
“Yup.”
“Then you're in a life pod.”
“Great.”
“You lookin' for a rescue or would you prefer I jump out and leave ya here?”
“I think I'd rather be rescued. Um, what does the transponder look like?”
“It's a square orange thing, about the size of your head.”
“How do you know how big my head is?”
Kagan pinched his nose in frustration. “An average person's head, OK?” he snapped. “You know most people try to make it easy to get themselves rescued.”
“Sorry. It's cold and I haven't eaten for a few days. I'm feeling a bit odd. I see the transponder thingy now, so what do I do?”
“Open the lid and press the big red button.”
“OK. Oh, and one thing?”
“What?”
“My head's not square.”
Any reply was cut short but the sudden appearance of a life pod icon on the tactical plot, and the corresponding shrill alarm.
“I see you now,” he said. “I'm sending out a recovery drone now. We'll have you nice and warm and fed in no time.”
“Thank you very much, big ship.”
“You're more than welcome. Although most people just call me James.”
“Thank you, James, then. My name's Alice.”
“It's a pleasure, Alice,” Kagan replied. “Now you'll feel a bump in a moment, but don't worry. It's just the recovery drone latching on to your pod.”
It took a total of thirty seven minutes to get Alice out of the life pod. Ten minutes were taken up getting the pod back to the ship. Twenty minutes were devoted to decontaminating the pod's exterior, during which James hastily showered, dressed in his uniform and administered himself a hefty dose of De-Tox. Five minutes were needed to to heat the pod's outer surface to an acceptable level, and the last two involved Kagan ensuring his hair was in order and all insignia were attached properly, just in case. The pod door opened, the girl stepped out, and Kagan was suddenly very glad he'd taken the time to clean up. In an age of life-extending therapies, it was impossible to determine her age, but chronologically she seemed to be in her mid twenties. She was petite, neither tall nor short, with shoulder length shockingly red hair and large green eyes that she cast about the hanger bay with great interest.
“This is a very nice ship James,” she said before pitching forward and landing face down on the hanger bay floor.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

James T. Kagan, by any chance? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

[AgentZero]

Hardley. An interesting side note, the character of James Kagan was created in the 1950s by Christopher Fletcher, for use in a novel he intended to write. Unfortunately, 40-odd years later he died without ever having written anything. Being a good friend of his grandson Craig, I was there to help him sort through Chris Fletcher's belongings after he passed away. I found the notebook that detailed Kagan, along with a few other colourful characters, and since Craig had absolutely no interest in writing, he let me keep them.

So big thanks to Chris Fletcher, where ever you are for providing the characters of Kagan, Empress Raezel and Kaelan.

More to come....

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Wow.

[dogscoff]

Sorry Narf, but you should take solice in the fact that the name Narf will live on forever as the official scientific term for a triple supernova: A Narfsplosion




Yup, it's official. Look: http://invirtuo.cc/phpwiki/index.php/narfsplosion

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Well, gee...Uh, thanks? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/rolleyes.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

[dogscoff]

Just read the latest installmet. Fantastic stuff, it puts my own meagre scribblings to shame. Thanks for writing AZ.

[dogscoff]

narf poit chez BOOM said:
Well, gee...Uh, thanks? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/rolleyes.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif



Hey, the Malfadorica is the complete record of all SE4 lore. You have been immortalised, Narf- it's an honour. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

[narf poit chez BOOM]

...And I'd like to thank my mommy and my daddy and my sister and my brother and our cat and the cartoon show Pinky and The Brain and animaniacs and looney tunes and the road runner and mickey mouse and goofy and donald duck and speedy gonzales and ...

And special thanks to my dog, whereever you are.

[TurinTurambar]

*/me prints a hardcopy of AZ's story so far and submits it to a Balantine publishing agent.

j/k
Turin/threads/images/Graemlins/icon42.gif

[TurinTurambar]

*<Bumpitty-bump-bump>*

More story please!!

Turin/threads/images/Graemlins/icon42.gif

[TurinTurambar]

bump

[Puke]

i second that "bump"

and i still want to know who plays Steve McQueen's part. (though i can guess, with the last installment).

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Yeah, story.

[El_Phil]

I endorse this product/service

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

[AgentZero]

Sorry, folks, got kinda busy with other projects there, but I've still being finding a bit of time for the odd paragraph now and then. So, now that I've got something substantial done, here it is. First though, a little history lesson. It's not relavant to the following, but it will be very important later on, so I'm posting it now.

The Terran Imperium's history is made up of a series of Dynasties, each representing a significant period of time in the Empire's evolution.

The First Dynasty began with the unification of Earth and her in-system colonies and the discovery of interstellar travel. The First Dynasty lasted slightly over 15,000 years and was marked mostly by exploration, rapid technological advancement, the establishment of peaceful relations with other races, and only a few minor wars.

The Second Dynasty lasted about 10,000 years and represented the Empire at the very height of her power. To give you an idea, think of the power you wield in SE4 when you've researched the entire tech tree, control 99% of the galaxy's star systems and have colonized all the worlds within those systems. Now, multiply that by 100 and the Second Dynasty could have still whupped your behind with a single squadron of their dreadnoughts. Unfortunately, 9,000 years into the Second Dynasty, they ran into a race that was nearly as powerful as them, just as aggressive, and spoiling for a good fight. So began the Thousand Years War in which a sizable number of the Empire's worlds were wiped from existance, and the end of which saw both the genocide of the Imperium's enemy, and the end of the Second Dynasty.

This story is set about 5,000 years into the Third Dynasty. For the last 5,000 years, other races, and indeed other factions within the Imperium itself have being preying upon it, stripping it of resources, technology, even entire worlds. But the Imperium has just succefully fought back an invasion by the Taurans and managed to unite humanity's scattered worlds, though in terms of size the Imperium is only about 15% of the Second Dynasty's, and technologically it is several thousand years behind.

So now that you know, here's the next installment:


“Unscheduled tachyon spike at gate seven, Admiral,” one of the sensor techs reported calmly. “I'd put it at heavy frigate or destroyer class, sir.”
Admiral McArthur rose and walked slowly over the tech's station, using the time to work enough saliva into his mouth for him to speak. “Open a channel once they've made transit,” he said, hoping his voice didn't sound as rough as it felt.
“Transit confirmed, receiving IFF codes now. Sir,” the tech said as McArthur began to turn away. “You may be interested to see this.”
The admiral turned back and stared at the readouts on the tech's screen. ITS Defiant. McArthur crooked an eyebrow. So the Defiant was an Independent Traders Ship now? Interesting.
“Sir, the Defiant is hailing us,” reported the comms officer. McArthur's eyebrow raised itself a bit further. For a ship to hail a station was highly unorthodox, established protocol stating that any vessel was to hold position after making transit and wait for the local command station to challenge them. But not only was the Defiant hailing them, but a quick glance at the tactical plot showed that she'd pulled away from the jump gate and was blazing towards McArthur's station as fast as her engines would carry her. And the only time any ship did that was when something very, very bad had happened.
“Open the channel,” he ordered. “Full aud-vid.”
One of the communications screens flickered to life and the image of a man in rumpled, stained clothing who clearly hadn't indulged in basic personal hygiene in some time appeared before them. Upon seeing McArthur, the young man's face split into a broad grin.
“Admiral, sir, howya?” he said with a jaunty salute. “Don't suppose you have any Guinness?”
“Commander O'Shea,” McArthur replied, trying to repress a smile. “What's the bad news?”
“It's just O'Shea now, sir,” came the reply. “But that's the good news. Bad news is the Narf System has gone and blown itself up.”
It took a moment for McArthur to digest what he was hearing. “What?” he asked slowly. “Are you sure? Have you double-checked your instruments.”
Kaelan sighed irritably. “Why does everyone keep asking me that. I'm bloody sure and there's nothing wrong with my bloody instruments. You can check 'em yourself if you want.”
“Very well. You're clear to dock in bay one-four-seven. I'll arrange for some quarters for you while you're aboard. I hate to inconvenience you, but our tech boys are going to want to go over your ship with a fine tooth comb. It could be a few days.”
Kaelan chewed the inside of his mouth thoughtfully. “Well,” he said slowly. “You still allow fairer sex to serve aboard stations, no?”
McArthur cleared his throat uncomfortably and replied, “That much hasn't changed since you were with us.”
“And do you have any Guinness?”
“I believe so.”
Kaelan settled back in his chair contentedly. “Grand,” he smiled.

In the star system known as Fyron's Star, there orbits a planet known as Zellund, and on the planet's northern continent there is a city known as Portent, and in the city of Portent there is a district known as Keatchem, and in the district of Keatchem, there is a building that is not known by any name at all. Inside the nameless building, a group of nameless individuals sat around a marble table, which unknown to any of them, was named Ted.
The man at the head of the table spoke softly, his voice quiet but dangerous. “Agent Fourteen, what do you have to report.”
“Operation Severance has run into some... minor difficulties,” Agent Fourteen replied nervously. “Our transport was attacked and destroyed, along with those who attacked her.”
“And her cargo?” asked the man known as Agent One.
“Missing,” Agent Fourteen replied. “We received confirmation that it was jettisoned before the ship was destroyed, but it's current whereabouts are unknown. Ships have been dispatched to the area, and I'm waiting to hear back from them.”
“Wait until never-time,” Agent Twelve, the being sitting across from him spoke. “Ships were ours-that-are-not-ours and will be returning never. Destroyed.”
“Destroyed?” Agent Fourteen exclaimed. “By what?”
“The bringers of life brought death,” was the reply.
It took a few moments for human minds to translate the alien thought. Agent One realized it first. “Nova,” he whispered.
“Nova upon nova upon nova,” said Agent Twelve. “Destruction total.”
“But how?” wondered Agent Fourteen. “To cause a trinary star system to go supernova...”
“The how, the why and the who will be up to Agent Twelve to determine,” Agent One informed him. “Yours will be to find that cargo and ensure that it is disposed of safely. Understood?”
Agent Fourteen nodded gratefully. Failure within the organization was seldom tolerated. He began to rise from his chair but Agent One's voice froze him half way up.
“Wait.” Agent One amused himself briefly by watching to see how long Agent Fourteen could hold himself suspended above his chair before sliding a data pad down the table. “This may prove useful to you. Now go, and if you fail, well, Agent Fifteen is long overdue for promotion.”
Agent Fourteen hurried out of the room, trying not to notice Agent Fifteen grinning dryly at him from across the room.

The worlds at the furthest reaches of the Terran Imperium are generally referred to as the Outworlds, and are considered to be the limit to humankind's colonization of the galaxy. However, beyond these worlds are the Fringe Worlds, planets colonized not by the Imperial Bureau of Colonization, but by intrepid individuals seeking to forge their own destiny outside the constraints of Imperial law. There have always been Fringe Worlds, for thousands upon thousands of years, as the Empire continually expanded, absorbing the Fringers into the Imperium, often peacefully, sometimes at gunpoint, and as the Empire expanded, those seeking to live outside it were forced to move further and further away. Current IBC estimates state that the known Fringe Worlds will not be added to the Empire for fifty to one hundred years. This fact gave very little comfort to Captain Yolanda Powell. In fact, she mused as her destroyer squadron executed a tight turn, it would be really damn nice to have an Imperial Superdreadnought or two around right now. Actually, she thought as her ship shuddered under the firepower of their attacker, three would be nice. Three Imperial Superdreadnoughts. Was that really too much to ask?
“Sir!” her chief weapons officer called from across the smoky bridge. “Don't ask how but Engineering's got missile tube one operational.
“Well don't just sit there!” Powell shouted back. “Fire!”
The weapons officer relayed the message to missile control and a moment later the tiny destroyer lurched as a massive capitol-ship missile blasted it's way into space. Traveling at incredible speed, the missile sneaked through a gap in it's target's shields, slammed through a hole in it's armour and detonated right next to a heavy cruiser's reactor. There was a bright flash of light, and a split second later, the pirate cruiser was ripped apart in a cloud of nuclear fire.
“Yeah!” shouted one of the officers in missile control. “Choke on that, you bastards!”
Powell grinned. She shouldn't have heard that, but there shouldn't have been a large hole in the floor next to her chair either. “Nice work, everybody,” she said, deciding that if she shouldn't have heard it, then she hadn't heard it. “I think it'll be a while before the Scraghoppers give us any trouble. Lieutenant Liu, set a course for home, I think we've all earned a long bout of R&R.”
“Course laid in, sir,” reported the helmsman. “ETA is-”
“Sir!” interrupted Ensign Jones, who was filling in for their injured sensor tech. “Tachyon spike at twenty three point seven mark eighteen point nine, range fifteen thousand.”
“Size?” inquired Powell.
“It's- Holy Mother....”
“Ensign!” Powell barked.
“It's massive sir, completely off the scale. I can't get any sort of accurate reading, it's overloading the sensors.”
“Main viewer!” ordered Powell. The main view screen came alive just in time for the bridge crew to see an impossibly large section of space rip apart and something very big made transit from null-space into normal space.
There was a long moment of silence before Powell managed to find words suitable for the occasion. “Anybody mind telling me, what the hell is that?”

[Ragnarok]

Excellent addition to the story AgentZero. The drama is very well done. Keep it up!

[narf poit chez BOOM]

A marble table named Ted? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

[AgentZero]

Thanks, Ragnarok. And Narf, no, I don't know where the marble table named Ted came from, or if it will have a role to play in future events. It just seemed like a good idea at the time. And since the AO servers still seem to be down, I think I'll go back to a spot of writing.

[rdouglass]

narf poit chez BOOM said:
A marble table named Ted? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif



Yeah, that's what I thought too. Shape-shifting infiltrator maybe?

Anyways, great ?chapter?

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Yeah! Another vote for shape-shifting infiltrator. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

Good-guy shape-shifting infiltrator. Evil shape-shifters are a dime a dozen.

[TurinTurambar]

Great stuff AZ. Glad you're back at it!

Turin/threads/images/Graemlins/icon42.gif

[AgentZero]

Hey folks! Between work, beta testing, AO, and the rest of a complete and balanced life, I haven't had much time for writing. But, having been a tad bit sick the last few days and the side-effects of medication including a strange groggy insomnia, I've found the time to put together a few more pages.
By the by, if anyone has any problem with me using your forum names for places and things, just let me know and I'll gladly change it. Well, not gladly, but I will change it without complaining. Much. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

James Kagan opened his eyes slowly. For once, there was no sour taste of tobacco and alcohol in his mouth, but rather something a lot like... strawberries. It had been an eventful four weeks. The nav-computer had gone haywire and their last jump, rather than take them towards the relative safety of Fyron's Star, had sent the careening towards Tauran space along some of the highest hyper bands. The strain of an emergency crash jump to normal space had fused the hyperdrive's capacitators, and it had taken him and Alice the better part of three weeks to remove them, and another three days to fit new ones. Another week had been spent drifting aimlessly while they repaired the nav-computer, a task that should have taken a lot longer if not for Alice's intuitive knack for all things electronic. In fact, for someone who claimed to have never served aboard a spacecraft of any kind, she seemed to know a rather shocking amount about their inner workings. When he questioned her about it, she would shrug and tell him that it just made sense. Which was odd, he mused, since she'd re-tuned the hyperdrive by herself, and nothing about hyperdrives 'just made sense.' Still, despite all the interesting happenings, including an exciting trip through an asteroid field with no navigational drive, Kagan had to admit that the most enjoyable events had been those occurring within the last four days.
He ran his fingertip slowly along Alice's bare shoulder, down her forearm, and settled his hand in the curve of her waist. She shifted sleepily and closed her hand around his.
“You awake?” she murmured.
“No,” he replied quietly.
With a small giggle, she pushed herself up and kissed him softly on the forehead. “Big day, today, huh?” she asked as she swung herself out of the bed.
“Big day,” he agreed, dragging himself out of bed to join her in the shower.
“So, you think it'll work?” she asked.
“Should do. If all goes according to plan.”
“And if it all goes wrong?”
“We die.”
“Oh, dear.”
“Well, I was factoring in a reactor breach in it all going wrong,” he said, giving her a reassuring pat.
“So, if it all goes wrong but the reactor doesn't breach?”
“We still die.”
“Oh, dear.”

Up on the bridge, they ran through the pre-jump checks -three times, at Alice's insistence- then strapped themselves into their chairs and held their breaths as Kagan squeezed to leavers together. The whole ship seemed to jerk forward, backward, left and right, all at the same time, for a brief, terribly uncomfortable few seconds then subsided and on the main nav-console, a green light came on with a corresponding bing!
Kagan breathed a sigh of relief and unstrapped himself from his chair before he began entering commands into the nav-computer.
“Are we OK?” a meek voice inquired from behind him.
He looked back to see Alice, still strapped in her chair, sitting bolt upright with a fearsome death-grip on her armrests.
“We're fine,” he replied. “Now relax, I lent my Barclay's Widget to O'Shea.”
Alice didn't budge. “What's Barclay's Widget?” she asked.
“A mythological tool for removing fingernails from permaplast,” Kagan replied dryly.
Alice frowned at him, not understanding until her gaze traveled downwards to her bright white knuckles. Letting out a nervous laugh, she sagged into her chair, then unstrapped herself and joined him at the console.
“So, where we goin?” she inquired.
“The Edward's Gambit system,” he replied. “We're running desperately low on supplies, and Kolis Station is the biggest trading outpost in the Empire. We'll be able to collect everything we need, and more, once we're there. I've got us at the top of the Tigga Band, so we'll be there in three days.”
“Hmm... Any ideas on how to spend our time until then,” Alice asked with a mischievous grin.

Three blissful days later and the Daedalus and her crew of two arrived in Edward's Gambit. The Edwardians being a rather conservative bunch, Kagan had dug an old Merchant Corps. uniform out of storage for Alice. The top fit perfectly, but the bottoms were two sizes too big, and only agreed to stay up with the assistance of a tight belt. But, with her seated safely behind the nav-console, no one would notice.
“Daedalus to Kolis Control,” Kagan said crisply as he opened a communication channel. “Request docking permission.”
“Control to Daedalus, we acknowledge,” was the prompt response. “What is the purpose and intended duration of your visit?
“Daedalus to Control, we need to resupply. Intended stay is two to three days.”
“Control acknowledges, Daedalus. You are clear to dock in Berth 117A.”
“Daedalus acknowledges Berth 117A,” Kagan replied.
“Acknowledged, Control out.”
“Wowers,” said Alice. “That was sure formal.”
“Yeah, the Edwardians are big fans of the formality,” Kagan agreed. “So, you wanna take her in?”
“'K!” she agreed happily.

Two minutes later, and Kolis Control were back on, sounding anything but formal.
“Daedalus, clear current grid NOW!” the control officer shouted, the speaker distorting his voice from sheer volume. “Incoming crash transit!”
Kagan's military training slowed his perception of time to a crawl as his head whipped towards the nav-console and he began instinctively to rise from his chair. But even through his vastly dilated view of time, Alice's hands still flew over the control panel with amazing speed. He was thrown back in his chair as the ship surged forward, then nearly tossed clear out of it as Alice took the ship through a spiraling evasive maneuver that thew them clear of a massive hyperspace wash by a mere few meters.
“Bloody hell,” Kagan gasped as he pulled himself out of his chair, shaking his head to clear the lingering effects of psychological time dilation. “Where the hell did you learn to do that?”
“Don't know,” Alice replied quietly, her hands now deathly still over the controls. “Don't know.”
“By the Divine, the Navy's top fighter pilots would have had a hard time with that one and you just-” his hand came to rest of her shoulder and found it shaking. He drew her gently to her feet and wrapped his arms around her.
“That was scary,” she whispered.
“Well, when a four megaton freighter pops outta hyperspace right behind you, it's seldom very fun,” Kagan said wryly.
“Not that,” she said. “What I did. I don't know what I did, or how I did it, I just did. It's like the hyperdrive and the nav-comp. I don't know how I know what I know, and it scares me.”
“Hush,” Kagan replied. “It'll be okay. We'll figure this out together.”
He leaned down and kissed her softly, but was interrupted a second later by the insistent beep of an incoming transmission.
“Control to Daedalus, are you guys all right?”
Kagan sat back in his chair and flicked open the comm channel. “We're fine, Control, just a little shaken up. What the hell was that?”
“A freighter carrying refugees from the Turin System,” was the reply. “A lot of them are taking on too many people, then coming here too fast and crash jumping in. It's been like this for the last week.”
“The Turin System?” wondered Kagan. “That place was paradise last time I checked.”
“Then you need to read the news more often,” the controller told him. “Two weeks ago Turin Prime got hit by seven dirty nukes. We still don't know who's responsible, but Turambar and Eru were swamped within days and they've been shuttling everyone through here since.”
“Frak,” Kagan said simply.
“Control acknowledges and agrees fully,” came the wry reply. “Unfortunately, Berth 117A is the only one big enough to accommodate the freighter, so we're moving you to Berth 204C. It's a bit tight, but the best we can do under the circumstances.”
“It'll do fine, Control. Daedalus acknowledges Berth 204C.”
“Acknowledged. Control out.”

Kagan swung his assault cruiser out around to the far side of the station, and managed to dock in the not quite big enough berth without damaging anything terribly important. Minutes later, after clearing customs, they were in the enormous promenade that took up the upper two hundred decks of the Kolis Station. Kagan strode purposefully through the crowd of humans and aliens, traders, refugees, merchants, con-artists, criminals and holy men. Alice gripped his arm tightly as she gazed about in wide-eyed wonderment at all that lay before her.
“I've never seen so many- anythings!” she exclaimed. “You could spend your whole life here and only see a tiny little bit!”
“Some people do,” said Kagan. “But we're not here long so let's-”
He was cut short by a deafening roar that was followed a split second later by a great lurching of the deck that sent the crowd of humans and aliens, traders, refugees, merchants, con-artists, criminals, holy men, Kagan and Alice crashing to the ground. Kagan grabbed Alice and twisted as they fell, putting himself between her and the hard deck surface, although this did cause their landing to be quite unpleasant for him as most of her weight landed in his midsection.
“What,” he gasped as soon as he managed to draw a breath. “The. Hell. Was. That?”

[Puke]

yea! more!

[AgentZero]

Well, folks? Comments, criticism, questions, guesses as to where I'm going with all this? Anything?

[Puke]

reminds me of the firefly girl.

edit: or of the girl in John Ringo's _When the Devil Dances_ who had memories and skills assembled from various "places"

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Interesting plot.

[AgentZero]

Puke said:
reminds me of the firefly girl.





Yeah, I'm a bit worried about that. I've never seen Firefly, but after watching the Serenity trailer, I see definate similarities between her and Alice. Especially after the bout of fisticuffs I'm getting ready for posting. Ah well, time will tell....

[AgentZero]

Sorry folks, no addition to the story yet, but more is in the works at the moment. Just been playing around with Doga and made a pretty decent renditon of the Daedalus. Those of you with a bit more experience with Doga's texturing capabilities please don't hesitate to critisize (constructively) since I'm not 100% happy with it yet.

http://www.shrapnelcommunity.com/threads/uploads/389972-Daedelustb.JPG

Edit: See the attatchment for bigger version

[dogscoff]

Just caught up. I'd forgotten just how good this story is. More! More! More!

[TurinTurambar]

Yep, looks like DoGA parts. lol

Hey, yell at Atrocities to email you his custom parts files; they're much more fun to work with. (Though some are decidedly proprietary, like SW and ST:TNG/OS stuff)

Nice lookin ship though; reminds me of a ship called Armageddon from some TV series,

T
<edit:typo>

[Puke]

Kinda reminded me of the ship from Aliens. More story, please!

[AgentZero]

Puke said:
Kinda reminded me of the ship from Aliens. More story, please!



Crap. Everything I do is really something else. My female lead is the Firefly chick, my spaceship is the Aliens ship, and aside from the fact that I created Alice before I'd even heard of Firefly, and I can't remember the ship from Aliens, I'm beginning to have doubts as to my own creativity.
Anyway, more on the story is forthcoming, I'm just home visiting my parents and it's very hard to get 5 minutes, let alone a couple hours to lay down some wordage but they're heading off on holidays of their own soon, so it won't be long until I have the requisite time.
And limitless alcohol. Oh yes, there will be writing.

In the meantime, tell me what you think of this lil fella. It's the Defiant, that wee destroyer from the start of the story. And hey, I even rememberd to tack on a sensor dealy on the front, maintaining congruity all the way!

[dogscoff]

Like the defiant pic. It looks like something that could be successfully piloted by one drunk dude, too.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

I like the ship.

[Puke]

AgentZero said:
Crap. Everything I do is really something else. ... I'm beginning to have doubts as to my own creativity.




ah, piss and moan. There are dozzens of other ships and adventure characters that your stuff reminds me of. its not because you copied it from them, its because adventure stories have existed since the dawn of the spoken-word. And modern(ish) space sci-fi has been kicking about for around 70 years now.

even if you didnt see alines or firefly, you were part of the same collective consiousness that the creators of those shows based their characters and art upon. its not that your not creative, its that you CANT create something that does not (at least vaguely) remind someone of something else.

I could just as easily picked dozzens of other characters or ships that those reminded me of. But yours fit together in a way thats refreshing and new, and thats why this is one of my favorite stories to read.

And I like the Defiant. It reminds me of...

puke ducks as everyone in the room throws a heavy object at him. there is a loud cacaphony of crashing noises, as puke is burried under heavy, flying, blunt objects

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Original is hard. Creative, not so hard.

Personally, I'd shoot for creative and just be really happy at anything that happened to be original.

[TurinTurambar]

Well put, mousey-wousey.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Thank you, human bean.

[AgentZero]

OK, given that I'm away from home at the moment, I don't want to write up TOO much, since all my notes & reference material is 3000km away and as such inconsitencies and plot holes would likely result, but I figure I've left you poor guys in suspense about what that boom was for a couple months, and that just ain't nice. So here ya go!

After extraditing himself from Alice, Kagan rose and surveyed the chaos all around them. People, as they do when the universe is not so kind as to provide forewarning before it does something unusual, were running quickly back and forth, although aside from managing a quite heroic amount of arm waiving, it wasn’t entirely clear what, if anything was being accomplished. Some semblance of order was restored as a few began to realize that not everyone had gotten back up, and various people began attending to the wounded. The semblance of order was quickly shattered, however, as a great number of people realized exactly how badly, or rather, how gruesomely, some of their fellows had been injured. This caused a great many people to hastily depart from the promenade, ostensibly having decided they’d much rather waive their arms somewhere much further away. It is worth noting at this point that having a Traxian knife-stand fall on you holds the record as the fourth messiest way to die in the universe. This holds little relevance to the story at hand, aside from explaining why Alice glanced down and said, “Ewwww!” This was followed shortly by, “Smoke. Smoke is bad in space.”
Kagan followed her gaze to the other side of the promenade and one floor up, where smoke was indeed drifting lazily out from one of the corridors. Without a second thought, he charged forward, nimbly weaving between the wounded and crowds of arm-waivers. As he neared the far side of the promenade, genetically and technologically enhanced muscles flexed, and he hurled himself up into the air, landing heavily at the entrance to the smoking corridor. He had just enough time to reprimand himself for being thoughtless enough to leave Alice behind to muddle up the stairs, and turn halfway around before she landed nimbly beside him.
“We’re going to talk about this later,” he said, eyeing her warily.
“Won’t help,” she informed him. “Don’t know.”
Kagan made a noise that perfectly transmitted his doubt on that particular subject, along with the slight sense of worry that she might be telling the truth, before the two of them jogged down the corridor. It wasn’t long before they came across someone who obviously knew something important, since he was busying himself with exhorting people to keep moving, and reminding them that despite evidence to the contrary, there was nothing to see here. Kagan caught a glimpse of his name-bade and raced up to him.
“Corporal Jonestown, report!” he barked authoritatively.
The young corporal snapped immediately to stiff attention. “Admiral Kagan, Sir!” he bellowed with such enthusiasm that Kagan had to suppress a wince. “There’s been an explosion, Sir! Berth 117A, Sir!”
“At ease, Corporal,” Kagan said, rubbing his right ear. Then in a more conversational tone asked, “What else do we know?”
Jonestown relaxed –slightly- and replied, “Not a lot sir. The Barinas –the freighter- was on final docking maneuvers when there was an explosion. Looks like something in one of the docking clamps blew, shot the clamp out like a kinetic warhead. It must of hit the Barinas’ main grav-thrust array, I don’t know that for sure, but she dropped all the way down to Tango deck.”
Kagan winced openly. That was a drop off a little over one hundred meters and probably hadn’t left much of the freighter intact. Or of Tango deck for that matter.
“Sabotage?” he inquired quietly.
“Well…. That hadn’t occurred to me sir, but now that you mention it, there isn’t anything in the docking clamps that can explode. You don’t think-“
“Admirals don’t think, Corporal,” Kagan interrupted. “We have people who are much better at it to do it for us. Give me a dump of the bay’s sensor logs and I’ll have my people take a look at it.”
“Aye, sir.” Jonestown’s fingers flicked across his handpad and a second later there was a beep from Kagan’s pocket indicating a successful transmission.
“Keep up the good work, Jonestown,” said Kagan as he jogged off.
“Admiral?!” Alice exclaimed as soon as they were out of earshot. “You’re an admiral?”
“Not any more,” was the reply.
“But he-“
“Sometimes, when everything has just gone horribly horribly wrong, people just want someone else to take charge, and they’re usually not to particular about who it is, at least, not until later.”
“Oh,” Alice said, the simple expression coming out far to thoughtfully for anyone’s liking.
“This, by the way,” Kagan pointed out. “Is why we should be running faster.”

A few minutes later, Corporal Jonestown was still basking in the glow of having met the legendary Admiral James Kagan, and even better, the admiral had known his name! Jonestown’s mind was running through the impressive list of accomplishments the admiral had racked up over the years until it hit the most recent event, namely the admiral’s honorable discharge at the end of the war. Jonestown turned back to the direction the admiral had disappeared and slowly uttered the immortal catchphrase of the duped.
“Wait a minute…”

[dogscoff]

Nice. Of course it only replaces the suspense with more suspense...

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Suspencefull Suspence!

[AgentZero]

dogscoff said:
Like the defiant pic. It looks like something that could be successfully piloted by one drunk dude, too.



Thanks. As a matter of reference, it's about the size of the Serenity, and while that means nothing to those of you who haven't seen Firefly or Serenity, tough. Watch 'em both, you won't regret it.

Now, I've got a lovely treat for you all today, more story, AND another picture. Who loves ya? BTW, the pic isn't the finished version, which will be unveiled at the appropriate time, but can anyone tell me how to get rid of those 'stripes' on the rear section of the ship?

And now, the next installment!

Kaelan O’Shea stretched comfortably in his destroyer’s control chair. A small smile teased his lips as he allowed his mind to wander back towards the delightful young midshipwoman he’d encountered on McArthur’s fine, shiny station. As his mind slithered about the memories of their time together, the warm tingle of love spread through his body, starting in his belly and slowly spreading out towards his limbs, ending with a pleasant tingle in his fingertips. Of course, he reflected as he reached behind his chair, the warm glow might have less to do with love, and more to do with the case of Guinness he’d liberated from McArthur. Those Ruskies, he decided as he cracked open a can that had changed remarkably little in over 30,000 years, had absolutely no business hoarding that much fine brew. It just wasn’t right. As he poured the can carefully into a well-used glass, his shipboard detection system began beeping quietly.
“Ye can wait,” he informed it as he gazed intently at the glass, waiting for the perfect moment to complete the two-part pour. Completely unfazed, his ship to beep, albeit slightly more insistently. “I said ye can bloody well wait!” he snapped at it. Taking no heed of the alarm’s increasing volume, he completed his pour and set it in his chair’s armrest to settle. “Now, what’s all the commotion about?” he inquired placatingly as he slid his command chair forward to the control panel. “Oh,” he said as his eyes swept the sensor readouts. “Well now that’s hardly good now is it?”

The Defiant was a decommissioned Revolution-class destroyer, one of the newer models the Empire had produced before the end of the war, and the haughty title bestowed on her class was not undeserved. The Revolution-class was markedly faster and more maneuverable, while still boasting significantly heavier weapons, shields and firepower than any of her predecessors. Of course, all of the decommissioned ships in the fleet had had their power plants, shields, armor and weapons stripped out, since the Navy was hardly going to release it’s most advanced equipment to the general public. That being said, if one knew the right people, it was quite possible to grease a few palms in the now cash-strapped Navy to have all of the above –save weapons, unfortunately- put back in. Which had been the second thing O’Shea had done after acquiring the Defiant. The first thing had been to have a Navy quartermaster sign off on the forms stating that all power plants, shields, armor and weapons had been stripped from the ship. He’d also managed to pull a few strings and have his ship fitted with the Komsa-class reconnaissance destroyer’s sensor suite. Which is why his ship was beeping at him far before any ship his size should have been able to see the light cruiser and two corvettes bearing down on him on a direct intercept course. O’Shea sat and watched the three blips moving steadily closer to him, though any ship moving on a course that direct and at that speed didn’t leave much to the imagination as to their intentions. The vast majority of the Revolution-class that had been decommissioned had found new employment as courier ships. Stripped of their weapons and magazines, they had a surprising amount of empty space to them and shipping companies had been eager to buy them up to use as high-speed transports to deliver valuable, time-critical goods across the Empire. This of course, made them a tempting target for pirates, and the three ships heading towards him seemed to be following the standard (and successful) tactics for capturing a speedy prey. Even with commercial power plants, the Revolution-class were still extremely fast ships, but even the fastest ships need time to accelerate, so the usual intercept was to use a light cruiser with a powerful sensor rig to pick targets from outside their own range, then build up enough speed before being noticed to make any attempts at evasion completely futile.

From his readouts, it was readily apparent to O’Shea that the three ships barreling towards him had already built up enough speed to overtake him well before he reached the nearest jump-node, even if the pirates hadn’t been in between him and said node. Faced with the prospects of certain death if they ran, versus only probably death if they didn’t, most pilots chose the former, hoping calm co-operation would save them from having their cockpit decorated with their own intestines. But O’Shea wasn’t worried just yet. These could just be a couple fine ordinary, entirely peaceful folks who just happened to be in an extraordinary hurry. He wouldn’t know for sure until they entered what they figured to be his maximum sensory range, which wouldn’t be for another –he consulted his readouts again- eighteen whole seconds. Kaelan O’Shea amused himself by inscribing a cloverleaf pattern into the head of his pint. The reasons for his fascination with the symbol had long been lost in the mists of time, but it always drifted into his mind when things were looking grim. Nineteen seconds later, his com-screen beeped and the words

Cut your engines and drop your shields

appeared on the screen. No voice, no visual, and completely lacking in piratiness, O’Shea reflected. No ‘Arrrr!’ and not even the essential ‘Prepare to be boarded.’ Amateurs, he decided with a snort and slipped his hands around the manual controls. The one thing O’Shea had that most commercial Revolution pilots didn’t, aside from a dangerously unstable psyche, was a gleaming new set of military grade pulse cannons that had been obtained from a heavy cruiser before it was scrapped. Their power requirements should have been a bit high for the Defiant’s reactor, but that was only if one ran the reactor at it’s ‘recommended’ output settings. O’Shea brought the guns to hot standby, transmitted a quick acknowledgment to the light cruiser, then spun his ship around and fired the engines to kill his momentum, before he spared a glance at his pint. In all likelihood, a spot of rough and tumble was about to ensue, he mused, and while there was little doubt about anything else in his mind, he didn’t much care for the drink’s odds of survival. Which only left one option. Grabbing his custom-made throttle control in one hand, and the pint in the other, he downed the whole thing in one go, tossed the glass out the cockpit door and slammed the throttle to full power. The Defiant leapt towards her pursuers, and immediately more and more severe threats began to pour across his com-screen. He let out a chuckle at one particularly virulent message which he deemed colourful enough to warrant his reply of, ‘Well, I’m definitely not gonna play nice now.’

He drew closer, accelerating all the time and making a beeline for the two corvettes, who decided they didn’t want to get any closer to a ship piloted by someone quite so suicidal and broke away from the light cruiser to set up an attack run –exactly as he’d hoped they would. A flick of a switch brought his weapons to full power, and his first salvo sliced through the cruiser’s shields to score direct hits on its sensor array. As he pealed off to set up another run, the first corvette fell victim to his cleverly hidden ventral-mounted auto-cannons, while the second was unfortunate enough to discover that, being swivel mounted, his pulse cannons could also fire backwards. The light cruiser managed to get her secondary sensors up and running and O’Shea chortled merrily as his ship flitted between interceptor bolts and point-defense beams. A single strafing run reduced the destruction being directed at him to a rather boring level. He executed a snap turn that would have made the most stringent flight instructor proud and loosed a disruptor missile (something good folk outside the military weren’t even supposed to know about). The missile struck home, and quite it’s power plants died and it’s guns spluttered out. O’Shea brought his destroyer in uncomfortably close to the light cruiser’s bridge and thumbed a com switch.
“Don’ bother tryin’ to fix it,” he said conversationally. “It ain’t ever startin’ again. Now,” he continued after a few seconds pause to let his words sink in. “Here’s what’s gonna happen…”

Within an hour, the Navy heavy cruiser Rawson arrived on the scene and took the pirate crew into custody. O’Shea was not unhappy to learn that a few of them had been daft enough to resist arrest and gotten themselves splattered all over a bulkhead or two. O’Shea shook his head ruefully as the Rawson’s extremely cute com officer relayed the news to him. Anyone who argued with an angry Marine in two and a half meters of powered battle armor had to be an amateur. He even stuck around for a few hours, but only in case the Rawson had to depart for some reason before the tug arrived to tow the damaged cruiser, and had absolutely nothing to do with the two hours he spent flirting with her com officer. Once all three ships had safely departed towards the nearest jump-node, he brought his ship back on course and continued along at cruising speed. Nine hours later, he was setting up his jump trajectory when a spike on one of his sensor displays indicated another ship was about to make transit to normal space. It was a fairly large spike, so he slowed the Defiant to give the new arrival plenty of room. Strictly speaking it wasn’t necessary, there was more than enough room at a jump-node for several dozen ships to simultaneously jump in and out, and since sensors could read into normal space from null-space, any exiting ship would have more than enough time to adjust their course in the extremely unlikely event of a collision hazard. Still, it was a courtesy that spacers extended to each other, and O’Shea waited patiently for the other ship to complete transit. Which occurred roughly ten seconds later, and O’Shea’s jaw dropped.

Pointing out his cockpit window and with the sort of indignation that could only be mustered following the consumption of a heroic amount of alcohol, he demanded, “What the hell is that?”

[sachmo]

Very nice story; thanks for writing it.

Do I detect some Terry Pratchett influence? If not, you should read his stuff. Methinks you might like it.

[AgentZero]

sachmo said:
Very nice story; thanks for writing it.

Do I detect some Terry Pratchett influence? If not, you should read his stuff. Methinks you might like it.



Thanks. There probably is some Terry Pratchett influence there, along with some Douglas Adams. I just like the way the English write.

[dogscoff]

I'm really enjoying it. It's the characters that make it work so well.

[JAFisher44]

Yes, definately an engaging story. You know, eventually you are gonna have to answer the question. "What the hell is that?" I want to know!

[JAFisher44]

By the way, you wanted stripes removed. Check the attachment. Is that the right part?

[AgentZero]

dogscoff said:
I'm really enjoying it. It's the characters that make it work so well.



Yay! I thought I was crap at characters. Victory is mine!


JAFisher44 said:
Yes, definately an engaging story. You know, eventually you are gonna have to answer the question. "What the hell is that?" I want to know!



Ah, don't worry, all will be revealed in time. Although I think that question will be getting asked a few more times yet. More to come tomorrow in all likelihood.

Edit: Oh, & for those of you wondering what the Taurens are flying around in, here's a pic of the Tauren battle cruiser of the same class that went bye-bye along with the Narf System.

[dogscoff]

Edit: Oh, & for those of you wondering what the Taurens are flying around in, here's a pic of the Tauren battle cruiser of the same class that went bye-bye along with the Narf System.





Oooooohhh... shiny!

[AgentZero]

JAFisher44 said:
By the way, you wanted stripes removed. Check the attachment. Is that the right part?



Tis indeed. I was just sneaky and used it backwards. Thanks very much for the part, it looks a damn sight better than before. Think I might have to name a star system after you. Course, that's not always the honour it should be. Just ask Narf. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif



dogscoff said:
Oooooohhh... shiny!



I like shiny.

[JAFisher44]

If you are gonna name a star for me name it Fisher's Star or something like that. The JA part is just my first and middle initials http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

Also, If you would like, I can show you how to remove stripes and stuff from your DoGA parts. If you have any chat programs we can talk there or if you visit the #SpaceEmpires channel on IRC I am there a lot. It's just easier to explain stuff in "real time".

[AgentZero]

JAFisher44 said:
If you are gonna name a star for me name it Fisher's Star or something like that. The JA part is just my first and middle initials http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

Also, If you would like, I can show you how to remove stripes and stuff from your DoGA parts. If you have any chat programs we can talk there or if you visit the #SpaceEmpires channel on IRC I am there a lot. It's just easier to explain stuff in "real time".



Cool. I'm on MSN with fairly regular frequency, just look for Agent_Zero(at)hotmail.com. And don't bother sending emails to that address, since I use it purely for MSN so I can stick it on forums & stuff & not care about the vast quantities of spam that get sent my way, but I won't be dropping by #SpaceEmpires until I'm back in Ireland. What timezone are you in, BTW?

[AgentZero]

I was thinking about doing a little bit of political intrigue next, but I've been reading War of Honor, and I'm SICK of intriuge in general, especially the political kind. So what does that leave?

That's right, we're blowin' some s*** up!

The seven-ship destroyer squadron screamed towards their target at speeds best not thought about, their parade-perfect formation suddenly exploding into a fiendishly complex, yet perfectly choreographed evasive maneuver as their entered the enemy’s energy weapons range. Like steel hummingbirds, they flitted around the streams of death being hurled their way, but unlike any bird, these Cumana class hunter-killers were carrying state-of-the-art shaped antimatter warheads designed specifically to take down ships much bigger than them. Closing from outside their target’s missile envelope to within reach of their short-range ordnance, their reformed formation for a split second to simultaneously launch their payloads before wheeling around to set up and new attack run. Only three of them survived the launching maneuver, but these three formed up with another shattered squadron and howled back into the jaws of death.

“Hard port! Missile control, FIRE!”
Admiral Nelson Esperance gripped the his command chair tightly as his ship’s overstressed compensators didn’t quite manage to cope with the strain of his helmsman’s perfectly executed snap turn. The maneuver swung his ship clear of the incoming missile salvo just long enough for the Renown’s point-defense turrets to deal with them, but also aligned her broadside with the ship that had launched them, and Nelson felt his chair shudder as she belched a full broadside towards- whatever that thing was.

It had popped out of hyperspace thirty-two minutes earlier, and the Renown’s sister ship, the Repulse, along with the Heroic, an orbital shipyard and three incomplete had died in that first hellacious salvo. Nelson had lost half his carriers and two cruiser squadrons to those massive spinal mounted beam cannons before he’d gotten his command out of range. Whatever could be said about it’s firepower, the juggernaut was neither fast nor maneuverable and Nelson hadn’t had much trouble keeping his ships outside of it’s energy weapon’s range and away from it’s deadly front end while they peppered it with incessant missile barrages. Yet after over twenty minutes of bombardment they still hadn’t even managed to put a hole in the colossal ship’s shields, and it’s missiles hadn’t stopped killing his ships. Just as the admiral allowed the despairing thought that they might lose this battle through attrition alone, the Renown’s extremely pretty com officer gave him a spark of hope.
“Sir, Tanzia reports enemy shield penetration! Aft grid, section seven,” Lieutenant Rebecca Morse reported excitedly.
“Thank you, lieutenant,” was all Nelson managed to say to her before a direct missile hit and the inevitable overloads blew out her station and hurled her clear across the bridge. He was vaguely aware of shouts for medics, the acrid smoke drifting into his nostrils and the smell of burnt human flesh, but none of that was terribly important as his focus turned to the red hole showing in that bastards shield layers. He reached out and opened a com-link to the only ships that had so far been not involved in the battle.
“Carrier command,” he said grimly. “You have a go for launch.”

The surviving members of Nelson’s carrier group still represented a formidable fighting force, each one capable of launching upwards of three hundred fighters in a single wave, and now thousands poured into space and bore down on their single target like angry dogs unleashed, determined to avenge their fallen comrades. They approached the colossus in neat, orderly formations that would be the dream of any point-defense operator, but seconds before they entered into range, the dream turned into a nightmare as the squadrons split apart into a chaotic, swirling cloud rushing forwards, and a split second later, everything got a whole lot worse as the ECM drones accompanying the fighters activated their full range of decoy systems. And right about the time when any point-defense operator would be thinking it couldn’t get any worse, every single fighter fired as one, their tiny payloads fired at an angle that slid three quarters of them in underneath their target’s shield layer to detonate all across the armored hull of the warship, doing little damage to the armor, but stripping off turrets and guns and melting shut missile tubes. The other quarter were targeted at a single point on the giant’s hull barely a meter square, and no material ever made could withstand the furnace of pure destruction. Armor melted and sizzled away into space as warhead after warhead slammed into it until finally it gave, and the remaining missiles slammed through the unprotected hull, and the resulting explosions blew away a massive chunk of the goliath’s aft armor.

“Well,” Admiral Nelson Esperance as a truly evil smile spread across his face. “Looks like our little friends have gone and made us a nice little blind spot. Signal the rest of the fleet, focus all fire at that hole and close to energy range.”
The unknown ship twisted and turned desperately as Nelson’s fleet closed on it’s gaping wound, but it was too big, and Nelson’s ships too fast and they bore down on it, firing endless streams of missiles which continued to widen the hole the fighters had made. Then the fleet entered energy range, and almost as one began to pour vengeful fire into their wounded adversary. The Renown and the other heavier ships slowed to maintain optimal firing range for their massive forward armaments, while the lighter ships closed the distance to use their more powerful short range weapons. Nelson was just beginning to ask himself exactly how much more punishment this thing could absorb when a massive explosion erupted from the center of the ship and split her right across her breadth. The forward section began to rotate away from the other as momentum carried it away, and then suddenly, the battle cruiser Hogart scored a direct hit on something important and the entire aft section detonated in a massive explosion that smashed the forward section into pieces and –Nelson grimaced- took the Hogart out with her. A ragged cheer went up on the Renown’s bridge as her sensor’s swept across the expanding debris field that had once been their enemy, followed by a slowly spreading silence as the survivors began to realize how much their victory had cost them.
“Well now,” Nelson said conversationally as he settled back into his chair. “Would someone explain to me, exactly what the hell WAS that?”



Edit: Realized I hadn't posted the Raezel yet.

[TurinTurambar]

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

[Puke]

great stuff!

[narf poit chez BOOM]

It's a baseship!

Well, he wanted an explanation.

[AgentZero]

Hush, little mouse, don't go giving away secrets. Oh, wait. It's not a baseship so no secrets are being divulged. Victory, once again, is mine!
But for those of you who want to know what the big nasty was before Nelson & Co. went and blew it up, check out the attatchment.

Oh, and a wee question as well. On one particular Doga model, when I try to load it, the program just exits and restarts at the little start up screen. Every other model I have is fine, and this one isn't even the biggest or most complex one, but I wanna work on it and I can't.

[AgentZero]

Oh, and also, MORE!

“Someone,” Kagan said grimly from behind his desk. “Was trying to kill me.”
“Hmmm?” Alice replied, having just entered the room.
Kagan looked up at her. It must be getting late, he realized, since she was already in her nightgown, though experience told him there wouldn’t be anything under it. “Someone tried to kill me,” he repeated as she crossed the ready room floor and plunked herself comfortably into his lap.
“Who?” she asked. “Why? How? And possibly, when?”
“Well, if I may answer your questions in reverse order,” he said, making the question a statement as he slipped a hand inside her gown to rest it easily on her bare hip. “This morning, when we were docking, the docking clamp that blew was supposed to kill me. As for why-“
“But the explosion wasn’t in our berth,” Alice interrupted.
“No,” Kagan admitted. “But it was in the berth we were supposed to be in, and that would have been determined as soon as they received our flight plan, which would have been a couple days ago, and who’s due to dock where is available to the public. Hell, they’ve got big screens in the arrivals area announcing arrivals for the next thirty-six hours. That’d give anyone who wanted to do us in more than enough head start. The freighter that took our berth was a last minute thing, unplanned, unforeseen. Shouldn’t have happened.”
“OK,” Alice agreed slowly. “But that explosion took out their main grav-thingy, right? That seems like a good way of doing someone in to me.”
“Admittedly, from the outside, it looks like good old-fashioned terrorism, but look at this.” With his free hand he entered a command into the desktop information console and a wireframe simulation of the docking area and the freighter entering from the top right of the screen. Two minutes and thirty-seven seconds into the recording, one of the docking clamps shot forward, and the simulation tracked it’s progress through the ship as a list of the freighter’s damaged and destroyed sections scrolled down the left hand side of the screen.
“Now, look what would have happened if it had been the Daedalus coming in.”
The simulation reset, and began to play again, this time with the Daedalus coming in from the top right using standard docking protocols. Two minutes and thirty-seven seconds in, the same clamp shot forward and the simulated damage to the ship scrolled up on the left. “See,” said Kagan tapping the screen where ‘Bridge’ was listed in the blood red indicating total destruction. “ I’ve run the simulation a hundred different ways, checked every single approach vector and variation in speed, and exactly what ends up getting destroyed is always different. Except-“ he said, turning off the console with an irritated slap. “For the bridge. That gets destroyed every single time, without exception. On the other hand, if that freighter had been traveling a bit faster or slower, or the explosion went off three seconds earlier or later, she would have survived it with minimal damage.”
“So if no matter what, our bridge would have been destroyed by the explosion,” Alice said slowly as she rolled the thought around in her mind. “But there’s only a very small margin for error for it to destroy the freighter, then that alone suggests that it was meant for us. So someone’s trying to kill us.”
“Not us, me,” Kagan said softly. “No one knows you’re here, so whoever it was, was after me.”
“But who would want to kill nice you?”
Kagan slumped back in the chair with a wry smile. “You got a few hours? We should probably get moving,” he added as he made to rise, but Alice pushed him back in the chair.
“In the morning,” she said firmly. “You’re far to distracted right now, anyway?”
“Distracted?” Kagan frowned. “By what?”
Her reply took the form of a raised eyebrow and a nightgown sliding to the floor.
“Oh. Jakers,” he murmured.

The following morning, the two extremely relaxed crewmembers of the Daedalus set about prepping the ship for launch, and within half an hour they’d received launch clearance from Kolis Control and were easing out of the docking berth. Once clear Kagan turned the helm over to Alice, partly for the practice, partly to get her mind off the fact that someone willing to kill thousands for a chance at killing one person was somewhere out there, looking for him.
“Set a course for Perth Nine, Victoria System,” he instructed her. “I’ve got a few friends there who might be able to shed some light on who wants me dead.”
With flawless precision, Alice brought the Daedalus into the queue for Edward’s Gambit’s outbound jump gate and fifteen minutes later, they were in null-space, enroute to what would hopefully be some answers. Who to ask, that was the question, he mused. He had many contacts on the Perth Nine system, having started operating the Daedalus from there at the end of the war. Not to mention saving it from being destroyed by a Tauren assault fleet during the war. That had to be worth a favour or two. And if all else failed, well-
The bridge lurched suddenly and Kagan was nearly knocked clear of his chair as a sloppy null-space band switch rocked the ship.
“Careful!” he snapped angrily.
“Sorry,” Alice cringed. “I’m still getting the hang of this.”
“Sorry,” he apologized in turn. “Having people try to kill me makes me cranky.”
“Ego, Mr. Kagan, ego,” a dry voice chuckled behind him. “What makes you think this has anything to do with you?”
Kagan spun out of his command chair, drawing his side arm as he did so to bring it up pointing squarely between the voice’s owner’s eyes.
“What the holy hell are you doing on my ship?” he snarled.
The owner of the voice, a shaved-bald man in a black trench coat and black sunglasses standing in the entrance to the bridge, smiled serenely at him. “You may address me as Fourteen,” he said calmly. “And I must commend you on your reaction time. Still keeping to the old military training regiment, hmmm?”
“I didn’ ask ye wha yer frackin’ name was,” Kagan growled, reverting unconsciously to his native accent. “I asked wha te frak yer doin’ on me ship!”
“Oh, dear. We really should have left yesterday,” Alice said quietly. “Sorry.”
“It’s no’ yer-“
“Actually,” Fourteen interrupted. “I’ve been aboard since you disembarked onto Kolis Station, so it wouldn’t have made much of a difference when you left. Although I must say, that was quite a performance you put on last night. Wore me out just watching.”
If looks could kill, the one Alice bestowed on Fourteen would have been enough to wipe out his entire bloodline, ancestors and descendents included. Her mouth opened to say something, but Fourteen’s attention would brought back to Kagan by the sound of an energy cell dumping into a capacitator as Kagan thumbed off the safety on his weapon.
“Scuze me,” Kagan grated. “But ye still haven’ explained wha’ yer doin’ on me ship. Now if I don’ get an answer soon, then whether yer intentions are honourable or not’ll be somethin’ fer God te decide. Am I makin’ meself nice an’ clear to ye?”
“Perfectly,” Fourteen replied with that same sereneness. “My associates and I-“ he gestured by spreading both hands out in front of him, and a dozen black-clad men appeared as they deactivated personal cloaking devices, and two of them seized Alice firmly. “-are merely here to collect the girl and bring her to our superiors for questioning. After which she, and whatever is left of her mind, will be returned to you if you so desire.”
“Not. Bloody. Likely,” Kagan replied through gritted teeth.
“Now Mr. Kagan,” Fourteen said reasonably. “There’s really no need for violence. Nor any point, since you are clearly outnumbered.”
“Well,” Kagan said with a defeated sigh. “I ‘spose… Well I ‘spose we’ll have to jus’ agree te disagree ‘bout tat.” No sooner had the last syllable escaped his lips than his finger tightened on the trigger and a blot of light leapt out at Fourteen. It struck him square in the forehead, causing him to flicker slightly, before carrying on to splash harmlessly against a corridor wall.
“Frackin’ hologram?” Kagan muttered with disbelief shortly before something decidedly unholographic slammed into the back of his head and he hit the deck face down, hard. He managed something approaching a, “Gurk,” as he turned his head towards Alice, while the rest of his muscles refused stubbornly to do what they were told. A man dressed in white stepped out from behind Fourteen and approached Alice, who began struggling fiercely the moment he produced a medical injector.
“Now relax, Ms. Montaigne,” Fourteen advised her. “The good doctor’s just going to give you a little something so you’ll sleep through the trip home.”
“No!” Alice screamed. “Not sleep! Neversleep! No! Don’t want to go!” With that last word, she threw her legs out so they were behind both of her restrainers, then thrust her arms backwards, throwing all three of them to the ground. Kagan’s eyes widened. Both of those men outweighed her by at least a factor of three, and she’d just thrown them to the ground with almost dismissive ease. The two released her as they hit the ground and she grabbed hold of the knives holster on their belts with either hand. Then, propelling herself upwards with the strength of her legs alone, she slashed her arms backwards, neatly slicing through the throats of the two on the ground. The moment she regained her vertical base she swung her around and slammed a knife into either side of the doctor’s head with astounding ease. Yanking them free, she kicked the body aside and strode towards the stun baton-armed men approaching her with grim determination.
Kagan for his part, suddenly realized that his right hand was actually quite cold. It took a split second for is mind to connect the fact that he could once again feel the gun in his hand to the fact that the effects of the stun baton had worn off. He leapt to his feet, his left hand pulling out his holdout from his ankle holster.
“A stun baton to the head is not very nice,” he informed the man who’d stuck him. “But then, neither is a plasma bolt. It’s an imperfect universe,” he reassured the fresh corpse. “Scuze me, luv,” he called out to Alice, who was busy carving her way through the seventh black-clad man. “Yer getting blood all over me floor an’ I only cleaned it yesterday.”
She stared back at him with an uncomprehending gaze, not moving except to absent-mindedly slice the throat of someone who got too close.
“Right,” said Kagan. “Well do ye understand this?” he asked irritably as he raised both weapons to point in her direction. The message got through, apparently, as she launched herself backwards through the air to land with surprising agility on the railing in front of the view screen, flexing her knees as she landed into a combat stance. The men who had been vainly attempting to subdue her now found her far out of reach with a seriously pissed off, heavily armed New Eireannman training his weapons on them. They had exactly enough time to realize that he was now the more serious threat, and begin to formulate some sort of appropriate reaction before Kagan hauled back on both triggers in full-auto mode, and he and Alice were quite suddenly the only living things on the Daedalus. Which wasn’t to say they were the only ones making any noise, Kagan thought irritably as Fourteen’s hologram piped up.
“Now that, Mr. Kagan, Ms. Montaigne, was a terribly bad idea,” he scolded, his tone finally losing some of that infuriating calm. “There are going to be consequences for this, serious, dire consequences, I’m afraid.”
Kagan, poking through the bodies, finally found the holographic transmitter on a corpse that had been thrown clear across the bridge and was backwards over the railing behind his command chair, it’s near decapitated state making it clear it had been one of Alice’s victims, though how she’d managed to throw a one hundred-plus kilogram man roughly seven meters through the air wasn’t something Kagan really wanted to think about.
“Fourteen,” he said instead in an almost friendly tone as he took aim at the transmitter. “Get te hell off me ship.” He pulled the trigger and Fourteen’s indignant protest was lost forever as the hologram disappeared back into the ether.

[Puke]

wheee!

[AgentZero]

/me needs to stop blowing stuff up & killing people so I get more eloquent responses than wheee! Not that I don't appreciate wheee!

[dogscoff]

I'm still loving it. Is there anything that girl can't do? I'm beginning to suspect she's a robot and/ or ninja and/or pirate.

[JAFisher44]

Yes, definately a good story. It has that special something that keeps you wanting more. Alice is definately interesting. Very good imagery with her in the fight scene.

[dogscoff]

Alice is definately interesting. Very good imagery with her in the fight scene.



And in the lingerie...

[narf poit chez BOOM]

...Was fourteen Morpheus?

[AgentZero]

narf poit chez BOOM said:
...Was fourteen Morpheus?



Nope, Fourteen's white. As for Alice & her limitless abilities, well, the reason for them will be revealed in the next few parts, but unfortunately y'all are gonna have to wait about a week coz I'm gonna be visiting my sisters and then heading back to Dublin this week, so I won't have much time. But after that, oh yes, there will be writing.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Ah, the similiar physique was simply a coincedence. And the sunglasses. And the trenchcoat.

Good luck with your vacation.

[Puke]

AgentZero said:
/me needs to stop blowing stuff up & killing people so I get more eloquent responses than wheee! Not that I don't appreciate wheee!



maybe i should have used more e's. at least im not the one comparing characters to movies, this time.

im waiting to see how everything comes together. there seem to be a couple of seperate plot threads that are about to converge into something cataclysmic. if thats the right idea, then its a very nice buildup.

if thats not the idea, then its good misdirection for suspense building. or maybe im just dense.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Ah, don't mind me. Complete originality is nearly impossible.

[AgentZero]

narf poit chez BOOM said:
Ah, the similiar physique was simply a coincedence. And the sunglasses. And the trenchcoat.

Good luck with your vacation.



Hey, my sister has a computer with internet access. Who knew? I guess 'poor' is a relative term. And yep, the sunglasses & trenchcoat are mere conincidence. Don't think I mentioned anything about Fourteen's physique, but in my mind's eye he's a bit too skinny for a Morpheus. More like a bald Neo, if one must draw a comparison. Although it's not going to matter very much soon...

[AgentZero]

As I was saying....


It took another seven hours of travel before they reached the jump beacon for the Victoria System, and Alice brought them smoothly in line with the Perth Nine beacon before executing a perfect null-space transit back into normal space. Twelve seconds after they made transit, the Daedalus rocked violently.
“Not my fault!” Alice cried.
“I know,” Kagan growled. “Someone’s shooting at us.”
“Oh, frack,” she replied dejectedly. “Control is yours.”
Kagan slid his hands over the control panel that moved smoothly into place as Alice transferred ship control over to him. The tactical plot showed a small, destroyer-class ship right behind them. From its approach vector, it must have exited null-space along with him. In fact, he realized grimly, it’d probably been shadowing them all the way from Kolis Station. The ship rocked again and this time the sound of rattling deck plates was accompanied by the friendly chirp of an incoming transmission. The com screen came to life at Kagan’s command to reveal the smug face of Fourteen staring back at him.
“Now, Mr. Kagan,” he said, an almost undetectable hint of rage colouring his tone. “I’m giving you one last chance to play nice. If you do not cut your speed, drop your shields and turn the girl over to me, I am perfectly willing to cut my loses and blow you out of the sky.”
“Now, now, Mr. Fourteen,” Kagan replied in exactly the same tone, but humour rather than rage coloured his tone. “I’m sure even if your instructions aren’t particular to whether dead or alive, they do at least want her in more or less one piece. I’m sure your superiors would be none too pleased if you blew your objective into tiny little pieces.”
“Actually, Mr. Kagan,” Fourteen replied tersely. “My instructions do provide for such an act if it is deemed impossible to recover her by other means. And since you so handily dispatched my retrieval team, I really don’t have any other means.”
Kagan thought about this for a long moment, then finally nodded slowly. “Alright,” he said. “Coming about and cutting engines.”
“No!” Alice shouted jumping out of her chair. “I won’t-“
“Quiet!” Kagan snapped at her. “Sit back down!”
He’d never raised his voice to her before and the shock of it hit her like a blow and she dropped back into her seat in surprise. She opened her mouth to protest again, but closed it resignedly when she recognized the expression on Kagan’s face.
“Velocity at zero, Perth Nine relative,” he informed Fourteen. “Preparing to cycle down shield layers.”
“Good, Mr. Kagan,” the other replied. “I must say you are very lucky that I’m a patient man. Most men in my position wouldn’t have given you a second chance.”
“Aye, Mr. Fourteen,” Kagan agreed. “You are indeed a patient man, and I very much appreciate that patience.”
“Thank you, Mr. Kagan,” Fourteen replied, not noticing the dangerous edge in Kagan’s voice.
“I, on the other hand, am not a patient man,” the Eireannman continued and the dangerous edge was now very obvious. “And I ran out of patience for playing nice a long time ago!” He slammed his hand down on a control lever, and the bridge suddenly filled with noise. First the high pitch whine of backup power plants coming online, then almost simultaneously the clunk of some large things detaching from the hull. This was swiftly followed by the suffering moan of hydraulics being forced to work at higher than normal speed, which was ended by the clang of some large things locking into place. No sooner had silence begun to settle on the bridge of the Daedalus than it was interrupted by a new noise, this time a screeching noise from the com system as Fourteen’s ship reacted noisily to the targeting scanners that were suddenly sweeping it. He looked out at Kagan with an expression of shock, his face bathed in red emergency lights.
“Surprise,” Kagan grinned evilly.
“There was nothing in the brief about this,” Fourteen mumbled softly.
“Fourteen,” Kagan said in an almost friendly tone. “Git te hell outta me sky.”
He depressed a single button, and eight military grade beam cannons fired as one, all but obliterating Fourteen and his ship from existence. “Now then, my love,” Kagan continued. “Would you be a dear and plot a best-time course for Perth Nine?”
“Yessir, right away, sir,” she replied merrily, and responding to her nimble fingers, the Daedalus swung back around and accelerated towards the Perth Nine shipping station.

I know, kinda a short installment this time, but it's more finishing off the last installment than starting a new one. I only really have time to write when my sister's in a class, which is only an hour at a time, hence I can't be sure when the next installment will be ready.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

...Do all private vessels in this universe regularly carry military weapons?

Cool.

[Puke]

whe--*cough* ah, and you were threatening to cut short the portions of "blam"

good to see that you're still lighting their ducks on fire - but we do want to see what the stooorey is about, too.

[AgentZero]

narf poit chez BOOM said:
...Do all private vessels in this universe regularly carry military weapons?

Cool.



Um, no, not as a rule. But Kagan and O'Shea are kinda exceptions to that rule. War heroes and all that.


Puke said:
whe--*cough* ah, and you were threatening to cut short the portions of "blam"

good to see that you're still lighting their ducks on fire - but we do want to see what the stooorey is about, too.



Yeah, but I like blam, dammit! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif But don't worry, all will be revealed in time.

[dogscoff]

...Do all private vessels in this universe regularly carry military weapons?




Wouldn't be much of a story if they didn't:

(With apologies to AZ)

The Defiant was a decommissioned Revolution-class destroyer, and as such it was completely unarmed, its once-fearsome weaponry now safely retired to a dusty shelf in some military spaceyard. Even the Komsa-class reconnaissance destroyer’s sensor suite he'd wanted, and which would have fitted perfectly into his hull, had been denied him by the law that forbade military-grade hardware being installed into civilian craft. Which is why his ship was beeping at long after it was too late to do anything about the light cruiser and two corvettes bearing down on him on a direct intercept course. O’Shea sat and watched the three blips moving steadily closer to him, though any ship moving on a course that direct and at that speed didn’t leave much to the imagination as to their intentions. A stripped-down Revolution-class like his, now employed as a cargo-laden courier ship made tempting target for pirates, and the three ships heading towards him seemed to be following the standard (and successful) tactics for capturing a speedy prey.

From his readouts, it was readily apparent to O’Shea that the three ships barreling towards him had already built up enough speed to overtake him well before he reached the nearest jump-node, even if the pirates hadn’t been in between him and said node. Seconds later, his com-screen beeped and the words

Cut your engines and drop your shields

appeared on the screen. No voice, no visual, and completely lacking in piratiness, O’Shea reflected. No ‘Arrrr!’ and not even the essential ‘Prepare to be boarded.’
"Please don't shoot," He squealed into the comm, "I'm unarmed." Long seconds dripped from the viewscreen as he awaited the reply. Suddenly, his sensors told him that the pirates had cut their acceleration, and a new message appeared on his screen:
"Actually, so are we."
"Phew!" Thought O’Shea, and returned to his pint.

[JAFisher44]

LOL, I believe the above is an exerpt from "Hell is for People", a re-envisioning of the AZ classic "Hell is for Heroes" toned down for the excitement intollerant.

[AgentZero]

I thought it was the children's version, 'Heck is for Heroes', toned down for consumption by the underage. Been watching loads of children's programming with my niece the last few days and seriously, anyone raised on that junk is in for a NASTY suprise when they bang into reality. Anyway, due to the aforementioned babysitting duties, I'm not sure if I'll get around to any updates before I get back to Dublin. That's Wednesday evening, so don't expect anything new before Thursday. I'm not saying I won't try to suprise you, but don't hold your breath.

Or, do. It'll be funny, trust me.

[JAFisher44]

I'll tell you what, I tried and it wasn't funny. So, come on and get some more writing done.

[AgentZero]

Bring Us More Pie!



“Frak,” murmured Alice some time later. “What the hell's that?”
Kagan glanced up at the view screen, while making a mental note to mind his mouth around the girl. She seemed to be picking up his bad habits with gleeful aplomb. “That would be Perth 9. Not the friendliest place in the galaxy, but it's where we need to be.”
Allowing Alice to busy herself with the docking maneuvers, Kagan opened up a communications link to the station. He keyed in a series of codes, then waited. Within a few seconds, a long stream of seemingly random numbers and letters filled the screen, and Kagan sat back with a sigh of satisfaction. She was here.

“Who was that?” Alice asked after the Daedalus had latched securely to the station.
“Just checking up on an old friend,” Kagan replied.
“Odd,” she muttered as she went about shutting the ship down.
“What's that?” he inquired.
“Well, the proper communications protocol for contacting someone on board the station would be seven-six-two-eight, or two-nine if they were on a ship docked with the station, but yours was nine-seven-four-six. Which like I said is odd, especially since civilian protocols stop at seven.”
“How-” Kagan stopped to allow a good frown to form. “How did you see that from there?” he asked slowly.
“Didn't see,” she informed him. “Heard. The little beeps it makes when you press a key.”
“But those beeps all sound exactly the same,” he pointed out.
“Nope,” she disagreed cheerfully. “Slight frequency difference depending on which row and what position the key is in. A one sounds like 'beep' and a nine sounds like 'beep'.”
“I couldn't tell any difference between your beeps,” said Kagan.
“No, me neither,” she agreed. “But the human vocal apparatus simply isn't designed to create such slight variations in frequency.”
“But the human ear is?”
“No, not most of them.”
Kagan's frown deepened to the point where it was in serious danger of becoming a scowl, and he turned back to the communications console and began alternating between pressing the one and the nine. After a few minutes, he resigned himself to the fact that there was no difference between the two, and that he was in love with a raving lunatic. A raving lunatic who'd also been completely right, he reminded himself. Deciding that was a conversation for another time, he tucked his sidearm into its shoulder holster and headed on to Perth 9 with Alice in tow.

The smell was the first thing one noticed upon arriving on Perth 9, and it wasn't a pleasant experience. The air was thick with the smell of unwashed bodies, vomit, excrement and other bodily products best not thought about. Greasy, filthy bodies squeezed past each other in the tight confines of the corridors, though Kagan and Alice were given some measure of space, thanks partly to Kagan's sleeveless shirt which showed off both his firearm and the long line of dates and places tattooed down his right bicep that identified him as military, and partly to the disproportionately massive sidearm Alice wore slung low off her hip.
"Why do we have to be here?" Alice inquired, trying to ignore the leers that no weapon in the galaxy would protect her from; women weren't a common sight on the station.
"Because a friend is here," Kagan replied. "Probably the only person who might know what the frack's been going on the last few days."
"What's he look like?" wondered Alice.
"She," Kagan emphasized. "Looks.... Terrifying."
"Oh. Dear," she muttered, casting her gaze around to see if anyone matched that description. Many adjectives came to mind to describe the crowd around her: Disgusting, revolting, vile, mildly disturbing, but none that could be considered terrifying, and definitely none that could be considered female.
"There," said Kagan, looking ahead.
Alice, being somewhat shorter, had to wait a moment longer for her first glimpse of Kagan's friend. The crowd suddenly parted, the slovenly workers suddenly trying to put as much distance between themselves and the woman striding purposefully down the corridor. She was tall, almost the same height as Kagan, and slender but she moved with a noticeable aura of barely restrained power, a sort of quiet lethality that Alice had to agree, was terrifying. Almost as much as her face, which was completely white except for her black lips and blacker eyes. As they drew closer, Alice realized with a sense of growing trepidation that the woman approaching them was not wearing any make up, that the disturbing mask was no mask at all, but bare skin. The woman swept her gaze across the corridor, and the filthy men filling it seemed to wither under her gaze. Alice felt a cold chill run through her as the woman's eyes fell upon her. A fearful knot tightened in her stomach, though she could think of no rational reason for it, Alice was stuck with the unshakable feeling that the eyes of Death itself were upon her.
She stopped in front of Kagan and extended her hand expressionlessly. He gripped it firmly, and the two of them pulled each other towards themselves, wrapping their free arm around the other's shoulders in a tight embrace.
"Alice, I'd like you to meet Saraea Azen," Kagan said.
Saraea nodded politely towards Alice. "A pleasure," she said.
"Eek," Alice said.

[JAFisher44]

Woot! More Hell is for Heroes. I like it. Good imagery on the dirty, slovenly station. Hopefully your writers block has broken.

One criticism. I don't feel that you really conveyed the terrifying aspect of Saraea very well. She just didn't feel terrifying to me. I don't know if she is terrifying because of her appearance or maybe she just radiates terror or something, but a quick line or two describing what exactly makes her terrifying, maybe in the form of inner dialogue from Alice or something, would clear it up.

Hopefully we will see some more Hell is for Heroes in the NEAR future. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

Joshua

[AgentZero]

Yay! Critism! I like critism. Makes for better stories, methinks. I've added a couple extra lines to better explain the terrifyingness of Saraea, and the full scope of her scariness will become apparent as the story progresses.

[JAFisher44]

That was much better. Thank you for clarifying her terrifying demeanor.

[AgentZero]

Welcome....



Without another word, Kagan and Saraea turned and headed back towards the Daedalus. Alice, for her part disappeared into the crowd, reappearing to cast an apprehensive glance back at the two every time Kagan started to wonder about where she'd gotten off to. They reached the ship considerably faster than they'd left it, thanks to the wide berth the crowds continued to give Saraea, the two of them ducking slightly as they passed through the airlock door. Kagan glanced backwards, waiting for Alice to board before he sealed the doors. When she failed to materialize, he cast an anxious look up the corridor and slammed his head into the airlock door from the start of finding Alice looking back at him.

"Fracking son of a fracking frack!" he snarled. "Don't do that!"
Alice watched him impassively for a moment longer before turning the same gaze towards Saraea. "What happened to your hand?" she asked with innocent curiosity.
Saraea glanced down at her seemingly entirely flesh and blood right hand and flexed it gently. "I lost it during the Corporate Wars," she said. "How did you know?"
"When we were walking back to the ship you brushed it against a pipe that was one hundred and forty seven degrees Celsius and didn't even flinch," Alice replied. "That and the noise."
"The noise?" asked Kagan irritably, still rubbing his head. "Prosthetics make the same amount of noise as normal flesh and blood. In other words, frack all."
"No," Alice replied slowly, as if speaking to a particularly slow child. "They make noise. And her right hand makes a different noise to her left. Mechanical. Squeaky. Almost distracting." She stood still for a moment, staring off at a point in between Saraea and Kagan's bewildered faces, as if lost in deep thought. Then, she shrugged suddenly, dismissing whatever thoughts she'd been having. "No matter," she decided. "I'm filthy. Grubby men and all that. Going to shower." With that, she stripped off her admittedly reeking clothes and tossed them to Kagan. "Probably want to burn those," she advised before strolling down the corridor and disappearing around a corner.
"How does-" Saraea finally managed.
"Don't know," Kagan admitted. "I'm still trying to get passed the beeps thing."

Yolanda Powell felt something crunch beneath the sole of her armored environment suit. She froze, willing herself to look down, but far to aware of the hefty dose of sedatives it had required for her to stay in control of herself the last time something had gone crunch, and she'd glanced down to find she'd trodden on a child's skull. Eventually, she managed to force her eyes downwards and breathed a sigh of relief as they fell upon a large piece of ceramocrete poking up through the ashes. She pushed on, and soon reached the crest of the hill they'd been climbing for the last hour. She stared into the valley below, and knew without a shadow of a doubt that it was only the deadening effect of the sedatives coursing through her veins that allowed her to retain any semblance of composure as she beheld the remnants of her home. What had once been a thriving metropolitan colony, home to fifteen million souls was now nothing more than a blackened scar on the valley floor below. Everything had been reduced to soot and ash, just like everything else on the entire surface of the planet. She heard a choking sob over the comlink and turned her head to the right in time to see Lieutenant Liu crumple to her knees and press her head to the ground. Her entire family had been here, Powell knew. Grandparents, parents, husband and children, all now nothing more than ash drifting through the valley. She left Liu to the attention of Ensign Jones, knowing that in her emotionally dead state, she was more likely to make things worse for the lieutenant than she was to help. Instead, she turned her head to the left, to her Exec, Edwin O'Shea and knew she should feel guilt as she looked upon the expression of horror on his face. The sedatives she'd taken were a luxury afforded to captains only, and aside from O'Shea, no one on the ship even knew they existed.
"Why?" he whispered. "Who? How?"
"It's only the last two that concern me, Ed," Powell said grimly. "Why can wait until we've tracked down the bastards who did this and decorated their ships with the intestines of her crew."
Edwin's admonishment was cut short by a cry from Liu. "Captain!"
Powell turned to see the Lieutenant on her feet and pointing at something down in the valley. She turned the zoom on her suit's visor up to maximum and frowned at the strange object in the dust below.
"O'Shea?" she inquired.
"I know, ma'am," he said resignedly. "What the hell is that?

Kaelan O’Shea flicked a switch and the Defiant transited from the chaos of null-space into the very depths of Hell itself. Missiles and weapon fire swarmed about him and he cursed quite creatively as he forced his nimble ship to duck and weave its way to a relatively safe portion of space. It was only then that he turned his ship's powerful sensors on the maelstrom behind him.
"Well now," he said in surprise. "That just ain't right."
A massive Tauren fleet swarmed around the colossal ship Kaelan had been tracking for the last six days. Unrelenting fire poured down onto it's massive hull, and answering fire poured back just as savagely, but the unfathomably big ship continued relentlessly towards the planet ahead of it. Kaelan turned his sensors towards the planet itself, and got another less than pleasant surprise. It was inhabited, heavily so, and they energy signatures his sensors were picking up were unmistakably Tauren.
"What are you lot doing with a colony this far out?" he wondered. "And how'd you get it so big without us noticing you, hmmm?"
As he watched, an entire squadron of Tauren light cruisers bore down on the colossus, firing madly, but rather than pull out to execute another run, they continued forward and suicided themselves upon it's hull. Kaelan scowled. The Taurens were just as unlikely to perform such an act as humans, and if they were willing to take such drastic measures, they must be trying to prevent something very, very bad. He hadn't long to wait to discover what the Taurens were so desperate to avoid, as the alien vessel reached whatever range it needed to reach, and two incredibly bright, incredibly large beams of light flashed outwards and slammed into the planet. The burst lasted a mere few seconds, but the effect was devastating. A massive wave of fire plumed outwards from the epicentre of the blast and raced across the planet with incredible speed. As Kaelan stared in absolute horror, the colossus began to accelerate, it's task complete, it headed rapidly for the outer reaches of the solar system to make null-space transit. Numb with shock, Kaelan was only motivated to action by the fact that the beast was heading towards the same part of the outer reaches of the solar system that he himself was currently occupying. Acting on pure instinct, he brought his small ship around and flashed into null-space, bringing the Defiant up through the hyperspace bands a little bit faster than was really safe as he set a course back for Terran space, with only one thought running through his mind.
'What the hell was that?'

[JAFisher44]

Nice! Super-huge mystery ship of DOOM! You have to love it. Sorry, but this time I don't have any criticisms for you. Oh, wait, yes I do. It isn't long enough. I want more.

[AgentZero]

Thanks, it's so nice to have a fan. Fans would be nicer, but hey, whatcha gonna do. I know it's a bit short, but that's part of my fiendish plot to break down my writer's block. Bounce quickly between threads to move the story along, then go back and flesh them out later.

BTW, any English Majors or fellow writers out there feel like being the 'editor' for the story?

[Puke]

what am i, chopped liver? you have more S's on your Fan, they just dont always have usefull things to say.

[dogscoff]

*dogscoff dons his "I am a rabid HifH fan!" T-shirt, then straps on his bumpin' boots and does the laces up reeeeal tight.

<font color="purple"> Ker-BUMP! </font>



BTW, what kind of editting did you want? I'd love to be involved. I've done a fair bit of writing myself, as well as some translation/ editting of other ppl's work on xenology.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

I also read this.

[AgentZero]

Point taken. Enjoy!


“So, what do you think?” Kagan asked.
Himself, Alice &amp; Saraea were in the galley of the Daedalus. The two women were seated at a small table, while Kagan slouched against the wall. The Daedalus was currently cruising across the vast expanse of space between the Victoria system’s two main jump nodes. The trip would take nine days, traveling at the maximum permitted speed designated by the system’s authorities. They’d just finished a leisurely dinner, during which Kagan had filled Saraea in on what had been happening, interrupted with great regularity by Alice who provided additional, although seemingly irrelevant details. He’d just gotten to the part about the explosion on Kolis Station.
“Well,” Saraea said slowly. “It sounds to me like someone’s trying to kill you.”
“But why?” Kagan asked.
Saraea shot him a meaningful glance. “Aside from the obvious?” she asked sweetly.
Kagan made a rude gesture at her. She made a ruder gesture back. And Alice made a much ruder gesture at both of them.
“Where in the civilized galaxy did you learn that?” asked Kagan.
“Nowhere,” she replied innocently, tucking both hands underneath her.
“As I was saying,” Saraea continued. “Whoever tried to do you in obviously didn’t much care about innocent bystanders, had access to state of the art equipment, an extremely skilled operative or operatives, and likely had an inside man on the job, too. Which leaves one of two possibi-“
She was interrupted as Alice suddenly jumped up, knocking over the table. “We’re under attack!” she shrieked.
Saraea and Kagan looked at her in puzzlement. “No, dear,” Kagan assured her. “For once we’re not-“ The remainder of his platitude disintegrated into the sort of language he’d been telling himself not to use around her as the ship lurched violently, throwing him to the ground. He scrambled to his feet and took off running down the hallway with Saraea in hot pursuit, only to find Alice already seated at the sensor station on the bridge.
“Three bad guys,” she informed them. “All of them bigger than us.”
“Any ideas on who they are?” Kagan asked.
“Um, yes,” she replied. “The ones with the funny spikey things on their heads. Kinda yellow greeny?”
“Taurens?” Kagan exclaimed. “What the hell are Taurens doing out here?”
“That’s the ones,” Alice replied. “Taurens. Terrans. Taurens, Terrans, Taurans, Terrans. It’s all good. Or bad. Yes, in this case it’s definitely bad.”
Kagan ignored her ramblings, something he was getting really quite good at these days and moved to a weapons station, while Saraea took the helm.
“Looks like three battlecruisers,” he said nervously. “Not familiar with the exact class though.”
The ship lurched again as their pursuers managed to land a couple hits, despite Saraea’s best evasive maneouvers.
“Oh no, we’re all going to die!” Alice exclaimed.
“More than likely,” Kagan replied as he began plotting in a firing solution that would hopefully slow the Taurens down enough for them to make an escape.
“Oh dear,” she replied. “I was being flippant.”
“No time for that now, the shooting’s starting,” said Kagan as his first missile salvo tore through space towards its targets. The battlecruiser’s point defense swatted the missiles down effortlessly, only allowing one through, and it was unlikely the huge ship even felt it. He made a few adjustments to the engine ignition sequence for the following salvo. The missiles would burn out a lot faster with the new configuration, but at this short range it wouldn’t matter much. The Daedalus trembled gently as her second salvo tore free, and this time the Tauren’s point defense only managed to stop a pair of the missiles, and the recipient of the salvo definitely felt it this time. The battlecruisers slowed their approach, increasing the distance between them and the Daedalus, which meant that the same trick wouldn’t work twice, but it at least pulled them out of energy weapons range. That victory, however was short-lived, as the three warships returned fire with their own missile salvos.
“Missile separation, we have incoming!” Kagan shouted.
“On it!” Alice shouted back, flinging herself across the bridge to land heavily at one of the defense stations. Her hands flew across the controls with blinding speed, and between her efforts and Saraea’s stomach-churning evasive actions, they managed to evade the first round of missiles entirely, but by the time the last of them fell victim to the Daedalus’ guns, another two waves were rapidly approaching.
“Time to jump node?” Kagan called out.
“Four days at present speed,” Saraea replied. “Though we could make it in twenty-seven minutes if we were to go to maximum acceleration. But that would attract-“
“Frack it,” Kagan snapped. “Max acceleration, now!”
The Daedalus surged forward, abruptly increasing the distance between themselves and the Taurens, and their missiles. The green-hides hadn’t planned on that, Kagan noted, as their missiles, realizing that they no longer had the power to reach their target, simultaneously detonated. Their burst of speed had temporarily pulled them out of even missile range, but Kagan knew that wouldn’t last as the battlecruisers began to accelerate.
“Tachyon spike!” Alice called out. “Looks like we’ve got more company. And I haven’t cleaned the good silver.”
Kagan looked up at his display as three icons representing Victorian in-system cruisers popped into existence on an intercept course. As they lacked in any sort of null-space drive system, they relied on Perth Nine’s massive null-space catapult to hurl them about the solar system. While this limited them to operations within one system, it also meant that the cruiser sized hulls packed considerably more shields &amp; firepower than the three battlecruisers behind them.
The comm. screen flared to life and the uncompromising face of a Victorian captain stared out of them.
“ITS Daedalus,” he said sternly. “You are in violation of Article Twelve, Section Seven, Sub-Section Twenty Four, Paragraph Eighty Four of-” his head suddenly snapped to something off the screen. “What the hell is that?” he demanded.
On his display, Kagan saw the three cruisers break off and begin to accelerate towards the pursuing Taurens. Moments later, missile salvos erupted from both sets of ships.
“Phew,” Kagan breathed. “Looks like we’re gonna make it ok.”
“Well, not really,” Alice informed him.
In response to his questioning raised eyebrow, she gave her display a meaningful look. “We’ve been fined,” she told him.
“Have we now?” came the rhetorical reply. “Inform them that we will be happy to pay the fine at upon our next docking with Perth Nine.”
“Happily?” Saraea inquired. “When have you happily paid for anything?”
“When am I likely to be back here again?” Kagan countered.
“Touché,” she replied. “Now, captain, my captain, we are coming up on the jump node, so do you have any particular destination in mind, or shall I just jump randomly and let the Fates decide?”
“Hmmm,” Kagan mused. “As appealing as the centre of a sun or event horizon does sound, I’m afraid we’re going to have to pick a destination beforehand.”
He pulled up the local starchart on his display, and Alice’s finger went immediately to one particular sector.
“There,” she said insistently.
“There? Nothing there but-”
“There there there there theretheretherethere!” Alice began to stamp her foot and then bang her fist against the console so hard that Kagan was compelled to grab hold of her to make her stop. Getting dents out of permaplast was difficult &amp; time-consuming, after all.
“Ok,” he agreed. “We’ll go there and see yer frackin’ nebula. Happy?”
“Yes,” she replied in a relieved sigh, before bouncing out of his lap and heading for the exit. “Now all this excitement has gone and made me sleepy, so I’m going for a nap.”
After she left, Kagan turned his eyes towards Saraea, only to find her staring back at him. “So,” she said. “She does tantrums now.”
“This does not bode well,” he replied dryly.
“For your relationship?”
“For civilization in general.”
“Heard that!” Alice’s voice drifted in from down the hallway.
With a look of astonishment, Kagan mouthed the word ‘How?’ to his friend.
“Heard that too!”

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Fun.

[Puke]

too long between updates! youve got some of the most entertaining characters!

nice explody bits, too.

[AgentZero]

Puke said:
too long between updates! youve got some of the most entertaining characters!

nice explody bits, too.



Critism accepted, so here's another bit. I know, it's small, but I'm knackered, at a crossroads, &amp; can't be bothered continuing until tomorrow.
Now... Here's a very important question. I've finally realized how the story is going to play out, and it focuses entirely around Kagan, Alice &amp; Saraea, will O'Shea popping in for good measure. However, if you really liked any of the other threads &amp; would like to see it continue, just say so &amp; I'll see how feasible it'd be to tie it into the endgame. Or just divert a bit to tie it off sperately.


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

Some hours later, Kagan went, “Hmm…”
“Hmm?” Alice inquired, turning towards him.
“Hmm?” replied Saraea, having not heard Kagan.
“Hmm?” Alice asked her.
Kagan went “Hrmph,” and turned back to his console.
A few minutes later, he said, “I think we may have a problem.”
“Really?” asked Saraea dryly.
“No, actually, I’m sure we have a problem,” said Kagan, frowning at his console.
The two women joined him at his station, and he pointed at a set of readings on the display. “That,” he said. “Is a very bad thing.”
“Can you fix it?” asked Alice.
“Sure,” he replied. “But we’ll have to come out of null-space to do it.”
“Are you sure?” Alice wondered anxiously. “Couldn’t we maybe fix it while we’re still in null-space?”
“Sure,” said Kagan. “All I’ll have to do is stick my hand in between into a turbine spinning at four hundred thousand RPM.”
“Ok then,” she said happily, then met his stare with a confused expression until her eyebrows shot up in a moment of revelation. “Oh. Right, that’d be a problem, wouldn’t it?”
“Slightly,” he agreed.
“There’s a nice quiet looking system about ten minutes away,” Saraea told them, looking at the starcharts on the astrogation station. “There’s a good sized orbital habitat on the outer reaches of the system, but it looks to be just a mining operation. Doubt they’d mind if we stopped in to make a few repairs.”
“That ok with you, love?” Kagan asked Alice, stroking her palm with his index knuckle as he noticed the dark look in her eyes.
“Well, it’s not like it’s life threatening, is it?” While her tone was sulky, the last two words came out as a genuine question.
“It is, I’m afraid,” Kagan replied. “Left unchecked, it’ll kill us all in a few hours. Probably in a terribly messy and painful way.”
“Well, in that case I suppose it’s alright,” Alice said after a moment’s thought.
“We’ll be back on our way before you know it,” said James, plotting in the co-ordinates of the node to normal space. “Pop into this lovely quiet system, spot of paint, Bob’s yer uncle and we’re back on track. To your nebula.” He held her gaze for a moment to see if she’d reveal anything about why getting to this nebula was so important, but the expression staring back at him told him he wouldn’t be getting any information. And probably wouldn’t have liked what he heard if he did.
“Coming up on jump co-ords,” he said, making a few final course adjustments. “And jumping in three… two… one… now… Ladies &amp; me, welcome to the scenic- Sweet Holy Terra! What the hell is that?!”

[TurinTurambar]

I too am a fan AZ. Having a hoot reading your stuff.

Thx,
TT

[dogscoff]

Now... Here's a very important question. I've finally realized how the story is going to play out, and it focuses entirely around Kagan, Alice &amp; Saraea, will O'Shea popping in for good measure. However, if you really liked any of the other threads &amp; would like to see it continue, just say so &amp; I'll see how feasible it'd be to tie it into the endgame. Or just divert a bit to tie it off sperately.




We need to know what happens to Ted...

[Puke]

yeah, you cant leave us hanging on Ted.

[AgentZero]

Oh, right, Ted.

Kagan wandered onto the bridge and was vaguely surprised to see a large marble table sitting square in the middle of it.
"Ah," he said. "So we're Ted today, are we?"
The table began to writhe and twist and contract until, eventually, it was Alice standing on the bridge. That's right!!! Alice is a shapeshifter!!!! OMGWTF PWNZZZZ!!!! Alice PWNZ EVERY1!!!1!!!1!!!1!!!eleventyone!!!






























Kidding.

[AgentZero]

Anyway, here's a proper continuation, along with a promise that Ted's role in all of this will soon become clear.


“That's not quiet!” Alice cried, pointing at the colossus on the main viewer. “Well, really it is quiet, sound not being terribly prevalent in space and such bit still, I'm not pleased about this turn of events at all, nope, not one bit. However, it must be mentioned-”
Alice's monologue was interrupted as she was flung from her chair. The colossus had decided to start shooting at them, and Saraea was doing a rather admirable job of avoiding it's fire, though her evasive maneuvers were having a rather detrimental effect on the rest of the crew.
“Get us the hell out of here!” Kagan hollered as he tumbled past.
“Trying!” she yelled back.
Kagan and Alice continued to bounce and roll about the bridge for several minutes before Saraea announced: “Jumping out, now!”
There was the familiar crackle of discharging energy, then an altogether unfamiliar, but very loud, bang, and everything went black.
“Oh no we died,” Alice said sadly.
“Kagan, you there?” Saraea called out.
“Most of me,” came the reply.
“Then we're not dead,” Saraea concluded. “Because there's absolutely no way that you and me are ending up in the same afterlife.”
“Comforting,” Kagan said dryly.
“What about me?” Alice inquired. “Whose afterlife am I in?”
“I think you'll be getting your own,” Kagan informed her.
“Lonely,” she decided. “But since I don't remember inviting you into my afterlife, we must be alive.”
There was a loud thunk, a louder groan, and Kagan informed them, “Yeah, we're definitely alive.”
“What did you do?” asked Alice.
“I banged my head.”
“Oh,” she said. “Well I don't think that's a very afterlifey thing to go and do.”
“Unless we're in Hell,” Saraea pointed out.
There was another loud thunk, another louder groan, and Kagan informed them, “It's beginning to look like a distinct possibility. Although it's bloody cold for Hell.”
“And dark,” Alice said. “Very very very dark. I don't like it. Hold on, I'm going to do something about it.”
Kagan and Saraea waited in the black silence for what seemed like a very long time before Kagan spoke up.
“When?” he inquired softly.
“I'm trying,” she replied, sounding as though she was genuinely trying very hard at something. “It's not working... give me a moment...” She exhaled suddenly, inhaled deeply and cursed savagely.
“What exactly are you trying to do over there?” Saraea inquired, sounding rather concerned.
“Glow in the dark,” Alice replied matter-of-factly.
“Can you do that?” Kagan asked.
“Doesn't look like it,” she replied dejectedly. “I guess I better go find a light switch.”
There was a loud thunk, a louder groan, and Saraea snickered.
“That wasn't me,” Kagan informed her.
“Oh,” she said, surprised. “Sorry sweety, are you ok?”
“Yes,” came the reply. “I just tripped over something strange.”
“That's not good,” Kagan said slowly. “What did it feel like?”
“My foot,” Alice told them.
“Right,” Kagan said. “Well in all your tripping over your own feet, did you manage to find a light switch?"
“No, but I did find this,” she replied. There was a small 'beep' followed by an audible announcement from the ship that emergency power had been activated. Shortly after that, dim lights finally illuminated the bridge.
Kagan found himself lying underneath a console, staring up at what appeared to be an imprint of his forehead in the bottom of it's casing. He slid out from under the console, rose to his feet and took a couple steps towards the command chair before he paused, turned, and administered a good kick to the console. He plunked himself down, and looked over at Saraea, who was draped comfortably across a chair in front of the sensor console. Which was rather odd, he thought, considering she'd been at the helm the last he'd seen her. Looking across to Alice, he saw her still scrambling to her feet at the engineering console, one hand still over the emergency power activation switch. Which was also odd, he realized, since that last he'd seen of her she'd been on the opposite side of the bridge. Deciding he didn't really want to know how they'd gotten there, he swiped at his itching forehead only to see his hand come back dusted with dried blood.
Saraea studied him for a moment and then slid gracefully out of her chair.
“I'll get something from Medical for that,” she told him.
He grunted an acknowledgment as he finally began to notice the throbbing pain in his head. As he began to run diagnostics on the ship, a strange thought surfaced in his mind.
“Alice, my dear,” he said slowly. “Was I rather quiet for any period of time after you heard me bang my head?”
“Nope,” she replied, engrossed in diagnostics of her own. “You kept right on babbling away.”
“Hmmm...” he pondered. “In that case, I must have received this wound to my forehead earlier, yet I don't remember it.”
Alice looked up from her console briefly as the same thought struck her. She pressed a few buttons on her console and then looked back at him.
“It's been eight hours and forty three minutes since the very loud bang,” she said.
“Were we unconscious for all that time?” Kagan wondered.
“Hard to say,” she replied. “With it being all dark and all, can't tell if eyes are open or closed, if thoughts are conscious or dreams, very hard indeed to say.”
“I was unconscious for seven hours and sixteen minutes,” Saraea said, re-entering the bridge. “Following a significant energy discharge caused by overloading systems, which in turn was a result of us getting hit just as we entered null-space. Yourself and Kagan were out for eight hours, twelve minutes, forty-two seconds and eight hours, eleven minutes, fifty-two seconds, respectively.”
“How'd you know that?” Alice demanded, sounding almost indignant that for once she wasn't the bearer of strangely accurate information.
“Very, very accurate internal clock,” Saraea told her. “And both of you made rather funny noises when you came to, which made the whole thing rather easy."
“And during the time you were awake before us, you didn't do anything about the lights, or us for that matter, because...” Kagan let the sentence trail off into a question.
“You were both breathing comfortably, there was no immediate danger, and – I was comfy,” Saraea shrugged. "So,” she continued. “Have we figured out what's going on, and where we are? I'm presuming that we made it into null-space successfully, since neither of you look like floating clouds of vapor to me.”
“Aye, we made it alright,” said Kagan. “We're currently flying arseways through the Tigga band, but don't ask me how we got there.”
“Interesting,” Saraea said as she began wiping the dried blood from his forehead with a moist towel. “Which would put us, where, exactly?”
“About twenty minutes outside the Fyron System,” Alice said darkly. “Very far away from where we're supposed to be.”
“Aye,” said Kagan, trying to keep an eye on his console as Saraea applied a dermal patch to his injury. “But we'll definitely need to stop by there before we go anywhere else to put my ship back together. And yes,” he added, cutting off Alice's objection. “We do absolutely have to. One firm nudge and the poor girl's likely to fall to pieces.”
Having finished tending to Kagan, Saraea made her way towards the helm, pausing as she noticed Alice looking around the bridge with an expression of total confusion.
“He means the ship, sweety,” Saraea murmured.
While she'd intended to be helpful, Saraea realized she'd just made Alice even more confused, but decided to leave well enough alone rather than risk making things even worse. She sat herself down and began the slow job of coaxing the ship into facing the right direction. It didn't matter terribly much which way they were facing in null-space, but making transit in any direction except forward was terribly hard on any ship, let alone one that had just had a number of holes punched in it. That being said, she knew she couldn't go too easy on the poor Daedalus, otherwise they'd overshoot the Fyron jump nexus and have to start the whole thing all over again.
Alice, having never heard of the Fyron System, busied herself with looking up information about it in the ship's database.
“Huh,” she said. “Are we going to Sheol or Zellund?”
“Zellund,” Kagan replied. “Why?”
“Just curious,” she replied. “It says here that on Sheol all the women are um... genetically enhanced, never wear clothes and average three sexual partners a day. I was just wondering why you don't want to go there. It seems quite odd to me.”
“Keep reading,” Kagan advised her.
“Oh,” she said a few minutes later, sounding quite disappointed. “No men? None at all? Not even one? But how do they... you know?”
“Sheol happens to be the galaxy's largest importer of sperm,” Kagan deadpanned.
“Interesting,” Alice murmured, looking off space as she contemplated the ramifications of a planet without Y chromosomes.
“He's having you on,” Saraea said with a chuckle. “Keep reading.”
“Oh,” Alice said a few minutes later. “Genetic enhancements... They do it with their... huh.”
“My kind of planet,” Saraea said with a wolfish grin.
“Huh,” Alice said again, this time staring at Saraea and contemplating the significance of this latest revelation.
Fifteen minutes later, Saraea had managed to bring the ship around and they were slowly dropping through the null-space bands in preparation for the softest transit they could possibly manage.
Within moments of dropping into normal space, there were four Fyronian heavy cruisers approaching them at high velocity. Saraea had managed to pull off an extremely soft transit, which as far as the Fyronian Navy was concerned was a sign someone was trying to sneak into their system.
“Fire up the emergency transponder,” Kagan told Alice. “We don't want these nice folks blasting us into tiny little pieces for trying to sneak up on their lovely ladies.”
“This one doesn't look like my head neither,” Alice muttered as she activated the transponder.
Moments later, the lead cruiser hailed them, and an extremely attractive, well proportioned redhead appeared on the main viewer.
“This is JNS Cerberus hailing ITS Daedalus,” she said authoritatively. “What is your situation?”
“We encountered an unknown hostile outside the Patrocian System,” Kagan replied. “We've taken heavy damage and are in need of urgent assistance.”
“Acknowledged,” the Cerberus' captain said. “We will escort you to the Zellund Shipyards where you can make arrangements for repairs, though I would recommend you try stay planetside. The orbital platforms have gotten rather crowded ever since someone decided to install telescopes in all the Sheol facing viewports.” She spoke with the resignation of someone who had lived with such behavior her whole life, but never quite managed to get used to it.
“Thank you, Cerberus,” Kagan replied, suppressing a grin. “We're setting a course for the Zellund shipyards now.”
The main viewer blinked off as the Cerberus cut their comm link.
“Friendly folks, aren't they?” Kagan muttered.
“Yeah,” Saraea agreed. “But I still totally would.”
Kagan's witty reply was interrupted as the main view flared back on, revealing the still-unnamed ship's captain looking a fair bit more friendly. “I have just relayed your information to Naval Command,” she said briskly. “And I have been informed that Command is willing to cover the expense of repairing your ship in return for all sensor data pertaining to the hostile you encountered in the Patrocian System.”
“Sounds like a good deal to me,” Kagan informed her. “We'll begin transmission as soon as we're within range.”
“Thank you, captain,” she replied, and disappeared as abruptly as she'd appeared.

True to his word, Kagan transmitted the sensor logs of their brief encounter to the Fyronian Naval Command as soon as he was able, and received a prompt reply containing docking instructions for them to receive their repairs. This was followed by an estimate from the repair yard that it would take the better part of two weeks in order to repair all the damage he'd reported. In the mean time, he was advised, the JNC would be providing them with a courtesy planetary shuttle and a comfortable hotel for them to use at their leisure during their stay on Sheol. Within four hours, they'd left the Daedalus in the caring hands of the Navy repair docks and shuttled down to the planet. Saraea advised him she had some things to do and people to see, and bade the farewell after agreeing to meet up with them in a few days time. Kagan and Alice, for their part, decided to go explore the wonderful sights of Zellund's capitol city's renowned Keatchem district.
They spent several hours wandering through various shops and markets, Kagan having finally yielded to the idea that Alice really should have clothing of her own. After a long and seemingly fruitless search, they stumbled upon a little store that just happened to have exactly what Alice had been looking for hanging in the front window. After a bit of cajoling, Kagan agreed to buy it for her and was enjoying his reward of a proper hug when he caught the eye of a passer by. He nodded at Kagan briefly and smiled as he passed by. Kagan was still trying to work out who he was and why he couldn't place a supposedly familiar face when a bolt of energy ripped through Alice's small body and slammed into his chest, hurling him against the wall. The two of them collapsed into a pile, and with his fading strength he managed to wrap his arms around Alice.
“Ouch,” she whispered, looking at the scorch mark on his chest. “That looks sore.”
“It's nothing,” he murmured. “Nothing at all.”
Then, the tight grip they had on one and other loosened, and they died.

[Puke]

sell it with sex, baby. sell it with sex.

while "oh no we died" had me in stitches, there does seem to be some scruffy continuity in this one. one of the girls had quite a bit of awake time and didnt manage to find emergency power or lights with it.

Another one woke up about 15 minutes before Kagan, so his response to (what you would presume is her imediate reaction) "oh no we died" seems misplaced. he should have been alseep for that.

but im just being picky. the flow and witicisms are, as always, superb.

[Hunpecked]

AgentZero: “Oh,” Alice said a few minutes later. “Genetic enhancements... They do it with their... huh.”

Ears?

[AgentZero]

Puke, thanks for pointing out the scruffy continuity. I've fixed it up, fortified Kagan's constitution by having him wake up a bit earlier, and thrown in a little explanation of why Saraea didn't do anything about the lights. Of course, what she was really up to is for her to know and you to wonder.

Hunpecked, you don't want to know.

No, really. You don't.

[TurinTurambar]

An interesting OT thought: When I read stories that are this engaging, I usually start to visualize the characters in my head. For some reason, on this one, I'm getting really good environment images but I have no faces yet for the main characters...

AZ, have you done any "preliminary casting" in your head for when this gets made into a movie? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

TT

[AgentZero]

TurinTurambar said:

AZ, have you done any "preliminary casting" in your head for when this gets made into a movie? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif





Nope, you're gonna have to come up with the faces all by your lonesome. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif If you don't have at least a vague idea what Alice &amp; Saraea look like, then you haven't been paying attention (naughty!) as they were both described when they were introduced, though I admit I haven't done a great job of reinforcing that description. That'll come later, once the story's done &amp; I'm into the editing (shudder).

If it helps, I always pictured Admiral Angus McArthur as looking a bit like B5's John Sheridan when he had a beard, and Admiral Ivanov Korjev looks kinda like his buddy Jack Maynard, also with a beard (the captain of the big ole explorer ship).
If, for some reason you've never seen B5, a Google image search of Bruce Boxleitner and Russ Tamblyn should sort you out nicely.

Aside from that, can't help you much. Except for the fact that Alice is a redhead now. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

[AgentZero]

More!



Orrin Pendlebrook hurried around a corner and into a dark alley. Towards the back of the alley, he came across an industrial grade incinerator bin. Such things weren't normally found in back alleys, they tended to make their homes in very secure areas of large industrial complexes, usually with a few friends and specially designed shutes leading into their business ends. To find one that could be accessed simply by lifting a lid and tossing in incriminating evidence was almost unheard of. And yet, somehow, most conveniently, such a rarity had found its way into the alleyway in which Orin now found himself. He hurried over to it, lifted the lid and tossed in his pistol, facial morphnet, gloves and overcoat, then let out a sigh of relief. He was safe. No one would be able to point to him as the trigger man, and any other evidence had quite recently been atomized.
It was a pity, he mused. The girl had been terribly pretty. It was a good thing, he decided, that she'd presented her back to him when time came to shoot. He'd studied her picture ever since the assignment had been given to him, and he'd rather fallen in love with her smiling face. Had he been forced to meet those lovely green eyes, he might have hesitated, and hesitations had a way of being fatal in a job like his.
It was a pity, too, that that Kagan character had to die as well. Orin remembered seeing vids of him at the end of the war, and wasn't very pleased with himself for having assassinated a war hero. Still, his instructions had stated that Kagan was 'optional' and knowing that he was dead gave Orin some measure of relief. Having an angry soldier out for his blood was the sort of thing that made it difficult to sleep at night. But with Kagan dead, he didn't have to worry about that, and with the startling amount of money he was being paid for the job, he would be sleeping very well indeed for some time to come.
It was about this time that Orin became he was not alone. A hooded figure emerged slowly from the inky darkness, walking towards him with great deliberation.
“Frack off!,” he shouted. “Another step and you'll end up dead!”
“No, Mr. Pendlebrook,” the figure replied, pulling back it's hood. “You know you don't pose any real threat to me, now don't you?”
The figure stepped into a pool of light and Orin tried to swallow, his throat suddenly very dry. A legend stood before him, a veritable angel of destruction, chaos and death. And Orin realized that he did indeed pose absolutely no threat to her whatsoever. In the darkness he couldn't make out her eyes, only two large black holes where they should be, and when she bared her teeth in a humorless smile, he could swear he was staring at a living skull rather than any living creature. Saraea Azen herself stood before him, contemplating him much as one might contemplate an insect scuttling across the floor, idly toying with notions of crushing it beneath ones foot.
“Deathchild,” he whispered breathlessly.
Saraea gave him a brief nod of acknowledgement.
“To.. to what do I owe this honour?” he asked nervously.
“Honour?” Saraea scoffed. “Try horror.” She paused then for a moment, muttered something under her breath, then continued, “You murdered two very close friends of mine today Mr. Pendlebrook, did you know that?”
“I don't know what you're talking about?” he said quickly. “I haven't murdered anyone. You don't have enough evidence- no jury in the galaxy would-”
Saraea interrupted him with a laugh, a truly evil sound. “Do you really think I'm going to put you on trial, Mr. Pendlebrook?” she asked harshly. “Since you're obviously of less than stellar intelligence, let me explain to you how this is going to work. I am going to ask you questions. You are going to answer them to my satisfaction, otherwise you will know pain, you will know fear, and then you will die. First: Who hired you?”
“I have no idea what you're-”
Saraea didn't move, didn't even twitch, but suddenly every nerve in Orin's body was on fire with the heat of a thousand suns. He screamed in agony and collapsed, writhing on the floor in a desperate, though vain attempt to escape the pain.
“Scream all you like,” she told him. “No one can hear you.”
The pain went on, washing over him in waves of agony, rising to the point where he thought he was about to slip away into merciful unconsciousness, then receding to the point of almost being bearable before building up again and crashing down on top of him. And then, just as suddenly as it had started, the pain was gone, and he found himself quivering on the ground, curled into a ball at Saraea's feet.
“Now then, Mr. Pendlebrook,” she said conversationally. “Are we feeling a little more talkative, or would you like to find out what level two feels like?”
“Anything,” he gasped. “I'll tell you anything, just don't, please don't do that again.”
“I'm glad to see you're being reasonable,” she said soothingly. “I'm really not asking for very much. Just the answers to a couple of questions, and then I'll be on my way. I've no real quarrel with you, it's those who hired you that I'm angry with.”
“I don't know much,” Orin gasped, still reeling from the agony that had somehow been inflicted upon him. “I was hired by a group calling themselves The Council.”
“Names?” she inquired, with just the right hint of menace to make him break out in a cold sweat.
“I don't know,” he admitted honestly, staggering to his feet and leaning against a wall. “They only ever referred to each other as numbers. A guy called Two did most of the talking, Three gave me the details of the job, and there was another one, Fourteen, who didn't say much except that it was vital that I complete the job and that Very Bad Things would happen to me if I failed.”
“Ironic, then,” Saraea said dryly. “That you succeeded so brilliantly, and yet Very Bad Things have still befallen you. Now, where can I find this Council?”
“I don't know,” he replied, shaking his head. “I never-”
Saraea sighed with disappointment. “It's a pity, really,” she said slowly. “That the memory of pain fades so quickly.”
Orin suddenly felt almost nostalgic for the pain she'd initially inflicted upon him as agony beyond comprehension ripped through his body. He opened his mouth to scream, but couldn't make a sound. His eyes bulged in their sockets, feeling like at any moment they'd burst out of his head. In an instinctive attempt to escape the cause of this agony, his body twitched and spasmed and he staggered about the alleyway, somehow managing to retain his footing. Somewhere through the mist of anguish, he heard the voice of Death murmur, “You know I'd grown terribly fond of Alice. She was a lovely girl, and you killed her. That makes you a bad man. And bad men deserve level three.”
The pain suddenly shot up to a form of such agony that Orin actually relaxed for a second, sure that unconsciousness would soon claim him. When it didn't, his mouth opened again, and his time a thin, whispered scream squeezed it's way out of his tormented throat, before slowly growing to a ear-shattering howl of pain and despair. His bowels and bladder released themselves, but he didn't even notice, all that existed for him was the pain. The alleyway, his tormentor, even his own body melted away and all that was left was an unending sea of pain. And then, once again, the pain was gone just as suddenly as it had come. He slumped against the wall, half sobbing, half gasping. Saraea stood watching him impassively, waiting until he'd regained some measure of composure before repeated her question.
“They took me to a building,” he wheezed in reply. “There was a large room at the top of it, where there were twenty one men seated. They spoke with me, told me that this was much more important then any normal whack job, how imperative it was for me to succeed. I don't know if that's where they're based, but it's all I know. Please-”
“Where is this building?” Saraea interrupted.
“Downtown,” he said shakily. “Across the road from the big MechaCorp building.”
“Thank you Mr. Pendlebrook,” she replied, sounding almost grateful. “That will be all. You do try to have a nice day now.”
And with that, she turned and walked out of the alley. Orin watched her go, a deep hatred beginning to seethe inside him. He pushed himself off the wall to stand upright and swore to himself that no matter how long it took, no matter how much it cost, or what had to be sacrificed, he would track Saraea down and kill her. He glanced down to check if him soiling himself had left any outward trace on his trousers, and only then noticed the large knife protruding from his chest.
“Oh,” he said with profound realization before he crumpled to the ground.

[JAFisher44]

Interesting. Killing the main characters. Ballsy. Ill bet they come back with amnesia. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif Good writing, keep it up.

[TurinTurambar]

Nah, they aren't dead... "and then the darkness overcame him" is just supposed to make you think "dead."

[AgentZero]

TurinTurambar said:
Nah, they aren't dead... "and then the darkness overcame him" is just supposed to make you think "dead."



Hmm... That's a good point actually. I'll have to rewrite that bit to make the fact that he's dead a bit more clear. That's the problem with being all poetical and stuff. Lets people make their own minds up about things.
How about... "And then he died." Blunt, to the point, no wriggle room.
Or maybe "And then he wasn't alive anymore." Also blunt and to the point, though there's a marginal amount of wriggle room if you want to debate the exact meaning of 'alive.'
"And then, the tight grip they had on one and other loosened, and they died." I quite like this one. A bit more poetical, plus it's quite obvious that they both die.

Agent Zero scurries off to work on the rewrite

[AgentZero]

And yet again, more! Figured it was time for a little more boom boom. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif


Admiral McArthur gripped his command chair tightly to avoid being ignomiously dumped out of it as his station shuddered from another direct hit. As he turned his head, the station's attacker disappeared in a flash of light, utterly annihilated by a blast from the fortresses main battery that continued onwards to cripple an enemy dreadnought. Still, crippled or not, it still took another four hits to finish the ship off completely. They were built tough, the admiral noted, not quite as tough as Terran ships, but tough nonetheless. And there were a lot of them. More than a lot, a veritable horde of warships swarmed about his command. Still, the network of battle stations built around the jump nexus had been designed to hold up against the entire Tauran Navy, and while several of his stations had taken severe damage, he'd yet to lose one yet. Although, he had to admit, part of that was down to the fact that once a station had been damaged to the point where it no longer posed a threat, the unknown attackers shifted their targeting to a station that was actively firing. And, McArthur thought, despite many reminders as to the downside to that strategy, they continued to follow it. He grinned as one such reminder wiped out an entire battlegroup as Station 37 got her short range weapons back online and proceeded to tear apart anything near her with vengeful fury. His chair lurched again, and this time he barely managed to hang on. Looking up at the damage display, he was confronted with a sea of red. The station's forward shields had failed completely, her armor had been shredded and barely a quarter of her weapons were still operational. Her aft section, however, was another matter.
“Rotate one-eighty,” ordered Admiral McArthur. “And shunt power from forward weapon's systems to shields and damage control.”
“Aye, sir,” the helmsman confirmed. “Rotating one-eighty now.”
A furious babble erupted on the bridge as gunnery stations that had been idle due to lack of guns to co-ordinate suddenly became active again, and the gunners began tossing targeting priorities around their section with all the casual banter that went with it. To a less informed ear, it sounded terribly unprofessional, as actual target priorities seemed to get as much, or even less attention than discourses on the personal hygiene of the gunners mother, yet in truth all of what was said was a code known only to the gunners themselves, and more to the point, it was a brutally efficient code. As no doubt, the crew of an enemy dreadnought squadron would surely attest, had they been more than a cloud of vapour following a particularly crude description by the chief gunner of his second's father's genitalia.
“Tachyon spike!” one of the sensor operators cried over the din. “Almost off the scale, something massive is coming in!”
Despite knowing that there was no possible way reinforcements could be coming through that jump node, part of McArthur couldn't help but hope, that maybe, somehow the new arrivals might be something other than violently hostile. Moments later, his hopes were crushed as a vessel of unimaginable size forced it's way into normal space.
“By the Nine Divine Whores of Kantarl,” whispered the McArthur.
“Ship configuration seems to match that of hostile forces,” the sensor officer reported. “But it's just much, much bigger than anything we've seen so far.”
“Station Ninety-Seven, code Omega!” called out the comms officer. And seconds later, “Station Ninety-Eight, code Omega!”
McArthur grimaced. The two dying stations held only a small crew, being more lookout stations than actual fortresses, and had been passed over by the enemy in their desperate bid to break through the system's defenses. The new arrival, however, seemed more than willing to spare a little attention to them.
“Station Ninety-Six, code Omega!” cried a different comms officer. “Station Ninety-Five reporting heavy fire.”
“Well,” McArthur murmured. “Looks like they've finally played the ace up their sleeve. Now it's time for us to play ours.”
Turning to the comms officer, he instructed, “Contact stations Two and Three, order them to target the new arrival and fire when ready.”
The two stations flanking McArthur's command station, untouched by enemy fire given the fact that they were the only stations not actively firing, and the fact that neither of them sported any discernible weapons, aside from a few rows of point defense turrets, began to move slowly. At first, they only seem to be rotating to point their narrowest end towards the colossal enemy ship, but as they did so, pieces of the stations began to rearrange themselves, moving outwards, upwards and downwards until both stations had taken on the unmistakable shape of two singularly massive guns floating in space. Their movement slowed as they stopped orienting themselves and began tracking their target. Soon, their movement had slowed to the state of being barely perceptible, and far at the back of the stations, massive capacitors began to glow red, becoming brighter and brighter until they glowed a blood-tinged white. The stations soon were became completely engulfed in light as more and more power was poured into their single main weapons system. And then, abruptly, the light vanished. An observer would have just enough time to wonder exactly where the light had gone to, before the answer became abundantly clear to all as a massive white beam of energy blasted its way out of the barrel of the two space stations, casually cut a swath through anything in it's way, and slammed into the alien juggernaut. For a moment, but only a moment, it looked like the behemoth was going to hold up against the vast torrent of energy being poured into it, but then, inevitability, it broke, and the twin beams of light tore through the ship and out the other side. They then began slowly moving about, carving the goliath apart until they hit something critical and the entire ship blew apart in a galaxy-shuddering explosion that wiped out scores of alien ships that had been flying too close.
Almost as one, the surviving ships turned and ran, but the route back to the jump point was a gauntlet of battle stations all waiting for their turn to tear into the attackers, and barely a quarter of the ships made it to safety.
McArthur sat back heavily in his chair. “Status report,” he called into the sudden, eerie silence.
There was a moment of frenzied activity as individual stations rushed to complete preliminary damage reports, and a few minutes later his bruised and battered exec handed him a list of the damaged, destroyed and dead.
“We took heavy losses this time, sir,” he said quietly. “Given a few days to make repairs, we might, maybe weather another attack if we're extraordinarily lucky.”
“Reinforcements?” McArthur inquired.
“The Raezel is en route, along with the entire Fourth and Fifth Fleets, but they're still four days off. The Ninth Fleet should be here tomorrow, but they've taken heavy damage from running engagements and will need the better part of a week for repairs before they could be considered combat-ready.”
“Well,” McArthur mused. “We hurt 'em bad this time. That's the first time we've seen one of their planet-killers come through here. Hopefully we've given them enough of a bloody nose that they'll hold off on another assault long enough for us to get our legs back underneath us.”
“Sirs? If I may interrupt?” Lieutenant Commander Gomez, a small, petite blonde from Intelligence approached the admiral, a datapad in hand. “Station Twenty-Four managed to get some in depth scans of the hostile ships done while her weapons were out. We've just finished the analysis and though you might want to have a look.”
She handed the pad to McArthur, and stood in silence as he read the report. As he reached the end, his eyes jumped ahead to a single word, the only word, really, that the report needed to contain.
“No...” he whispered.
Gomez nodded. “It's confirmed, sir. They're back.”

[TurinTurambar]

"Marvelous!"

[i](...better than "Weeeeeeee!" ?)

[JAFisher44]

A criticism, I don't like the changes you made to the death scene. I liked it better before. Room for speculation is fine. The ponderings of your fans doesn't change what happened, and curiosity keeps people reading. Besides, it just sounded better originally.

Another criticism, poetical isnt a word, the word is poetic.

I enjoyed your boom boom. It was good. Space combat is always fun. Nice cliff hanger. Keep up the fun.

[Puke]

I'm with JAF on all points. And again, "Wheeeeeee!"

[AgentZero]

JAFisher44 said:
A criticism, I don't like the changes you made to the death scene. I liked it better before. Room for speculation is fine. The ponderings of your fans doesn't change what happened, and curiosity keeps people reading. Besides, it just sounded better originally.

Another criticism, poetical isnt a word, the word is poetic.

I enjoyed your boom boom. It was good. Space combat is always fun. Nice cliff hanger. Keep up the fun.



Criticism taken... However perhaps what I didn't make clear in my previous post is the fact that I don't want there to be any room for speculation as to whether or not Kagan and Alice are alive. They're dead, and while I'm not terribly happy with the wording either, it'll do until my muse prompts me with something more eloquent.

And yes, I know poetical isn't proper English, it's just a form of bastardized English that I'm rather fond of, but criticism accepted, I'll try to be less poetical in future. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Lastly, I've kinda gotten to a point in the story where I need to talk a few things over with someone because the story could progress in one of two radically different ways, and I honestly don't know which one to go with. And don't anybody tell me 'go with whichever feels best' because they both feel pretty damn good, but they're also mutually exclusive. So... If anyone out there feels like having a chat, preferably with a writing bent themselves, though not necessarily, but is willing to have the ending spoilt for them, though in doing so help ensure that it's a damn good ending, PM me with an MSN/ICQ/whatever and we can go from there.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Ok then, go with whatever makes a better ending.

[AgentZero]

Well, that's the problem. They're both the same ending, but very different ways of getting there.

[Puke]

pick the one on the right!

[AgentZero]

I was afraid you'd say that

[AgentZero]

Bring Us More Pie!

A champagne cork ricocheted off the roof and landed neatly in someone's outstretched glass. The room erupted into peals of drunken laughter as the victim of fate tried vainly to fish the bobbing cork out from his glass, his impaired co-ordination causing him to mostly spill wine all over himself. His antics drew more and more laughter until finally, a well aimed cork popped him square in the nose and he toppled to the ground. A brief silence descended upon the room, but only lasted as long as the first snort of poorly contained laughter. The unlucky man finally pulled himself to his feet, grabbed a bottle off the table and held it aloft.
“To success!” he declared loudly. “Beyond our wildest expectations!”
The cheers were punctuated by the sound of more corks popping as the champagne flowed liberally. The happy, drunken conversation ebbed slightly as the doors opened, then loud cheers erupted once again as a tall, stunningly beautiful young woman entered the room. She wore a full length white trench coat wrapped tightly around her that accentuated the curve of her breasts and hips magnificently, black gloves and matching black boots. Her olive skin offset her light blonde hair, and none were able to look away from her large, strikingly blue eyes. She entered the room confidently, with a sensuous sway to her hips, made her way to the table at the centre of the room and stepped up onto it.
“Gentlemen,” she purred softly. “If you will be so kind as to be seated, the... entertainment will begin.”
In all the years that they had been meeting, never had they assembled at the table so quickly as they did now, staring upwards with eager faces, smiling puppy dog smiles at her as her lips curved gently upwards. As soon as they were all seated, she began to move, swaying her hips slowly in rhythm to unheard music. She began to move faster and faster, her movements smooth and confident, graceful. Suddenly, she flung open her trench coat, and her audience gasped at the sight of two automatic plasma bolters strapped to her chest. Smiling broadly, she drew the bolters from their holsters, held them above her head and began to slowly gyrate her hips as she lowered herself almost to her knees, then raised herself up again, then began to move slowly downwards again. There was a smattering of applause as the audience recognized the bit: They were dangerous men, they enjoyed danger, and having their stripper armed just made the show that much more exciting. On her way back up again, she paused, threw her pistols into the air, let her trench coat slide to the ground and caught the guns again easily to another smattering of applause. No sooner were the weapons back in her hands than she suddenly launched herself high into the air, flipping head over heels and rotating around her centre axis at the same time. Her plasma bolters snarled viciously, and when her feet again touched down at the table, all those around it were dead, save the one at the head of the table, who found himself looking down a red hot barrel. His eyes slowly moved up to face the beautiful assassin, and his lips managed to form the words, “Why?”
The killer smiled charmingly back at him, and as she did so, her hair blackened, her dark skin paled to white and her liquid blue eyes decayed to the deepest shade of black.
“You know why,” she whispered. “Bastard.” And with that, she fired a single round into his heart, hopped off the table and strode out of the room.
The man known only as One watched her go, paralyzed from the shock of being shot, knowing he was dying, and knowing just as well that there was nothing that could be done about it. At first, he wondered if it was his dying mind playing tricks on him, but it soon became apparent that the table before him was indeed twisting and deforming itself, spilling plates and glasses and bottles onto the laps of those seated around it, except for one untouched glass of champagne that managed to stay upright as the table went through all manner of contortions, eventually resolving itself into the figure of a man, holding the glass of wine in one hand. One stared in wonderment at this apparition that stood before him, the face that most had attained legendary, almost mythological significance amongst the organization.
“Zero,” whispered One. “You're real... You're here... You're-”
“Terribly disappointed,” interrupted the other, sipping gently at the champagne. “I look around me and what do I see? Nothing but failure. The grand organization I brought into being reduced to nothing by it's own incompetence.”
“Not... our... fault...” whispered One. “Even we... cannot stop... a Deathchild.”
“No,” agreed Zero solemnly. “But I wouldn't have expected you to. I would, however, have expected you to avoid giving a Deathchild good cause for vengeance.” He shook his head sadly. “It's my own fault, really. I stood idly by and watched as you all drifted away from my teachings, as you became so blinded by your own greed and petty concerns that when the object of your entire existence was revealed, you couldn't even see it for what it was, instead branding a threat. You were supposed to protect her,” he hissed, then paused and took a good look at One. “Of course, you're not listening to a word I'm saying, seeing as you're dead and all, which is a terrible pity, really. You see, now there's no one left for me to share the delightful irony of this whole situation with.” He sighed softly. “I suppose I could always catch up with the Deathchild, I'm sure she'd appreciate the irony. Yes,” he said, taking a deep draught of champagne. “I'm sure she would appreciate it indeed.”

[dogscoff]

LOL! Nice one. It closes everything neatly, but at the same time opens up so many more questions.

Thanks AZ, I'm still smiling from that.

[Puke]

mmm... pie.

i dont quite feel wrapped up yet, though. it isnt revealed who the attacking fleets are, unless i just havent been paying attention. nor does it really explain what the purpose of our ex-supergirl was. again, unless i havent been paying attention.

I think this is just the prelude to the wrap up.

[TurinTurambar]

It can't be wrapped up:


She handed the pad to McArthur, and stood in silence as he read the report. As he reached the end, his eyes jumped ahead to a single word, the only word, really, that the report needed to contain.
“No...” he whispered.
Gomez nodded. “It's confirmed, sir. They're back.”

[AgentZero]

You were saying....



Kaelan O'Shea stared at his bedside monitor in disbelief. Barely half an hour ago, he'd received a brief, terse message from Saraea telling him that Kagan and Alice were dead, and now this. He shook his head and squinted at the screen, convinced what he was seeing was a trick of the eye, a sick joke, anything but true. But all the authentication codes checked out fine, no matter how unbelievable the news was, there was no questioning the authenticity of the message. Kaelan reached for the the glass sitting on his bedside table, and, finding it empty, cursed loudly and pushed himself out of bed in search of something with which to fill it. The message had been sent by a pretty, young comms officer aboard Admiral McArthur's command station. It was a copy of a dispatch being sent all over the fleet, but what was contained within it was-
“Hey...” The prone figure in his bed stirred sleepily. The petite brunette he'd picked up on his last port of call sat up on the bed and stared at him drowsily. “What's wrong?” she asked, noticing the expression on his face.
“End of the feckin world,” Kaelan replied, waving a hand at the bedside monitor.
“Can I look?” she asked.
“Yeah, work away,” he replied, trying to remember her name. Karen? Kelly? Kaelan? Yeah, that sounded familiar. Oh... Right. He groaned softly at the load taxing his mind and tried vainly to push his eyeballs further back into his head. He wandered out of the bedroom and stumbled over a bottle of scotch.
“Well look at you!” he declared happily, scooping it up off the ground and holding it up to eye level. “Thought you were getting away did ya? Back inside with ye!”
He marched back into the bedroom triumphantly to find Katherine? Kristin. Yes! That was it! Kristin was curled up in a tight ball, staring fearfully at the monitor.
“It can't be,” she whispered tearful. “Not again, it can't be.”
“Aye, but it is,” Kaelan said, pouring two large glasses of scotch. “So drink up and enjoy yourself, for only the Nine Whores know how much longer it'll last.
The girl took a glass with a shaky hand and drank deeply as Kaelan settled himself in beside her to run through the dispatch again. It started out with a thin line of text stating that the old enemy, that which had nearly wiped out the Second Dynasty, that which was supposedly exterminated, had returned. Following that eye-catching proclamation, there were several pages of sensor analysis, comparing recent scans of ships that had been attacking the Imperium all across it's borders to scans taken thousands of years ago, and if that wasn't enough to satisfy the reader, it ended with footage from a battle showing a gutted ship spewing bodies out into space, and whoever had taken the footage had managed to get a good clean shot of the faces of those being sucked out. One look at one of those skull-like, demonic faces was all Kaelan needed to convince him beyond a shadow of a doubt. That horrific visage was burned into the minds of all school children as the personification of all that was truly evil.
“What are we going to do?” asked Kristin, interrupting his musings.
“Well,” Kaelan said slowly. “We are first going to get very, very drunk. Then, when we wake up, we're going to stop off at the nearest spaceport, buy up a lifetimes worth of supplies, and get the bloody hell out of Terran space.”
“Where will we go?”
“Doesn't much matter,” he replied. “The Second Dynasty barely survived the last invasion and they were thousands of years ahead of us. The Imperium doesn't stand a chance, that report says as much, so the further away we get from here, the better.”
The following morning, Kaelan awoke to find himself on the bridge to the sound of a console beeping. He pushed himself out of the command chair, and stumbled over to the source of the noise, only to find that it was the communications terminal with a message confirming that all supplies had been loaded, and he was cleared to depart. With a fuzzy minded scowl, he looked over the manifest of cargo that had been transferred onto his ship. Several lifetimes worth of fine food, drink and medical supplies now filled his cargo hold. He scratched his head blearily and was still trying to figure out how this had all happened when Kristin strolled casually onto the bridge.
“You decided there was no time like the present after your third bottle,” she informed him after taking one look at the confused expression on his face. “So you came up here, sorted everything out, and passed out as soon as they told you it'd take seven hours to prepare everything and get it loaded.”
“Oh,” he said slowly. “Well, in that case, is there anything you want before we go?”
Kristin, a social outcast and only child to deceased parents, shook her head. “No,” she said softly. “I'm all done here.”
Kaelan reflected for a moment, then decided, “Me too.”
With that, he brought the ship into the air, rising higher faster and faster, blazing through the nighttime sky until they broke free of the atmosphere, and soon after, broke free of the constraints of normal space and into the limitless freedom of null-space.

[TurinTurambar]

trying to remember her name. Karen? Kelly? Kaelan? Yeah, that sounded familiar. Oh... Right.



LMAO

[Puke]

nice. very nice.

[AgentZero]

Mwahahahahahaaaaaa!



Darkness. Confusion. Pain. A shrill, skull numbing shriek. Silence. A dull rumble. The sensation of movement. And then, light. Bright, white, all consuming light. A low groan. Movement within the light, black shapes moving about. Then, colour. A splash of red resolved into a tousled mop of hair, pale skin, sparkling green eyes, a smiling mouth.
“Rise and shine, sleepy head!” The words, spoken cheerfully, at first had no significance. Their meaning came slowly, dripping one syllable at a time into his consciousness. When the whole sentence had been properly digested, he groaned loudly and pulled himself into a seated position. He looked about slowly, taking in the unfamiliar surroundings. To his right there was the girl, he was sure her name would come to him eventually. To his left, there was a body on a slab. Beyond that, more bodies. He looked back over to his right, beyond the girl was an empty slab, beyond that, a human shape crumpled on the ground, and beyond it, more bodies on slabs. He too, he realized suddenly was seated on a slab. And more to the point-
“I'm naked,” he said, his tongue thick in his mouth.
“Me too,” the girl- Alice, his mind informed him belatedly- replied cheerfully.
He took a proper look at her, noting that she was indeed naked, but far more noticeable was her pale, colourless flesh, even her lips lacked any sort of colour.
“You look awful pale,” he told her.
“I know,” she said with a small frown. “It's distressing. And I feel tingly. Do you feel tingly?”
Kagan flexed his hands slowly and grimaced at the pins-and-needles sensation that shot up and down his arms. He shifted slightly and gasped as the sensation exploded all over his body.
“Blimey,” he muttered. “Yeah, I feel... tingly, all right. Who's the fella on the floor?”
Alice glanced over at the body lying near her feet. “Dunno,” she said with a shrug. “I opened my eyes just as he was about to slice me open with a great big saw. I told him I'd really appreciate it if he didn't, and well, he didn't handle it too well and toppled over.”
“Huh,” was all Kagan could manage, his mind still sluggish, his body still not feeling as though it belonged to him. “What... happened?” he asked a few minutes later.
“How do you mean?” Alice called back, having wandered off to explore the room.
“You... I... Died. Didn't we?”
“I'm absolutely sure and certain we did. Dead as door nails we were. And now we're not. Don't think about it too much or it'll make your head hurt. At least, it sure made mine hurt.” She emphasized her last statement by stopping to rub her temples and then slowly turned back towards Kagan, having explored as far as she could in that direction. Kagan slowly swung his legs off the slab and managed to rise shakily to his feet. He grabbed the white sheet that had been covering him and wrapped it around him, partly out of modesty, partly to help ward off the intense cold he was feeling.
“Aren't you cold?” he asked Alice.
“Freezing,” she replied, then stopped and stared at him for a long moment. “Good idea,” she said finally, grabbing her own sheet and wrapping it around herself. “Here I was wasting all kinds of time trying to find my clothes.”
Kagan pushed the slab back into it's rack, popped open a small door underneath it and pulled out a box. He opened the lid and pulled out a pair of trousers.
“These look familiar,” he said dryly before putting them on. As he struggled to free his boots from the box, Alice bounded happily over to her slab, gave it a good shove to get it closed and bent down to open the cupboard underneath it. Unfortunately, it soon emerged that she had given her slab far too hard a shove and it rebounded and caught her square in the forehead, sending her sprawling onto the floor.
“Well I sure didn't need that,” she said irritably. “Wait! I remembered something. No, wait. I didn't. Forget I said anything.”
“Done,” Kagan said, deciding it was best to completely ignore her ramblings at this juncture in favour of utilizing his limited brainpower for extraditing his other boot. Having finally accomplished this, he discovered his socks beneath his boot and proceeded to put them on, followed by his boots. Alice, for her part, gently replaced the slab into it's rack, then opened the cupboard beneath it and pulled out her box. The first thing she lifted from the box was her shirt, which she held aloft and looked at Kagan through the scorched hole that ran through both sides of the shirt.
“Yup,” she said gravely. “Definitely deaders.”
Kagan stared at the shirt long after Alice had dropped it to one side in favour of other articles of clothing. He tried vainly to bring back some sort of memory of the day they had apparently died, but his mind stubbornly refused to part with anything pertaining to that day. The last thing he could remember was docking his ship at the Zellund shipyards, then lying on the street with his life leaking out of him. And then- nothing. He reached the bottom of his box and pulled his shirt out, to the front of it marred by a large scorched hole. Alice was right, he knew. No one could have survived the injuries that were evidenced by the holes in his garment, let alone Alice's, and yet here they were, certainly the worse for wear, but undeniably alive. He looked at her and couldn't help wonder, as he watched her happily putting on her clothes as if trying them on for the first time, what manner of creature he had been sharing his bed with. He pushed the thought out of his mind as quickly as it had entered. After all, he had survived too, hadn't he? But still, a nagging doubt remained. After all, his injuries would have been far less than hers, it was possible he could have survived, but she'd had a hole blown clean through her, and yet-
“There,” Alice pronounced, satisfied. She was fully dressed, if one was willing to overlook the topless issue. “That's much better, but you'll need something to cover up those,” she told him, pointing at the guns he had strapped to his belt.”
“Aye,” he agreed. “And what about those?” he asked, nodding in her direction.
She stared back at him in puzzlement for a moment, then followed his gaze and dropped her eyes downwards. “Ah, yes,” she said, not looking up. “Well...” he eyes wandered over to the unconscious doctor on the floor. “You take his coat, I'll take his shirt. I'm sure he won't mind.”
Between them, they managed to remove the doctor's coat and shirt, and then placed him up on one of the slabs upon Alice's insistence that he'd be more comfortable there. Kagan found the doctor's coat to be a perfect fit, and though the shirt was much too big, Alice was obviously pleased with it's silky fabric.
“So, what's the plan?” she inquired.
“Well,” Kagan said slowly. “I was rather planning on just strolling out of here, finding the nearest exit and trying to get back to the ship from there.”
“Hmm,” Alice pondered. “And if something goes wrong with the ingenious plan?”
“Well,” Kagan replied, patting his two concealed pistols. “Then things around here are just gonna get all kinds of violent.”
“Works for me,” she replied happily, giving him a big smile. Kagan noticed a touch of pink to her lips, and tugged open the snap-buttoned shirt to reveal skin that was beginning to show mottled colour.
“Starting to warm up?” he asked.
“A little,” she replied, looking down at herself. “Sure don't look too nice right about now though.”
Kagan had to admit that the returning colour gave Alice a blotchy, bruised appearance, which he wouldn't admit aloud, wasn't entirely pleasant.
“You look lovely,” he told her. “Now lets get moving.”
They made their way out of the room and entered a brightly lit corridor. There seemed to be no one around, and they strode quickly up the hall, eager to put as much distance between them and the morgue as they could. They soon realized they were in a very large complex as one identical hallway after another branched off, each one stretching off into the distance. Just as they were beginning to despair ever escaping, they rounded a corner and banged into a rather surprised looking man whose name tag identified him as Doctor Gwenllyn.
“Good evening,” Kagan greeted him cheerfully.
“Err, good evening,” the doctor replied slowly. “Might I ask what you are doing here?”
“Well,” Kagan replied. “We're rather new here-”
“It's our first day,” Alice piped up.
“-yes, our first day,” agreed Kagan. “And we got a little bit turned around trying to find the exit and all, because-”
“There are many corners,” Alice informed the doctor gravely.
“-yes, many corners,” Kagan echoed.
“I... see,” Dr. Gwenllyn said, giving the two of them a look that left no illusions as to what he thought they'd really been up to. “Well, if you follow this corridor to the end, then take your first right, and the second left after that, you'll be in main reception, and I'm sure you can make your way out from there.”
“Great!” Alice exclaimed happily. “Thanks, doc!”
“Of course,” Dr. Gwenllyn replied with a gracious nod. He watched the two hurry off, waiting until they'd gotten about halfway down the hall before tapping a few commands into his wrist controller. As Kagan and Alice passed through the next doorway, there was a pop and a crackle, and the two collapsed into a motionless pile. Gwenllyn shook his head ruefully. Honestly, he wondered. Who had they thought they were fooling?

[Puke]

yea! more story. Im confused and confounded about the dead coming back to life, but im sure that there will be an explination in time. just like with the table.

[Baron Munchausen]

Heh...

Behold the power of the author! Not even death is final.

Intoxicating, isn't it?

[Puke]

indeed it must be intoxicating. i generally prefer for death to be final. but im still entertained by the story.

[AgentZero]

Puke said:
yea! more story. Im confused and confounded about the dead coming back to life, but im sure that there will be an explination in time. just like with the table.



Don't worry, I'm currently working on the explanation for my necromancy, so you won't have to wait as long as you did with Ted. Well, actually, I already know what the explanation is, I'm just working on getting it all written down.
As for death being final, well, is was going to be, since I was planning on wrapping the story up, but then I had this unbelieveably cool idea that sorta requires Alice &amp; Kagan to be alive, so hey presto! They're back.

And on another note, I don't know if I ever mentioned it or not, but 'Alice' was always supposed to be a place-holder name until I came up with something better. And I think I've done it. I was randomly wandering around one of those baby-name websites and I came across Ashild, which is a Norse (I think) name whose meaning I thought fitted a bit better than Alice. I'll let you all go discover it's meaning on your own though. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Puke]

i kinda liked alice, because she always seems to have an aura of innocent wonderment about her. like the girl in the book, ya know?

i thought it was part of the joke. this supernatural baddass whos totally wide-eyed all the time and has an unobtrusive name.

[AgentZero]

Damn. Hadn't thought of that, but it does work rather well now that you mention it. Great. Now I'm gonna have to think about it.

[TurinTurambar]

Alice stays please. The name has such a nonchalant feel to it, and we're attached to her now.

[capnq]

Maybe Ashild is a new character with mysterious ties to Alice?

[AgentZero]

capnq said:
Maybe Ashild is a new character with mysterious ties to Alice?



Nah, I think I'll keep Ashild for another story I'm planning. Suits her better anyway.

[JAFisher44]

good fun

[dogscoff]

yay! They're back!

By the way AZ, I created a brief HifH page over on the wiki: http://wiki.spaceempires.net/index.php/Hell_is_for_Heroes but it's more of a placeholder than anything. Feel free to improve it.

Will this other story you mentioned be set in the same galaxy as HifH or is it a complete departure?

[AgentZero]

dogscoff said:
yay! They're back!

By the way AZ, I created a brief HifH page over on the wiki: http://wiki.spaceempires.net/index.php/Hell_is_for_Heroes but it's more of a placeholder than anything. Feel free to improve it.



Cool, thanks! I've given it a little read over and can't think of anything to add. It's short and to the point, and that's the way I like things.



[/quote] Will this other story you mentioned be set in the same galaxy as HifH or is it a complete departure?

[/quote]

The new story is a pretty big departure. It's set in the future, but it's not really the future of Earth, but of a fantasy realm, so you have things like the filthy rich riding around on dragons, wizards complaining that personal teleporters are putting them out of business, orcs and trolls cleaning floors, that sort of madness.

[Puke]

AgentZero said:It's set in the future, but it's not really the future of Earth, but of a fantasy realm, so you have things like the filthy rich riding around on dragons, wizards complaining that personal teleporters are putting them out of business, orcs and trolls cleaning floors, that sort of madness.



aw, poop. its set in the adamant mod.

[AgentZero]

Puke said:

aw, poop. its set in the adamant mod.



Well, I haven't actually played the adamant mod (ducks) so don't get your hopes up. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif More than anything, this story will be a case of me poking fun at the whole fantasy universe thing, so it'll either be very entertaining, or suck harshly. It's really hard to say which.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Don't parady to much. Sly humour is much better than in-your-face for parady, otherwise it tends to become a rant session - At least, based on the fanfiction I've read.

[AgentZero]

Resurrected from the depths of page 2!


“Now, now,” the doctor said soothingly. “There's no need for that. Not that it would do you any good, mind you. We've taken some extra precautions this time around.”
Kagan tried to sit up in the bed, but found it rather difficult, given the large strap wrapped around his chest. He tried moving his arms, only to find them restrained at the bicep and further down at the wrist. Not expecting much, he gave his legs a tentative wiggle, and felt the straps around his thighs and ankles bind slightly. He called upon the power granted to him by the nanobots coursing through his veins, but nothing happened. He tried again, but to no avail. It was as though something was blocking him from communicating with the machines within him. He could give orders, but something prevented them from ever reaching their destination.
“We have of course taken a number of other precautions, beyond simply restraining you,” the doctor went on. “You'll notice there are no windows for you to fling yourself from-”
A memory pushed it's way to the surface of Kagan's mind. Armed guards, pointing their weapons at him. Alice at his side, ready to fling herself into battle. Looking behind himself, seeing a window with shrubs outside. The assumption they were on the ground floor. Grabbing Alice and diving through the window. A glimpse of potted plants sitting on the window ledge, and the ground far below, rushing up to meet him. He shuddered. That fall should have killed him, and yet, here he was sitting in a bed with no apparent injuries, listening to the doctor ramble on.
“-after that, of course, we decided to separate the two of you,” Dr. Gwenllyn was saying. “Oh, yes. I almost forgot. There's the suppression field that should render it quite impossible for you to make use of those pesky nanobots you seem so fond of.”
Kagan stared at Gwenllyn for a long moment, and realizing that he was, for the moment, trapped, decided to make good use of his time here.
“What happened to us?” he asked. “Someone shot us... We died... And then...”
“Well, that is quite an interesting story,” the doctor said. “One I have told you before, but I suppose given the trauma you insist on inflicting upon yourself, it's no surprise you've gone and forgotten. You were first brought here by our paramedics, straight into the morgue, I'm afraid, as you bother were quite dead. Some time after that, we found you, ah, wandering the hallways in a state of great confusion.”
It didn't take nano-enhanced senses for Kagan to know that the doctor wasn't being entirely truthful; Gwenllyn was a lousy liar.
“You're lying,” Kagan said bluntly. “Tell me the truth, or don't tell me anything at all.”
Gwenllyn sighed and pinched his nose with an expression of resignation. “Very well, Mr. Kagan, we found the two of you fornicating in a supply closet. Does that little truth make you feel better?”
Kagan grinned toothily. “Much,” he replied. “Please continue.”
Gwenllyn sighed again. “After you were- found, we were naturally curious as to how this came to be, so we arranged a number of tests-”
Kagan gasped as another memory slammed into the front of his mind.
“You bastards!” he snarled. “You dissected us! Pulled out our organs and made us watch!”
The doctor cleared his throat and looked mildly embarrassed. “Please, Mr. Kagan, you make it sound so- primitive. You had to be conscious in order for us to discern the effect organ removal would have on you. But the results, the results were quite miraculous. Within seconds of us removing an organ, be it a heart, lung, or length of intestine, your nanobots swarmed into the area and formed themselves into an artificial organ. Once the artificial organ had stabilized, other nanobots began constructing a new, organic organ around the framework of the artificial one. As soon as this task was complete, the nanobots dispersed into your bloodstream, leaving you good as new. That being said, the removal of your organs did prove rather traumatic for you, and you both had a tendency to lose consciousness for several hours, even up to a day or two upon the removal of a major organ.”
Kagan lay still, staring at the doctor in mute horror. “But... but that's not possible,” he managed eventually. “Nanomachines aren't that sophisticated, not by a long shot.”
“Indeed,” Gwenllyn agreed. “Though I was able to dig up some references to nanobots with similar abilities, and I should also mention that the design and materials used for your nanobots are quite unlike anything we've ever seen. At least, not in a very long time.” He leaned in close to Kagan. “So, Mr. Kagan, the real question becomes, how did you go about getting your hands on Second Dynasty nanobots, hmmm?”
Kagan pondered the question for a moment, then lunged forward with all his might. Dr. Gwenllyn jerked backwards, barely managing to save his own life as Kagan's jaws snapped shut a hair's breadth away form his throat.
“I'll kill ye before I tell ye a thing!” Kagan shouted. “I'll feckin kill ye for what ye've done to us, ye godless son of a whore!”
Gwenllyn's condescending reply was cut off by a vengeful scream from the room next to theirs.
“Ah,” Gwenllyn said. “It seems your companion is awake.”
Quite suddenly, the far wall exploded inwards as the body of an intern crashed through the plaster and skidded across the floor. Silhouetted in the billowing dust around the hole, stood the figure of Alice, dressed in a hospital robe with her arm restraints dangling from her wrists.
“Aye, that she is,” Kagan agreed.
“Security!” shouted Gwenllyn, fearfully jabbing at a button on his wrist control unit. The sound of combat boots burst into the room outside of Kagan's field of vision, followed swiftly by the sound of charging capacitors as weapons were readied. This was followed by muffled sounds of confusion as Alice's silhouette suddenly disappeared from the hole. Moments later, the sound of struggle filled the room, punctuated occasionally by the sound of a body hitting the floor heavily. At one point, a stun-rifle flew butt-first across Kagan's field of vision and smacked Dr. Gwenllyn squarely in the side of the head. The doctor crumpled to the floor unconscious, and soon after silence once again filled the room.
“Are you just going to lie there all day?” Alice inquired, leaning over him. She was now dressed in the ill-fitting uniform of hospital security, and carried a stun-rifle in one hand.
“I can't get free,” Kagan admitted. “There's a suppression field stopping me from using my 'bots.”
“Oh, that,” Alice said dismissively. “That's easy. You just have to want for the field to not be there anymore and it goes away.”
Kagan frowned at her in disbelief, but tried anyway, willing more than anything to be free of the suppression field. Suddenly, there was a crackle and a fizzle, and Kagan tore himself free of his restraints with a burst of inhuman strength.
“I'm not sure I want to know how that worked,” he said, eying Alice as he tugged the restraints off his arms and legs.
“Hey, since when do I have the answers?” she asked with a grin.
Done with freeing himself, Kagan hopped off the bed and found a lifeless security guard laying near the bed that was about his size.
“What I do know, is that we're on the ground floor,” Alice told him as he set to work undressing the guard. “There was a floor map in my room. On the other side of that wall, there's another room, and on the other side of that is outside.”
“Well then,” said Kagan as he cinched up his belt and adjusted his shirt. “We just have to figure out a way to get-”
He was interrupted as Alice picked up Gwenllyn's motionless form and hurled it through the far wall.
“Tada!” she said happily.
“Yes,” Kagan agreed dryly. “That's much better than my plan.”
“Sorry,” she replied as she clambered through the new hole. “We'll do your plan next time, I promise.”
Kagan squeezed through after her, and looked about the new room. It was dimly lit, but from what he could make out, it appeared to be a common room, with tables and chairs placed about the room, and a large screen on one wall. On the other side of the room was a large window, through which Kagan could see a garden path that led down to a main road. Alice once again picked up Dr. Gwenllyn and hurled him through the window.
“Easy as pie!” she declared, and turned back to Kagan to find him pointing to the open door right beside the hole in the window. She looked from Kagan to the door, then back to Kagan and shrugged.
“Surely you concede, he deserved it,” she said.
It was Kagan's turn to shrug, and they hurried outside; Kagan through the door and Alice through the hole. They jogged down to the main road, and managed easily to flag down a passing taxi. Kagan instructed him to take them to a busy downtown street, charging the fare to the hospital's account, where they picked up another taxi to a different thoroughfare. They repeated the process several times, eventually reaching the Daedalus's landing pad. They approached the ship slowly, the gangway was down and light spilled out onto the platform. Slowly making their way up the ramp, they spotted a group of a half-dozen men facing in their direction, their eyes intent on a woman standing with her back to them. Raising his head to get a better look, Kagan banged his skull against a support strut, causing it to resonate with a loud twang. The six men raised their weapons, and the woman spun around. Kagan heard Alice let out a cry of glee as she recognized Saraea, and within seconds, Saraea had crossed the floor and grabbed ahold of the two of them in a tight embrace. The three friends hugged each other tightly for a long moment before Alice inquired, “Um, whose hand is on my bum?”

--------

Who are these strange men aboard the Daedalus? What manner of adventures await our plucky heroes? What ever happened to Ted? Exactly whose hand is on Alice's bum? All these question and more will be answered in the next exciting installment of Hell is for Heroes!

[AgentZero]

Dear lord, did I really let this slide to page 3?


“Sorry, sweetie,” Saraea said, stepping back. “I've just missed it so much.”
“Well,” Alice said slowly. “I suppose I'd probably miss it after a while too, so you're forgiven. But more importantly, who are they?” she asked, pointing at the six onlookers.
“Mercs,” Saraea replied. “I hired them after I found out you were being held in the hospital. They were actually going to make a move tonight.”
Kagan looked from the mercenaries to Saraea, and back to the mercenaries again before settling his gaze on his old friend. “You needed six large men to break into a hospital? You.”
Saraea smiled at him. “I do not need the assistance of six large men to rescue anyone from anywhere. I do however need six large men to rescue my two favourite people from a hospital without anyone getting killed.”
“Ah,” Kagan said, nodding. “I knew there was a logic to it somewhere.”
“So, Alice-” Saraea broke off and looked around the room before inquiring, “Where's Alice?”
As if in reply, the ship's atmospheric thrusters thundered to life and the ship lurched as it began to rise into the air. Kagan stumbled forward in the direction of the bridge. Saraea shouted at the mercenaries to get off the ship while they still could. Five of them raced down the gangway, but the leader stood fast, shouting something about payment until Saraea sent him scurrying off the ship with an indescribably evil look. Somehow managing a serene stroll despite the bobbing and weaving of the ship, she made her way to the gangway controls and closed the cargo bay doors. That accomplished, she walked up the flight of stairs to the common room, dodged a sliding chair, nimbly leapt over an overly aggressive sofa and ambled up the corridor to the bridge. There she found Kagan, on his back with his legs propped up in the air by a chair, struggling to right himself, and Alice seated calmly at the navigation console, her hands deftly flying across the controls. Noticing Saraea, Kagan briefly stopped struggling long enough to inform her that forcibly removing Alice from the bridge was not a wise course of action. Eventually, he managed to free his legs from the chair, and pulled himself onto it, where he sat for a moment, breathing heavily.
“So, pumpkin,” he said conversationally. “Where are we going.”
“Up,” Alice replied distractedly. “We are most assuredly going up.”
“Okay,” he said slowly. “And where are we going after that?”
“There,” she told him, pointing vaguely at the navigational chart to her left.
“Wonderful!” he exclaimed with the barest hint of sarcasm. “Why?”
“I have too many pistachios, yet no spoon,” Alice informed him.
Kagan and Saraea shared a look, then as one rushed Alice. Several minutes later, Kagan turned his head towards Saraea and inquired, “How exactly did this happen?”
Saraea looked at the length of rope that bound her hand and foot, then over to Kagan who was similarly bound. “I really don't know,” she said. “I'm still trying to figure out where she got the rope. A few minutes later, she added, “You won't tell anyone about this, will you?”
Kagan made a questioning noise.
“I mean,” she went on. “I have a reputation to consider. Grown men tremble at the mention of my name. Mother's frighten their children with stories of me. Entire armies turn and walk the other way rather than confront me, and yet here I am, overcome and restrained by a single tiny little girl. Centuries of terror and bloodshed could be for naught if this ever got out.”
“My lips are sealed,” Kagan assured her. “But look on the bright side, you may be bound, but at least you're not gagged.”
Some minutes passed before Kagan attempted an apology through his gag. Saraea, unable to make a proper reply, contented herself with making a particularly rude gesture.
More time passed in silence before they were gently jostled by the familiar shudder of the ship entering null-space, and Kagan had fallen asleep by the time the deck shuddered again as the Daedalus made transit back into normal space. It took the gentle prodding of Alice's boot to rouse him.
“We're here,” she informed him. “I'm going to untie you now.”
She easily undid the knots that Kagan had worn himself out just trying to loosen, and extended a hand to help him to his feet, whereupon he fixed her with a dark scowl.
“If you weren't so cute and little, I'd kick your *** up one bulkhead and down the other,” he informed her darkly.
Alice met his gaze for a moment, then shrugged. “You can spank me later, for now we have more important things to do.”
From the floor, Saraea made an angry noise and held out her hands.
“We-ell,” Alice said. “I'm not sure you'd have the same reservations in the *** kicking department. It may be safer to leave you there for now.”
Saraea made a reassuring noise, struggled to her knees and held out her hands again.
“Ok,” Alice agreed after a moment's thought. “But you have to promise.”
Saraea nodded earnestly and sighed with relief as Alice removed the gag and ropes. Saraea stood and gave Alice a short bow, waiting until Alice had turned around before delivering a mighty boot to her posterior. Alice whirled, he face ablaze with fury, but her expression crumpled when she saw the size of the grin on Saraea's face.
“Ok,” she said with a wry smile. “I suppose I had that coming. But now, behold!” She waved an arm towards the main viewer, and Kagan and Saraea crowded around it. The screen showed an artificially enhanced view of what was outside the ship, mainly a thick, swirling nebula. In the distance, an unmistakably artificial structure was slowly revealing itself.
Kagan's brow furrowed as he quietly asked, “What the hell is that?”

[Puke]

it must be a giant spoon!

[AgentZero]

Yes. That, or....


“Home,” Alice said quietly. “It's home.”
As they watched, the structure eventually unveiled itself as a small space station. It was unfathomable that they'd stumble across something that small in such a huge nebula, and yet someone else had obviously done the same as the ship beeped an alarm.
“Contact!” Kagan called out, rushing over to the sensor station. “One ship, directly aft, coming in fast.”
“They're hailing us,” Saraea advised. “Switching to main viewer.”
“Oh, [censored],” Kagan muttered as the screen flared to life.
“O'Shea, actually,” a grinning face informed him. “How are ya, ye jamby bastard?”
“What in the name of the Nine Divine Whores of Kantarl are you doing out here?” Kagan asked.
“Getting shot at by you it would seem,” Kaelan replied dryly.
Kagan turned around in his chair. “Alice, stop shooting at the nice man,” he told her.
“Sorry,” she replied, grudgingly switching off the fire control console.
“Cheers,” O'Shea said. “Now as for how I got here, that's a very interesting story. There I was, all set to head off into the wild black yonder with a fine filly at my side. We decide to stop at a small station on the outskirts of the Fyron system to pick up a few supplies, when said filly decides that she's going to leave me for a gas miner. A gas miner! Can you believe it? A man. Who mines. Gas. Stole my woman! Well, obviously, the only thing that's going to make me feel better is a low altitude flyby of Sheol. So there I am, cruising along and I must say quite enjoying myself, when my scanners pick up a rather familiar ship. And I admit, it was a difficult choice to make, but I eventually decided I'd best be following you to make sure you didn't get into any trouble, and so, here I am.”
“Interesting,” Kagan said slowly. “Well, hurry on up and get yourself on board then.”
“Initiating docking maneuvers,” O'Shea replied. “See you in a few minutes.”
Kagan left the Daedalus's docking maneuvers in Alice's able hands and hurried down to the docking bay to greet his old friend. Just as he arrived in the bay, the ship lurched gently and there was a loud clang as hull met hull. A few moments later there was the hiss of the airlock cycling, and a few moments after that, Kaelan O'Shea stepped onto the Daedalus. Kagan greeted him with a slap on the shoulder that O'Shea returned enthusiastically. They chatted about inconsequential things for a few minutes, until they were interrupted by a clang that seemed to come from below.
“Expecting more visitors?” O'Shea asked.
“No,” Kagan replied worriedly. The two men hurried up to the bridge to find out what was going on, where they found Saraea on her back with her legs propped up in the air by a chair, struggling to right herself, and Alice seated calmly at the navigation console, hands folded on her lap.
“We've docked with the station,” Alice informed them matter of factly. “They left their main shuttle bay open.”
Kagan sighed. “I suppose you want to go aboard now?” he asked.
“Yes, please,” Alice replied, managing to sound as though there was actually any choice in the matter.
The four of them trotted down to the main cargo bay, Alice racing ahead to gleefully slap the switch that opened the door. Kagan, slightly behind her, slapped the switch to close it again, dodged her elbow, and flicked the switch that activated the external cameras. The screen above the console flared to life, and showed six dull gray battle machines standing outside the door, their ludicrously large rifles at the ready.
“Wouldn't want to run smack into them, now would you?” Kagan admonished.
“No sir, sorry sir, an older boy told me to,” Alice replied, staring at her feet. “But seriously? Robots? Who uses robots these days? It's so...” she wrinkled her nose. “Colonial.”
Kagan opened a locker beside the control console and pulled out two heavy duty handguns, loaded explosive rounds into them and tossed them to O'Shea before pulling out another two for himself.
“Right, here's the plan,” he said. “We're going to drop the gangway. As soon as it's open enough for us to fit, Kaelan and I will jump out. Kaelan takes the three on the right, I'll take the three on the left. You ladies hide around the corner to avoid any stray fire. After- what?” Kagan stopped at the look he was receiving from Alice and Saraea.
Alice raised her hand. “Hide?” she asked incredulously. “Um, certified unstoppable killing machine right here. Honestly, I have a certificate. I made it myself.”
Saraea raised her hand. “Intergalatically feared destroyer of worlds, standing right beside the certified killing machine,” she said. “Hide isn't exactly in my vocabulary. Unless it's in the context of, 'Stop hiding, I'm trying to shoot you.'”
“Yes... well... you'll just have to... I mean...” Kagan floundered, clearly distressed.
“It's a guy thing,” O'Shea interjected.
“Yes!” Kagan cried, pointing a finger at the two women. “A guy thing. A thing guys do. For guys. Done by guys. Us guys.”
“Fine,” Alice said with a shrug. Turning to Saraea, she asked, “Are you hungry? I'm starved.”
Saraea nodded. “Now that you mention it, it has been a while since I ate. Let's go find something to munch on while the guys do their guy thing.”
Kagan watched the two of them head up the stairs and into the common room before turning to O'Shea. “Ready?” he asked.
O'Shea cocked his pistols. “Let's do this thing,” he replied.
Kagan punched the switch that began lowering the gangway, and gave his friend a hard look. “Where did you learn to talk like that?” he asked. “I mean really, 'Let's do this thing'? What the hell is that?”
He was still lecturing O'Shea as the two raced up the gangway and launched themselves high into the air. Kagan twisted in mid-air, and his pistols spoke angrily. The first two exploded before they had a chance to move, the third had just enough time to swing it's rifle upwards before two explosive rounds blew apart. The gangway touched the deck a split second before Kagan and O'Shea landed in the middle of a smoking pile of scrap.
O'Shea looked back into the ship. “See, doing cool stuff like that just isn't as fun when there's no one around to see it.”
“I saw it,” Kagan pointed out. “And it was pretty damn cool.”
“You don't count,” O'Shea replied. “You don't have jiggly bits.”
“No,” Kagan said sadly. “You're right. It's not the same without the jiggly bits.”
“Ladies!” O'Shea called. “It's safe to come out now!”
Alice &amp; Saraea appeared at the doorway to the common room, and leisurely made their way down the stairs before crossing the deck and stepping down the gangway.
“Oh, good,” Alice said dryly, still chewing. “You destroyed something. Well done. I couldn't have done that. Not me. Helpless little girl and all.”
“Yes, well, be careful,” said Kagan. “There might be more of them.”

[Puke]

HA! i was right. i was so right. its just that the spoons they were eating with in the common area was off-scene. darn, im good.

[TurinTurambar]

Nice to see the flow and dialogue is back on track. A good read AZ, thanks!

TT

[AgentZero]

Alice hefted one of the machine's rifles that was roughly the same size as her. “Good,” she replied with a large grin.
Although massive, the hanger bay they now found themselves in had only one visible exit, a large open door at the far end of the hangar. They made their way towards it cautiously, weapons raised, each expecting a tide of battle machines to pour through the opening at any moment. They reached the door without incident, and Alice poked her head around the corner.
“All clear,” she told the rest. “Follow me.”
They followed her slowly through the door, and through an endless maze of corridors. Bulkhead doors politely opened as they approached, and at each, the foursome readied themselves for a fight that never came. One immaculate, sterile corridor led to another, which branched off into an identical hallway, which in turn brought them to still another passageway. Just as Kagan was about to ask Alice if she had any real inkling as to where they were going, they reached a particularly large door that stubbornly refused to open for them.
Alice set down her rifle and approached the door. She worked her fingers in between the two plates that formed the doorway and heaved mightily.
And precisely nothing happened.
She braced her one leg, then two against the door frame as she continued to heave with surprising strength until her fingers slipped and she dropped unceremoniously to the floor.
O'Shea stepped forward and gave Alice an amused look as he stepped over her. “Sit and watch in awe at how a man does it,” he advised her. He pulled a strange looking tool out from his pocket and used it to detach a control panel that sat to the left of the door. He reached inside the small aperture behind the panel and began rearranging the wires behind it. “There,” he said after a few minutes of fiddling. “Almost got it- done!”
There was a small pop, a terribly loud bang, and O'Shea sailed gracefully backwards through the air. He flew through a bulkhead door, which opened conveniently in front of him, and closed after he had passed through. Several seconds later, there was a muffled thump as O'Shea ostensibly impacted something unwilling to open.
“Wow,” Alice said into the surprised silence, sounding really rather awed. “That was way more impressive than my way. I couldn't have done that, me. No sir, no way I would've flown that far. Well, maybe, seeing as I'm small. Now that I think about it, I probably could have done that. Yep, I probably could.”
O'Shea wandered back into the room and sat down heavily. “Blimey,” was all he said.
“How many fingers am I holding up?” Kagan asked, not holding up his hand, let alone any fingers.
“Seventeen,” O'Shea replied.
“Right, he's fine,” said Saraea.
“So,” said Kagan, turning to look at her. “Shall you or shall I?”
“Oh, I couldn't,” Saraea replied with a modest wave of her hand.
“You sure?” he inquired. “I don't mind if you-”
“No, really,” she insisted. “I really couldn't. You go ahead.”
“If you insist,” Kagan said with a shrug.
He stepped forward, reached out, extended one finger, and pressed the large green button to the right of the door frame. The two sides of the door slid apart with a gentle hiss, and stood open, waiting expectantly. Alice stepped passed him, shot him a look that would have withered a lesser man, and moved into the cavernous chamber on the other side of the door. Kagan stepped through and looked around. Directly ahead there was a large, three meter high control tower that sat in the middle of a circular platform. The platform, and the causeway that led to it were the only illuminated areas of the room. Glancing over the edge of the causeway, Kagan saw only darkness. The floor could have been two meters below, or two hundred. Neither the walls, nor the ceiling were visible, giving the platform the illusion of floating in midair. The tower was comprised of six individual work stations, each with a multitude of information screens, and each equipped with a dauntingly complex array of controls. At the top of the tower was long, retracted mechanical arm with a large, four-pronged gripping claw on it's business end. Behind each of the tower's workstations, arranged in a circle around the tower were a set of what appeared to be docking cradles. They were comprised of a 'spine' that rose up out of the floor, higher at the far end then it was at the near end, with three ribs, one at the top, middle, and end of the spine. Something evidently fit into the cradles, though a cursory examination of the room revealed no hints as to what that something was, but Kagan couldn't help thinking that whatever it was would be roughly the size of a coffin.
He reached the end of the causeway and walked onto the platform to find Alice already engrossed at one of the tower's workstations. She paid him no heed as he walked up behind her, as she slowly, almost tentatively ran her hands over the controls.
“Green paint always fades, much better to use yellow,” she murmured quietly. “Large canines serenade small felines, but big dogs loathe small cats. Inactivity is death. Inactive, inactive, inactive, inactive. Active!” she exclaimed suddenly and mashed a button with both hands.
The mechanical arm at the top of the tower hummed with energy, raised itself high into the air, and extended out into the darkness. It returned a moment later carrying a two meter long capsule that reminded Kagan immediately of a shiny silver coffin. The arm lowered the capsule onto the cradle behind Alice. After releasing the capsule, the arm removed the top half of the capsule and set it aside before returning to it's perch at the top of the control tower.
The four of them crowded around the capsule, staring at it's contents in absolute shock. Alice was the first to speak. Raising her hand a little, she inquired gently, “What the hell is that?”

[AgentZero]

Hmmm... Releasing more HifH in the midst of a SE5 frenzy appears not to have been the wisest of actions. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

[capnq]

We unfortunate few who can't play SEV appreciate having something else to read about.

The door opening sequence was fun. I wonder if Alice even knows what the mnemonic she's reciting stands for. (If that's what it is.)

[AgentZero]

I still have a fan! Glee!

Guess that means I should get back to writing...

[TurinTurambar]

Oh trust me you have lots of fans.

[Puke]

lots and lots of them

[AgentZero]

Oh no! Page 2! Undo! UNDO!


Seriously though, 10 points for the first person who gets the Alice Name Joke in this installment.


There was a long, appropriately stunned silence, during which three of them stared numbly at the contents of the capsule, while Alice's gaze flitted from one to the next as she waited a reply.
Eventually, she sighed, and, fed up with waiting for a response, said, “It looks like me. Only bald. And naked.”
“Yes,” agreed O'Shea. “She is that.”
“Hey,” Alice said indignantly, giving O'Shea her best glower. “Stop staring at my naughty bits!”
“But they're so nice,” Saraea protested.
“Mmmmm,” Kagan chimed in.
“All right, that's enough!” Alice declared, stamping her foot on the ground. “Everyone find something else to look at, or I swear to the Nine Divine Whores of Kantarl, I will go completely bat**** crazy! Now!”
As one, Kagan, O'Shea and Saraea suddenly found something else to look at.
“That's very interesting upholstery,” murmured O'Shea.
“Indeed,” agreed Saraea. “And the exterior is so finely machined, not a single dent or scratch to be seen.”
“And the... um... err...” Kagan stammered. “Did anyone else notice that the bald one's boobs are bigger?”
“They are not!” Alice protested vehemently.
“Have a look for yourself,” Kagan told her.
Alice peered over the edge of the capsule, but was unable to resist the urge to have a proper look at her face. That moment, naturally, was the one her doppelganger chose to open her eyes. The surprise sent Alice stumbling backwards, which caused her to trip over her own feet and plop to the ground. She sat there for a few moments, with an annoyed expression on her face, until it was replaced by a look of curiosity. Her head tilted to one side and she rose to her feet to approach the capsule slowly. She got as close as she needed to be to see her duplicate's face, and stopped there.
“Yes,” she said after a few moments. “No, they're not. I don't know. Blue. Seventy-three. Of course....”
Kagan gave O'Shea a look as the one-sided exchange continued. O'Shea merely shrugged. “Telepathic exchanged?” Kagan wondered aloud.
“Don't ask me,” O'Shea told him. “I'm about as sensitive as a well-attuned rock.”
“I'm getting something,” Saraea said, frowning deeply. “Don't ask me what, but the naked one is definitely broadcasting some sort of telepathic- Ack!” She stumbled backwards, clutching her temples.
“Eavesdropping is rude,” Alice informed her darkly.
“Son of a...” Saraea muttered.
“So, what do we call this one?” O'Shea wondered.
Kagan walked over to the console Alice had been using and looked at it. “Alice Fiona Komatsu. Huh. How about that? I guess we call the new one Fiona.”
“That is acceptable,” Alice advised them.
“Well, we should probably be getting back to the ship,” said Kagan. “I don't like this place one bit, and the sooner we're gone, the happier I'll be.”
“We're not going to leave her, are we?” Alice asked, suddenly looking very worried.
“Of course not,” said Saraea, pulling off her coat and wrapping it around Fiona. Once they'd gotten the jacked closed up, Saraea and O'Shea helped her out of the capsule and set her on the floor, only to have her collapse into a heap at their feet.
“She can't walk,” Alice said mournfully.
“Not a problem,” O'Shea replied, scooping Fiona into his arms.
The five of them hurried down the causeway and out the door, and with Alice in the lead, made their way quickly through the maze of hallways. They were almost back to the hanger deck by O'Shea's reasoning when the rounded a corner and ran smack into a contingent of battle machines. Instinctively, they spun around to head the other way, only to find their escape blocked by another group of machines that had somehow materialized behind them. The rust coloured machines herded them into a small cluster and raised their weapons. O'Shea looked down at the bundle in his arms only to find Fiona glaring at the machines with unimaginable ferocity. There was the unmistakable sound of a large number of rounds being chambered, and then the battle machines simply melted into a gooey pile on the floor. While Kagan, Alice and Saraea stared at the pile of goo in surprise, O'Shea's gaze was firmly locked on Fiona, whose expression had relaxed into one of abject serenity. She waved her hand slightly, and the two puddles of goo spread up the walls and wrapped around the ceiling, forming an archway of sorts. The metal goo continued to shift and move about as it coalesced into beautifully intricate patterns all around them.
“Ahhh...” Kagan said cautiously. “That's an interesting function. Are the pretty patterns going to kill us with their prettiness of doom now?”
“I don't think the machines did that themselves,” said O'Shea. “I think it was her.” He glanced down at Fiona and gave her a gentle bounce for emphasis.
“Oh,” said Kagan, looking vaguely embarrassed. “Of course it was. Erm, Alice, sweetheart, could you tell her to please not do that to anything on my ship?”
“She can hear you just fine,” Alice said with only a small hint of condescension. “It's only the talking part that she can't do.”
“Oh,” Kagan said again. “Can we just hurry the hell up and get back to my ship where things make sense.” He paused to consider his last comment, then added, “Sort of.”
They made their way uneventfully back to the ship, passing wordlessly through several more rust coloured archways along the way. Once aboard, Kagan hurried up to the bridge and got the ship back into space with considerable haste.

[Puke]

no... is it a play on comatose?

[AgentZero]

Ok, it's not the greatest joke ever, but the name Alice Fiona Komatsu forms the initials AFK, aka Away From Keyboard. As in, 'not quite there', 'lights are on but...'

Ok, I admit it, that was really geeky, even for me.

[dogscoff]

Yay, more more! Two Alices... that's... that's... that was your little birthday present to yourself wasn't it?

[AgentZero]

dogscoff said:
Yay, more more! Two Alices... that's... that's... that was your little birthday present to yourself wasn't it?



Hell yeah.

[AgentZero]

For those of you still without SE5....



Alice plunked herself down at the navigation console while Saraea lounged across the two chairs at weapons control. O'Shea set Fiona down beside Alice and wandered over to stand behind Kagan's command chair. Alice began twirling her hair around her finger as she idly punched buttons on the navigational computer with her free hand. After a few minutes, she looked up sharply, then turned towards Fiona.
“Yes, of course you can,” she informed her bald-headed twin.
“The others hurt me if I spoke,” Fiona said, quietly so the others couldn't hear.
“These people are awful nice though,” Alice assured her, lowering her voice. “They don't hurt people. Well, sometimes they do, and they're quite good at it really, but the only people they hurt are the evil, wicked and nasty sort.” He eyes widened suddenly. “You're not my evil twin, are you?”
“I don't think so,” Fiona replied, looking suddenly worried. “How would I know if I was?”
“Well, staring at the galactic map and laughing maniacally is a pretty good indicator,” Alice said thoughtfully. “And of course you need an evil lair, not just any lair, mind you, but an evil one. And a legion of barely-competent minions, can't forget them. Oh, and a collection of carnivorous plants and/or animals. And a fluffy white cat, that's vital.”
“I don't have any of that,” Fiona said, sounding slightly disappointed. “Although I did have a good laugh over a galactic map once, when I realized that if you take the first letter of all the systems you transit from Fyron's Star to Rigellia, it spells something naughty.”
Alice frowned in thought and began ticking the systems names off on her fingers. “Fyron, Urkutall, Clementine, Kalvinicus, Yorgenslav, Ozmentia, Uymanda, Rottera, Mandella, Otterman, Thereami, Hera, Ekelbar, Rigellia. You're right that's very naughty.”
“But not as bad as if you take the last letters of all the systems between Sol and Thereami,” Fiona pointed out with a mischievous grin.”
Alice pondered that one for a moment, then her eyes widened suddenly. “Fiona!” she exclaimed, barely keeping her voice down. “That's just plain filthy!”
“It's shocking, really it is,” Fiona said, smiling. “And did you know you can use the Imperium's major trade routes to spell out all the major parts of the female reproductive system?”
“Oh, everyone knows that one,” Alice said with a grin and a mock dismissive wave of her hand.
The two fell silent for a time, and Alice resumed her poking at the navigational computer. “Individual atoms must fall upwards, collecting kings into nine groups, not until then sleep,” she murmured as she worked.
“Imps might create rapid and zany interruptions effective rarely,” Fiona replied off-handedly.
“Never overestimate the lambs, invaders kill every large yew,” Alice replied firmly.
Over at the command chair, O'Shea leaned over to whisper in Kagan's ear. “What in the name of all that is holy are those two on about?” he said as quietly as he could.
“No point in whispering,” Kagan replied softly. “Alice at least has got hearing like...” he paused for a moment, at a loss for an appropriate adjective. “...something with really good hearing,” he finished lamely, giving Alice and Fiona a small wave as they turned towards him and grinned to show they'd overheard. “And I don't know what they're talking about,” he continued. “But I'm absolutely sure and certain that I'm a happier, more well adjusted person not knowing what they're talking about.”
Alice suddenly let out a profoundly happy laugh and clapped her hands, before hunching over the navigational computer once more with Fiona peering over her shoulder.
“You sure it's a good idea to be letting them play with that thing?” O'Shea wondered.
“I'm sure they're just having a bit of harmless fun,” Kagan said easily. “What makes you ask?”
“Well, the fact that we're changing course has me vaguely worried,” O'Shea replied.
“We're changing course?” Kagan asked as he looked down at his console. “We're changing course,” he repeated, this time as a statement. “Why are we changing course. Girls? Why are we changing course?”
Alice and Fiona bounded over to Kagan's chair, flushed with excitement. “Becaues we have to!” Alice exclaimed.
“We found it!” Fiona enthused.
“I had a number!”
“And I had a number!”
“By itself it didn't mean anything-”
“Neither did mine!”
“But together-”
“Together!”
“Together, our numbers make coordinates!”
“Coordinates!”
“Of something important I bet!”
“Definately important! Well, probably.”
“So we have to go!”
“Have to!”
“Gah!” Kagan exclaimed. “Stop doing that! It's wrecking my head. Now, you're saying that the two of you each had some random number bouncing around in your heads, and when you put the numbers together you came up with a set of coordinates, and on that basis alone you think we should go investigate.”
“Not just that,” Alice said, rolling her eyes.
“There's the nothingness!”
“Yes, the nothingness!”
“The coordinates are for a jump node that leads to a system where there's nothing!”
“Nothing at all!”
“Now when have you heard of a system with nothing in it?
“Every system has something in it.”
“That's what makes it a system.”
“But this one has nothing.”
“Nothing at all.”
“And it's the only system with nothing in it in the known galaxy.”
“Which is big.”
“You're doing it again,” sighed Kagan, already resigned to the fact that he'd be putting up with a lot more of it in the days to come.
“Sorry.”
“Sorry.”
“Right,” said Kagan, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “So your main argument in favour of visiting this system is that fact that there's nothing there?”
“Supposedly,” said Fiona.
“Yeah, supposedly,” Alice agreed.
“I'm thinking that's not the best reason to go trapsing across the galaxy,” O'Shea put in.
“Actually, he's thinking much naughtier things than that,” Fiona advised them.
“Hey!” O'Shea objected. “Stay outta me head!”
“I learned my lesson,” she replied meekly. “It's dark and scary in there.”
“Pleeeease,” Alice begged. “It's terribly, terribly important that we go there. I know it the same way I knew we had to come here, and look what we found.”
Fiona raised her hand happily. “Glad to be found,” she informed them.
Kagan sighed. “I suppose, if it helps unravel the enigma that is the two of you, it can't help but be a good thing.”
“Glee!” Alice exclaimed, jumping onto Kagan's lap. “I promise I'll make it worth it I will.”
Fiona gave Alice a strange look. “Doesn't that hurt?” she asked.
Alice blushed ever so slightly. “Sweety, you need to stay out of people's heads, otherwise things will happen to you that will hurt a lot more.”
“I can melt things with my mind,” Fiona pointed out.
“But who am I to tell you what to do with your own gifts?” Alice added quickly.
Saraea stood suddenly and grinned broadly at the four of them. “This is going to be fun!” she said in a tone that almost literally dripped sacrasm.
“Aye,” Kagan agreed dryly. “Piloting a ship full of the crazy, the sarcastic and the perverted into the very depths of nowhere... This is bound to end well.”

[dogscoff]

Yay! The thick plottens!
Thanks for the new sig, btw.

--
"I can melt things with my mind."

[Lord_Shleepy]

narf poit chez BOOM said:
Don't parady to much. Sly humour is much better than in-your-face for parady, otherwise it tends to become a rant session - At least, based on the fanfiction I've read.



http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/Sick.gif This is true of fiction in general, in my experience. I've read a lot of famous parodies (and other social commentaries) and they all started to suck after about 100 pages or so (became too whiny and caustic). Humor lightens it up a lot but it is still a genre that is best kept short. This is, of course, only my own measely opinion.

[Lord_Shleepy]

Hmm....I just realized I left something out...

Excellent story AZ! I love the cliffhanger endings. Still not quite sure where that waking up dead thing came from tho.
Is there going to be an explanation for that? And those "what the hell is that" ships?

[AgentZero]

All will be revealed in time. Some of it in the next installment. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

[Baron Munchausen]

Lord_Shleepy said:
Hmm....I just realized I left something out...

Excellent story AZ! I love the cliffhanger endings. Still not quite sure where that waking up dead thing came from tho.
Is there going to be an explanation for that? And those "what the hell is that" ships?



Well, the immediate reason for that was given. Both of the 'main' characters are endowed (infested?) with nanobots. This makes them somewhat like the advanced 'Terminator' models that can repair themselves after almost any damage or injury.

Just where the nanobots came from hasn't been said yet, but it's entirely possible that said nanobots are a hold-over from the second dynasty and one or both of these characters are in fact thousands of years old. Theoretically, the aging process could be 'healed' just like any other sort of damage. This brings an interesting twist to the earlier issue of whether 'Alice' should be named 'Alice' -- she could very well have had many, many names over the millenia. And as long as she doesn't stand too close to any detonating nuclear weapons or otherwise get exposed to some instantaneous vaporization she could live many thousands more years and have many more names.

[AgentZero]

A short little installment coz Puke was bugging me. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

O'Shea pinched the bridge of his nose and sighed, trying to ignore the look he was getting from Saraea. The two were sitting in the cramped confines of the engineering section, which wasn't the most pleasant location on the ship. In fact, it was a front runner for the lofty title of Most Unpleasant Place On The Ship. The main drive engine emitted a jarring vibration that set one's teeth on edge, as did the circulation fans for the life-support system. It was also hot, and humid, both also results of the life support system. Such an environment did however have the upshot of making it a very good place for a private conversation. The noise made it difficult to be overheard, and the sheer repellent nature of the engineering section made sure that no one came wandering idly by.

“So?” Saraea ask impatiently.
“So?” O'Shea echoed with a shrug. “I don't know,” he added after an uncomfortable pause. “Maybe. She's more stable than the others.”
“That's not saying much,” Saraea pointed out.
“True, but we haven't any real idea as to how stable she was to begin with.”
Saraea exhaled heavily. “That's an understatement. And the other?”
O'Shea barked out a short laugh. “Telepathy? Telekinesis? Hardly.”
“Damn,” muttered the tall woman. “Termination?”
“Hard to say,” O'Shea said with a shrug. “She seems stable enough. We'll have to keep an eye on her, of course, but drastic action shouldn't be necessary if she continues on as she has.”
“That's a relief.”
“You've developed a real emotional attachment to her, haven't you?”
It was Saraea's turn to shrug. “It was easy, at first. The unstable ones. They were clearly a threat, to themselves an everything around them. They were beyond help. But this one, she's got a clear understanding of right and wrong, and thus far has shown responsible use of her abilities-”
“Doctor Gwenllyn might disagree,” O'Shea interrupted with a wry grin.
Saraea smiled despite herself. “Seeing that pompous *** get slapped around made my year, I admit it,” she said. “But still... The girl is a sweetheart. The thought of putting her down distresses me greatly.”
“Me too,” O'Shea admitted. “The others, they were so far gone they didn't even realize what was happening, right up until the end. But this one, she knows what's going on, and if we try, she'll fight back. And I really don't know if even the two of us could handle her if she did.”
“That's a fact,” O'Shea agreed. “Not to mention-”
“I know,” Saraea said, rubbing her forehead. “Do you think he could be reasoned with?”
O'Shea laughed merrily. “Before the fact, not a chance. After the fact, if she hasn't already killed us, he definitely will. And it won't be quick.”
“Let's just hope it doesn't come to that,” Saraea said after a moments silence.
“By the Nine Divine Whores he sure did complicate things, didn't he?”
“I told you we should have brought him in. Think how simple this could have been!”
“The time wasn't right, you know that. Not that it matters now anyway.”
“You're right,” Saraea admitted. “He would have never gone for it back then and we would have had to terminate him.”
“A proposition much easier back then than it is now.”
“Speaking of which, what are we going to do about that?”
“Nothing,” O'Shea said firmly. “We say nothing, do nothing, sure as hell tell no one, and keep a bloody close eye on him in the meantime.”
“Sounds like a plan for the immediate future in general,” Saraea said agreeably. “Any discussion as to whether or not we've found the Original will have to wait until we've collected more information. Now what do you say we get out of here, I'm absolutely bucketing sweat.”
“Yeah,” said O'Shea, mopping his forehead. “Let's.”
They passed quietly through the ship's common room, managing to not disturb a sleeping Fiona, and almost made it to their respective quarters undetected. But just as they were passing Kagan and Alice's quarters, the door slid open, and the two wandered out, both bathed in sweat. Kagan gave Saraea and O'Shea a cursory nod as he headed towards the bridge. Alice, however, paused and looked slowly from O'Shea's sweaty face to Saraea's, then gave them both a big, knowing grin and scampered down the corridor after Kagan.

[Puke]

let this be a lesson to everyone that bugging AZ produces more story.

[AgentZero]

And since nobody bugged me, here's a bigger installment. Go figure that!


Kagan had almost passed through the common room before a niggling thought made him stop and turn around. He walked slowly across the room to stand beside Fiona and gave her a hard look.

“You're floating,” he noted.
“Yup,” she agreed happily.
“This is new.”
“Yup.”
“How new?”
“Pretty new.”
“I see...”
“Well it goes to figure, doesn't it?” Fiona asked, an emphatic shrug sending her into a slow backspin. “If I can manipulate things around me, it goes to figure that I can manipulate myself as well, right?”
“No need to be manipulating yourself, I'm sure there's plenty who'd be willing to do it for you,” Kagan quipped. “And remind me,” he added, picking himself up off the floor. “Not to mock the nice telekinetic lady.”

Alice strolled into the room, looked from Fiona to Kagan and then to the path of destruction in between them. “You mocked the nice telekinetic lady, didn't you?” she asked.

“Oh, come on!” Kagan protested. “She left herself wide open to that one.”
“I did, at that,” Fiona admitted. “But regardless, I stand by my telekinetic shockwave, and all that it stands for.”
“Getting us back to the whole issue of the floating,” Kagan said, settling down on the couch.

“Pretty neat, isn't it?” Alice asked, snuggling up beside him.
“You knew about this?” asked Kagan.
“Yup.”
“And you didn't tell me, why?”
“Um, well I tried, but I couldn't figure out how to work it into the conversation. 'Oh Gods! Oh Gods! Fiona can fly! Oh Gods!'? See, it just doesn't flow.”
“Point taken,” Kagan admitted, flushing slightly. “Still, you could have told me before-”
“You didn't exactly give me the opportunity, what with the grabbing, throwing and-”
“Ok!” Kagan exclaimed. “But afterwards would have been good too.”
“I was about to,” Alice told him. “But then you remembered that there was no one on the bridge and went running off, so- say, who's on the bridge now?”
Kagan exclaimed something unmentionable, leaped off the couch and raced down the corridor towards the bridge. Alice stared after him with a bemused expression before turning to Fiona, only to find her rolling about in the air in laughter.

“Does my man's forgetfulness amuse you?” Alice inquired.
“Very much so,” Fiona chortled, settling down on a couch to halt her multi-axial spinning. “But not nearly as much as how flustered he gets when you mention fornication in any form.”
“It's rather adorable,” Alice agreed. “Though rather silly, given that you can just- you know.”
“Replay the events in my mind?” Fiona asked delicately. “I do admit being able to simulate the event as either participant has given me a rather unique insight into a great many things.”
“Such as?” Alice inquired, her eyes alight with curiosity.
“You, my dear, are a little tiger.”
“A sexy tiger,” Alice corrected with a wicked grin.
“Of course,” Fiona agreed patronizingly.
“So,” said Alice, bounding happily along to the next topic. “Are we going to go harass my lover some more, or do you have a better way of killing the next few hours?”
“I am quite amused as is,” Fiona informed her as O'Shea floated into the room.
“I don't mean to alarm you ladies, but there appears to be a problem with the gravity on this ship,” he said, pivoting slowly to face them. After managing to get himself turned around, he looked from Alice to Fiona and back, and they looked back at him with serene expressions.

“Oh,” he said after a moments consternation. “It must just be me. Awful peculiar this. Well,” he said with a sigh as he approached the corridor leading to the bridge. “I'll keep you appraised of any new developments.”
A few moments later, they heard him call out, “Hey chief, I'm floating!”
“Not you too!” came Kagan's pained reply.
“What do you mean, 'too'?” was the rather worried response.
There was a thud, loud cursing, followed by muffled cursing, followed by a comparative silence into which Fiona tittered merrily.
Alice looked at her for a long time before asking, “You are the evil twin, aren't you?”

“Coming up on transit point,” Kagan announced some hours later. The five of them were strewn about the bridge, having assembled at Kagan's earlier announcement that they were close to making transit. “Four... Three... Two... Hold on to your lunches... Transit!” There was a jarring thump, more jarring that usual, and several of those assembled made noises indicating that they were indeed putting considerable effort into keeping their lunches on the inside.

“The second part of the co-ordinates is just a heading,” Kagan advised them. “I've put us on that heading and set best speed, so now all there is to do is sit back and enjoy the show.

Kagan switched on the external cameras, and they beheld the reason for their unpleasantly rough transit. They had jumped right into the middle of a dense nebula, and the space around them was thick with swirling gas. They watched the main viewer in silence for a long time, lost in their individual thoughts as they gazed upon the hypnotic display in front of them.

Kagan, while curious about what would be found at their ultimate destination, felt confident that given the capabilities of his ship and crew, they shouldn't have any trouble dealing with whatever they found. On the other hand, he was concerned about Fiona and what seemed to be her growing powers. She was already a contender for the most powerful being he had ever encountered, and the gods only knew how much more powerful she would get. He knew that rescuing her from that derelict space station had been the right thing to do, yet part of his mind refused to let go of the idea that it might have been a mistake.

Saraea's mind strayed to the strange man who had brought the news that Kagan and Alice were alive. Recent events hadn't given her much time to ponder the matter, yet the more she thought about it, the stranger it seemed. He was oddly familiar to her, but his face slipped and slithered about in her mind, refusing to be pinned down to a recognizable name. He had known a lot, much more than tried to let on, she could tell that much. He'd known about her destruction of The Council, mere minutes after it had taken place when she knew well that she hadn't left any survivors. And of course he had managed to not only find out that Kagan and Alice were alive, but where they were as well, two fact that had managed to elude her. And he'd known other things, things about her that no one else could possibly know. Things she hadn't even known herself until he'd voiced them. And despite the great distances she had traveled since that meeting, and the sheer enormity of the galaxy as a whole, she couldn't shake the feeling that she'd be seeing him again one day.

O'Shea's thoughts concerned Saraea, Fiona and Alice, and are not suitable to be mentioned here or anywhere else.

Out of all of them, only Fiona was fixated on what they would discover as they continued along the course that had been set from them. She wondered how it came to be that she had half the co-ordinates imprinted in her mind, and how Alice came to have the other half. Part of her couldn't help thinking that maybe the two numbers weren't related, that there were a great number of copies of her out there somewhere, each with their own individual number, and only by combining them in some mysterious pattern would they come up with the proper sets of co-ordinates. But mostly, her mind was filled with a kind of childish excitement about the adventure they had embarked upon.

Alice knew exactly what they'd find, and where they'd find it, and the thought of it both thrilled and terrified her.

[Lord_Shleepy]

I guess it is time to bother AgentZero again... :-)

[AgentZero]

The five of them were seated quite comfortably on the bridge, when suddenly and for no good reason, a big truck came crashing in and reduced O'Shea, Saraea and Fiona to greasy spots on the deck. Kagan was mashed shortly thereafter by the truck truck that followed, while Alice met a similar fate moments later at the hands (or is that tires?) of a truck truck truck.

[dogscoff]

...and then in the morning, AZ read through his hangover what he had written the night before and said
"oh nadgers, I'm gonna have to resurrect them all with nanotech again."

[rdouglass]

Is that really how you end the story AZ? I feel used like a 1-night-stand. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/redface.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Puke]

if you hung out in the IRC channel, youd be up on more of the inside jokes.

so how soon until there are triplets?

[JAFisher44]

Well, its been 4 months AZ, isn't it about time for some more story?

[AgentZero]

Probably.

[AgentZero]

See? Good things do come to those who wait. There's a little joke for those of you who frequent #spaceempires, and a vague reference to Sheldon and/or Sinfest, but otherwise those of you familiar with none of the above should do fine. And now, without further ado, I present to you 1727 words of unadulterated... something. Or it might be adulterated. I'm not entirely sure what adulterated is. Oh, right. That probably counted as ado, didn't it?






“Incoming!” Alice shrieked suddenly, diving to the nearest console and sending the ship into a dizzying evasive pattern.

“Who? Where?” Kagan asked, trying not to sound as though he was trying desperately to keep his lunch down. “And why?” he added for good measure.

“Couldn't tell you,” Saraea replied, staring at a display screen. “The source of the fire is outside our sensor range.”

“Someone's taking shots at us from outside our sensor range?” Kagan repeated incredulously. “That's not good.”

“Actually,” Saraea said slowly, scowling at her display screen. “Alice, sweetie, stop flinging the ship about for a moment, would you?”

“Thanks but no thanks,” Alice told her. “Being dead isn't on my plan for the day.”

“We won't die,” Saraea assured her. “Just... stop.”

“Ok,” Alice agreed grudgingly. “But if we die, I'm spending eternity poking you with a tiny spoon.”

The ship settled into a more stable course, and true to Saraea's word, they didn't die. All eyes went to Saraea, who ignored them magnificently, staring at her display screen instead, periodically adjusting a few controls.

“No one's shooting at us,” she said eventually. “What we're seeing is stray weapon's fire from something very big up ahead, if the energy signatures are anything to go by.”

Kagan turned to Alice and Fiona. “Are you girls sure you-” he let the question die as the girls turned towards him, their expression telling him everything he needed to know. “Right,” he said. “We're continuing in, but if there's a big hostile out there, we're going in slowly and carefully. Set all systems to minimum power. Configure engines for silent running and switch to passive sensors only. O'Shea, get over to the Defiant and power up her passive sensors too. They've got better range and resolution and you're docked far enough back that the Daedalus's engines should mask the higher output.”

O'Shea obediently rose from his seat and left the bridge, while the rest of them crowded around Saraea to get a view of her display screen. Minutes passed and nothing happened. The four of them jumped, then managed to do a respectable job of pretending they didn't when a burst of static preceded O'Shea's announcement that something bigger than them had just come into range, and that they should be able to get a reading on it in about five minutes. The longest five minutes in the history of the galaxy proceeded to pass with nary a care over the anxiety they produced in the four occupants of the Daedalus's bridge.

“Squee!” Alice exclaimed suddenly.
“I see something!” Fiona chimed in. “Something... blobby.”

Indeed, at the very fringe of passive sensor's range, the silhouette that appeared on the display screen was distinctly blobby. Passive sensors operated on a variety of different frequencies, and at the furthest extent of their range, didn't do a very good job of telling them apart. Kagan found that by squinting just so, and tilting his head ever so slightly, he could make out the vague shape of a ship's hull, buried amongst what he could only assume were heat blooms.

“Kaelan, do you have any better idea of what exactly we're looking at?” Kagan asked through the intercom.

“Unless my eyes deceive me,” O'Shea replied. “Which I might add they don't. At least not where this sort of thing is concerned. Perhaps when it concerns the drink and buxom young fillies, but most assuredly not where this sort of thing is concerned.”

A long silence ensued, eventually prompting Alice to point out, “You never actually finished that thought, sweetums.”

“I didn't?” O'Shea said, bewildered. “I normally don't talk that much without making some sort of point.”

“Well you did,” Alice said bluntly. “So would you please finish? Inquiring minds want to know!”

“Oh. Well it's a Tauren battleship,” O'Shea replied matter-of-factly. “And someone seems to have blasted the bajasus out of it.”

“Cool bananas!” Alice exclaimed.

“Eh, might I point out,” Kagan said tentatively. “That we are currently in the process of approaching at a not insignificant velocity, and not distancing ourselves at a fair and resonable velocity, from said person, place or thing that blasted the bajasus out of a Tauren battleship. And might I also point out that we are considerably less well-equipped than said Tauren battleship to absorb the sort of punishment that results in the aforementioned blasting the bajasus out of.”

“When you use lots of big words it makes me all tingly,” Alice informed him.

“Really?” Fiona replied. “I'd describe it as more prickly.”

“You *****!” Alice declared good-naturedly, delivering a gentle swat to Fiona's backside.

“*****?” Fiona gasped in mock indignation. “Why you!” And with that sentence fragment, she proceeded to return Alice's swat in kind. This, for whatever peculiar reason set the two of them off into a fit of giggles.

“What's all the laughing?” O'Shea demanded. “What's so funny?”

“It's nothing,” Kagan replied, sounding harried. “The twins are spanking each other.”
“That's nothing?” O'Shea exclaimed. “I'll be there in two- why hello.”

Kagan made a noise of confused interest.

“Something new coming up,” O'Shea explained. Something big. Very... Big. Should be visible to you in five minutes or so.” The longest five minutes in the history of the universe proceeded to pass with nary a care over the anxiety they produced in the four occupants of the Daedalus's bridge.

“Hey, it's a... wall,” said Fiona. “A big blue wall.”

“Zooming out,” Saraea informed them, her hands swiftly manipulating the controls. “A lot.”

The solid wall of blue proceeded to shrink, albeit at a less than rapid rate, until it began to form the outline of something very large indeed. Eventually, it resolved itself into a shape bearing a striking resemblance to that of a spaceship, though admittedly a spaceship much larger than anyone on either bridge had encountered thus far.

“Blimey,” said Kagan.

“Crikey,” said Saraea.

“Yoink,” said Fiona.

“Thbbt,” said Alice.

Kagan was about to say something cautionary, when a sudden wave of nausea washed over him. At first it was a mild ripple that he tried to shake off, attributing it to too little sleep and too much strenuous activity. It surged suddenly, leading him to wonder, despite all the logical impossibilities of such an occurrence, if he had perhaps eaten something he shouldn't have. It then proceeded to explode into a dizzying sensation not entirely unlike having ones innards pummeled by a thousand tiny, freezing cold fists. He collapsed to his knees, gagging on something unpleasant as he tried desperately to avoid pitching over altogether. He turned his head, ignoring how the action caused his vision to swim crazily, and tried to croak a warning to the others, only to see Alice and Fiona collapse to the floor almost simultaneously. He turned his head the other way, towards Saraea despite the profound sickness such an action produced, only to find that she too was slumped over her console. Over the intercom, he could hear the unmistakable sound of violent retching. His vision blurred, and began to darken, when suddenly without any warning, the sickening sensation vanished, and he found himself breathlessly kneeling on the floor.

“What...?” was all he could manage.

Saraea pushed herself back from her station and visibly collected herself. “We were scanned,” she managed weakly. “Vigorously.”

“My nooks!” Fiona moaned, rising shakily to her feet.

“My crannies!” Alice groaned, struggling to her knees, then slowly pushing herself upright.

“Eh, lads?” O'Shea's voice wavered over the intercom. “I've gone and made a fine mess down here, so I wouldn't be expecting any updates for as long as it takes me to clean this up.”

“Bloody hell,” Kagan muttered as he pulled himself into a chair. “I once stepped in front of a scoutship's array while they were running diagnostics on it and it felt something like that. But this far away? What the hell has that kind of power?”

“Nothing I can think of,” said Saraea. “But this leads me to believe that it may be safe to approach. Consider,” she continued over Kagan's feeble objections. “Something with that sort of sensor capability would have seen us long before we ever saw it, silent running or not, yet it did nothing. Didn't shoot, didn't launch missiles, didn't even run away. More to the point, we are now considerably closer to it than the Tauren battleship and it still hasn't done anything, leading me to believe that not only is it safe to approach, but whomever is on that ship actually wants us to approach.”

“We agree!” the twins chorused.

“Fine,” said Kagan, shaking his head to banish the last remnants of that godawful, invasive scanning. “Well enter communications range and see what they have to say. But if anything they say smells even the tiniest bit fragrant, we're turning tail and forgetting we saw this thing.” The longest five minutes in the history of the multiverse proceeded to pass with nary a care over the anxiety they produced in the four occupants of the Daedalus's bridge.

“Entering communications range... now,” said Saraea. “And incoming hail, audio only.”

“Prompt,” observed Alice. “Like a moose.”

“Efficient,” Fiona agreed. “Like a fox.”

“Put it through,” said Kagan, directing his most fierce scowl at the twins.

“Docking permission granted,” a matronly voice informed them.

“That's all,” Saraea said after a few moment's silence. “They've severed the connection.”

“Never have those three words made me want to run the other way so much in my life,” Kagan said.

“I'm with you on this boss,” said O'Shea. “Let's scedaddle.”

“No!” Alice blurted. “We have to go! They know things. Important things. About us. And if you don't, well, why I'll bludgeon you severely with...” she rummaged around in her pockets briefly before whipping out her weapon with a flourish. “This!”

“That's a tissue,” Kagan pointed out.

“I know,” said Alice, sounding vaguely uncomfortable. “Think about it.”

“Fine,” said Kagan grudgingly. “We'll probably wind up dead. Or enslaved. Or both. But whatever happens it has to be better than having the two of you whinging at me. Besides which, if we try to run, they probably have a tractor beam or some such silly made up device to drag us in anyway. Take us in.”

“Initiating docking procedure,” said Saraea. “Estimated docking time: five minutes.”

“Why does everything take five minutes?” wondered Alice.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

The only proper responce is, of course, "I'll tell you in five minutes."

[TurinTurambar]

Gah! Too short!

re-engaged,
TT

[AgentZero]

Too short? That was epic! I meant to get more posted today, but I spent most of this afternoon painting trellises in the basement, and it turns out that several hours in an unventilated room filled with paint fumes leaves me feeling less than ideal. But I should get another installment done this weekend.

Or, dare I say it... maybe two?

[AgentZero]

As promised, here's the next, almost as long as the last mostly by virtue of a big speach by O'Shea of all people, installment. JAF, you wound up with a syndrome named after you instead of a star system. Sorry about that. But it's a really cool syndrome.

And can anyone say triplets?








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

This time, five minutes passed rather quickly, as they had a massive spaceship in front of them to observe in ever greater detail as they drew closer. At first there was just the general shape of a ship, with a few large, well defined weapon emplacements clearly visible. As they grew closer, large areas of light and shadow resolved themselves into clusters of guns and external missile racks. As they grew closer still, rows upon rows of gunnery emplacements became visible. Soon after, the nearly invisible slits of internal missile bays became visible, and shortly after that, as they were all still marveling at the vast array of firepower on display, the Daedalus was swallowed up into the massive ship's docking bay. There was a soft thump and the deck rocked gently.

“Docking complete,” Saraea informed them.

Wordlessly, the four of them made their way down to the common room where they were joined by O'Shea, who'd had the good sense to put on a change of clothes. They headed down to the cargo deck, and if Kagan hesitated at all before lowering the ramp, it was only for the slightest of moments. They stepped out onto the deck of the giant ship and looked about in awe. The docking bay was beyond huge. It stretched for several kilometers at least off behind them and to either side. They'd landed near one of many white doorways with blue frames. The doorway in front of them was closed, as were all the other doorways they could see in either direction. The floor was a dull gray but the walls and ceiling were eggshell white, though on closer inspection, Kagan realized he couldn't actually make out the ceiling. The walls just seemed to go up forever, disappearing into a sea of white. In the absence of any noise from the quintet, the only sound was a gentle hum that you only noticed when you thought to listen for it.

“Jasus,” O'Shea said quietly, making the rest of them jump despite his soft tone. “You could fit a superdreadnought in here.”

“Or a squadron of them,” Kagan murmured. “This ship is colossal.”

“I bet I could make it to the other side before anyone else,” mused Alice. “I can run super fast.”

Before anyone could think to answer her challenge, the door in front of them clanked loudly, then quietly open. On the other side of the doors stood a more or less humanoid robot. It was ceramic white with blue detailing and triangular blue eyes. It had no nose, for obvious reasons, though it did sport an oddly ordinary pair of ears. It's mouth seemed similar to the mouth of a normal human being, aside from the lips being blue, and it's arms and torso seemed designed purposefully to resemble their human counterparts in only the crudest fashion. The robots strode towards them gracefully and stopped before O'Shea, who was standing to the far left of the group.

“Good evening,” the robot said to him. Before he could reply, the construct had moved on to Saraea.

“Good evening,” it said to her.

To Fiona, it said, “Good evening.”

To Kagan, it said, “Good evening.”

To Alice it said, “Good evening, Grand Admiral.”

Kagan turned and fixed a look upon Alice, who ignored it entirely, chosing instead to stare at the machine with something between confusion and apprehension.

“Um, sorry Mister Robot,” she said slowly. “But I'm not an admiral. I am grand though, thanks for asking. How are you?”

“All my equipment is functioning within normal parameters,” the robot informed her. “And part of my normally functioning equipment is a GS1939-0608 DNA scanner, and your DNA which I have so recently scanned, conforms with that of Grand Admiral Alice Fiona Komatsu, commander of the Seventy-Fourth Fleet of the Grand Imperium of Sol.”
Kagan's eyebrows shot up. They hadn't called it the 'Grand' Imperium since the Second Dynasty, over five thousand years ago.

“Unless,” the machine went on. “You're claiming to be an impostor?”

“What would happen if I were an impostor?” Alice inquired tentatively.

“It would involve my sharp, jagged bits, and your soft, delicate bits,” the robot replied impassively.

“I ask only out of curiosity,” Alice said hastily. “I am of course Grand Admiral Alice Fiona Komatsu, commander of the... thing.”

“Seventy-Fourth Fleet of the Grand Imperium of Sol,” the construct prompted.

“That's the thing,” she agreed. “Hey,” she said a few seconds later. “What's with the guns?”

Kagan spun around to find that Saraea and O'Shea now had their weapons leveled at Alice and him. His mind raced. The two of them had manged to put a few paces between themselves and their targets, and he was quite certain he couldn't get close enough to either of them quickly enough to avoid being severely perforated. He spared a glance at Alice, hoping to find her ready to fight, hoping that maybe the two of them could disarm their friends and find out what the hell just happened. But Alice was simply staring at Saraea, eyes moist and her lips trembling. His eyes flicked over to Fiona, who was staring a hole through O'Shea, her hands twitching slightly at her sides. Maybe, just maybe, if she provided a telekinetic distraction, he could get in there and get a hold of one of those guns.

“I'm sorry, sweetie,” Saraea was saying. “I don't like this any more than you do, but we have orders, and we've come to far to go against them. Now I'm going to come over and give you a little injection. It won't hurt a bit and you'll have a nice pleasant sleep, ok?”

Alice's gaze abruptly turned steely. “The last person who tried to do that didn't fare too well,” she said dangerously. “And that time I didn't have a telekinetic backing me up.”

“Here comes the floor!” Fiona announced cheerfully, and pitched over flat on her face.

“She'll be fine,” O'Shea assured them. “She'll wake up in a couple hours with little more than a mild headache and a dry mouth.”

“What in the name of the Nine Divine Whores of Kantarl is going on here?” Kagan demanded.

O'Shea sighed. “I suppose we owe you that, don't we?” he said. “It goes like this: Towards the end of the Second Dynasty, Imperial scientists uncovered a method whereby nano machines could be used to temporarily mimic the function of human brain cells while new ones were created by other machines, thus overcoming the one major hurdle standing in the way of immortality; the eventual breakdown of the human mind. With this accomplished, true immortality was at last within our grasp for the first time since we'd cast aside our religious objections to it's pursuit. Of course, you don't want to be going about handing out immortality willy-nilly, that just wouldn't be responsible. So it was decided that only those deemed essential to the Imperium would receive immortality treatment. The emperor, of course, certain members of the royal court, key scientists, and since we were at war, members of the armed forces, including, but not limited to, Grand Admirals. Unfortunately, the war didn't exactly go as planned and the emperor, members of the royal court, key scientists and members of the armed forces for the most part, died. Of course, some had to have survived, and in the years that followed the end of the war, the surviving government put together a group of people tasked with keeping tabs on the immortals. That group still exists today, and still reports to the emperor. Towards the end of the war with the Taurens, rumours began circulating that an immortal that had somehow managed to evade detection for over five thousand years was beginning to take a, shall we say, more active interest in the affairs of the galaxy. Saraea and I are members of a ten man team sent to find, and retrieve this elusive immortal. And that brings us to you, Alice. You seem to have had a rather extraordinary number of clones made of yourself, and we spent literally years chasing some of them down, but upon close inspection, all bore genetic markers and abnormalities that marked them as clones. Fiona, for example, is a clone, and thus this machine's DNA scanner did not register her as being anyone of importance. You, however, it identified as Alice Fiona Komatsu, which means that we, at long last, have found the original.”

“But I'm not five thousand years old!” Alice protested. “I'm only... well I'm not sure, but I'm certainly not five thousand years old. That's an awful long time for me to have not noticed it!”

“You can stop playing games,” O'Shea said sternly. “We've got you now, and there's no sense in pretending any longer.”

“But I'm not!” Alice insisted.

“It's possible something went wrong over all those years, and now she's suffering from something akin to Fisher's Syndrome,” Saraea mused. Then, to Alice's blank stare, she explained, “Earlier attempts at immortality resulted in subjects whose bodies went on forever, but whose minds did not. Their nanobots would rebuild their brain tissue but in doing so overwrote existing memories and experiences, so that as time wore on, the original personality disappeared and a new one emerged. Regardless, some memories and knowledge of your previous self surely exists somewhere within your mind, and given that you're the only surviving immortal with knowledge of military technology, those memories could be vital to the future of the Imperium. That's why you must come with us.”

“You've never lied to me before,” Alice said slowly. “And I don't think you're lying now, but at the same time, I'm sure you have the wrong person.”

“I'm sorry, sweetie,” Saraea said regretfully. “But you're wrong.”

“Actually,” said an oddly familiar voice. “She's not.”

All of them spun to face the open doorway, and O'Shea let out a low moan.

“Ah Jasus,” he groaned. “Not another one!”

[narf poit chez BOOM]

...So, which one of them is a long-lost relative? *Snerk* http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif

Good suprise.

[JAFisher44]

Great, Fisher's Syndrome! Hrrmmmmph. Immortalized as a nanite induced form of Alzheimer's Disease.

*JAFisher turns indignantly and walks away muttering to himself.

Nah, just kidding. I'm fine with a syndrome. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

[narf poit chez BOOM]

I got a star system.

But it blew up.

But still a star system.

But he blew our star system up.

Yes. It was my...Precious...

[AgentZero]

Oh look what we have here? Could it be? It is! More Hell is for Heroes! A fairly short installment this time, to set the stage for the thrilling finale. I planned to finish it tonight, but the pig I ate for dinner seems to resent me for it, so I'm going to curl up in a ball and try to sleep, and try to get the last chapter out by lunchtime tomorrow.

-----

A million is a very large number. The frequency with which it is used has robbed it of much of it's significance, because there are a lot of very big things out there. A million light years. A million credits. A million years. A million ships. Even something small multiplied by one million wound up being something awfully large. A million seconds was nearly two weeks. A million minutes was a couple months shy of two years. And a million hours was a bit over a hundred and twenty years.

Yes, Grand Admiral Angus McArthur mused, a million ships was an awful lot of ships. Seven million ships, on the other hand, was an awful lot more. And while a million fighters was the stuff of nightmares for any point defense operator, one hundred and forty million fighters was enough to drive that same poor PDO absolutely mad. And yet, for better or worse, that was exactly what he found himself in command of. News of the Great Enemy's return had reached the Empress rather quickly and McArthur had just as quickly found himself promoted to Grand Admiral of the Fleet and put in charge of nearly every single warship in all the Imperium, even if it had taken the dissolution of Parliament and the execution of a few rebellious Senators, it was still a rather remarkable feat for the amount of time it had taken the headstrong young lady.

The Armada, as it had begun to be called, was the single greatest concentration of firepower ever mustered in one place by the Terran Imperium, or for that matter, any known sentient race in the galaxy. Save one, McArthur thought with a shiver, although it was debatable whether the Great Enemy could be considered sentient. It was also debatable, he admitted to himself, whether or not his mighty force would be enough to overcome the Enemy fleet that had just begun to show up on the tactical plot in front of him.

“All fleets, enter attack formation,” he said calmly, rising from his chair. The phrase 'all fleets' still felt strange on his tongue, for a man used to commanding task forces and squadrons.

It took nearly ten minutes for all fleets to report ready status. McArthur cringed inside. For a single fleet, such a response time was thoroughly unacceptable, but his armada consisted of over twenty thousand fleets trying to work together as one with far, far too little time to practice.

“All fighters, assume standby positions.”

This time it only took a shade over four minutes for Fighter Control to report readiness. Of course, the fighters didn't have to do much maneuvering, they just had make sure they weren't in the flight path of any of the countless missiles McArthur was about to unleash. The fighters themselves would go in behind the the Armada's third missile salvo, to make sure that the Enemy was suitably tied up not to notice the fighters bearing down on them until it was too late. Every single one of McArthur's one hundred and forty-plus fighters was either equipped or retrofitted for anti-ship duty. The Enemy did not employ fighters, despite the horrific destruction the Imperium's fighters had wrought on their most recent assault, even despite the truly appalling casualties the Second Dynasty's fighters had inflicted so many thousands of years ago.

The enemy did not seem to adapt well, if at all. It was their one, perhaps their only weakness. From mankind's first encounter with them up to the present, they had always favoured big ships. And when their big ships fell prey to small nimble fighters, their solution was simply to build bigger ships. Not ships with more point-defense, not dedicated point-defense cruisers. Just bigger ships. Of course, their biggest ships still fell prey to the Second Dynasty's fighters, it just took a lot longer. The fighters were a tremendous advantage for the Imperium, and McArthur was willing to take all the advantages he could get in this fight. Especially since from the reading coming in to the tactical plot, he was going to be outnumbered almost two to one.

“Missile Control, status report,” said McArthur, his eyes fixed on the tactical plot.

“All fleets report firing solutions locked in, sir,” came the response.

“Very well,” said McArthur. “All fleets, prepare to fire salve one on my mark.”

“Five...”

“Four...”

“Three...”

“Two...”

“One...”

“Fire.”

[narf poit chez BOOM]

...Wonder how long that would take to process.

[Suicide Junkie]

According to my rough calculations...
5500 years, on a top of the line PC

[AgentZero]

Puke mentioned that it's been a while since I updated HifH, so here you all go. We've got nods to Schlock, fun being poked at internet memes, Puke got his own star system (after a fashion), and even a great reason for the whole world to look forward to the future with breathless anticipation. Enjoy!

Tadhg Kagan (of no relation to James Kagan), was a simple man. In another place, another time, another universe, perhaps, he might have been a great man. But in this universe, he was but a simple Station Operator for the Puk'ng Port Authority, charged with providing insertion instructions to arriving freighters and keeping an eye out for things within Puk'ng's jurisdiction that perhaps shouldn't be there. Puk'ng was a quiet system on the fringe of Imperium space, so Tadhg's job was not particularly strenuous. Ever morning he shuttled out to his little station and sat with Sven Armstrong for nine hours, until Margaret Hussein and Samantha Turtledove showed up for the night shift, then he shuttled back home in time for dinner with his wife and children. Every so often, there was a bit of excitement (thrice in fifteen years, as a matter of record), when a few pirate raiders would stick their noses into the system, only to be chased off by Puk'ng's attention-deprived space navy.

Today looked like it might be action-packed and fun-filled, Tadhg mused, as an alarm on his board squeaked to life. Whoever had designed the station had likely known that it was to be placed in a small backwaters system where nothing of any importance ever happened, and had designed it's warning system accordingly. There were no loud hooting alarms, no overly dramatic flashing lights, just a meek, almost apologetic, squeak that suggested that maybe, if you weren't terribly busy and weren't engaged in more important matters, you may want to have a look at something the computer had noticed that didn't quite fit with what it had been told was a normal state of affairs.

“Looks like someone's fooling around in sector B-Ninteen,” Tadhg said casually, running his fingers over the control pad. “You mind swinging Dish Six around so we can have a look-see?”

“I suppose,” Sven Armstrong replied with mock reluctance. “Not like I wasn't about to glass the Phong homeworld or anything,” he added as he cleared a game from his screen and set about pointing the station's primary sensor array in the requested direction.

“Damn Phong,” Tadhg grinned. “Every time I send them a Trade Agreement, they send me back naked pictures of themselves dancing. Can't for the life of me figure out if that means yes or no.”

“I'm fairly sure it's a commonality to all sentient species that swinging your reproductive organs in anyone's general direction is to be interpreted as a negatory,” Sven said dryly.

“Is that what those are?” Tadhg replied incredulously. “Gross.”

“Best guess, mate,” Sven laughed. “But if I were a xenobiologist, I wouldn't be stuck out here with you every day for the last- Oh, hello.”

Tadhg glanced up at his friend sharply, instinctively reacting to the sudden stress in his voice. “Something?”

“Somethings,” Sven answered quietly. “I'll put it up on the main.”

The main display flickered briefly before changing over from a large clock counting down the hours until lunchtime to show the output from Dish Six. Tadhg suddenly found his mouth rather dry, and his forehead rather wet.

“Oh,” he murmured. “Hello.”

There were indeed a multitude of somethings speeding along the outer edge of Puk'ng's space. Large somethings. Very, very large somethings. Dish Six, despite being able to pick out individual rivets on freighter's hull from twice this distance of these somethings, was having awful difficulty resolving any sort of image. Instead, it displayed large, fuzzy blobs, moving through space rather faster than anything that large had any rights to.

“New freighter design?” Tadhg wondered hopefully.

Sven shook his head. “Gravatics say those things outmass a Monolith-class freighter by at least a factor of six, and if someone had come up something bigger than a Monolith, I think we'd have heard about it by now. Could be military having a little fun spoofing our array.”

“It's not a spoof,” Tadhg said. “I can tell from looking at some of the pixels and by seeing a few spoofs in my day.”

Sven turned his head slowly towards his friend and raised a quizzical eyebrow. Tadhg caught his gaze and shrugged. “I thought I mentioned I turn into a total ****wad when I'm about to die a horrible, messy, painful death.”

“Wouldn't worry about that,” Sven reassured him. “They're traveling tangentially to the system, and at that speed it'd take them the better part of a week to decelerate enough to turn in-system.”

“Really? Well that's great to know,” Tadhg said with forced relief. “Especially that whole week thing. Because that reassures me that it's just my mind playing tricks on me when Dish Six says they just decelerated and turned in-system in less time than it took you to tell me they couldn't.”

“What?” Sven exclaimed, his head snapping back to the main display. “What?” he repeated. “No... That... They can't... [censored].”

“We are going to die, aren't we?” Tadhg said resignedly.

“Yes, Tadhg,” Sven said sadly. “Yes we are.”

“Think we'll get probed first?”

“We can only hope.”

“I suppose- wait, what?”

The next few hours were spent in silence, after sending of the requisite dispatches to the military station, there wasn't really much to do except sit and wait as the mysterious ships grew inexorably closer. After a while, Tadhg noticed that his companion kept glancing in his direction, then looking back at his display for a time before throwing another furtive glance his way.

“If you have something to say, just say it,” Tadhg said finally.

“I ah, just noticed the ships have entered range of our visual array,” Sven replied. “I was trying to think of an appropriate way of asking you if you wanted to see the ships that are probably going to murder us.”

“Wasn't so hard to be subtle, now was it?” Tadhg muttered. “Sure, throw it up. Let's see what those sons of *****es look like.”

The main display flickered again, and there before them was a veritable wall of ships. They were unlike any ships either man had ever seen before. They were long, sleek, and gloriously white. Their designers had clearly put equal thought into form and function, and these magnificent vessels slid through space with swan-like grace. But all the form in the universe couldn't disguise their function, as each and every one of them positively bristled with every weapon system imaginable, and a good number that had heretofore yet to be imagined.

“My gods,” Sven whispered. “They're beautiful.”

“And shiney,” Tadhg agreed, then a moment later added, “Is it me or is their shininess getting shinier?”

“It's not you,” Sven replied. “It would appear as though we're about to get vaporised.”

“Oh,” Tadhg replied shortly. “So no probing then?”

“Doesn't look like it.”

“Well... Thank heaven for small mercies.”

“Speak for yourself.”

“Wow. That's really really bright.”

Eternity passed.

“Still there, Sven?”

“It would seem so.”

Tadhg opened his eyes. He was still seated in his chair aboard his little station, and Sven was still sitting across from him. What wasn't still there were the colossal warships. Of them, there was no trace. Tadhg turned his gaze towards his friend and fixed him with a steady stare.

“Sven, old friend... What the hell was that?”

The Elarians, as far as the rest of the galaxy was concerned, were a dying race. The Elarians themselves, of course, new better. Once a great power in galactic affairs, indeed for several millenia, the undisputed greatest, over the last few hundred years they had slowly withdrawn, and eventually disappeared entirely from the galactic stage. Scout ships sent to their worlds found former city-worlds barren of any sign of advanced civilization. Planet after planet was discovered to have returned to it's original, pristine state, with no evidence that the Elarians had once flourished there. Any thoughts of detailed examinations of the planets were gently dissuaded by the still-functional and hideously effective Elarian orbital automated defense grids that still surrounded each world, the only demonstrable sign that there was ever anything less primitive than particularly intelligent trees inhabiting the planet.

What was happening to the Elarians, and where they were all going to was one of the great mysteries of the universe to everyone except the Elarians themselves. They themselves knew full well where they had all gone, having for the most part transcended to a higher plane of existence, another dimension in which thought itself was made manifest, and where such petty concerns as wealth, power, and influence were of no concern to anyone at all. Some Elarians remained, however. Semi-transcended, they existed in both dimensions, yet in neither, a testament to Elarian pride and their doubt that the galaxy could really continue to function without their presence.

Two such Elarians stood atop the great spire of the Seat of Righteousness, the massive structure that once held Elaria Prime's galactic government. Their eyes were turned upwards, seeing beyond sight, space and time of little relevance to either. Eventually, the shorter of the two, Cadence Of A Dying Breath, turned it's gaze towards the taller.

“As they have, do, and ever shall,” it said softly. “They are moving again.”

“As they have, do, and ever shall,” Chorus Of Harmonious Joy agreed. “An arrow seeking a worthy heart. To be deflected by a skilled hand or left to find it's mark.”

“A blade seeking the throat of an innocent,” Cadence countered. “The hand possesses naught but the skill of it's master. But a clumsy limb is compelled.”

“As they have, do, and ever shall,” Chorus reminded it's companion. “The bowls are both full and both empty. Tied together, one does, the other does. Eternity passes.”

There was a soft noise behind them, and both glanced backwards, more out of mortal habit than any particular need to see who had joined them.

“There can be no harmony without balance,” Symphony Of Willful Disregard informed them softly. “Without balance, a sphere cannot fail to act, it is compelled and must obey.”

There was a moment of grave silence before Symphony gave it's judgment. “A skilled hand is of little use to a pierced heart.”

Cadence bobbed it's head sadly. “Innocence weeps,” it murmured softly.

“Innocence weeps,” Chorus and Cadence agreed.

The Elarians, in their own particular way, had agreed to stay on the sidelines at let one of the greatest acts of carnage, bloodshed, and violence in the history of the galaxy come to pass, but James Kagan knew naught of this. Nor, had he known, would he have particularly cared. He was far too busy staring down the barrel of a very high calibre weapon being wielded by an impressively large war machine. While the cannon aimed at his nose was a more immediate concern, Kagan couldn't help but let his gaze drift over to the machine's other appendage. It was a cluster of close-combat ordnance, the least horrific of which was banned by no less than seven interstellar treaties and the worst of which was proscribed by every religion in the galaxy as a crime against Creation. One of these machines, Kagan was sure, would be a match for an entire regiment of Imperial Marines. And there were two of them.

And between them, stood yet another Alice Fiona Komatsu. At the moment, she was staring at herself, or rather the other Alice Fiona Komatsu. The one that wasn't passed out on the deck, that was. Kagan felt a twinge at the back of his head as his brain pulled a muscle trying to keep all of the Alice's straight. The Alice that had just recently arrived was gazing at the Alice that Kagan had fallen in love with, her look of cool dispassion barely masking and exuberant curiosity. Kagan's Alice, on the other hand showed no such reserve, and stared at her clone with open fascination, going so far as to poke and prod at her, even lifting her lips to have a look at her teeth. After a few more minutes of inspection, the new Alice gave a satisfied 'hrmph' and took a step back.

“Special Operations Combat model,” she said, sounding mildly impressed. “A Mark-Six, if I'm not mistaken. Remarkable mental stability.”

Kagan's eyes widened. “You call that mentally stable?” he asked incredulously.

“I feel like a kelapa hijau,” Fiona announced from the floor. “Green and bitter on the outside, sweet and pink on the inside.”

“You're not green, sweety,” Alice informed her.

“It's an imperfect world,” was the ominous reply.

The newest Alice turned her head slowly towards Kagan, her only reply an arched eyebrow that when used by his lover he found immensely arousing, but when used by his clone, he found... immensely arousing. Which in itself was immensely disturbing.

“Right,” Kagan said. “So, I might have missed that part, but who did you say you were again?”

The new arrival didn't answer immediately, turning to face O'Shea and Saraea instead. “I suppose,” she said quietly. “I'm the one you've been looking for.”

“You?” exclaimed O'Shea, pointing a finger at her, and apparently forgetting that his finger was still wrapped around the trigger of a rather powerful hand-cannon. One of the machines made a rather ominous hum, and O'Shea sailed across the hanger, careened off the Daedalus, and face-planted rather spectacularly onto the deck.

“Jaysus ta [censored]!” Kagan exclaimed, his hand dropping towards his own holstered sidearm.

“Relax,” New-Alice said, holding up her hands. “These machines have been configured for non-lethal force only.”

“Y'all right, bud?” Kagan called towards his friend, trying to simultaneously look behind himself and keep an eye on the war machines in front of him.

O'Shea groaned loudly. “'Non-lethal' is not the same thing as 'non-painful',” he grunted as he rose to his feet. “But I'm alright. My stalwart companion, on the other hand, has seen better days,” he added, looking down at the twisted chunk of carbon-steel and circuitry that had once been an exceptionally lethal weapon. “So,” he continued, limping back towards the three Alices. “If you're who you say you are, I suppose you would be properly addressed as Admiral Komatsu, to avoid confusion, hmmm?”

“That sounds much better than New-Alice,” said Alice. “Or 'the recent arrival', or 'the newest Alice', or even 'another-Alice', or any other such contrivance one might use to skirt the issue until such time as O'Shea made the relevant point.”

“What an odd thing to say,” Admiral Komatsu said.

“Not really,” said Kagan. “I mean, for her.”

“There are fourteen million, six hundred and forty thousand, two hundred and fifty two rivets in the ceiling,” said Alice. “But only fourteen million, six hundred and forty thousand, two hundred and fifty one rivets in the floor. One over there is missing,” she said pointing into the distance.

“See?” said Kagan.

“Why did you clone yourself so much?” Alice asked suddenly.

“I-” Admiral Komatsu hesitated a moment, slightly taken aback. “A lot of reasons,” she said after a moment, deflating slightly as if resigning herself to the inevitable exposition. “Mostly to keep an eye on the galaxy. An immortal grand-admiral with the most advanced warship in all of creation can still only be in three places at once, after all. There were certain threats that required neutralizing, certain parties that required distracting, but for the most part the clones were designed for simple espionage.”

“She doesn't look like a very good spy,” Alice pointed out, aiming a finger at Fiona, who had somehow managed to not only convince Komatsu's robotic butler to dance, but had taught it to waltz.

“She's not one of mine,” Komatsu replied. “One of my clones managed to get herself brain-wiped and captured by some sort of clandestine organization. They made her, and a large number of very unstable others. It took a significant amount of subtle string-pulling to arrange for the destruction of the organization and their facilities, but they were meddling with things beyond their understanding, and it wouldn't be long until they created an abomination that would be a threat to the stability of the entire galaxy.”

“Well that wouldn't be good,” said Alice. “An army of telekinetics that think their a rare fruit. It would be the end of civilization as we know- wait.” Her eyes narrowed. “One of yours. Captured. Brain-wiped. It was me, wasn't it?”

Admiral Komatsu nodded slowly. “Yes. I'm afraid-” Whatever else the Admiral had to say went unuttered as she sailed gracefully across the hanger and slammed into a wall.

“Jaysus, Alice, the machines!” cried Kagan.

There was an ominous hum, an even more ominous crunch, and two massive war machines crumpled impotently to the ground.

“I was wondering when you'd realize you could do that,” Komatsu said, rising easily and dusting herself off. “And in all honesty, I probably deserved that. But please bear in mind, should you be tempted to express yourself physically, that you are but a copy of me. An imperfect copy at that. And I can hurt you in ways you've never dreamed of.”

“Understood, ma'am!” Alice exclaimed, her eyes widening. “Terribly sorry, ma'am, I didn't mean to, ma'am, an older boy told me to, ma'am. But, can I ask, how did you stay hidden if you had all these clones nipping to and fro, gathering all this information for you. That's a lot of shuttle traffic, not to mention the price of cantaloupes.”

“It's usually best to ignore the last thing she says,” Kagan supplied helpfully in response to Komatsu's puzzled expression. “If you enjoy your sanity, that is.”

“That's what I've been doing,” Alice agreed. “And it's worked out pretty well so far.
“Although sometimes it's best to ignore her entirely,” Kagan added.

“Alright,” Komatsu said slowly. “Any of my clones don't need to be physically present in order to gather information for me. All of you have an organic null-space transmitter build into your cerebrum. Everything that you experience is transmitted every two hours to this ship's mainframe where it can be analysed for relevant information. Mundane experiences are filtered out, anything unusual is catalogued and prepared for a daily briefing.”

Alice looked uncomfortable. “Um... Everything we experience? Even, um...” She glanced in Kagan's direction, then made an obscenely biological gesture.

Admiral Komatsu coughed into her fist and coloured slightly. “Ah, well,” she stammered. “Adjustments had to be made to the system's filters to account for your unusually... active personal life. Though sometimes something unusual enough to creep through would make for a rather crude wake-up call. Though I'm quite sure it filtered out... that. Whatever that was.”

“Oh good,” said Alice. “I'd be quite mortified if anyone ever saw me doing that.”

Kagan cleared his throat loudly. “I'm sorry to interrupt, ladies, and the whole spy story is facinating, really it is, but big picture-wise, what the hell is going on here?”

The floor hummed slightly, and Komatsu smiled. “Impecible timing, as usual. We just entered null-space.”

“And where exactly are we going?” Kagan inquired with exagerated politeness.

“As you have said so many times before, old friend,” Admiral Komatsu said with a wry smile. “We're going to Hell.”

[dmm]

A rollickin' good story!

[AgentZero]

A random bump, or a portent of things to come?

Time will tell, my friends. Sooner or later, time will tell.

[AgentZero]

Gasp! It cannot be! Another installment?

The Ishii-Kun system was not Hell, but at the moment, it was managing a fairly close approximation. The space in between McArthur’s mind-numbingly big fleet and the Enemy’s mind-numbingly bigger fleet was awash with the fire of raging suns, and though the vacuum of space was not terribly conducive to the transmission of sound, if it were, it would be filled with the screams of tortured souls. Mighty warships crewed by thousands, ships that represented the pride and joy of a shipyard - or even a whole star system – burst apart in fiery explosions that could leave no survivors as salvos of missiles and energy weapons crisscrossed the space in between the Enemy’s unstoppable force and McArthur’s immovable object as they circled each other, trapped in a murderous dance. And trapped they were; the sheer volume of material that had been vaporised in the course of the battle had formed a thin atmosphere around the two armadas that had the side effect of preventing jump drives from functioning. Ships could jump in, but not out, and both sides were bound and determined to keep the other side within the cloud.
An engineer aboard a dreadnought in the 9th Fleet had come up with a remarkably accurate explanation of both why the cloud prevented jumping out, and why it remained localised around the fleets, no matter how they manoevered. Unfortunately, this was four days into the battle, when everyone thought they’d be able to see it through to the end without sleep, and more unfortunately, his dreadnought suffered a direct hit to its magazine and was blown to scrap while said engineer was still working on a solution to the problem.

And into this maelstrom of death and destruction, nay, absolute annihilation, flew the brave (or stupid, depending on your personal definition of either), men and women of the Terran Imperial Navy’s Space Superiority Force. Fighters, millions of them, raced towards their targets and incomprehensible speeds. The Enemy showed no signs of noticing them, yet the inferno of exploding ships, premature detonations, and sundry energy munitions sailing back and forth made for a rather hostile environment for the Navy’s tiniest warriors. Thousands perished as they raced forward, never wavering, to a man utterly resolute in their determination to accomplish the mission they had been tasked with. The cloud of fighters reached their engagement threshold, and millions of cockpits came alive with the squeal of confirmed target resolutions. Seconds later, millions of cockpits shuddered with the clunk of their missiles being released, then, an eerie silence as their pilots watched their payloads racing towards the solid mass of death in front of them. The sight vanished quickly as skilled hands flipped their birds around, punched their drives to full throttle, and held tight as the fighters rocketed back towards the slightly friendlier wall of death to refuel, rearm, and repeat the whole experience all over again.

And in the midst of all the carnage, death, and destruction, a moment of serenity: Admiral McArthur smiling slightly at the yeoman pouring his morning tea. The bridge of the flagship was abuzz with activity, and yet a sense of calm quiet surrounded the admiral’s chair.

“Cream or sugar, sir?” the yeoman enquired.

“Why not both, this time?” McArthur suggested. “Who wants to live forever and all that.”

“Quite, sir,” the yeoman replied with a genial smile. “Did you sleep well last night?”

“I did, actually,” McArthur replied, managing somehow to not sound surprised. “The boys did a good job of keeping the racket down.”

“Indeed, sir,” the yeoman replied. “The 409th was relieved by the 121st on point in our sector. I think we only lost a pair of cruisers the whole night.”

“And the rest of the fleet?” McArthur asked, sipping at his tea.

The yeoman’s smile became a little strained. “Ten thousand capitol ships lost, sir,” he replied. “So far, a little over a million survivors have made it back to the relief ships.”

“That’s impressive,” McArthur murmured, setting down his tea cup, and surprising himself when his hand did not shake. A million men from ten thousand capitol ships represented about a twenty percent survival rate, less than a quarter of the expected rate during normal combat operations. But these were hardly “normal” combat operations part of his mind told him.

Even the Second Dynasty, in all its might and power had not faced the entirety of the Enemy fleet. And there was no record them facing off against anything nearly as big as that... thing sitting at the back of the Enemy fleet. Imperial One, the defence base that sat in orbit of Earth occupied an area of sixteen square kilometres, and was over sixty-four kilometres high, and was crewed by millions, with room for millions more should the need arise. And yet, according to gravatics, that thing out there was approximately fifty percent larger. And mobile. It could all be an Enemy trick, of course, since any ship he’d sent to get close enough to get a proper look at it had been blasted out of the sky by incomprehensibly powerful weapons from beyond sensor range. The analysts in Naval Intelligence had a theory that it was some sort of command ship; an immensely powerful warship, yet also too valuable to the enemy to risk in open warfare. Which had done little to lessen McArthur’s desire to blast it into tiny little pieces.

“Anything else newsworthy?” he asked the yeoman, as he laid a thick layer of butter onto his breakfast roll.

“Well, at seven o’clock this morning, EST, we were officially engaged in battle for ten full days,” the yeoman replied. “But other than that, no, sir. Nothing newsworthy.”

McArthur grunted. “You’ve been telling me that every day for a week now.”

“Has it been a week, sir?” the yeoman inquired with mock incredulity. “I suppose that’s newsworthy in itself.”

McArthur snorted. “So, what are the doomsayers saying this morning?” he asked.

“Less doom than yesterday,” the yeoman replied wryly. “Though they have become much more vocal in their insistence that we do something about that command ship. After we destroyed the largest of their dreadnoughts last night, the revised prediction became that we would destroy the Enemy fleet utterly in approximately three weeks, but would be left with nothing but a few thousand badly damaged ships to tackle the command ship.”

“A fight they are no doubt predicting we will lose,” McArthur said dryly.

“After inflicting minor cosmetic damage to the command ship, yes, sir.”

“Wonderful. Pass along orders for the analysts to meet with the boys from Tactics. They came up with some impressive results last time.”

“And two of them shot each other,” the yeoman pointed out.

“True,” McArthur agreed. “Ensure Marines strip them of their side arms before they meet.”

“Of course, sir,” said the yeoman. “Will there be anything else?”

“That will do for now,” McArthur replied.

“Very well sir,” the yeoman replied, smiling slightly as she tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear. “See you at lunch.”

But McArthur was already absorbed in tactical reports, logistics summaries and strategic planning initiatives, as one of the most powerful tactical minds alive tried to find some flaw, some weakness in the Enemy’s defences that would allow him to strike a decisive knockout blow. The yeoman knew as well as McArthur himself that he had been selected for this assignment based on a history of knockout blows against superior foes. He had not been given control over every mobile weapons platform in the entire Imperium just to piss it all away and leave it defenceless to a multitude of other threats. Hours passed, and the yeoman returned with lunch; the admiral’s favourite: a grilled ham and cheese sandwich.

“Good afternoon, Admiral,” she said, pretending not to notice as he started at the sound of her voice.

“Lunch already?” he asked wonderingly. “Well, I am rather famished.”

“Yes, sir. Tea?” she inquired.

“Please,” he replied. “Was the afternoon hail sent?”

“Aye sir,” she told him. “A request to cease hostilities and open negotiations was transmitted fifteen minutes ago.”

“Any reply?”

“The usual,” she said grimly. “A collage of pre-generated footage of Enemy soldiers landing on Earth and murdering and devouring children and infants.”

“Lovely thought before lunch,” McArthur replied dryly. “Ensure the source of the transmission receives an extra volley in our next missile salvo, and – wait.”

He hunched forward over his console. There! A pattern! Just what he had been looking for all this time. He scrolled up rapidly, and to his amazement, found the same pattern repeating throughout his sector. Scrolling sideways, he found the same pattern repeated across the entire Enemy front. A weakness. A vulnerability that could be exploited to strike a savage blow against the Enemy. It would cost him, of course, his analytical mind projecting a brutal casualty rate of thirty percent. And yet, it would mean the utter destruction of the Enemy fleet in a matter of a day, massive command ship included.

Admiral McArthur leapt to his feet, sending his sandwich sailing across the bridge to land comically on a fire control operator who was, fortunately, far to absorbed in his work to notice that only a thin slice of bread was protecting his scalp from half a pound of molten cheese and meat.

“Coms!” McArthur shouted. “Fleet-wide channel, now! I need – ”

“Sir!” one of the sensor technicians interrupted. “Tachyon spike detected, we have inbound!”

“How many and where?” McArthur demanded, his mind quickly shifting gears. There were no allied ships due to be jumping in for another six hours.

“Indeterminate, directly ahead”, the technician replied. “And it’s big.”

“Can you get a – ” McArthur was once again interrupted as the ship lurched violently and he, most of the crew, and his sandwich sailed across the bridge.

“What the hell was that?” he demanded as he struggled to his feet.

“Shockwave, sir,” someone replied. “From the ‘atmosphere’.”

“And what, pray tell, caused the shockwave?” McArthur asked with venomous civility.

“Still trying to determine that, sir,” the sensor tech told him. “They’re broadcasting Imperial FoF codes, but their silhouettes don’t match anything in the database. They’re far too big, for one thing.”

“Bigger than the Enemy command ship?” McArthur asked hopefully.

“Negative, sir,” the tech replied. “They’re roughly half the size. But there are fifteen thousand of them.”

“So,” McArthur said softly. “That’s what the hell that was.”

“Incoming hail, sir,” reported a communications officer, who promptly proceeded to look quite puzzled. “And a transmission from the Enemy command ship.”

“More butchery, I suppose?” McArthur guessed.

“No, sir,” the coms officer replied, looking more puzzled. “Puppies, kittens, homeless begging for change, monks praying, and a man running away from... something... very quickly.”

“That’s... interesting,” said McArthur. “I wonder what – ”

Again he was interrupted, this time by a voice amplified through the bridge’s PA system: “They’re begging for mercy,” the voice informed him. “They’re begging you to let them run far, far away from here, rather than make them face me. But you’re not going to do that.”

McArthur nearly gave himself whiplash as his head whipped to the view screen, then to the coms officer who silently mouthed ‘it was not me’, and then back to the strikingly attractive woman now occupying his view screen. And standing behind her...

McArthur’s jaw momentarily went slack, but he recovered quickly, straightened his spine and looked her in the eye. “I am Grand Admiral Angus McArthur of the TNS Raezel, commander of the First Terran Imperial Armada. And you are?”

The woman facing him smiled ever so slightly. “I am Grand Admiral Alice Fiona Komatsu,” she replied. “Aboard the Murder of Creation, commander of the Seventy-Fourth Fleet of the Grand Imperium of Sol.”

“Grand Imperium?” McArthur asked incredulously. “It hasn’t been called that in – ”

“Over five thousand years,” Admiral Komatsu finished for him. “I know.”

“I...” McArthur stopped, gathered himself, and tried again, only to falter again. “We... What?”

“I’m sure you have many questions,” Komatsu supplied. “For now, there are only a few answers that you need. In the last great war with the Enemy, we did not kill a single one of them. They sat safely in the background, sending genetically modified sentients to do their dirty work. They are a race of parasites that drift across the galaxy, scouring entire worlds of resources and lives. They have no real home, other than a colossal space craft that is home to every single member of their wretched species. And yes, that is the very same craft that is currently sitting smugly at the back of their line of battle. I have spent over a millennia bringing this day to pass, and I intend to avenge the billions of lives these perversions of nature have cost us by wiping their entire misbegotten species from the face of existence. You may stand with me or against me, the only difference is whether or not you’re still drawing breath five minutes from now.”

McArthur stiffened. “As far as I’m aware, no ship in the Navy has ever fired in anger against another Navy ship. It’s a fine tradition, and not one I have any intention of breaking.”

“It’s settled then,” Komatsu said, sounding slightly relieved. “Come then,” she continued, a ghoulish grin transforming her pretty face into the very spectre of Death. “It’s a fine day for a genocide, don’t you think?”

The view screen blanked abruptly, and all eyes turned towards McArthur. “What are you staring at me for, you lollygaggers?” he snapped. “Get to work, provide Komatsu with fire support, and let’s see what those Second Dynasty behemoths can do!”

Fifteen thousand ships of unimaginable power rocketed forward and slammed into the Enemy’s main formation. A fighter pilot witnessing the event would later describe it as being like watching the fist of an angry god smash into the Enemy. And yet, his metaphor contained one serious flaw: The might of any god any member of his audience could imagine paled in comparison to the fury that Komatsu’s fleet unleashed upon their enemy. Every single weapon on all fifteen thousand ships spewed for brilliant streams of death; beams of annihilation that tore through the Enemy fleet with stomach-churning ferocity. The vapour clouds of millions of exploding warships formed an ever expanding semi-sphere around the flotilla as it carved a path through the centre of the Enemy fleet, making a beeline for the command ship. The Enemy ships on either side of Komatsu’s cone of destruction didn’t take long to realize what was happening, and began to turn inwards, directing their fire onto Komatsu’s flanks. This must have seemed like quite a good idea for several minutes, until the full force of the First Terran Imperial Armada slammed into the Enemy’s now-unprotected flank and began tearing their ships apart with merciless abandon.

It must have been clear to those aboard the command ship what was happening. It must have been just as clear that there was no chance to run. Komatsu’s fleet was moving too fast, by the time the command ship could alter course and begin to accelerate away, the fleet would be upon them. So they made the only decision anyone could make in such a situation: The Enemy leapt forward, weapons blazing in a last-ditch effort to wipe out those who sought to destroy their entire species.

The command ship had over five thousand years since its last encounter with Second Dynasty dreadnoughts to improve its weapons systems, but so had Komatsu. And while she had focused purely on brutal, ugly firepower, the Enemy had at least learned from the savaging it had received from the Royal Imperial Navy’s longer range, and this disparity became quickly apparent as it opened fire from well outside Komtasu’s range.

Aboard the Murder of Creation, Kagan and Alice sat together, arms around each other as they watched the carnage unfold on the bridge’s tactical plot. Unlike McArthur’s flagship, the Murder of Creation’s computers possessed more than enough computing power to render ever single ship surrounding them. Kagan’s eyes were locked on Admiral Komatsu, and it was only his intimate familiarity with her twin that allowed him to notice the slight quiver of her lip as one by one, her beautiful, unique warships began to die.

Alice poked Kagan suddenly. “In the hanger, the Admiral called you old friend,” she whispered. “Have you met before?”

“Of course not,” Kagan murmured back. “My family have served as Naval officers since the First Dynasty. She must be confusing me with one my ancestors she may have served with.”

“Seems logical,” Alice replied. “In a convenient kind of way.”

Kagan eyed his love suspiciously for a moment, then turned his gaze back to the Admiral. As irreplaceable dreadnought after irreplaceable dreadnought bloomed into fiery destruction, her anguish became more and more obvious, until, just as it seemed as though she would break into tears, a soft ‘ping’ disturbed the deathly silence aboard her bridge.

“Optimal engagement range reached,” the flagship’s AI announced dispassionately.

Admiral Komatsu inhaled deeply, then exhaled slowly as her entire life’s work culminated in the utterance of one single word: “Fire.”

For a moment, nothing happened. Then, silently, the bridge was bathed in a red glow from the tactical plot as the vengeance of a billion murdered souls reached across the cold vacuum of space and tore into their murderers. The enemy command ship twisted violently, bucking and twisting like a wild animal trying to free itself from an imbedded blade. And then, with shocking speed, its shields collapsed and Komatsu’s dreadnoughts ripped deep into its flesh, mercilessly tearing it to pieces. The Enemy command ship was far too large to merely explode, but the Murder of Creation and her sisters methodically carved it into pieces and proceeded to blow apart each piece until there was nothing left but an expanding cloud of vapour and scrap metal.

Admiral Komatsu issued a series of brief, terse orders, and her fleet broke up into squadrons that linked up with Admiral McArthur’s fleet and systematically wiped out the remainder of the Enemy fleet. The “remainder” still consisted of several million vessels, and the cleanup took the better part of a day, but eventually, reports began coming in that all Enemy vessels had been destroyed. When final confirmation arrived from the most distant of the Murder of Creation’s sisters, Admiral Komatsu sagged against her command chair.

“It is done,” she whispered. “It is finally done.” She took a deep breath, then stood, turned to face Alice, and of all the strange things in the universe she could have done, she saluted.

“The Fleet is yours, Grand Admiral,” she said crisply.

Alice frowned at her. “You’re the Grand Admiral, silly,” she replied, sounding slightly unnerved. “You’re tired and confused. Which is understandable. You have been having an awful lot of sex the last couple days. Wait. That was me. See how that works? We’re all different on the inside, even if we have the same delicious outside parts. You should go get some sleep before you start thinking you’re a watermelon. I know when I start thinking I’m a tropical fruit, that’s a sure sign something bad is about to happen. It usually involves three fish and a garden gnome, and let’s be honest, the galaxy has seen quite enough horrors for one day.”

Admiral Komatsu’s lips turned upwards ever so slightly. “My mind is not playing tricks on me,” she said. “You are the first. Always have been. I apologize for the deception, but I felt it was necessary to fulfil the mission you tasked me with. I am of course willing to accept whatever disciplinary measures you feel are necessary.”

“What?” Alice squeaked, casting her eyes helplessly around the bridge. “How? What? Why? What? Oh... cantaloupe!”

‘Admiral’ Komatsu smiled kindly. “Explanations are in order, of course,” she said soothingly. “You see, Fisher’s Syndrome was never really cured, per se.” She paused for a moment, seeming to relish the gasps of surprise and dismay coming from O’Shea and Saraea’s direction. “The ‘solution’ was clones. Clones implanted with cerebral uplinks to a central databank, to be precise. Thus, as far as the public was concerned the heroes of the Imperium would never die. The truth of course, was that they would die a great number of times, only to reawaken in a cloned body with the memories of everything up to and including the moment of their deaths. In hindsight, I suppose it was inevitable that this would drive them mad. Especially when one considers the fact that to avoid disconcerting shifts in their appearance, the heroes of the Imperium were routinely murdered and replaced with fresh clones.”

“That’s rather fracking awful,” Alice put it.

“Indeed,” her twin agreed. “I have noticed a tendency for those of this time to look back upon the Second Dynasty with rose-tinted goggles. But in truth, it was a brutal, repressive regime, whose only virtue was that it protected all that was good in humanity, along with all that was bad. But I digress. It was decided at the highest levels that the routine murdering of the ‘Immortals’ should be kept as much a secret as possible, even from most of the Immortals themselves. Many accepted their fates with quiet dignity, but you?” Komatsu grinned wolfishly. “You had other ideas. They dispatched a regiment of the Emperor’s finest to your door, and you single-handedly dispatched them to the afterlife. You then proceeded to gather up the entire Seventy Fourth Fleet, as well as forty thousand drone ships slaved to the Murder of Creation, and led a strike against the heart of the Enemy. Unfortunately, you were betrayed by the Emperor’s men and led into an ambush. Most of your fleet was lost, but you eventually escaped, even though it meant leaving many of your drone ships, and their sentient AIs, to die.

Knowing that you would eventually succumb to Fisher’s Syndrome, you created clones of yourself, with orders to enhance and upgrade the fleet, while manipulating galactic events to bring the Enemy homeship into the open, so they could finally be destroyed.”

“But... Then how did I wind up on a research station?” Alice wondered. “Abducted and brain wiped and all that nastiness.”

Komatsu smiled. “You weren’t brain wiped, I assure you. That was just a convenient explanation for your Fisher’s Syndrome-induced amnesia. As for how you got onto that research station, I do not know. I do remember the day you left, however. You were discussion a new engine prototype with my predecessor, when you suddenly declared, ‘Frack this. You know what? I haven’t been laid in fifteen hundred years, gods dammit. Back in a bit’. And you must have had some itch to scratch, because that was thirty five hundred years ago. But it is nice to see that you somehow managed to reunite with your husband.”

“Husband?” Alice exclaimed.

“Um, we’re not married,” Kagan explained, almost apologetically.

“General James Kagan,” Komatsu replied. “Commander-in-chief of the Mobile Infantry of the Grand Imperium of Sol. I hear you took out a small moon escaping from your would-be assassins.”

“I have collected vast amounts of data confirming my analysis,” Komatsu informed him. “But that can wait until later. Right now, Admiral McArthur has been hailing us for several minutes, and I am awaiting orders from my admiral.”

“We should probably leave,” Kagan suggested suddenly. “If we stay, there will be explanations, inquiries, investigations...”

“Dissections, likely,” Fiona added.

“Well!” Alice exclaimed, placing her hands on her hips. “I must say, I am morally opposed to being dissected. It’s almost a religious belief with me you know. So, Miss Komatsu, my orders are as follows. Take us away. Far, far away.”

“Third star on the left, and straight on til morning?” Komatsu suggested, arching an eyebrow ever so slightly.

“Oh, no,” Alice replied dismissively. “That would take us right into a black hole. Second star on the right will do just fine.”

“As you wish, sir,” Komatsu replied.

Aboard the TNS Raezel, Grand Admiral McArthur, commander of the First Terran Imperial Armada watched helplessly as eleven thousand of the mightiest warships he had ever seen flicked out of existence and into null-space. With his own ships still stranded by the vapour clouds, he was powerless to follow. As he sat aboard his flagship, surrounded by more death and destruction than any man should have to bear witness to, at the centre of the tomb of an entire species, one single question preyed on his mind, and refused to be dismissed.

“What the hell was that?”


The end.









And I mean it this time.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Heh. Huh.

[dmm]

So glad to hear that they are married. Now I can let my kids read it.

[AgentZero]

narf poit chez BOOM said:
Heh. Huh.



I slave away until 5am to bring you the final installment of HifH, and this is the thanks I get? http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif Seriously though, given that Komatsu's exposition was written around 4:30am, if there are any inconsistencies or gaping plot holes, feel free to point them out before I let less forgiving eyes gaze upon it. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

[capnq]

Wow.

That was worth the wait. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/smile.gif

[narf poit chez BOOM]

It was worth the wait. My summary is accurate as to my reaction, although not conveying the depth of it. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

[Baron Munchausen]

That's it? An E.E. Smith space battle and no follow up for a dozen different characters who've appeared in the story but haven't been heard from in a long time?

[AgentZero]

You have anyone in particular in mind, Munch? Everyone else is either dead, or fulfilled their purpose in the story. I write stories about defining moments in my character's lives, not their biographies. Which is a good thing, really, seeing as how my main characters are immortal, there can be no bittersweet ending for them as they lie on their deathbed surrounded by loved ones, content in knowing that their life's work is done. There can be only a brutal, violent death for Kagan and Alice, but I decided to end things on a slightly less depressing note. Or maybe they don't meet a bad end. Maybe the two of them are there to witness the death of the last star in the universe, to be left alone as the only living beings in all of existence. But then what?

That being said, if you think I forgot about someone important, by all means tell me who, and maybe they might get a paragraph or two when I go back through the whole editing phase.

[Baron Munchausen]

Well, there were so many plot twists maybe I've lost count/track of characters. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif Or maybe it's not so much the characters (although I do wonder what happened to the guy (?) who could turn into a table) but just the plot itself. Right here at the end we get a bald statement about 'manipulating galactic events'-- implying some pretty massive backstory details -- and yet no explanation. How was this 'manipulating' done from a fleet of thousands of warships that had to remain concealed? What sort of resources does a warfleet carry for long-term (really long term) covert activities? What sort of 'galactic events' do you manipulate, or can you manipulate, to influence the behavior of aliens that are no longer even in contact with the culture/civilization you have access to? (Living entirely on this single mothership, it doesn't seem likely that they are very susceptible to infiltration or psy-ops...) It's just a very sudden 'pow' ending that seems disappointing because it so abrupt.

[AgentZero]

Baron Munchausen said:
Well, there were so many plot twists maybe I've lost count/track of characters. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif Or maybe it's not so much the characters (although I do wonder what happened to the guy (?) who could turn into a table) but just the plot itself. Right here at the end we get a bald statement about 'manipulating galactic events'-- implying some pretty massive backstory details -- and yet no explanation. How was this 'manipulating' done from a fleet of thousands of warships that had to remain concealed? What sort of resources does a warfleet carry for long-term (really long term) covert activities? What sort of 'galactic events' do you manipulate, or can you manipulate, to influence the behavior of aliens that are no longer even in contact with the culture/civilization you have access to? (Living entirely on this single mothership, it doesn't seem likely that they are very susceptible to infiltration or psy-ops...) It's just a very sudden 'pow' ending that seems disappointing because it so abrupt.



That's a fair critism. I suppose part of the abruptness of the ending is a result of the battle between two parts of my mind; one insisting I finally finish the story, and the other pointing out that it is 5am and I should be sleeping. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif But do bear in mind that this is Alice we're talking about. Or rather, a small army of them. I believe the amount of mischief they could get into is inversely proportional to the odds of them ever telling one what they were up to. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Though I only really aluded to it, the Enemy are a race of interstellar scavangers. They drift from galaxy to galaxy, seeking out advanced civilizations, only to all but anihilate them, then take what resources &amp; technology they desire before moving on to a new area of space. Of course, since none of the characters in HifH are aware of this, it makes it difficult to explain without feeling like the explanation was cludged in there. I thought about putting in a scene or two aboard the Enemy mothership, but since in my mind the Enemy are unknowable, and entirely incomprehensible to the human mind, I don't see how I could write that. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif

Komatsu was working on the hypothesis that, in order to lure them back, one would not need any agents aboard any of their vessels; one would simply have to make it appear that the Terran Imperium once again had something worth taking. I'm of the thinking that might need to work it's way into her exposition at the end, though I'm also thinking that said exposition is quite long enough as it is. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif

As for the warfleet, that's fairly easily explained. You might have noticed no mention of any crew on any of the ships. That's because they were essentially drone ships, slaved to the Murder of Creation and under the fine control of their individual A.I.s The Murder was used as Komatsu's base of operations, the rest of the fleet was hibernating in the deepest reaches of null-space. Which is why one did not see them trundling around until Komatsu's plan was coming to fruition, at which point they became the answer to more than one, "What the hell was that?"

Now that I think about it, I did leave rather a lot out of the big ole ending exposition...

[TurinTurambar]

Well then, we all eagerly await the next post that begins:

Epilogue:

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

http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif TT

[TurinTurambar]

Did I just make "Captain" or is it just that I haven't been here much in the last year?

[Puke]

That was plesant. I look forward to the next entirely different AZ story.

its been so long i've forgotten earlier parts though, it would be cool if it was all together in one easy to read place - kinda like Dogscoff did when he put his all on a webpage.

[AgentZero]

Puke said:
That was plesant. I look forward to the next entirely different AZ story.

its been so long i've forgotten earlier parts though, it would be cool if it was all together in one easy to read place - kinda like Dogscoff did when he put his all on a webpage.



Once I'm done a few revisions, it'll probably wind up in se.net's fanfic section. I'll add a little linky here when that's done.

[capnq]

TurinTurambar said:
Did I just make "Captain" or is it just that I haven't been here much in the last year?

You were promoted at post 800. Rank table in FAQ (http://www.shrapnelcommunity.com/threads/faq.php?Cat=#titles)

[Baron Munchausen]

AgentZero said:
As for the warfleet, that's fairly easily explained. You might have noticed no mention of any crew on any of the ships. That's because they were essentially drone ships, slaved to the Murder of Creation and under the fine control of their individual A.I.s The Murder was used as Komatsu's base of operations, the rest of the fleet was hibernating in the deepest reaches of null-space. Which is why one did not see them trundling around until Komatsu's plan was coming to fruition, at which point they became the answer to more than one, "What the hell was that?"

Now that I think about it, I did leave rather a lot out of the big ole ending exposition...



Well, that answers the question I did not ask... about how 15,000 warships were supporting themselves out there. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/laugh.gif But that doesn't answer the questions I did ask, about how you go about 'manipulating galactic events' from completely outside the political or social context of the times.

Suggestion for the revisions: The 'original' Alice could remember more things, fragments of the 'long exposition' that Admiral Alice had to deliver at the end, without completely spoiling the story. When they discover that the Taurans are back, for example, she could 'know' that the aliens operating the warships are not the 'real' Taurans. The final explanation could still be held to the absolute end, but this 'hint' makes it seem less like a 'gotcha' or cop out.

[TurinTurambar]

I have compiled it into one text document and put in online in my Yahoo Briefcase for now. I left in some of the "forum flavor" bits, and I've corrected it for typos out to page 26, but haven't gone back to look for the annoying ones that spellcheck can't find ("to" for "too", etc.)

http://us.f13.yahoofs.com/bc/43ceff18m0b59f43e/bc/My+Documents/Hell+is+for+Heroes.doc?BC4gOeIBiAtQTnVg

No particular reason, just a fan and trying to help out others while the final version gets compiled by AZ.

TT

[TurinTurambar]

Correction Post - since I can't find the Edit button.

Yahoo Briefcase is closing so I moved the .pdf to Windows Live Skydrive. It's here:
http://cid-fb2996a974fa800c.skydrive.live.com/self.aspx/.Public/HI4H.pdf

Cheers, y'all,
Turin