IF YOU'RE PLAYING IN THIS GAME, DON'T READ THIS!
(This goes for Judd, John Moore, Vince, Mike, and anybody else who has
played or might play... Go read the Albatross logs!)
[Back to Gaming War Stories]
[Back to Leap, 154]
**Jan 1, 155**
My watch (ain't it always?), and a distress beacon comes in. I love New
Year's Day presents. The signal says it's from the _Starchaser_, registered
out of Kintara, crew of four. Uh-huh. Get Warren to scan things to blazes
-- he doesn't see any other ships. Head for the beacon, that's the right
thing to do, according to NG law; with luck, if it *is* pirates again, Kelly
will get bad vibes again.
Second planet of an old K star -- 1.15 Gs, 30% oxy, etc, terra-normal otherwise,
though low on everything but organics. Mostly plains & forests. You
can see why Kintarans would land here.
We get some pictures of three of them -- one seems to be chasing his tail,
one is lying on his back sprawled out, and one is hunting down an antelope
thingy and eating it.
I try, eventually, landing about 10 feet from the _Starchaser_ (which does
not answer the comm, even though there's a Kintaran in it playing with the
buttons (as near as I can figure from the way the ship's acting)); unfortunately,
I am not on Star Fire at the moment, and it would seem that one of the _Starchaser_'s
cameras got in the way of the landing. Parvari has commentary about finding
the only other ship on the planet to hit, and so I gritch back about the
lousy steering on this crate. Embarrassing.
We send T'kik out to get a sample of the dirt for our Irari, who demanded
some when we explained the situation (something about soil areation being
strange when he scanned). Student then griped about the lack of proper equipment.
T'kik got into the _Starchaser_, found a Kintaran female playing "piano"
on the control panels, and so the Bug cut the power. Bug comes back, we
give it a comm (I ain't going outside, there's big lizards out in the grass,
and Derek is having fits about the plains!), and send it back to talk to
the Kintaran (we don't want to go out till we're sure there's nothing strange
airborne). Warren knows Trade Kintaran. Warren tries yowling at the Kintaran
for a little bit, finally reports back that she's babbling about eating
birds. We tell T'kik to move out of range...
Student finally discovers something, and after much prodding, we find that
there are strange substances in the plants and animals, which read as harmful
for humans to eat. We send Warren out with a double-dose of Purge. He zots
the Kintaran, who complain that he stung her, and then wanders over on all
sixes to try and open the door and go get some more food. However, by the
time she figures out the door-opening combination, she's coherent. (T'kik
has taken her weapon away. Warren does not have even a stunner. Warren is
clueless. If there hadn't been scalies out there, I would have *instantly*
gone over to take care of things myself...) T'kik is trying to decide whether
to shoot the Kintaran or Warren with the Kintaran's gun.
She wonders why the power is off, goes & fixes it -- we explain that
she'd been playing with all the buttons... She winces at the thought of
accidently taking off at about 3 Gs.
[[GM says he missed a bet -- she should have been *flying* the ship when
we found her!!]]
We explain that the food's got strange stuff in it ("Humans... Can't
eat anything."), which was making her strange. She complains that they
smell and taste *so good*... She's tired of their synthesizer food. I offer
her some of our food -- which is "very unique." She askes for
"poached merfah on a stick"... I'll see what I can do... It looks
like a scorched lizard. Ugh. Let Kelly take the blame here; I'll hide on
the bridge.
The Kintaran ain't so thrilled with it -- worse than their stuff, she thinks.
Ah, well.
I ask what her name is -- Swiftflyer.
"Glad to meet you, Swiftflyer. I'm Quicksilver," I say from down
the hall a bit.
"*Quicksilver*? You're *really* Quicksilver??" she says.
"As far as I know," quoth me.
"Did you really fly through downtown Thralia at Mach 6?" she asks.
"Well, I don't remember how fast it was -- I wasn't looking at the
air speed readout at the time. It was fast enough, though," I smile.
She explains about "First day, first month" at Kintara Station
-- everyone leaves dock at once and flies in criss-cross patterns... *She*
did it at warp .5 once! I ask her to drop me a letter sometime when it's
going to happen, and I'll try to be in the area -- sounds fun!
She and Warren and Kelly go in the ATV to where the others are, about half
a mile off. (Swiftflyer mentions that she'd hit the distress beacon when
Swatpaw {"she's a mean drunk"} started acting strange, chasing
the others and yelling something about . . . twins. Not fraternal, either.)
We only have enough Purge doses for the lot of them, once, and a couple
of doses left over for us. The Kintarans have none, since More Beer, their
planetologist, was partying last station...
Warren wants to dose Whitebelly, their captain, have Kelly put "Tailchaser"/More
Beer to sleep, and have Swiftflyer take care of Swatpaw (who was the one
chasing the local fauna -- Whitebelly is the one on his back). Swiftflyer
won't get near Swatpaw; she's their security, she's mean, and she's probably
still got her blaster.
They return for a stun rifle. Derek and I go, I under much protest. I accuse
Parvari of being the one whose fault it all is and stalk off to the ATV.
We dose their captain -- who is *quite* cute. "Cute captain you've
got there," I comment. "Yes, that *I'VE* got!" Swiftflyer
says. Ah. "Don't worry," I tell her, "I don't poach. I don't
need to." "I've heard about you..." "Oh? Who from?"
"Flare." "Ah. Don't worry, really, poaching is beneath my
dignity."
We leave Swiftflyer to look after Whitebelly and head for Swatpaw -- we
get to within a certain distance of her and she fast-draws a blaster and
fires! Warren swerves and we only get grazed, fortunately! We pull up about
300 yards away and I (I'm better at sonics than Derek -- he's better at
lasers) aim and fire. "BANG!" says the gun. *T'kik*!!!! Argh!
I miss the other two shots, and she's chasing us... Kelly grabs her blaster
away and I lean out a hatch and finally manage to drop her. We dose her
(I shove Warren out to do it) and leave her to recover. On to More Beer.
*He* gets this friggin' grin on his face when we get near, then takes off
running away from us. I am *not* in a mood to deal with chasing down a Kintaran
with Warren driving. I lean out and drop *him* with the stun rifle. We haul
him into the back of the ATV, and head back to see what's up with Whitebelly.
Whitebelly and Swiftflyer are otherwise occupied. We head for Swatpaw, to
keep her from eating anything else.
She and Warren growl back and forth a little [She doesn't understand NG.
She's complaining about a "twinning stunner hangover".] I get
Warren to tell her *exactly* that eating the animal will make her have more
hallucinations about twins. She's in a mood -- she takes out a laser pistol.
Kelly takes it away from her as we flee. Swatpaw jumps on the roof. Kelly
tells her *Quit that!* or words to that effect and Swatpaw stops clawing
at the roof and bounds away to look at us with big eyes from a little ways
away.
About now, More Beer wakes up. "Did you get the number of that bar?"
he moans. He talks to Swatpaw [in family tongue, not trade] for a while,
and relays that she wants to know if our "shaman" is still mad
at her. Kelly replies that she won't be mad if Swatpaw behaves civilly.
Swatpaw wants her weapons back -- we oblige her. We lead them back to where
Whitebelly and Swiftflyer are straggling back to the ship.
Warren has been a pest, and I'm not so happy with T'kik either -- Kelly
grabs a drone and I try to feed it some grass. T'kik tries to send another
couple of drones to *gather* **lots** of grass and bring it on the ship!
I try and lock the airlock -- it overrides. I aim the stun-rifle at the
pair. "DROP IT!" Nothing. *FIRE*! Apparently stunning a Hive Beetle
drone is not too good for the drones. One nearly gets fried; I take it to
the autodoc. T'kik is irritated, no doubt. I'm going to have to *live* in
this biosuit for a while! [Captain: "Thanks, T'kik!"] I tell the
captain to try and keep a leash on the Bug lest he be without a pilot out
in the middle of a fringie run. Time to beef up the defenses... Maybe I
can figure out what the Bug is trying and fall for it so it won't keep a
grudge...
Take off from the planet, knocking the camera off the Kintaran ship's wing
again... Tell them that the trader joggled my elbow.
**Jan 2, 155**
A day to think things over, and I realize why I had such a fit about the
grass -- the stuff is a mind-altering drug (at least to Kintarans). Sandra's
left her mark on me, deeper than I realized. And after having to try *not*
to pound sense into Warren's head, I wasn't able to think clearly enough
to find a better way to deal with a threat like that grass.
Send T'kik Email: "I apologize for stunning your drones -- I've even
moderately sorry I did it, and I am sorry that the one got so sick. I was
having a bad day, having to deal with Warren and getting chased by psychotic
Kintarans with blasters and having to deal with Warren, and all, and frankly,
T'kik, just *threatening* to bring that stuff on board would have been enough
of a joke... I might have over-reacted just a tad. I'd been wishing I could
stun Warren, but I figured I'd get in even more trouble for that from the
captain. Want to team up and get Warren, instead?"
T'kik replies that I will not be the target of "special attentions,"
but I should beware its ordinary whims; never fear *that*!
**Jan 3, 155**
Warren wakes up one morning with a hot-pink biosuit. Derek asks how much
Warren will pay to have it fixed. Finally Warren gets T'kik to repair the
thing, in exchange for leaving an audio-only bug unmolested in his room.
I've already got one of the things, in exchange for being able to talk to
Jim privately.
**Jan 4, 155**
We get to the Irari base, and find nothing but a scorched area where the
research base should be. Eventually we contact the two Irari survivors --
the base was attacked by a smallish ship, 6-8 Thrals and humans wielding
heavy weaponry came and shot the other two Irari, and took a human researcher
and a human prospector (Quoth one of the Irari, "Captain Art, he is
female, yes."). They went and shot down the aircar that the survivors
were in, but didn't bother to hunt down the Irari themselves. We take in
the survivors and haul them along to Jordan's Station.
Strange that the pirates just shot the Irari -- if they'd wanted Kaa-food,
I would have thought drumsticks would be just fine. But they only wanted
the humans. Zombie Drug? That might not work on Irari, and might be plausible...
I wish that I was a free agent and could go do some digging on this.
[[Jordan's Station is a large ex-ore freighter, sorta like the Hell, only
spherical. It has puny warp engines, and Jordan moves it from system to
system as one belt gets mined out and another is discovered. There's been
a lanthanum strike in the system that it's currently inhabiting.]]
The Irari want to go back to Irar, but can't pay the captain enough to abandon
his route.
**Jan 6, 155, ship's evening**
We get in to Jordan's Station. There's the Station, and a couple of prospectors
are nose-up to it, but shut down. One of them... The transponder is wrong,
but it matches the configuration of Captain Art's _Rustbucket_, which the
raiders took with them. We are suspicious. We scan the place. We find five
human life-signs in one area, with no powercells, and four life-signs in
another area, where only three of them have powercells. They have *large*
powercells, consistent with weapons. We are paranoid.
I snarf my daily Star Fire about 10 minutes before we dock. We come in normally,
get directions normally, and are asked to unload our cargo ourselves, since
the station is short-handed. Derek in his exoskeleton plays cargo-handler.
I go along with a laser and stunner to play guard. Warren is there to handle
the paperwork, and Kelly is down just to be obnoxious.
A fellow meets us there, and introduces himself as Jordan. I am standing
out of his line of sight, holding my laser and being paranoid. He tells
Warren that they can do the paperwork in his office, and then go down to
the bar -- the rest of the crew is invited to hit the bar as well. (The
directions match where the three people with powercells were.) Kelly has
wandered up to listen during this, and now she says to Warren that the Captain
wants to speak with Warren. They excuse themelves and head back up to the
bridge. I stay down and Derek keeps unloading cargo. T'kik is hiding in
one of the boxes that we've unloaded.
[[ Kelly sensed that "Jordan" was lying about his name, and was
worried. Erk. So, ditch the cargo and undock? The Station has weaponry...
It could shoot at us. Finally it is decided that Derek, armed, Warren and
Kelly, unarmed, will go and do the paperwork -- we may be able to pretend
that we don't know anything's wrong. Derek is in on the conversation via
implant comm.]]
Warren and Kelly come back, collect Derek (out of his exoskeleton, but still
toting a heavy blaster and a laser), and go with "Jordan" to his
office. A couple of T'kik's drones attach themelves to Warren and Derek.
Kelly gripes about those "pets."
[[ In the office, "Jordan" says that he can't find his credit
transactor and he probably left it in the bar again. So everyone troops
to the bar, where there is a bartender and two men at the table -- one of
the men seems very drunk, and about the time that our trio+bugs get there,
the sober one is saying, "Come on, Doc, let's get you to bed."
They leave.]]
Captain says that the group is heading to the bar, and can I provide backup?
Sure thing... I head out and set myself on full paranoia mode. [[ Biosuit
goes camo, reflex armor]] I get to another end of the hallway that Jordan's
Bar is on, spot people coming, and wait.
[[ T'kik goes out and finds a control panel -- it will try and make a fire
alarm somewhere, when Parvari gives the signal.]]
I hear someone saying, "Come on, Doc, let's get you to bed." Odds
that "Doc" is the unarmed person? Sure... Hide against the wall
till pirate and Doc come round the corner -- they turn and head away from
me, so I sneak up behind 'em. Shoot pirate [[with Morphazine dart]]. He
falls. Doc is going "Uh?" so I [[drop camo mode and]] go "Shh!"
[[ Doc looks familiar, but Silver can't place the face... This is strange!
People don't look familiar to her anymore!
Doc: "Silver? What are you doing here??"
Silver: "Taking the station!"
Doc: "Got any Purge on you?"
Silver: "No -- there's some on the ship, though."
Doc: "It's quicker to go back to my cabin..."
Silver: "Okay -- here, take my stunner."
Doc: "Right..." And he weaves back towards his cabin.]]
Drag the pirate into a room and relieve him of his heavy blaster. [[ Go
back to camo mode on the biosuit.]] Head back to Jordan's Bar, poke my head
around the corner -- drat! The bartender fellow may have seen me! "Jordan"
is messing around under the bar for something.
[[ "Jordan" insists that everyone gets a drink on the house. The
glasses have been pre-drugged (which is why Doc was there), so there's no
"slipping something into the drinks." Kelly gets a vision of drinking
the stuff and waking up together in a room with a headache. She Telesends
to the others "Don't drink it! Bad! Go to sleep!" T'kik's drones
start drinking Warren & Derek's stuff. Kelly acts highly disgusted.
The bartender seems boggled. Both he and "Jordan" seem to believe
that the drones are pets -- must not know about Hive Beetles. New drinks
are served to Warren and Derek. Warren tries to help "Jordan"
find his credit transactor, but "Jordan" stands up and says, "No,
I don't need any help," while holding a heavy blaster. Bartender draws
a heavy blaster. Derek hits the floor, drawing his blaster. Silver decides
to step around the corner and take a second to aim her laser at Bartender's
shoulder. T'kik sets off the alarm -- decompression alert in section 16.
Derek shoots *through the bar* (Crit success! A 4!) and takes off the bartender's
leg at the same time that Silver nails the bartender through the right shoulder
(2d damage -- I rolled a 12). There is an explosion as the bottles of alcohol
are ignited by Derek's blaster. "Jordan" is briefly distracted,
and Warren gets a (crit!) head-shot with a punch, deafening "Jordan."
A moment of stunning, Warren throws another punch at "Jordan"
and hits him in the torso -- and hurts his hand, since there's a biosuit
there. "Jordan" starts to swing his blaster back on Warren and
Silver tries a snapshot at Jordan. Two crit-failures (17s) in a row. The
laser pistol sparks madly and she tosses it away, cursing. Kelly grabs the
blaster out of "Jordan's" hand, and Derek stands up and holds
his blaster on the man, just before Warren would have been decked. Silver,
still in camo mode, dodges out of the room and resets her biosuit to silver,
then starts heading for the prisoners. Kelly tries to make "Jordan"
drink her drugged drink (telepathically telling him to drink it, since he
can't hear anything), but he throws it in her face. She keeps her temper.
The bartender is dragged out from where he's lying on the flames, and the
fire is put out. ]]
I managed to shoot the bartender in the shoulder, but Derek blew the guy
away *through the bar*! I try to nail the fake-Jordan, but the laser pistol
sparks and I have to toss it away. Derek is up with his blaster, and Kelly
just stole fake-Jordan's, so I dodge back out the door, [[fix the biosuit
to silver]] and head for the prisoners. I'm going to have to have a little
talk with T'kik about modifications to the weapons -- it *did* say "Bang!"
before it blew...
About now, Parvari notices that there's a 500cy ship coming in, and there's
a little notation next to it that says, "Stealthed"! It figures,
considering where we *got* those sensors from. He calls us all up to tell
us this and wants everybody to come back so that we can run away. Me: "I
want to free the prisoners first, it will only take a minute..."
[[(She's got a comm with her.) Derek, Warren, and Kelly haul fake-Jordan
back to the ship and tie him up. They also bring T'kik's sleeping drones.
The captain decides that the pirate ship is faster than we are, and maybe
we should hang tight to the station and try to think of something, like
hiding in the belt.]]
I meet up with Doc again, him looking much better, and he suggests that
the Station *does* have weapons. I head for the bridge while Doc frees the
prisoners. Real Jordan gets to the bridge and demands to know who I am (I'm
sitting in the Captain's chair). "Quicksilver!" quoth me.
[[Jordan actually hasn't heard of her. Aw. Kelly gets bored with smiling
smugly at fake-Jordan and wanders away. T'kik gets a blaster and aims it
at the man's head.]]
Kelly shows up on the bridge, and complains about the people I know. I introduce
her to Doc. He says his name is "Doc Doyle." He then says. "Hello,
Kelly." Obviously I'm going to have to explain about keeping one's
powers secret to Kel.
Notice that the _Rustbucket_ is powering up. Captain Art wants to get *out*
of the area! She doesn't want to stick around, though I tell her that we
need the station to look the same as when the pirates left it, to make sure
that they don't get suspicious. She don't wanna listen. Jordan tells her
about her bar-tab, and she stops threatening to shoot holes in the docking
clamps and such. The Rustbucket powers down.
[[Kelly, Silver, Doc, & Warren go off to question the pirates -- Kelly
hangs back and asks who this person is, because he's lying about his name.
Well, he's not the right physical type to be Jim, so Silver has no idea!]]
Doc takes one looks at the bartender-pirate and asks if he should finish
the guy off now. Doc takes some Crediline and we head for the pirate I shot.
I suggest that a little Purge might be handy here. [[Warren fails an IQ
roll to realize that a purge doesn't work against stunners, and that the
pirate, when he wakes up, doesn't have a stunner hangover.]] First, I do
a quick search on the pirate, starting with stripping him. (I'm sure that
I'm shocking Warren, who is with me & Doc & Kelly.) I find a nice
little vibroknife in a sheath built into the man's boot. I know how to use
knives!!! There's a sheath that fits this small knife in my biosuit, along
the lower leg! I also find a neurolash.
[[About here, Kelly wants to know Doc's real name. Silver shoves Warren
out the door. There is a bit of gritching -- Doc doesn't want to say his
real name, since "I got blown up by the Organization once! I don't
want it to happen again!"
Silver, as the light dawns: "Blown up?"
Doc (aka Seth Henderson!): "Yeah, didn't you hear about it?"
Silver: "A-heh... There's something I need to tell you, then -- I managed
to hit my head..."
Kelly, muttering: "Lies."
Silver: "Kel-ly! And, anyway, I don't remember you."
Doc scans Silver's head. "Hit your head?"
Silver: "Yes. Don't say a word."
Doc: "Right."
Silver gritches mightily at Doc for getting blown up three friggin' days
before she got there.
Unfortunately, Doc's backups aren't with him -- the bigger cache is on Unar.
He asks if Silver will get it for him. She grumbles about being "legit"
with the _Albatross_. The much smaller cache of backup tapes is on Sparrion,
which won't be a problem.]]
We let Warren back in. Doc administers the Purge. I stand above the (nude,
with shipsuit discreetly draped) pirate, one foot on his chest, neurolash
in one hand. "Good morning," I chirp. "This is your wake-up
call!" The pirate goggles up and says, "I've died and gone to
heaven!" "Cute," I say. "Not bad. Maybe I'll talk to
you later, after the unpleasantness is over." Doc administers the Crediline.
We find out how many people are on that little pirate ship, and what the
recognition code is. They were hired to capture humans for sale -- bonus
for psis! The pirate captain had a gizmo that was supposed to detect psi.
They thought the Doctor was psi, maybe. He denies this ("Who, me? No
way.").
[[ Kelly senses that he's quibbling. Silver WANTS that psi-detector to test
her theory about the Novatech station manager being a "Witch."
She also wants to know who the people were being sold to -- Kelly had an
image of Kaa, but they aren't in the area, as far as anyone knows, and they'd
probably love to snack on Irari as well.]]
Next stop, the fake-Jordan.
Bolduc (aka fake-Jordan) is quite helpful -- he tells me what the recognition
codes are (type of music playing from the radio), and gives me his hold-out
laser. Tell real-Jordan to start playing the "coast is clear"
selection.
Yell at T'kik about my laser nearly blowing up in my hand and demand that
it fix it.
Out of curiosity, I wander over to the Rustbucket -- no Art. Turns out she's
in the bar, where she managed to polish off several bottles before the bartender
(real) caught up with her. She's mid-aged, red-head, fairly attractive despite
the blaster scar on her cheek. About my height. She's also rather drunk.
She's got an antique blaster which she waves about and vaporizes the center
of the dart-board. Dirk buys her a drink. I buy myself a drink since I'm
starting to finally come down from the Star Fire. Captain Art may or may
not be a help when we take the pirate ship, which will show up in about
nine hours, we figure.
[[It should be noted that "Captain Art" is Captain Artemis Hunter.
She's a bit ticked at her cousin (x-times removed) using her name for Her
company, but she never liked the name anyway. This A.Hunter never disappeared.]]
Take a nap before the pirates show up. Take another pill. Wait in a room
off the corridor that T'kik has prepared. Warren is with Dirk at a cross-corridor.
We have the place sealed off, and are in our suits, because there is nothing
but nitrogen in this hall. I have insisted to Dirk that he use his stunner
only, since I want to talk to their captain. For this, I have bribed him
with the biosuit I got off of Bolduc.
Five pirates leave the ship. They go into the corridor. T'kik has a robot
jam its "foot" in the airlock door, so it won't shut. The pirates
get a ways into the corridor and one says, "Something's wrong -- suit
up!" Only two of them manage, though. T'kik kills the lights, mostly
(save for disco-style croft) and the grav. [[Silver has her IR contacts
on.]] I hear a couple of >thumps< in the corridor where the grav switches
back on, and figure that Dirk can handle those two. I'll try for the ship.
I really mess up at first, going into zero-G. At least no-one can see me.
I hear a couple of stunner sequences, and the lights and grav come back
on. I hastily switch to ninja-outfit. [[From camo.]] I open the airlock
into the ship while Warren stuns the pirates that fainted in the hallway.
[[Normally, it's not possible to open an airlock on both sides at once,
and T'kik's 'bot is holding the inner door open. But Silver jiggers the
thing anyway.]] I ask Parvari where the last pirate is -- "Aft,"
he says, so I go that way into the pirate ship. Hear cursing up ahead, and
see a pair of feet sticking out of a maintenance panel. Stick stunner in
and fire. Feet go limp, and I haul out one stunned pirate. End of mess.
I take a hypo of Crediline, the rest of my well-gotten gains, and "Wolf"
(the pirate captain) into a room and ask him some questions. (I also get
another biosuit and a vibrodagger from him.)
[[ Not to mention the holdout screamer. Wolf & friends hijacked the
Jackal at a station a while back, started their careers. Word was going
around that some place would pay 1000 for humans, Kintarans, Hurricanians,
and Sparrials, and 5000 for psis. They got a psi-detector thingamabob from
these people. They've done two meetings -- 4 people the first time (mainly
Sparrials -- this is Sparrial space), and 6 the second. A fast (at least
warp 6) courier ship has met the pirates and they dumped the captives, unconscious
and unclothed, in the airlock. There's not enough cabin space on the courier
for more than freeze-tubes for the prisoners. Wolf thinks they're Corp.
-- part of the reason that he hasn't tried to take *their* heavily armed
ship. Heard something about "not wanting the home office to know"
what was going on. Heard something a few weeks back along the lines that
the courier ship would have to hurry to make room for a shipment (of people,
maybe?) from Sparrion. Get names/descriptions of all the humans that Wolf
has dealt with. Get the meeting-place coordinates. Get the comm-code for
arranging to meet the courier ship, his blind Sparrion account code (only
a few hundred credits, but hey) Get his other Organization contacts, too.
Find out that this Corp. has offered 500 credits for sighting certain ships,
too -- primarily _Diana's Bow_, but also the _Bat_ and the _Hell_. Of course,
anyone who knows about Her sensors would worry about seeing *those* ships
around. Still... Wolf was told not to attack those ships -- they were too
dangerous. This will at least be worth brownie points, probably.
Get the 6 ID cards that hadn't been hocked yet -- the ones they took from
the captives. Might come in useful. Hypnotize him to forget that he had
this little conversation.]]
I find out that the guy's name really is "Wolf" -- Bernard Wolf.
"Bernie," for obnoxious.
Warren managed to claim the ship as salvage from Jordan. I want to call
it the "Bullet." "I've heard about your ship, Silver,"
says Parvari. Ship? Huh? Oh, great, one of my instinctual reactions again.
He insists on calling it the "Sparrow." I comment that smart remarks
about SparrowHawkes will get someone whapped. At least he didn't want to
call the ship "Chicken." I will, of course, be flying this thing.
Warren is a pain about how to sell the ship (he seems to think it can't
be done), and I'm coming down off my pill, so I stun him. Dirk has a minor
cow.
The ship is Sparrion design, has no real transponder (but a nifty do-it-yourself
transponder imitation!), and got its particle beam shot up. T'kik transplants
its missile launcher to the Albatross. Now all the "Sparrow" (Formerly
"Jackal") has is a couple of medium lasers. Ah, well -- it's still
decently fast and stealthed.
I offer to buy the ship from Parvari -- with barter. He wants to know if
the Bug gets its ten percent. I tell him he can make the change and handle
that -- or does he want to watch? He says no deal. Oh, well. It was worth
a try.
To make sure that I don't fly away with this ship, Parvari has the Bug rig
the engines to stop working if they get too far away from the Albatross.
Spoilsport. The Bug wanted to just kill all "extra" stuff in the
navigational database. {snicker} I point out that now I've got a challenge.
(One I can't manage, it seems. Drat. Pity I don't understand this mess better.)
I set the "transponder" to that of the Albatross. Parvari doesn't
think that's funny. He doesn't want to race, either.
[[Before the Albatross leaves, Silver hunts down Doc and gritches at him
-- eventually she says she'll get his backups from Unar for him, as well
as the Sparrion cache. But if her tapes aren't in there, then he owes her!
He asks how long it's been since she was 'wiped -- about four months. Oh,
well, then that wouldn't work, he says. No, Silver replies, the braintapes
can only be meshed when they're both very similar. Doc is surprised that
she knows this, but "doesn't want to know" how she found this
out. Especially when he finds that her source isn't a competitor in the
gray or black market, but is most definitely in the "White market."
A term that Silver finds amusing. Silver asks how long the "unmistakable
neural traces" are going to stick around, and is told that they'll
last for a couple of years or so. This is so thrilling -- anyone with the
right skills and tech can scan her and find this out. Ugh. At one point
Doc says that he didn't think Silver really had any friends -- just useful
people. That she was a survivor, like him. This bothers her slightly, for
inexplicable reasons.]]
[[Her tape would be marked "H.G. Wells." Hg for Mercury for Quicksilver,
and Wells ("What's the Wells? Besides a deep subject.") "just
sounded good." It may or may not be with the rest of the Sparrion cache
-- he lost about 3 months from being bombed.]]
[[She scans everyone with the psi-detector -- she's 50% possibility, possible
Teleport; Warren is 0;, Dirk is 30%; Parvari at 17%; Kelly at 98%, possible
everything. T'Kik is no reading. Irari are 0%. Doc is another 17%, possible
Telepath. He says he read 40% earlier -- obviously the braintapes have settled
in properly now. ((He really is a psi -- a one-skill-only Mind Shield 'path.))
]]
[[Much later, checking the biosuit for more knife sheaths -- there's one
sheath per long boned limb! A dagger could go along each forearm, a large
knife at the thigh, and small knife at each "boot." Somebody likes
knives. Odds on Shannon, anyone?]]
[[Note that Seth is a bit of an organ-legger as well. Between that and the
fact that Captain Art was probably holding a personal grudge, it is dubious
whether any of the pirates survived for long... Frontier justice, and all
that.]]
**Jan 13, 155**
At the planet Karalooar, we onload a bunch of sealed "cages" with
live critters in 'em -- mudhoppers and something that looks, through the
cameras, like a bald ostrich. Parvari is also tired of me flying this ship,
and leaving him and Derek to split watches. He gets a Sparrial fellow to
play pilot as well. Gooooody. A Hive Beetle to break things, and a Sparrial
to steal them. Now all we need is a Hurricanian to eat stuff.
Actually, I kinda like Sparrials -- even if this one does seem to be a rather
scrawny fellow. Pity that they go in for life-mating only. Thank goodness
I brought my stuff over to the Bulle--ah, Sparrow.
His name is Awolloomarra -- Awol for short. *That* bodes ill.
Send off a nice little encrypted message for Her. [About pirates being paid
to watch for Her ships.]
[[Mud-hoppers look like furry frogs. >GRONK<]]
**Jan 16, 155**
Alardin. Thrilling, patriarchal Alardin, where female pilots aren't allowed
to land or take off, and women are property. They've only got one over-firepowered
system patrol boat... Let's see, about Mach 2 over the spaceport ought to
be good for some amusement... Yipe! They *saw* me! At least they can only
hit warp .1, and I can zoom out of range at warp 5!
According to some of my notes, a favored scheme of the Organization is the
"Underground railroad," which gets vaguely spunky females off-planet.
And then points out that they don't have any skills, but since they're almost
always lovely, there's this guy who's looking for a girl just like 'em...
And this after they've handed over all the jewelry they could swipe. I've
done some of this, but I give the explanation of what lack of tech skills
means out in the rest of the sector *before* they go off-planet. And every
now and then, there's the "land and stun everyone to rescue someone
who's been convicted of adultery or something" trick.
Alardin would probably *love* have my hide for a rug, whether they knew
about my memory problem or not.
I think I'll stay out of range for a while.
[[While Silver is staying out of range, an Alardin girl dashes onto the
starport in the confusion that followed Silver's sonic boom. She's dressed
in boy's clothes, and is carrying a stun rifle. She dashes up to the Albatross,
where Dirk & Warren are overseeing the unloading and loading of cargo.
The girl begs for sanctuary, and finally Dirk tells her to go inside. She
looks at the rifle in her hand in confusion, and hands it to Dirk before
she runs in. Warren notices her. T'kik leads her off to one side.
A couple of cops run up and ask Dirk where the girl is -- he says she went
out the other gate. "But you've got a police rifle!" points out
one of the cops. "She dropped it. Here," quoth Dirk. They take
the rifle and head for the other gate.
Unfortunately, one of the dockworkers, less blase' about escaping girls
than the rest, went to inform the admin fellow on the base about the incident.
He wants to bring a couple of guards on board and search the ship. Awol
takes the girl, Erica, to Kelly's room, and tells her to get on the top
bunk and put this belt on (distort belt) and pull this blanket over her
head (camo cloak) and don't move! This, along with some brilliant fast-talk,
convinces the starport guards that she really did leave the ship after Warren
saw her get on.
Kelly rolls a 4 for an Empathy roll upon meeting Erica.
The girl says she can pay, but nobody has asked her what, yet. She needs
passage off-planet, and she needs somebody to rescue her sister, Joanna
Cassidy, who was convicted of adultery and will be buried alive in her husband's
north field in two Earth-days. (Days are very long here, so it will be daylight
for several earth-days.) Discussion rages about what to do -- smuggle Joanna
some air and dig her up? Go in and get her now? The latter seems to find
favor with Awol (the other way has no class) and T'kik (this is great! A
practical joke, *and* stealing a person!) No, Joanna's alleged lover (that
muscle-bound twit, according to Erica) won't be needed.
We go outsystem, manufacture a warp problem for a little while to make plans.
Meet up with Silver's ship. Dirk and Awol, carrying a note from Erica, so
Jo will go with them, will do the rescue while Silver keeps the engines
warm. (Dirk asks if 'Silver' is really her real name for some reason. She
says, "Of course!" and Awol snorts slightly. Silver looks over.
"Slight respiratory problem you've got there," she states. Awol
coughs some more and comments on the stench of the ship.)
After a couple of false starts [the dratted dice kept coming up 7s and 8s
for the scanning-rolls for the patrol boat!], the Sparrow is landed in good
old Mr. Cassidy's north field (currently fallow -- people are in the southeast
and east fields). Dirk and Awol creep to the grain-storage building (up
against the house). At one point, they get sort of spotted -- Awol hides
up a tree, Dirk pretends to be grass (he's got his "new" biosuit
set to pseudo-camo), and after a couple of hours, most everybody in the
house who woke up to check things out is back asleep. Awol creeps into the
grain-house and uses his force-sword to cut through the wall under the bed
that Joanna is sleeping on. He then shoots *THROUGH THE DOOR* with a stun-rifle,
taking out the policeman on guard out there. Next, he fast-draws his pistol
and snap-shots the priest who was in the room. Joanna wakes up, Awol --
from under the bed -- hands her Erica's note, and fast-talks her into leaving
without getting her jewelry. He tosses a nitrous-oxide grenade (made by
T'kik) into the room as they leave. They reach the ship without further
incident, and Silver takes off. Joanna wants to know who's flying the ship,
and is rather loud about her disbelief at a female pilot. Silver is not
amused. Joanna, when she sees what Silver's wearing, is somewhat scandalized
(or maybe jealous), and the pair are rather cool to each other. Once again
the patrol boat spots the Sparrow. Silver takes off to the two-parsec range
from the Albatross, since she's *tired* of being chased around.
Payment: several rings, a very ornate necklace, and a bracelet that Joanna
claims is hers, and berates her sister for having. Not really quite enough
to get them to Sparrion, technically, but hey...
Joanna, it should be noted, is Very Beautiful, has Voice, and Sex Appeal
20. This means that her SA skill is 28 when used on males. (Oh, yeah, don't
forget HT 17.) Her sister is merely Beautiful, with Voice, and SA 15 (not
counting the bonus for appearance). It should also be noted that our Jo
is Lecherous and Unlucky, among other amusing disads. She attaches herself
to Warren and he plays his keyboard (or whatever it is) for her, and they
sing. Quite well. Disgusting.
Somewhere in here, Silver will randomly psi-scan the new pair -- a 25%,
possible Telepath, for Joanna, and a 60%, possible Telepath, for Erica.]]
**Jan 24, 155**
[[Sparrion. Sparrial stations are... Think a slightly toned down version
of the Bazaar on Deva.]]
Ah, Sparrion. Time to go down to the planet and try to get Doc's cache for
him.
Leerawoola is not home -- wife & kids are. Woolly is out on a job, playing
"native guide" for some xenobiologist type, and will be for the
next 2-3 weeks. *sigh* Call him up, give him the code that Doc gave me...
Yeah, okay, he might be able to get away for the day necessary to dig up
the stuff (and we mean "dig up" -- he *buries* things to keep
them safe on Sparrion!), though his current employer will probably fuss.
I'll fly out in an aircar. The quickest route will still take me about 10
hours. Rent an aircar (20-30 creds -- Doc owes me), fly out. Read the news
while I'm going (I love autopilots) -- lessee, Novatechies not doing much,
announcing new advances in psi-tronics, and a quicker, faster way of doing
braintapes... I'll bet. Is that why you're collecting them??? What about
Her company... Got a contract to sell "probes" to the Kylarans.
Uh-huh. Announcing new "Nobel" class ship -- slow, but hey, it's
a research ship. Mucho news speculation on whether She's going to go into
the shipbuilding business. Note about the Novatechie shuttle that an AE
ship found. Heh. Something about stopping a rogue computer that had taken
over an Adam Two corp. station. Nothing else much in the news headlines.
Politics nonsense, that sort of thing. Take nap.
Finally arrive -- yeah, there's a clearing at these coordinates, but I was
supposed to land "next to the ship"... No ship here! Call up Woolly,
and ask him where he is... He's right there, the ship is camouflaged, if
I land in the clearing, I won't hit it. Okay, fine. Land. Poke my head out.
"Hello? Do I have to come in, or can I give you a lift now?"
"Hello," comes from behind me -- Sparrial standing at the top
of a ramp, in an open doorway, in midair. "Nice camo job," quoth
I.
"Some people have fancy toys."
"No kidding. So can you get the package for me?"
"My employer doesn't want me to leave," he says.
*sigh* "So I get to talk him into letting you go. He human or Irari?"
"Human." Sparrial looks me up and down. "You shouldn't have
any trouble."
Wander into the ship, notice that it's got a crescent-and-arrow on the control
panel... Argh. Note that it's a Nobel class! Funny -- those had *just* been
licensed! Nobody should have been building them yet!
"*Very* nice toy," I comment.
"Thank you!" says a voice from out of nowhere... 'Tis the ship's
AI, "Sweetie."
"So who's your owner?" I ask it, and it replies, "You're
about to meet him."
Ooookay. Step in to next room -- tall, thinnish blond fellow. Looks fairly
"outdoorsy." Minorly attractive.
Me: "Hello -- I need to borrow your Sparrial for about a day."
Him: "Yes, he said something about that. I really do need him to be
helping out here."
Me: "Whatcha need him to do?"
Him: "Set out monitors, that sort of thing."
Me, half-power leer: "Well, I could probably set out monitors
-- or whatever..."
Him: "Ummm. That might be a bit hard to explain to my wife, when she
joins me in a week..."
Me, losing the leer and pose: "Okay. But can Woolly go off
if I give you a hand instead?"
He agrees (provided I shift my 'suit to something that won't scare off the
wildlife -- or attract the wrong kind; no problem, camo-purple it is), and
the Sparrial takes off in my rented aircar, snapping a few branches... (I
have to ask for my comm and flashlight back before he leaves...)
Me: "Hotshot Sparrial pilots..."
Him: "There do seem to be a large number of them..."
Me: "Yeah -- I actually get along with them fairly well."
Him: "Oh, my name's Brad."
Me: "Call me Silver." {shake hands}
Brad: "Of course."
So we go back into the ship -- there's a room with a major holo-display
(seems to be catagorizing animals from a grouping of scenes, rather than
being used to scare a poor spacer into thinking that she's walked into vacuum).
Brad has Sweetie display a maplet and shows where he wants the monitors
placed. Up in trees, facing the game-trails, is preferable, since if they're
on the ground, they tend to get covered up with leaves and things. No problem
-- Sparrion trees aren't awful to climb. I've got a comm, so Sweetie can
guide me if necessary. Me, figuring out where I'm supposed to be setting
these things up: "Okay. I probably won't get lost." Find out that
*he* never gets lost. Me: "You a pilot?" He does a little of that.
So off we go, me at half-saunter.
Note that the monitors are self-tapping (you put the spike on wood or rock,
and it drills in -- I said I hoped it didn't like biosuits as well... He
said he didn't think so, looking at his own), and coated with the same stuff
as the holowalls. He had them specially made. He also mentions, when I comment
that he has nice toys, that he got the monitors and ship at a discount....
(When I asked what was in the woods, he said a whole bunch of complicated
names that I'm sure I don't understand... But there's nothing terribly big
and dangerous that doesn't run away from humans, so okay. I was really just
worried about scalies.)
I wander about -- get chittered at by a tree-critter. "Chitter-chitter
to you, too!" >bonk< A nut gets bounced off my biosuit hood.
Throw it back. >bonk!bonk!bonk!bonk!bonk!bonk!< "Agh!" Run
away with hands over head!
Gripe about the ship, the monitors, how Her stuff keeps crossing my path,
etc., etc., how the heck does one get a discount from Her?
"Be a member of the family," comes Sweetie's voice from my comm.
"Huh!?" My comm wasn't on! "How did you hear me?!"
"You *are* carrying monitors. Wasn't I supposed to hear that?"
"Uhhh.... Nevermind... *What* did you say? About how to get a discount??"
"You have to be a member of the family."
"A member of the family... I don't want to know..."
This goes off into a discussion of human curiosity, and why don't I want
to know? I explain that it's probably safer for me if I don't know. The
very idea that She has family...
It doesn't matter. Eventually, when I get back (and find that the ship is
named "Holmes' Sweet Home"), I find out that Doctor Bradford Holmes
is the father of Sweetie's creatrix. (I tell Sweetie to say hi to its mom
for me. It claims it only has a creator, not a mother. Whatever.) I rub
my head, claiming that my brain hurts... It asks if I have some problems
with internal connections. I tell it that yes, I suppose I do. It asks if
it should take some scans and show them to Dr. Jones when she gets in next
week. No, no, don't bother... Dr. Jones, it seems, is a genetic engineer.
Much is explained about Her, perhaps, by that statement.
While I was out wandering, I spotted something that kept running away that
I couldn't quite see... Held up a monitor and asked Sweetie what it was...
Long funny kind of name. "Uh, how about giving me a name that I could
understand?" "I don't know what level of understanding of xenobiology
you have." "Good point. Neither do I. Try going simpler and simpler
till I figure it out?" So Sweetie goes simpler... Finally we get to
"Sort of a ferret." Me: "Well, that shows how much xenobiology
*I* know... What's a ferret?" "It's an earth mammal. Do you have
a vidcomm?" Nope. Sweetie will have to show me a picture when I get
back. Ferrets eat things about the size of mice (which I do know what are),
so they can't be terribly big, despite the fact that they have lots of sharp
teeth.
Since I am now back, Sweetie can show me a picture of a ferret -- about
20 times enlarged! After I understand ferrets, I ask if I can look at Sweetie's
specs, or if the ship is confidential or something... Sweetie lets me look
at most stuff, but says that it's a prototype, and therefore isn't quite
the same as the specs. It can't tell me all the modifications, except that
it's a bigger computer.
After a while, Brad comes back. He's got something ferrety and a couple
of birds, which he proceeds to cook outside, over an open fire. I get invited
to dinner, and am appreciative. (I learned that he had to reprogram the
food synthesizer after he got the ship, since it was only producing pure
synethetic paste... I point out that it's better than having a Hive Beetle
engineer... He offers condolences.) The critter tastes like chicken, and
the birds have a sort of nutty flavor. I offer congratulations to the chef,
but he says that it's not his doing. Still, *I* would have managed to burn
'em. I can't cook even *with* a synthesizer.
I ask random stuff about what he's doing, find out random stuff about local
fauna... About everytime that Her name gets mentioned, I can't help flinching.
Finally he asks if I have a problem, and if it's related to his daughter.
I admit that I once had occasion to say hello to Her... He notes that She
can be rather irritating at times. (She could have been worse, but I don't
say that.) I mention that She's got a *nice* ship (ah, lust...) -- he agrees
that it's impressive, but notes that it's a little sterile, but if that's
the way She wants to live...Obviously She spent too much time with the computers
on Byte. Doesn't surprise me... He says kids are all crazy -- is this kids
in general, or his, I want to know... Just Her, really -- Minerva turned
out okay -- she's a scout, with her own ship... If she still has it; it's
not easy being a freelance scout. Especially, I comment, considering those
probes wandering about, or so the Pilot's Guild people have mentioned to
me. He says She doesn't think things through sometimes, or just doesn't
care. I ask if he's got any other kids -- none that he knows of. At my startlement
on such a comment, he explains that it's hard to know for sure what one's
genetics have been used for when one's wife is a genetic engineer -- and
she might have forgotten to mention it; she's like Her in that way... Spouse
is... Sir-sey? Jones. Both of 'em are doctors.
I get to bunk down in the ATV. No prob.
Realize that I missed a perfect opportunity to connive a look at some baby
pictures. Ah, well... Some things are probably better not known.
**Jan 25, 155**
Next day, Woolly comes back with my aircar (slightly sap-streaked) and a
box (it's thumb-print locked). Wave bye to Brad, say bye to Sweetie -- Sweetie
says, "Goodbye, Ms. Hawke." Pause, double-take. "Where did
you get that half of my name?" I ask it. Standard security precautions
when allowing someone onto the ship, it explains -- it looked me up. "Well,
I hope you found I was mostly harmless," I grin. "Not likely to
be dangerous, no," it agrees. "Where'd you get the data, anyway?"
I ask. Artemis Central Information, it turns out... And the full bit of
data was "Able to be dangerous, but not likely to be dangerous in this
situation." I am hurt. "'Not likely'? More like darned *un*likely!"
I protest. "I'm not *totally* unwise!" Leave, after making sure
that Woolly hadn't absconded with anything else of mine.
I wonder if I can get into this finger-print-locked box without breaking
it... I wanna see if my 'tapes are in it!
No, they're not (the lock is not busted, tho'). Captain Kirk, Al Capone,
Artemis Gordon {eek}, Herbert Hoover, yes. Mine, no. I can find all but
that Artemis one in the library -- Doc's a fan of 20th century Old Earth,
obviously!
Pack everything back up and put a note on the outside: "You owe me."
Dear sweet stars... The *other* cache is in a starport area of Unar. Major
city. How am I *ever* going to get down *there*? The place is FULL OF SCALIES!
I suppose I could suppress it, but... Gah! The idea! Maybe I could get Kel
and/or Derek to help me out here?
**Jan 27, 155**
Get new implant comm, to my specifications. Also get 112 pills -- with luck,
four months will get me back to Unar, where I can hopefully renew my prescription,
and maybe get the cache. Sparrials seem to like me -- I got the pills as
cheap here as on Unar!
[On to February]