16 moving forward, p.1
16 Moving Forward, page 1
(NERV Game Site – Official DAtS Offline Forums)
Number5Alive, Golddigger, BurtBacharach, CrazyCelt, Blaze, DoYouEvenLyft?, MarcoPolo, MightMakesRight, l33tpally, Bennie, SEA-TAC_Sweetie, Requiesce-in-Pace, MacD, HaveGunsWillTravel, Guardian, GunKitty, Chummer, Inquisitor, Lizard, RedFox, SemiSolidSnake, ElfMama, Not_the_Face!, Anonymous3, Anonymous4, Anonymous7, Anonymous9, AggregatorOfSorrows, M.Mollen, WhiskeyTangoFoxtrot, Dolcett, Backlog, DarkAvariel, Knocker, Hullu_Kapteeni, GrimDark, BloodForTheBloodGod, Queen’s_Bitch, BackDat@55Up, DoYouEvenDPS?, MajorTom, Parca, and DarkAngel are in the chat.
Knocker: So, the Dungeon at Hadarada Prime is looking like it has become some kind of buglike aliens involved. Everything’s covered with this weird goo, too.
l33tpally: But where did the AI get Zerg from?
MarcoPolo: Zerg? What are these ‘Zerg’?
DoYouEvenLyft?: From RTS genre. Old game called Starcraft had them as one of the factions. Nasty things, good at sending waves of weak enemies to wear you down before their big troops came and annihilated you.
MajorTom: Damn, they must have had off-site backups.
DoYouEvenDPS?: Off-site backups? You mean you’ve seen shit like this before in game?
MajorTom: Boss, you want to take this one?
M.Mollen: The facility is gone, and anyone involved already knows what we got from it, get your brag on, Marine.
MajorTom: All right, then. This was our first major op as the Black Star Marines. All of us were Nomads at the time, and all former USMC, some for injuries or age, and some for other reasons. Black Star had just hooked up with Merida’s faction in the Civil War, and her people gave us targets to hit that would hurt Travis’s people the most while we got ready for the big push back.
BackDat@55Up: So this was just after Edena?
MajorTom: Correct. Our target was a Blacker than Black research site working on bioweapons and with links to other sites in the sector. We come in on our ‘liberated’ Marine Assault ship, and we time it so that Thunderfury announced herself by destroying the comm array the same instance our drop ships broke stealth and hit the doors to their landing bay.
MajorTom: Brought the whole company, even though we were only expecting light resistance. You don’t give someone a fair fight in their own house, after all. Good thing we brought them, because we quickly ran into trouble when one of the VIPs decided it would be a great idea to unleash the test subjects. I think the idiot thought she could control them.
Knocker: So these were the Zerg?
MajorTom: Ooh, yeah. Nasty fuckers, and if they hadn’t been trying to get through choke points that were designed to prevent escapes, they might have been able to overrun us. But that facility got blown to hell. The Self-Destruct was to let the antimatter containment drop in the reactor. Big boom, and a new crater on that moon.
Parca: You know, they might have had the originals of whatever they used for those test subjects at a different site.
M.Mollen: Either way, the AI had access to it, and other horrible things. Frigging lovely.
CrazyCelt: Hey, anyone know what’s going on in the border sector around Tietera? First, my favorite steakhouse on Zanchul Station closes down, and my ‘completely legitimate trade agent’ goes missing…
MightMakesRight: You mean your fence.
CrazyCelt: Potato, Potahto. Anyways. My trade agent goes missing, and now all the completely legitimate suppliers of sundry surplus items I go to have been disappearing left and right, even the big names!
M.Mollen: Sounds like you’re a smuggler who deals with pirates, CC. Unfortunately for you, the pirates in that sector have met with some unfortunate reverses in fortune, and are either enslaved, dead, or on the run.
CrazyCelt: What the hell? No way they were all taken out so quickly. You’d need a whole damn fleet to take out their base! There’s a reason the Navy never went after them!
M.Mollen: You own your ship, CC?
CrazyCelt: Yeah, the Cyfreithiwr Diog. Why?
M.Mollen: I bet you your ship against a brand new one from the Black Star shipyards that their base has fallen.
Backlog: Do yourself a favor, CC, and stop while you’re not too far behind.
CrazyCelt: *sighs* No bet.
M.Mollen: Backlog, would you kindly not ruin my fun?
MightMakesRight: So, what proof were you going to show him to win the bet?
M.Mollen: Screenshot of me, right now, sitting in the Administrator’s Suite, drinking his liquor as my people sort through all the slaves we took.
CrazyCelt: What? How did you take it?
M.Mollen: Trade secret. But Homer would approve.
RedFox: So, you did manage to slip someone in and take it from the inside. We’d been wondering.
M.Mollen: Oh, and who is we, Red?
RedFox: A newly formed ‘mercenary’ group that just got a contract on the other side of the Alliance border to keep the piracy issue under control. Formerly of Lark’s Clan.
M.Mollen: Ah, figured that message pulse was warning more than just the people on the station. Made us start before we were ready, so more people ended up dying instead of being captured.
RedFox: Hah. Glad to see my idea paid off, then.
M.Mollen: Oh, so you’re the one who got them to put repeaters around? Nicely done. Your ships, and some from the Duskspine clan, and a couple independents like CC here, are the only ones who survived with your ships and freedom intact.
l33tpally: Why didn’t you just blast it, like the other installations you’ve hit?
M.Mollen: Well, having a well-protected shipyard and fleet base has some benefits. Plus, there are a lot of slaves with skills I can use who are now under my control, ready to help fill out positions in the fleet. Of course, I might sell off the station, since it is pretty isolated.
Dolcett: So, back to the Zerg, any tips on fighting them?
M.Mollen: Shoot them. A lot. And then nuke the place from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.
Dolcett: That… isn’t as helpful as you might think.
MajorTom: No real help for you. The Zerg are like fighting the tide. You have to withstand their initial rush, but then they got one coming after that, and another after that. You have to kill as many as you can and then prepare to strike back, HARD. Otherwise, they’ll destroy you.
Knocker: So, in context of the dungeon?
MajorTom: Pack plenty of grenades and explosives, pray you don’t run out of ammunition, fire is your friend, and shoot anything that moves. Platoon full of Marines in power armor using a choke point and automated defenses could only just hold them back, not push through and wipe them out, because of their numbers. Would not recommend unless you have uber high level skills and gear.
Knocker: Well, fuck.
(Administrator’s Suite, Madrigal Base, Madrigal System)
I’ll say one thing for the former administrator of Madrigal Base: he certainly knew how to live in style. While nothing in the suite he had used before his demotion screamed ‘lap of luxury’ on its own, together the whole thing came to a very comfortable bachelor’s pad, like you might see rich frat boys have when they were starting at whatever job their parents gave them. The fact that it wasn’t a gaudy flaunting of riches at least told me that the Administrator knew enough to not slap people in the face with how much he was skimming from the running of Madrigal Base.
Thankfully, despite the fact that it was a pirate base, the Administrator insisted on keeping records, so that he knew what was happening on his base. It didn’t take long to find both the public records and the REAL records, including some lovely hidden bank accounts in other parts of the sector that soon got added to Black Star accounts. Now, I was going through the paperwork, with Raven’s help, as I decided what to do with this lovely little fortress we’d captured.
Sure, part of me wanted to keep it. The idea of having a heavily fortified, easily defended base appealed to me, for all kinds of reasons. But I wasn’t a pirate lord. Running a base like this was expensive, and the pirates going out and bringing back spoils helped pay the bills. I wasn’t going to be doing that. And the things that made Madrigal Base so easily defended also meant that it was a crap location for legitimate business interests. It was too isolated to get good traffic, and anything that helped open it up would eliminate the fortifications.
There were some uses to the base, of course. I was already planning on having multiple groups in this part of space, so if I stationed the Fourth Group here when it was ready, I would have a decent staging point, since there weren’t any Gateways nearby. There was also the idea of using the shipyards here for building ships that weren’t going to be public knowledge. The shipyards at Dimiya and Nuevo Edo were larger, better equipped, but they were in plain sight, and it was getting harder to keep things secret.
The chime on the door sounded, and I checked the screen on the wall, which showed Captain Zylna outside. That’s right, her ‘liaison’ period was almost up, and she’d be returning to the Confederate fleet. I called out, “Open,” and the door automatically slid open to allow her in. “Good evening, Captain. What do you think of Madrigal Base?”
Zylna stepped inside, and did a quick look around the room. “Well, it wasn’t what I had expected, that’s for sure. I’ve been on pirate ships before, and seen the aftermath of when pirate bases were raided. I did not expect it to be this… clean.”
I nodded. “Pirates, smugglers, and even ‘honest’ merchants generally fall into two categories, in my experience. The first tends to get by with just
“The other kind, they’re the smart ones. They keep things maintained and running smoothly, because they would rather spend a little now than have something important break when they really need it, like in the middle of a fight. Oh, perhaps they don’t keep to ‘military’ standards, but they don’t let things get out of hand like the other sort.”
“You can see some of both in the ships we captured. But the ‘cheap’ pirates tended to be from smaller clans or independents, while the ‘clean’ pirates were from the larger clans. The smart captains, the ones who led the clans and the ones who followed them, lost a little profit in the short run, but when things happened, they were less likely to lose everything.”
“Until they met you.”
I smiled at Zylna’s words. “Yes, until they met me. But it didn’t have to be me. With the way they let things get out of control in this sector, there was always going to be some kind of response. The only question was how bloody things would get. That’s why you see that, while other sectors have seen a rise in piracy, it hasn’t been anything like on the level we saw in this sector. They got greedy, and didn’t keep their younger and dumber sorts in line. And so they all paid for that mistake.”
Captain Zylna nodded. “Yes, sir.” Something was bothering her, but she didn’t seem to know how to just come out and say it.
I put down the tablet I had been reviewing the paperwork on, and said, “Well, that’s enough ‘Admiral’ hat for the moment. So, what’s on your mind, Captain? It is about time for you to head back to the fleet, isn’t it? I expect you’ll be extremely popular with the other commanders of the Assassins that the Confederacy has purchased.”
Zylna nodded, and said, “Yes, sir, it has been an interesting experience working with Black Star, and I’m eager to put that to use helping to train the new commanders as we establish Navy guidelines for the use of the Assassins. There hasn’t been a change like this in the Navy for over a hundred years, as far as I know.”
“Well, if it makes you feel any better, your Navy is going about it the right way, trying to change with the times, instead of fighting to keep things as they were.” I looked at the young captain, and sighed. “Captain, you’re wound so tight you’re going to break something.” I pointed to the other end of the sofa I was sitting on, and the table with a bottle of some alcoholic beverage and some glasses on it. “Sit down, pour yourself a drink, and tell me what it is that is on your mind. You didn’t come here to talk about how your ‘liaison’ job went.”
Zylna sat down at the other end of the couch, and said, “I’ve been… instructed by my superior officers to ask what you intend to do with the Kythaela Daven, and this station.”
I smiled at her, and said, “Asking is always free. Whether I answer or not is a different story, as is whether your superiors will like the answer. Now, you’ve got a lot of good qualities to you, Captain, but a master negotiator and spy you are not. So why don’t we cut through all the bullshit and games, and get to what whichever Senator is behind this really wants.” Her eyes went wide as she looked at me, causing me to laugh. “Oh, don’t worry, my dear. Nothing has leaked from your end. But the people in the military side know enough about me, and my methods, that they would have sent someone I’m familiar with from Naval Intelligence or the like to simply ask what I intended, and go on from there. That you look so uncomfortable means that some other crap is going on, and someone with power is leaning on people above you to lean on you. Did I get it about right?”
Zylna sighed, and said, “It is frightening sometimes, the way you work through these situations and come up with the truth.”
“Ah, I have experience with bureaucracies, and I’d already made it perfectly clear to both Naval and civilian intelligence that I was willing to be reasonable, depending on what they asked of me. Reasonable, of course, does not mean that I’ll blindly agree to anything they want, of course. It just means that I’ll approach deals with an open mind, and a long memory for betrayal.” I paused for just a moment, and then said, “Now, what did they want from you? We can start with the ship, that’s almost certainly going to be the easiest one to deal with.”
The captain took a deep breath, and said, “Well, and this actually does come my superiors, they would like the ship, of course. It was a CNS ship, and deserves to be brought back to the fleet, either for decommissioning or to refit it and return it to service. We have the remaining records from the Kyathaela Daven, showing how the ship was caught by pirates after they were disabled in a spatial anomaly. They’d like to honor the crew.”
I nodded. “That was to be expected, after all. Since your ship led the attack, and disabled it, and your Marines took the cruiser, I see no problem with the Kyathaela Daven returning with you as a ‘war prize’, to be returned to the Confederate Navy. I was actually going to do that anyway, since it would make a lot of people happy, and I don’t really need the ship. Now, what about the station?”
Zylna shifted nervously. “Some of the Senate, as you guessed, is putting pressure on the military to ensure that the station does not remain in Black Star’s hands. They feel that you have far too much power already, and don’t like what you might do with a fortress like this. Ideally, they would see you kicked off the station by the Navy, but the one putting pressure realizes that is unlikely to happen. So they ‘asked’ me to do anything in my power to ensure that the Navy had ‘access’ to the station.”
“Ah, yes, it would be something like that. This wouldn’t happen to be from the same group who thought sending an attractive female captain to liaison with my forces would be a way to try and get a hold on me, hmm? Of course, a honeypot trap only works when the target doesn’t have a ton of honey already. Oh, don’t worry, I’m not judging you. So, what kind of access do they want, and what were they willing to give for it?”
“They want to be able to have a Navy ship here, or at least Navy personnel on board to ‘supervise’ things and ‘liaison’. I think they also want to have some Marines on station as well.” She paused, and then said, “The actual details of compensation and the like would be worked out at a later date.”
“And they expected you to try and seduce me into this, hmm? Yes, I can see it on your face. Well, in that case, you can tell them that, in the interests of being a good neighbor, I will allow a single person from Naval Intelligence to be chosen by and reporting to Lieutenant Zumrora (and him alone), to act as a liaison and contact should the Navy or other services wish to purchase ships away from the public eye. That is ONE person. No Marines, no warships in my space without leave, and so on. We will allow Confederate ships in need of repair access to the shipyards for standard rates, but the station and the shipyards will remain under Black Star control and jurisdiction at all times.”
Zylna’s eyes went wide at my pronouncement. I shook my head, and said, “Having a known intelligence officer in the midst is not nearly so annoying as having to ferret out the ones who try to worm their way into my organization. Zumrora has worked with me before, and knows what limits to put on his people. Frankly, I’m less surprised that anyone made this play, than that they forced you into doing it so late.”
Zylna nodded her head, and said, “I believe that is because Zumrora wasn’t there to tell them it wouldn’t work, like when I was getting briefed for this assignment. The Admiral will be happy to get the ship, but the people up the chain are not going to be pleased that they didn’t get what they wanted.”
“Well, if it becomes troublesome, you have proven yourself a talented and skilled commander. There will be a place in Black Star for you, if you decide to resign from the Navy, or are kicked out. You and your whole crew, actually. You’ve all done excellent work while attached to the Black Star Fleet.”
“Thank you, sir. I’ll keep that in mind.”
“You do that, Captain. Now, finish your drink, and when you’re done, you may return to your ship to start organizing the ‘prize crew’ to take the Kyathaela Daven home. Or you can stay, and try your hand at seducing me, without the orders hanging over your head.”
Captain Zylna blushed furiously, finished her drink in a single go, and then practically ran from the room.
