0005 Tremous Dex and the Hippity-Hop

[Tiglath]

"Agreed. Let's get the relic moved now and then get to venting the ship. You take lead on this and I'll help. Maybe keeping it in the case will reduce the effect."

Sigrún will use a cargo handler to move the now sealed crate carrying the artefact as close as possible to the "hide" and then with the help of her comrades manhandle it inside.

She will then don a vacc suit, arm herself and prepare for exiting jump.

She will either man a gun turret or if weapons are directed from the bridge standby as reserve flight crew / damage control / ship's troops.

[terrymixon]

"Agreed. Let's get the relic moved now and then get to venting the ship. You take lead on this and I'll help. Maybe keeping it in the case will reduce the effect."

Sigrún will use a cargo handler to move the now sealed crate carrying the artefact as close as possible to the "hide" and then with the help of her comrades manhandle it inside.

She will then don a vacc suit, arm herself and prepare for exiting jump.

She will either man a gun turret or if weapons are directed from the bridge standby as reserve flight crew / damage control / ship's troops.

Are we all in suits? Did we put the ship in vacuum?

Flighty

[Eris]

It's really too late to do another search, other than a quick look around, which doesn't find anything.

The cargo container is moved to the garage where it is cut open and the object, still in it's box is moved into the hidey-hole. Nobody has any effects from doing this. It is either not affecting you enough to matter through it's box, or it's not currently working, or you don't know! Maybe it's already had its effect on you and nothing more will come from being around it...you don't know.

Zaki and Karcsi are in the commons in their vacc suits, strapped in. Bob and Doug are similarly attired in Engineering. Doug occasionally grumbles about having to work in a vacc suit, saying if the ship is holed we're all going to die anyway, so why put off the inevitable...but he still has the suit on.

Up on the bridge Flighty, Donovan and Sigrun man stations and await emergence...the clock ticks down and at 167 hours, 23 minutes and 18 seconds there is a "PING!" signaling you are about to re-enter normal space.

The twist in everyone's gut isn't too bad this time, it only makes you blink a time or two, and opening your eyes you find the sensors are alive with data and broadcast radio signals are flooding into the ship.

On the sensors you are shown Tremous Dex, a bight blue ball in the far distance orbiting a huge gas giant.

Donovan sees a signal come down the wire to the transmitter from somewhere. He can trace it. It is coming from inside the Avionics package itself. The Transponder clicks as it turns itself on, or at least it thinks it is transmitting, but the outgoing signal is going nowhere.

The radio coming in is mostly noise, civil and commercial broadcasts from the planet, a repeating request for all ships to remember to turn on their Transponders, and various messages from local brokers advertising their services. One message, though, catches Donovan's and Flighty's ears..."For the best deals on Tremous Dex, take a Chance...a New Chance!..." and then there are coordinates broadcast and the message then repeats itself once every minute or so.

From Engineering Doug calls the Bridge, "Hey, we're doing A-OK back here. I've flushed the pipes and opened the second lines up. We'll be able to jump again in, um, 7 minutes...Mark!"

Switching out the Jump Tape for Tremous Dex and the one Flighty has prepared for Rangent will take a couple of minutes. Maneuvering the ship into the proper configuration will take a couple more. Then its just waiting for the power plant to power back up and the jump bubble to build back up around the ship....

J-5: A comm aimed generally in your direction comes in from Starport Control, "Will unknown ship please turn on your Transponder. Failure to do so is a crime."

J-3: Another comm aimed in your direction comes in on a Maser carrier wave saying the same thing, only the please is dropped and the request is now a threat.

J-1: Sensors pick up two System Defense Boats light up and begin boosting in your direction. Neither is near enough to get within a few million miles of you before...

J-0: Doug sends the confirmation which you've already seen on the Bridge. The ship is ready to jump again...

[Tiglath]

J-0: Doug sends the confirmation which you've already seen on the Bridge. The ship is ready to jump again...

Sitting at the reserve crew station with a rifle slung across the chest of her vacc suit Sigrún exclaims "Streð mik, just one SDB is bad enough news for us!"

Glancing over at Donovan calmly enough she smiles "Time to punch it chewy! That's Old Terran - I thought you might know it. I think it's something to do with tenderizing meat but it means run away - now!"

Her smile widens as she says "Well, they might guess we're headed to Rangent as there's really nowhere else to go but for all their M Drives and armour those SDBs aren't going to be jumping after us".

(OOC: Trans =

Fek me! (Exclamation)

Potty mouth!

And she has recalled the pop culture Terran meme - which is of course a misquote).

[joertexas]

Zaki checks all of the low berths, and also checks that her patient is still alive in their low berth. She's suited up and ready for vacuum. She retreats to the crew area to await the ship's decompression and grav shutdown.

I dearly hope we're pumping most of the atmosphere back into the tanks, and not venting it over the side.

[Tiglath]

I dearly hope we're pumping most of the atmosphere back into the tanks, and not venting it over the side.

(OOC: Yes. Hopefully this or some artful "swapping" between vacuum and atmosphere in some compartments (or our newly empty fuel tanks) or we'll all be rather blue in a week's time. Sigrun is apparently of the "Oddball" School of starship management: "I only ride ’em, I don’t know what makes ’em work").

[terrymixon]

The radio coming in is mostly noise, civil and commercial broadcasts from the planet, a repeating request for all ships to remember to turn on their Transponders, and various messages from local brokers advertising their services. One message, though, catches Donovan's and Flighty's ears..."For the best deals on Tremous Dex, take a Chance...a New Chance!..." and then there are coordinates broadcast and the message then repeats itself once every minute or so.

"Well, well. Looks like someone wants to meet up. Too bad for them."

Flighty will look up the coordinates, making a bet to himself that it will be one of the gas giants.

From Engineering Doug calls the Bridge, "Hey, we're doing A-OK back here. I've flushed the pipes and opened the second lines up. We'll be able to jump again in, um, 7 minutes...Mark!"

"Bridge copies that."

Switching out the Jump Tape for Tremous Dex and the one Flighty has prepared for Rangent will take a couple of minutes. Maneuvering the ship into the proper configuration will take a couple more. Then its just waiting for the power plant to power back up and the jump bubble to build back up around the ship....

J-1: Sensors pick up two System Defense Boats light up and begin boosting in your direction. Neither is near enough to get within a few million miles of you before...

J-0: Doug sends the confirmation which you've already seen on the Bridge. The ship is ready to jump again...

"They are too late and too distant to catch us. Jumping..." Flighty initiates jump. Once they are safe in jump space, he sets the systems for the week in transit and locks the console.

Then he turned to Sigrun and Donovan. "Looks like there were no surprises. We still don't know if we have an unwanted passenger. How do you two want to proceed as you have the lead on this."

Flighty

[Eris]

The radio coming in is mostly noise, civil and commercial broadcasts from the planet, a repeating request for all ships to remember to turn on their Transponders, and various messages from local brokers advertising their services. One message, though, catches Donovan's and Flighty's ears..."For the best deals on Tremous Dex, take a Chance...a New Chance!..." and then there are coordinates broadcast and the message then repeats itself once every minute or so.

"Well, well. Looks like someone wants to meet up. Too bad for them."

Flighty will look up the coordinates, making a bet to himself that it will be one of the gas giants.

From Engineering Doug calls the Bridge, "Hey, we're doing A-OK back here. I've flushed the pipes and opened the second lines up. We'll be able to jump again in, um, 7 minutes...Mark!"

"Bridge copies that."

Switching out the Jump Tape for Tremous Dex and the one Flighty has prepared for Rangent will take a couple of minutes. Maneuvering the ship into the proper configuration will take a couple more. Then its just waiting for the power plant to power back up and the jump bubble to build back up around the ship....

J-1: Sensors pick up two System Defense Boats light up and begin boosting in your direction. Neither is near enough to get within a few million miles of you before...

J-0: Doug sends the confirmation which you've already seen on the Bridge. The ship is ready to jump again...

"They are too late and too distant to catch us. Jumping..." Flighty initiates jump. Once they are safe in jump space, he sets the systems for the week in transit and locks the console.

Then he turned to Sigrun and Donovan. "Looks like there were no surprises. We still don't know if we have an unwanted passenger. How do you two want to proceed as you have the lead on this."

Flighty

OOC: Flighty would have won that bet...or lost it depending upon how you look at it. The coordinates would have taken you to the gas giant labeled Axiom one planet out-system from the one Tremous Dex orbits.

After the ship enters jump and is isolated for a week, a library check on Tremous Dex shows an interesting tid bit. There is a research base on a moon orbiting Axiom. The owners of that base are listed as Quicksilver Group Technologies and a note shows that the base has been leased to The Quicksilver Academy for 'basic research.'

[Tiglath]

Then he turned to Sigrun and Donovan. "Looks like there were no surprises. We still don't know if we have an unwanted passenger. How do you two want to proceed as you have the lead on this."

Sigrún gives a sardonic smile "Well, some progress, now we collectively know that I'm not the spy. If I was I'd have killed everyone on the bridge, locked myself in and waited for my allies aboard the SDBs to bring me my paycheck. Likewise for Donovan unless he, rightly, thought he couldn't take me..." her lips twitch as she fixes Donovan with the challenge of her unsettling heterochromatic gaze "...and also you Foringi Flighty. If you were the spy you just arsed that up and really pissed on* your employers, já?"

She adds "If Quicksilver make computers may we should take a spanner... uh...a little fiddly screwdriver to the ships systems and avionics - maybe look for our spy in there?"

She continues "I don't think for now we can do anymore than appear to relax and have whoever is bridge crew continue anti-hijack monitoring of crew and hatches - which happens to be only us three. We should set some security on the hide with the artefact as a trap for the spy. If we seem to be slack the spy might show their hand some other way but remember the bomb would have killed all aboard so, if they remained aboard, I say we look not for a spy but a fanatic. I've seen fanatics - they'd be really bad at maintaining a cover and, although willing to die, require a big idea to do it for. Corporate espionage just doesn't fit that".

(OOC: * Second language).

Edit: wonky colour selection

[ateno]

"Well I know its not me, I woke up with a bunch of these people, but I would say that anyway, if I was. Anyway, we should relax and do some more spear and axe practice. Yes?"

Karcsi

[terrymixon]

The radio coming in is mostly noise, civil and commercial broadcasts from the planet, a repeating request for all ships to remember to turn on their Transponders, and various messages from local brokers advertising their services. One message, though, catches Donovan's and Flighty's ears..."For the best deals on Tremous Dex, take a Chance...a New Chance!..." and then there are coordinates broadcast and the message then repeats itself once every minute or so.

"Well, well. Looks like someone wants to meet up. Too bad for them."

Flighty will look up the coordinates, making a bet to himself that it will be one of the gas giants.

OOC: Flighty would have won that bet...or lost it depending upon how you look at it. The coordinates would have taken you to the gas giant labeled Axiom one planet out-system from the one Tremous Dex orbits.

After the ship enters jump and is isolated for a week, a library check on Tremous Dex shows an interesting tid bit. There is a research base on a moon orbiting Axiom. The owners of that base are listed as Quicksilver Group Technologies and a note shows that the base has been leased to The Quicksilver Academy for 'basic research.'

He'll pass that info along. "Looks like our treacherous patrons have a name. I wonder if it is one of those hidden psionic institutes one hears about every once in a while?"

Flighty

[terrymixon]

Then he turned to Sigrun and Donovan. "Looks like there were no surprises. We still don't know if we have an unwanted passenger. How do you two want to proceed as you have the lead on this."

Sigrún gives a sardonic smile "Well, some progress, now we collectively know that I'm not the spy. If I was I'd have killed everyone on the bridge, locked myself in and waited for my allies aboard the SDBs to bring me my paycheck. Likewise for Donovan unless he, rightly, thought he couldn't take me..." her lips twitch as she fixes Donovan with the challenge of her unsettling heterochromatic gaze "...and also you Foringi Flighty. If you were the spy you just arsed that up and really pissed on* your employers, já?"

She adds "If Quicksilver make computers may we should take a spanner... uh...a little fiddly screwdriver to the ships systems and avionics - maybe look for our spy in there?"

She continues "I don't think for now we can do anymore than appear to relax and have whoever is bridge crew continue anti-hijack monitoring of crew and hatches - which happens to be only us three. We should set some security on the hide with the artefact as a trap for the spy. If we seem to be slack the spy might show their hand some other way but remember the bomb would have killed all aboard so, if they remained aboard, I say we look not for a spy but a fanatic. I've seen fanatics - they'd be really bad at maintaining a cover and, although willing to die, require a big idea to do it for. Corporate espionage just doesn't fit that".

(OOC: * Second language).

Edit: wonky colour selection

"Pissed off," Flighty corrected absently. "Though the other works just fine, too. Did you see anything try to use the transmitter, Donovan?"

Flighty

[terrymixon]

"Well I know its not me, I woke up with a bunch of these people, but I would say that anyway, if I was. Anyway, we should relax and do some more spear and axe practice. Yes?"

Karcsi

Now that Flighty has his Gunnery-0, he can start on that Melee-1 with boarding axes.

[Tiglath]

"Well I know its not me, I woke up with a bunch of these people, but I would say that anyway, if I was. Anyway, we should relax and do some more spear and axe practice. Yes?"

"Já! Karcsi, I don't think it is you at all but since you would be particularly difficult to kill I might pretend it is you for training purposes. No slight to your honour or personal offence intended of course".

[ateno]

"Já! Karcsi, I don't think it is you at all but since you would be particularly difficult to kill I might pretend it is you for training purposes. No slight to your honour or personal offence intended of course".

Karcsi laughs heartily!!

"It could be you, set here in a sleeper, looking like you have had a bad day and we take you in?"

Karcsi smiles.

"But yes, good fodder for fighting!"

Karcsi

[Tiglath]

Karcsi laughs heartily!!

"It could be you, set here in a sleeper, looking like you have had a bad day and we take you in?"

Karcsi smiles.

"But yes, good fodder for fighting!"

She eyes Karcsi and gives a challenging grin "Hah, so you say - but if that's so then haven't I already fooled you all?"

She pauses and winces at some pain then rubs her brow before hefting her new axe and eyeing it intently "Maybe there are more unknown layers of me but my instincts say discovery lies within the warrior's path".

"Gah, double jump! I might need some mead before I set to training".

[joertexas]

Zaki keys her suit comm. "Can we repressurize and get the gravity back on? I need to use the head, and I don't want to clean this suit."

[terrymixon]

Zaki keys her suit comm. "Can we repressurize and get the gravity back on? I need to use the head, and I don't want to clean this suit."

Flighty looked at Sigrun. "Are we ready to repressurize?"

Flighty

[Tiglath]

Zaki keys her suit comm. "Can we repressurize and get the gravity back on? I need to use the head, and I don't want to clean this suit."

"Já repressurize and restore ship's gravity. We have voided all areas of the ship long enough to flush out or kill a stowaway intending us harm and I feel we have not proven any suspicion against any crew members save that someone may have recently used the hide. I say Donovan and I maintain our vigilance but for the moment we stand down and you resume command Foringi Flighty".

She unloads her rifle and adds "I'll stow my gear and let everyone know about the hide and that the suspected security issue proved to be a historic event. I'm qualified to check out and rate that vacc suit. If it's functional I'll add it to the ship's stocks".

[Tiglath]

Zaki keys her suit comm. "Can we repressurize and get the gravity back on? I need to use the head, and I don't want to clean this suit."

Sigrún, looking entirely comfortable moving in a vacc suit with a military longarm, comes through to the crew commons to report "It's a Stand Down everyone - we are back to normal operations. Standard environment is being restored". She relates the finding of the smuggling voids and the hide and gear. "After discovering the bomb we had to be sure there was no one hiding aboard who intended us harm. I will show anyone who wants to see what we found and either the engineers or myself can demonstrate the new ship spaces we have discovered".