With little fanfare, the navies head off your ship.  You're down one prisoner.  But you've retained the stressed out, delusional heir.  So chalk up one win at least.

Pushing on to the next Jump?

Once the Navy was out of their hair Ledo had a lot of questions for the crew. He decided to start with Fritz.

"Fritz, can you pull a report of everything there is to know about Kla Mirken? We need to go in the opposite direction to get Nero to Collace but if the Mirken family is interested in retrieving this popsicle then maybe they can meet us halfway so we don't burn months of fuel and travel to get there."

He paused.

"Or for all we know his family sold him out and put him on ice to wipe away an embarrassment or clear the way for a fat inheritance. Before we go calling the Mirken's best to figure out what kind of noble scion Kla really was."

OOC: Yeah pushing out. The jump plan is Noctol -> Tarkine -> Talos -> Collace

Thanks for the flight path.  I was scanning old threads trying to remember where we were going next.

As Fritz gets busy prepping Tia for the next jump, Fritz pulls archives on what there is to know about the Mirken family.

It sounds like they'll be very glad to see him.  They offered bounties for his return.  The amounts kept going up and up, though they haven't posted one in a few years.  Quite a few years actually.

Did you know this guy's been frozen fifty four years now?

Funny how time flies, huh?

Anyway, his great nephew is now in control of the family.  He seems like a family man.

Oh!  The Mirken have a regional corporate headquarters in the Talos system.  So they'd be on the way!

Ledo nodded and finally gave himself a chance to relax. A lot had happened and he needed to process it. His pirate hunting plan had worked> from a technical point of view but seeing the arms dealer suicide into another ship was disturbing. He was no stranger to death but that kind of unhinged behavior unsettled him.

Tepha could sense the unease in him as he left the bridge but she decided he just needed time to process things.

There was mourning going on all around. Silver was upset about all the salvage that the Navy had chased them away from. Rig was saddened that he no longer had a certain nun on board with which to share his feelings with, and of course Nero was mourning the loss of his camera.

Despite having salvage, defeating some pirates and even rescuing someone who had been frozen for fifty years the overall tone of the crew was somber.

In reply to Ledo Typhin (msg # 4):

Alright.  Let's make our Jump rolls please.

Astrogation/EDU 4-

Engineer/EDU 4-

We've kind of gotten away from these rolls, and I want to plug them back in.

But hey. At least nothing will happen this jump.

Right?

Rig wasn't the most skilled at astrogation, but he knew his ship inside and out. And he loved her. The Tia had been Rig's home for over awhile now, and he had poured his heart and soul into her. He knew every bolt, every wire, every inch of her hull. He had repaired her countless times, upgraded her systems, and customized her to suit the needs of his crew.

With a deep breath, Rig hit the ignition switch. The Tia's engines roared to life and then reality winked out of existence. Rig could tell just by the hum of the engines what was happening. He could hear the engines flooding their extradimensional bubble, he could hear the miracle that was their J-Drive powering up and cycling through its stages.

He had loved every ship he had ever served on but none of them compared to how he loved Tia


20:11, Today: Gary 'Rig' Rigan rolled 11 using 2d6+3.
20:11, Today: Gary 'Rig' Rigan rolled 8 using 2d6+3.  astro/edu.

In reply to Gary 'Rig' Rigan (msg # 6):

I recall Rig's initial reaction to Tia wasn't so loving.  But hey.  Nothing grows love like a functioning life support system

For once, the Jump is bland.  You all spend time doing the things you prefer to do.  Then Tia signals Jump ending.  You come out into Noctol space...

...not far from a fire fight.

A quick scan shows five ships engaged in combat.  None of them are naval.  They all bear the logo of Strong Arm Dynamics, a corporation local to the system.

The space around him was filled with the bright flashes of laser fire, silent bolts of lightning that pierces the blackness of space. Debris from the fight floated through the void. Ledo's heart raced as he assessed the situation and started rapidly punching in course corrections to dodge and escape from the heart of the conflict.

"Tepha, get me comms stat. What the hell is going on here?"

Next to him Tepha began flipping through screens, first sensors and then communications to see if there was any explanation about why five ships were fighting one another.

In reply to Ledo Typhin (msg # 8):

Let's have Teph make those rolls please.  Hey...she got one of them last time

The scene is pretty chaotic.  So are the comm lines.  They all seem to be broadcasting emergency beacons on their channels. But that's not stopping them from firing on each other.

Uh...Captain Ledo?  They're launching torpedoes.  Maybe we should have someone in the turrets.  Just in case?

Tepha furrowed her brow as she scanned the comm frequencies, trying to make sense of the chaos erupting on the screen. The ships registered to Strong Arm Dynamics were tearing each other apart, their guns blazing in a deadly dance of destruction. She tried to piece together the jumbled transmissions as there had to be more to this battle than met the eye.

Her fingers flew across the console trying to untangle the web of chaos in front of her.


08:58, Today: Tepha Pezal rolled 9 using 2d6+1.  sensors / whatever.

Ledo hit the ships comms. "BB, Silver. Get to your turrets. Things are hot right now and we need defenses ASAP."

In reply to Ledo Typhin (msg # 11):

Have Silver and BB make Athletics/Dex checks for me please

Tepha, from what you can tell it seems to be a fight of three sides.  Two of the ships vs two of the ships vs the remaining one.  The chatter on the airwaves is confusing.  But they mostly seem to be...taunting each other?

President Yao sends her love

The Chairman will not yield!

Only Finance can save us!

Yep.  They're firing torpedoes at each other...and looks like three...nope.  Four of them are missing their targets and coming our way.

If Silver and BB make their Athletics checks, then they can sprint to their turrets and try to fire on the incoming torpedoes.  If not...

Good luck

Ledo hoped that at any moment the turrets would swivel around and start ripping apart those torpedoes. Any moment now...any mom-oh fuck...


16:20, Today: Silver rolled 5 using 2d6+1.  athletics check.

16:20, Today: BB Nova rolled 7 using 2d6.  athletics check.

In reply to Ledo Typhin (msg # 13):

Ew.  Yeah.  This is going to leave a mark.

Captain Ledo!  Engineer Rigg!  Two of them are on a direct-

From the explosions and Tia rattling shakes that occur next, you are assuming Fritz was going to tell you two of the torpedoes were about to hit.  They did.

Rig, your board lights up.  The hull took a solid blow near the fuel tank.  Luckily it didn't breach said tank.  But there's not much to cover that hole.  A scout troop trying to earn their welding badge could send you guys going super nova.

Of secondary importance is the nav comm.  The other torpedo took out nav tower.  So your ability to receive homing waves is gone.  -3 to any navigation roll until that's fixed

Oh.  And Silver's turret?..

How about Silver make me another Athletics check please.

BB is good to fire though

There was a lot of chatter on the comms but it all seemed to be a big fat old "not my problem" kind of conversation.

20:37, Today: Silver rolled 9 using 2d6+1.  what about silver's turret?

Another day another dollar. BB was starting to think Ledo was getting far more out of her than she was expecting when she agreed to work as a gunner for him.


20:39, Today: BB Nova rolled 10 using 2d6+7.  point defense  +4 beam laser +1 short range +2 skill.

In reply to Silver (msg # 15):

Silver, as the ship first started to shake, some sixth sense whispered in your ear.

...get the fuck outta here girl...

And your body did that.  You almost sommersaulted out of the turret as part of the hull ripped away.  The door slammed shut behind you just as the decompression started.

If you'd been one second later, you might be floating out in the black now.  But as is...

You made it.

Silver's Turret...out.  Sorry.  Tia took some heavy damage this time.

</purple>BB</purple>, you log on to your guns and get the scopes set.  In moments, you're knocking more rogue torpedoes out of the ether.

Well...the good news is I think we're safe for the moment.  Ms. BB seems to be knocking them out.  But we may want to beat a hasty Captain Ledo.

Tepha, you get a news feed alert.  And it may put some of this into context.

...Strong Arm Dynamics' internal feud took an even nastier turn today when it was discovered that Chief Financial Officer had attempted to poison several members of the Board who had disagreed with her attempts to oust acting Chief Executive Officer Hagans.  TAS has begun procedures to tag Noctol systems as an Amber sector until the corporate civil war is under control. Imperium Naval Command has declined comment, stating that the Noctol sector is a private sector, and therefore outside Naval jurisdiction.  This comes after...

You can't listen to much more of it as...you know.  You're in the middle of a war zone.  Things are you keeping you busy.
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:25, Tue 07 Mar 2023.

Ledo glanced at his fuel gauge and hit the afterburners. Their fuel tanks still had plenty of juice in them after only making a single jump to Tarkine. It was time to get the heck out of this warzone and re-assess the situation from a safer vantage point.

You take a quick glance at where you're going...

There are a total of four population centers in this system.

The main port is a high port circling the fourth moon of the second largest planet.

The third moon of the same planet is Chowder.  It has a sizeable mining settlement that works most of the moons for that planet.

The main population center is the second planet in the system, Noctol.  It's a cavern world, but apparently the caverns have been meticulously terra formed.  So it's rumored to be kind of lovely.

Lastly there's an older trading post on the rimward side of the system.  It doesn't see as much trade as the high port.  But it does seem to have enough flow going through it to keep it open.

Your best choices for a shipyard are the high port or the main world.  The miners might have some material for you to do a patch job, but probably not enough to get you ship shape.

No telling what the trading post may be able to provide.

Assuming there wasn't more fighting around the main station, Ledo would burn there. His ship was badly damaged and he need to get things back up and running ASAP.

In reply to Ledo Typhin (msg # 20):

Sorry. Thought I had responded already

You manage a course to the main station, though it's a bit tricky without the nav.

Luckily there's a lot of chatter on the comm lines so you can use that to find your way.

As you approach, you can see there's a lot of traffic.  Tepha, it sounds like a lot of ships are waiting for berth space.  Seems like everyone in the sector is trying to get aboard the main station. Sounds like the fighting is all over the place.

Tia, this is Station Command.  Park it.  We'll get you a berth as soon as we can.

Ledo took a deep breath and tried to clear his mind. The fight had come out of nowhere, and he had no idea what had caused it. He needed more information if he was going to get his crew out of this alive.

"Tepha, see if you can find out anything more about Strong Arm Dynamics. Maybe there's a clue in their history or something that could help us make sense of this. Rig, what's the status of the hullz` breach and nav comm?"

Rig's face was grim as he scrolled through diagnostics.

"Captain, the hull breach is stable for now, but we'll need to repair it as soon as possible. The nav comm is out, so we'll have to rely on visual navigation until we can fix it."

"BB, keep firing on those torpedoes. Rig, get started on the repairs. Silver, help Rig. Tepha, keep looking for any information you can find.  We're not out of this yet."

He flipped back to the external comms to talk to the station.

"Acknowledged, Station Command. I'll standby and await further instructions. Please let me know as soon as there is a berth available for me to dock. In the meantime, can you provide me with any information on the current situation at the station?"

He didn't bother waiting for a response, sending the comm signal to route through Tepha's terminal. She was better at speaking to bureaucrats than he ever was. He raced down the hallway towards the damaged section to see if Rig needed any help. If they were venting atmosphere this could be really bad really quickly and while he had issued orders to Silver he didn't even know if she was injured or not.