-- For all rp on board dropship --

The Union class dropship 'Raider' is an old beast, some of its parts over four hundred years old. It was once used by Clan Jade Falcon, and was intended to be sent back to the homeworlds after the first clan invasion wave.
As such the dropship holds some clan tech and schematics, and is updated with clan starcharts. This is the primary reason the Raiders know where to find the clan homeworlds.
The 'Raider' has twelve Mech bays, two aero bays, and an upgraded cargo compartment. It has a standard weapons array and has living room for 32 people.

March 6th, 3051.
19.55 hours. Steltenpool spaceport, Moxley IV.

The ship's warning horn sounds twice, and all lighting turns to red. The colonel's voice comes up over the internal speakers for all to hear.

Attention all. Have a seat and buckle up, prepare for launch. Raider will lift off in five minutes. Make sure all loose items are secured so they don't drift off in zero gravity, ensure all magnetics are enabled. Thank you, have a safe flight.

The dropship begins to rumble and shudder as the engines come to life.

Not yet responsible for anything but her own personal gear in her own quarters Tamara does a quick double check of the few things she has with her, mostly in a duffle bag already secured in her bunk's footlocker.  Then she sets that same bunk to its acceleration couch mode and straps in for the festivities.

Eileen was bone tired, but a light sleeper.  The rumblings of a Dropship taking off was something that was akin to an earthquake and not something you slept through.  As far as she was concerned, she was in a perfect position to wait out the gravitational pull of breaking orbit to make it out to space.  Laid out on her bunk the force is spread out comfortably over her body and easy to wait out.

When it was over she starts to stir.  With a few hours of sleep tucked away, she found she could actually eat.  She manages to drag herself out of bed and notices that she has a bunkmate now.  It wasn't particularly unexpected.  This was a union class dropship, which meant that space was precious and tight, and mostly taken up by huge mechs that were to deploy, which was this things primary focus.  Roomy long term accommodations were not part of it's mission statement.

These bunks must have been installed as a concession to long term travel, and were actually quite the luxury having only two to the room instead of the four she expected.

'Was it morning?  Afternoon?  Evening?', really in space such things sort of lost their meaning.

A mess hall on such a spartan dropship was probably out of the question and would have to wait till they got to where ever they went.  Either to a jump point or a base in system.

Fingers work her hair back into a neat bundle to tie off with red bandana that she had recently bought.  The pony tail was threaded through her Sutherby cap.  At this point she feels capable of getting out of the bunk to face whatever was waiting for her.

"Hello.", she comments to Nadia.  It would have been rude not to make some sort of greetings, but Nadia looked occupied, so she kept it brief.

Picking up her sidearm, she goes to the footlocker to put it away.  You were on a dropship, and shooting it off even accidentaly could do bad things in space, so she understood that such things were not to be carried casually.  Instead, she keeps her belted survival knife handy, making certain it was settle comfortably and out of the way at the small of her back in a horizontal position for easy drawing.

The locker was full of mostly camping supplies she had brought in a hurry.  Among them edibles, water, mess kit, single burner stove, and other things you would need to 'rough it' in the wilds.

She finds the roll of crackers she was looking for and opens it.  They were commercial, and not the military tasteless stuff.  She pops one in her mouth to avoid making crumbs.

"Cracker?", she offers one to her studious room mate.  She sensed, they were going to get along pretty good.  She was left alone to sleep, and this room mate seemed to like to read.  This room mate also seemed to be female, so that whole mixed gender awkwardness wasn't going to be an issue.

Nothing like food to help strangers bond.

After take off the Union dropped into an orbital spin to ensure 1G acceleration. That way zero gravity was over in just a few seconds, short enough time to prevent anything but the occasional loose mug or combat boot to go adrift. When the Union settled into its orbital pattern waiting for its transport launch window the intercom once again came to life.
Ladies and Gentlemen, this is Bubba speaking. Settle in and get comfortable, we will be spending the next twenty-four hours in transit. Raider will be moving on a steady 1G burn towards Moxley III, where we will be landing on its second moon. There we will be home. Once we get there everyone will be assigned quarters and a nice little tour of the compound will be provided in order for everyone to settle in. For now, there is makeshift dinner in mech bay 7 for those that want it. Thank you for travelling Colonel Bubba airlines.

Skinner familiarized himself with the ship, paying special attention to the clan technology. As he does he also makes sure to introduce himself to the crew and other support team making sure he remembered their names. Once in orbit he seeks out the commander.

As he familiarizes himself with the crew Skinner takes special note of mechanical engineer Tony 'Three-finger' Nelson. The young man introduced himself as the engineer assigned to maintain his Mech. His nickname was obvious, the man had only three fingers on his left hand, and no hesitation to explain to Skinner he lost the other two when getting stuck under a loose heat sink on a Commando. With some glee he even explains he used his own angle grinder to cut them off, and that those two fingers are probably still inside a Lyran Mech somewhere.

Lift time was familiar enough that all Nadia had to do after the announcement was pull up the mesh crash netting around the bunk and clip her data pad to the lanyard at her wrist before the ship lifted. Laying back comfortably on the bunk as the acceleration pushed her down into the cushions, she finished the article on transfusion related complications and decided against anything heavy as they broke atmo, settling instead for some of the Bard's sonnets.

As they settled into orbit, everything loose in the bunk floated free, which mainly consisted of Nadia and the pillow she was lying against. Free-fall lasted only a few seconds as the Raider spun up to a comfortable 1G, just long enough for Nadia to float into a sitting position on the bunk. Stowing her data pad in a thigh pocket and taking down the mesh, the slim latina made eye contact with Eileen as she got up and started moving around.

"Good evening." Making eye contact as the redhead greeted her, Nadia smiled and waited her turn to climb down the ladder. The doctor was used to cramped quarters, before they'd gone freelance, she'd shared a four-bunk with the rest of the 317th's medical team for two years, and this was more spacious than that had been. There would be a shaking out period, while they figured out schedules, chores, and the like, but Nadia found that without the big hold-out in her hand and wild look in her eye, Eileen was actually pretty friendly and approachable.

Slipping down off the top bunk as Eileen rummaged in her footlocker, Franz almost subconsciously stepped back into a narrow gap between the bulkhead and a structural brace, taking up as little space as possible. When the cracker was offered, she took one with a smile. "Yes please." Nadia held on to the cracker for a moment, keeping her mouth free. "Better than Fed-Com standard issue, thank you. I'm Nadia Franz, and it looks like we're going to be bunking together."

She paused a moment as the Colonel made an announcement over the intercom, listening carefully to the flight plan. "Well at least for the next day or so. I imagine they'll assign us bunks at the compound." Popping the wafer in her mouth, she chewed it quickly and swallowed, fastidiously checking her fatigues for crumbs. "Should we go see if the food is as good as the signing bonus?"

Candice heads to one of the places you can see outside a port hole during lift off, as this is her first real experience leaving planet.

Eileen quirks an eyebrow at the announcement.  She takes out three other crackers and stows the rest in her locker again.

She continues to eat them one at a time as she recovers her comp unit to put back in her cargo pants.

"You can go on ahead without me.  I suspect that after this announcement it's going to be rather crowded.  I'm not a fan of crowds.  If we have 24 hours of down time, plenty of time to eat later.  I'll probably be along half a hour or so from now when the first wave of hungry mercs are finishing up.", Eileen picks up a few data disc she had prepared and starts to leave.

"Mercs are like animals.  Never come between them and a warm meal."

"Hwyl fawr...", she comments gaily as she steps out of the berth area into the narrow corridors of the dropship.  She's off to the repair area, where most of her gear was quietly stowed in a corner.  She unlocks the crate that containers her equipment and starts to get to work.

A recently added crate was there that she had brought along, that was now shoved out and away a little to have room to work.  Cracking the seals on the thing, a brand new commercial rated Fusion engine was revealed.  Often used to provide power for housing off the grid, or provide power for vehicles like the Savannah Masters that the unit used.

Tools were laid out, along with many parts she had brought along to get to work on the small commercial engine.

Eileen will be busy for a good long time, and only realize she's hungry after a few hours have passed, and the need to relieve herself urges her to stop and take care of mortal fleshy needs.  Even with everything planned out it was probably going to take a while to finish the work she wanted done on the engine block.

The repair area and Mech bays kind of overlap, so from a distance the people having a quick microwave dinner can easily see what is going on the 'shop'.
Cassidy quickly notices Eileen opening a crate and laying out tools. He puts his plate on the table and walks over to the repair bay. There he stands to the side for a few seconds to check what it is she is doing.
After checking she at least takes rudamentary care to place the tools on magnetized trays and takes necessary precoutions to prevent stuff flying about in case of an emergency stop he comes closer to see what she is actually working on.
Good to see you are taking precautions. Always nice to see a mechanic that knows what they are doing. Is that a Urbanworks XL? Sweet little engines those are. reliable too. What are you planning on doing with it?

Having very nearly stuffed herself earlier in the day Tamara takes a few minutes to find her way through some of the less obvious paths of the dropship so she can get a start on learning alternate routs to the mech bay.  Eventually she finds herself in the right place and accepts a plate of the so called makeshift dinner which doesn't seem to be any kind of problem for her standards of quality as she begins eating it even before she makes it all the way to a table.

"It's a the conversion kit for light commercial engines.  I'm looking to see if i can use it on a light engine like the Omni 25 Fusion engine.  Will lighten the engine by... around half... but create balance issue that needs to be redistributed on anything that already has a Omni 25 engine.  For instance on a Savannah master... it would lighten the load, but the bulk we create drag and aero dynamic issues that will create balancing issues."

Eileen makes an ergo motion with her spanner in her hand, "with the weight savings... you solve the balancing issues by fitting heavier armor to rebalance the Savannah master.  That goes for anything you would put this in.  It gets trickier in say... a VTOL, which has aerodynamic issues that if you screw up will make you crash... and be expensive.  Still if i can reduce the mass of this thing from a thousand pounds to around 500, that's a pretty notably load capacity for a light unit."

Eileen is surprisingly friendly and talkative to anyone that talks to her about tech.

"I can't do any of the really serious work on it, but welding of the blocks will have to be done after i get the fittings worked out.  I'm mostly doing a dry run to adjust and fit what i can and to make sure i'm not missing parts ... or... if i am make notes on it, so maybe... we can find a workaround for it."
This message was last edited by the player at 20:14, Mon 06 Mar 2023.

As Candice enjoys staring out the window, enjoying the view of space for the very first time, she hears footsteps coming down the corridor. It's the young Mechwarrior captain.
Keeping a respectfull distance he observes her while she marvels at the beauty of space.
Gorgeous isn't? Can you imagine it streches out like that for millions of years in any direction? Imagine that... a distance so vast we don't even measure it anymore in meters, kilometers, nothing like that... We measure it in lightyears...

He joins her at the window, seeing the planet below them slowly becomming smaller as the dropship turns and sets course to the next planet in system. The green and blue that is Moxley IV quickly become smaller as the Raider reaches 1 G burn, gravity evening out to normal again.
First time in space? He asks...

---

Cassidy rolls up his sleeves after hearing of Eileen's plans. He looks around the tray of tools she has carefully laid out and then takes a look at the conversion kit pieces. His interest is clearly peaked, and the smile on his face betrays that he is in his element.
You could try to counter the balance issues the conversion causes in a small VTOl like the Ferret with a bunch of extra armour, but you would rikslosing the typical characteristics like speed and manouverability. However, in my youth I used to enjoy building racing drones, and regularly souped up those tiny engines. Adding weight actually made them more sluggish instead of faster, but if you adjust the rotorblade size and add a couple of fins they can make optimal use of the added speed and drag it provides, keeping them stable and manouverable, at least at speed. I don't know if that would work for a regular VTOL but I guess it is something to look into.
 
He stands up and walks to one of the work stations where he pulls up the schematics of the Ferret's engine. Humming a tune to himself that Eileen recognises as having bit a hit song twenty years ago he starts to study the blueprints.

---

In the dining area newly appointed chef Sabatino hands out microwaved meals to a couple of newcomers, all the while apologizing that he can not 'shine up a turd and make it edible'. It clearly pains him to have to distribute ready made meals, but it is all the dropship has available. The giant, Maximus Blaze, who is eating his third meal already, keeps reminding him he will have a large kitchen available to him once he gets to Raiders home base.
Sarrah Yu joins them all at the dinner table. She grabs half a bite and slides the plate away in disgust, which creates a waterfall of apologies by the pasta chef. Apologies she ignores as she turns to Tamara.
That Phoenix Hawk in Bay five, that one is yours isn't it?

"I have a custom Ferret... that i named "Clover".  I've taken the design of the Ferret about as far is it will go without radically changing the VTOL's profile.  Fitting a Fusion, especially an XL Fusion into it, will break the profile.  To much fiddling with the heat sinks and power management will change the profile, so i've worked out a new... Ferret inspired... version for this engine for the next iteration... Four Leaf Clover.  It's a little wider and tapered, to help improve control, and provide a little glide for the handling.  You'll have more area to fit cargo, but the ceiling will be lower... In a pinch, the top speed calculations are notably faster than the standard ferret.", Eileen is good with the extra hands.  If it's just an engine conversion, she's not giving any secrets away, and from where she is, she can see when the kitchen thins a little to sneak a quick bites during a lull.

Looking up when the quiet contemplation, for good or ill, of the food is interrupted it takes Tamara a moment to place the woman asking the question, but not long enough to seem like she is avoiding answering.

”I didn't check the bay numbers I just followed the path of lights but I believe mine is the only Phoenix Hawk aboard.”

Oh dont worry the bay is fine. My Mech is at home anyway although I usually dont use it much. Bubba prefers me flying the Raider or the jumpship.
Sarrah smiles sheepishly, hoping she didnt offend Tamara with her question, or make her feel attacked.
No, reason I asked is just that I think its a beautiful Mech. Always been a favorite design of mine.

Jason had found himself a comfortable enough acceleration chair that no one had claimed and had strapped his remaining gear underneath and then strapped in for the ride into space. The trip was far better than some he had been on in the past.

Once the dropship settled into orbit and Bubba made his announcement he decided to take a look around as he made his way to Bay 7. He wasn't all that hungry but he had learned to never pass up food. The bay was crowded when he got there, numerous people chatting and eating. Staying out of the way he nabbed a couple plates and found himself a fairly quiet shadowy corner to eat his meals and listen to the chatter.

Mike and Dar weren't late to dinner; not technically anyway. A last minute snafu during loading the shop had shifted some things, and the pair had actually spent the takeoff in the bay re-securing the contents of the small container, so they'd been there all along, but by the time they emerged from the shop, dinner was in full swing and they had to queue up for rations.

The microwaved meal was at least hot, which was better fare than you usually found in the field, and both men took a moment to thank Sabatino for his hard work before finding the corner of one of the long tables to eat at. Neither man wasted any time devouring the meal with obvious gusto, microwaved rations or not. Darius ended up going back for seconds, and spotted their third on his way back, half concealed behind the massive freebirth elemental. Nadia met his eyes, and shook her head, and Dar had enough sense not to push it.

Sliding back onto the long bench the crew chief glanced up at his pilot. "Something you wanna tell me Mike? Nadia's been actin' like you've got Capellan Crabs since before liftoff."

Kreig lifted his head and looked around. "She's here?" A confirming nod and he sighed, shaking his head. "She's pissed at me Dar, that's all, needs her time to cool off. You know how it is."

Finishing their meal, the two men just sat and watched the goings on in the bay, noticing the cluster that had formed around Eileen and the engine she was working on. The mechbay wasn't really big enough to keep them from following the conversation, and the two shared a look. Darius with an excited gleam as from the sound of it the work was everything they were trying to do on the Dragonfly, and Mike with a look of wide-eyed shock. She was a Ferret pilot? Or Engineer, or something... Mike shook his head and waved to Dar. "Go. You know you want to get stuck in on the details. Learn what you can, just remember, we need a flyable bird, not a hangar project."

Nadia had chosen her place carefully, away from the doors, close to the giant Maximus. Not just for concealment, though that was a benefit, because she wasn't ready to face Kreig again yet. Ever since the Elemental's outburst in the conference room and Colonel Johnsson's explanation her curiosity had been piqued. Picking at her own meal, she watched the giant tear through two, then into a third before she got up the nerve to ask some questions.

"Mr... Blaze was it? I don't want to interrupt your meal," The petite woman dipped her head and chuckled. "Though I suppose I just did. What did Colonel Johnsson mean about you being a freebirth? What does that mean in your culture? And what is an Elemental?"

Tamara doesn't seem bothered by the intrusion, just surprised that anyone would bother.  She doesn't stop eating but does at least swallow before talking.

”Jumpships don't really fly though, they just sit in one place and wait.  It is a pretty mech, I am trying to decide if I need to change the color scheme to something a little bit less obvious.”

Yes captain.  My first time off of the planet.  It is kind of a strange feeling to see the planet from above.

I am hoping that i can make a name here for myself.  Sure i won the tournaments, but i'm sure it is a far cry from what it is like for real.

So whats your name?  I'm Candice.

So true, so true! Sit and jump. We have occasional transit but its usually sit and jump indeed.  And yet they still call it piloting.
Sarrah chuckled. She picked at the microwaved food with a fork, knowing she needed to eat something but feeling rather hesitant.Maybe the Hawk will look nice in the bright Raider red. She's a beauty as it is much like yourself, so she might as well stand out right?

Quit hitting on the lady! the giant snapped at Sarrah between bites. At least give these people some proper time to get settled!
He then turned to face Nadia and gave her a wink, his way of at least indicating she hadn't been a bother.

I am a freebirth indeed.  That is what they call us in the clans when we are born... naturally... instead of engineered from a cryogenics vat. Those they Trueborn. They are of higher standing, because they have been tailor made for the task set out for their specific caste. I was not. Max shrugged.
Officially my name is just Maximus, so please, just call me Max. In the clans we do not have a last name. Only Bloodnames. Which are like a last name, but you have to earn it. As a freebirth... I was last in line to ever earn one. As an elemental, it is hard to ever earn a bloodname anyway.
He finished his third meal and put it aside, contemplating getting a fourth, but they really weren't all that good.
A Clan Elemental is what you would probably consider a combat armoured trooper. Only we live and breathe for it, and our tactics are fully designed to complement Mech warfare and tight quarters. I am actually small for an elemental.
He grinned. But not everywhere.
This message was last edited by the GM at 23:14, Mon 06 Mar 2023.