The Burnished Dawn winked into existence as it returned to material space. The only warning gave was a faint shimmer of light at the edge of the Weydana system. The colony ship engaged it's thrusters. The blocky brick like craft slowly rotated, setting a vector for Weydana-4, before it fired it's main engines. A pod of voraija that were cavorting in the upper atmosphere of Weydana-6 effortlessly zipped through the vacuum as the ship skimmed the gravity well of the planet. They sang to each other in a microwave concert that reverberated through the ship's hull and played havoc with the sensors as they pass you. Perhaps they were startled by your sudden arrival from Drift space.

"No worries folks," the ship's comms cut through the whale song's din with Erizand's calm voice. "Just spooked some harmless locals." He reassured the crew.

The bridge crew busied themselves at their stations, reacting as a well oiled machine after five weeks together in the Drift. The fledgling colonists might be a rag-tag bunch and have no uniforms, but all are experienced professionals. Within two hours the plan is for all of you to be boots on the ground at your new home. The open glass steel view ports give you a glorious view of the various planets as you passed them.

Erizand "Patches" Shyre stuck his steaming cup of coffee in the cup holder at his console, and dropped his half eaten breakfast biscuit next to it. Technically it was early morning ship's time. Astraca, the ships ysoki counselor, had the bright idea that for the last few weeks in the Drift the ship's crew should assimilate to Weydana-4's local time. Everyone reluctantly agreed, after some cajoling, and had adjusted their schedules accordingly.

Sniffing, Erizand checked everything over one final time, and eased back in to the pilot's seat.

"Well hell of a view, huh?" He asked over his shoulder at the gathered crew. "Our new home." He made a sweeping gesture towards the viewport.
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:18, Wed 28 Aug.

Kala-Shin had complied with the schedule readily, a task made easier when Kala had pointed out that she could see without difficulty well into twilight and thus could afford to be a bit looser with respect to local solar cycles. But they made a point of being awake for this, and are standing at the viewport, looking out at the world beneath them. They are, at present, in the somewhat awkward position of having nothing in particular to do except stay out of the bridge crew's way. In two hours, she will have boots on the ground, and at that point they will have work to do, a great deal of it. But right now, they'd only get in the way.

And so they simply stand and watch the world coming closer with each moment. They do not say anything in response to Erizand's words, but Kala flicks one hand through a few quick signs, and the meaning is echoed by a telepathic impression. It is beautiful.

Kala-Shin generally prefers to use sign language and telepathy when practical rather than talk. They aren't incapable of speech at all, just prefer this as a baseline. Not totally sure how I should mark those messages in the text.
This message was last edited by the player at 21:41, Wed 28 Aug.

While friendly enough Sprix proves to be at least as interested in the ship, or close formation of cargo containers depending on your interpretation, than on any given person.  She spends most of her spare time helping out with minor engineering tasks to keep the life support and crew interaction systems in top shape, occasionally she finds her way onto large teams responsible for the maintenance of the separation and landing systems, but she ignores the main engines and more ship style components almost entirely.

As the trip grows longer more and more of the engineers discover the value of having someone so tiny to fit into the spaces no human could ever dream of using to get to the hard to reach spots and do long complex jobs in a fraction of the time by just starting at the end.  Eventually this is all she does, so she gets to learn a little bit about everything rather than focusing her on the job training in any particular direction.

Rather than be distracted by the singing space creatures Sprix heads directly for the malfunctioning sensors, resetting and adjusting power settings to bleed off energy with a minimum of damage and downtime.

Waka had eagerly adjusted his schedule to the local planet's time, helpfully waking his teammates when they were subjectively 'sleeping in'. He met the others on the bridge and got on tip toe to get a better look at the planet. "Wow it sure is something! Ripe for the taking! I hope those critters aren't the only things living on this world or this will be a boring mission!" is voice somehow managing to be both high and gravelly. The purple furred skittermander, scratched his face with one of his six hands, the old scar on his face seemed to bother him at times. At the same time he fiddled with the spooled wire garrote at his belt, the only weapon or armor he was wearing at the moment, and with two more hands he signed to Kala 'Very, but most of them are from this height.'

There's sense of agreement from Kala-Shin in response to Waka's comment, laced through with both eager interest and a more subdued curiosity. Most things are beautiful from sufficient distance. Most things are interesting when examined closely enough. Two hours, it seems, in which to watch one transition into the other. Slightly less; they do have some belongings to collect, before planetfall, though not many. Kala tends to travel light. They aren't carrying a weapon, either. She's never felt the need.

Vinka's schedule had already been all over the place between energy-drink-fueled vidgaming and prodding the crew about their favorite vidgames, vidstreamers, music, and b-tier social media influencers. While she had agreed to get herself up and about for what made for the standard time of the system, with the planetfall coming soon, she decided to get in as much gaming as she could before the real work started. The Shirren girl was lying on a couch. She was wearing a skintight black suit with veins of RGB lighting pulsing throughout it with a dark coat on top marked with green glowing magical glyphs with a large circle surrounded by them on the back resembling the holy symbol of Eloritu. She wore headphones, and over her eyes was a holographic display. On one of her hands was a glove meant as an input device for the vidgame she was playing. The hand moved around, and the fingers rapidly tapped the air intensely. It was hard to tell what she was playing.

Her session was disturbed as the holographic display glitched with the rest of the ship, and it was followed by frustrated skittering sounds from her mandibles. She let out a loud sigh, and she flicked her fingers to dismiss the display. She drummed her chest while considering if she should get up, ultimately choosing to get up. She pulled the headphones off from her ears and let them hang from her neck as she joined her co-workers in gawking at the planet.

"Top five celestial objects I have seen from orbit. Because it's ours, maybe top three?" Vinka replied telepathically to Kala. "Full of mysteries begging to be solved and secrets to be uncovered." She also extended her latter words to Waka.

In reply to Sprix (msg # 3):

Tukor Hardhoof, the Nuar security officer, was looking flustered. His ears were down and he gave a snort as he tapped instructions into the sensor console before you extended a helping LFAN. Lost in his own work he had not noticed you scurrying over until you efficiently make repairs on the malfunctioning sensors. He looked bemused as the system rebooted better than it was before. You had even managed to save his settings and the display reverts back to dark mode for him.

Staring down his muzzle at you he snorted again, before he crouched down, and rests his forearms on his knees. Even having done this he is still taller than you. "Thank you, little warrior." His voice is gruff, but sincere. He gives you a salute as he tapped his closed fist to his breast twice before standing and resuming his duties.


Deirdrik, the ysoki coms specialist, snickered from her seat. "We should have had the turnip on sensors it seems, instead of you Hardhoof." Why she was manning her station at the moment was anyone's guess. Weydana does not have the infrastructure to have a port authority or even much in the way of traffic to need someone on coms. Not yet anyway.

The Nuar's ears once again go down, for a moment it seemed he might reply to the ysoki's snide remark. Instead he only snorted before continuing long range scans of Weydana-4.


In reply to Waka (since everyone else is using sign language and telepathy):

Erizand smiled and grabbed his crutch, the servos on his leg braces whirred as he stood. "Well I disagree there. I've seen enough action to last me a lifetime, my friend. I could do with some boring." He leaned heavily on is crutch as he made his way to the center display table.

All of you have been briefed on Erizand "Patches" Shyre, the advisor hired by the charter’s patron. A veteran of the Swarm Wars he has experience with command. On top of that he has multiple degrees in colony governance, xeno botany, and political theory.

As the display powers up a 3-d rendering of the land chartered to the crew of the Burnished Dawn unfolds into being. Erizand tapped one of his crutches lightly to draw the crew’s attention. He gave a wide smile before speaking. “A great place to set down roots, isn’t it? I’ve just correlated the local survey data to find the best sites for our initial settlement. Scans show that a rainstorm recently swept through, likely leaving it washed clean and glistening with dew for us." He nods over toward Tukor in thanks. "There are three, actually, and the final choice will be yours.” The man pulled up a rough overland map on his datapad. It has very little on it —filling in those details will be a task for later—but three sites glow with green circles. Erizand continued, “This one at the forest’s edge will have lots of timber and game, but no easy access to minerals. This lakeshore site has access to fish and minerals in the lake’s banks, but it’s far from timber. This mountain pass here is close to several mineral deposits but could be short on game. Everyone’s eager to land and start offloading. But it is best to have a game plan first. Where will it be?”
This message was last edited by the GM at 16:18, Thu 29 Aug.

Kala-Shin seems to change all at once as their focus shifts to the map. They're all business now, examining the limited recon information available. "We don't like the lakeside from a defensive perspective. It will be hard to fortify a colony there effectively, when it's in the middle of that much open terrain. I will be most effective with the forest nearby, but I think the mountain site is also workable." They're still signing along with their speech, but it's more habit than anything, and their speech is brisk and economical.

Examining the map while standing on a chair Sprix scans the larger map into a small device that seems to be part of her armor. "Location D seems reasonable, it has ready access to water and sits between forest and mountains for resource access."

Deimyn entered. It was obvious that he had just awoken from one of the naps that he had become infamous for.

"I like this area. . ." he said as he pointed to the green circle that indicated the forest location. ". . . seems like a good place to start, but I may just be a little homesick..." the lashunta said thoughtfully. "Anywho, I wouldn't be opposed to just starting off somewhere else!"

Waka stands on a chair to get a good look at the map "I say we take the mountain site. We have technology on our side if he have the resources to construct it. If we can't find game we can build green houses, if we need to get food from far off we can build vehicles. But we can't do either of those without raw materials from the site. How much food did we bring with us anyway?" He asks the last question sort of vaguely to whoever has an answer.

Erizand listened to the admin team begin to discuss which landing site to settle first with interest.

"Waka has a point. Raw resources will be important, and we have about six months of pre-packaged food and MRE's in storage. Assuming we get seeds in the ground ASAP, most of our crops have anywhere from 50 days to harvest all the way to 110 or so." Keeping the admin team informed on minor details was his responsibility, and he took it seriously.

"The main issue with the pass is we are so far south that we will only be able to expand North. The other side of these mountains is another charter's territory." He said looking around the table.