Z
Zack
ON> Ragna-city
Uso was perched on top of the Queen's slave, her power armor laying open in the spot where Errowyn's fighter was usually setup. Her black tights were clinging to her hips, as her hands clung to the datapad in front of her. The neko's hair all pulled back into a ponytail so that she could easily shift her attention between the pad and the city as she marked out just where she wanted everything to go. She couldn't help but smile, it was like playing a video game... only this stuff was really going to happen. Her funding was looking more and more secure. The I'ee would provide the Labor. The people were docile and the resources were close to the surface. What had started as a causal conversation was quickly turning into a large operation.
She was nearly ready to let herself feel like she had earned that title of empress.
A sudden, unexpected rolling thunder, like the old gods had responded to her self-importance with a gesture of pure spite.
It was a massive thing streaking overhead, a mutilated ball of flaming metal. Grey and green arcs of failing hull panels sheared off the imposing hulk and fell to the planet behind it, not just one large piece of debris, but a whole swarm of metal chunks flying in formation. Only the object at the very center held onto some vague semblance of a recognizable shape, some kind of pyramid shaped double-hull with shattered masts of bronze vibrating all around. It was... like the sails of an ancient seafaring vessel?... Who would design such a primitive ship?
Uso's sunny little spot on the top of the Queen's slave was briefly darkened by the ship passing overhead.... forcing her to look up, her eyes following its descent.
Some kind of glass mega structure on the rear of the behemoth exploded. If this was an attack, it was a suicide attack. That much was obvious.
More worrying was the fact that it was bearing down above the city, and not just some random location. Random shells of habitation sections and the broken cylinders of chemical containment tanks rained down from the sky in one long arc of continuous bombardment. Thankfully, it seemed to be heading towards some point at the outskirts, but that did not stop the sheer scale of the thing from dropping down hunks of metal the size of family cars.
Finally, cataclysmically, it broke landfall, erupting into a massive cloud of ashen dirt that plumed into the air like a titanic mushroom. The sound was deafening for miles around. And yet, silhouetted within that dusky cloud... It seemed the majority of the superstructure itself had not, in fact, detonated on impact.
Uso's jaw was hanging open as the cloud got larger and larger... the shield protecting the ship from the worst of it.
".......... OH COME ON!? REALLY?!?"
Uso dropped her datapad and went right to her power armor,
"Roll call.... Who's where?" She asked over the all hands channel.
"Present. Did we seriously have nothing which could have detected that ahead of time?" Arccos droned, somewhere between mad and bored sounding.
"Cut the Sass or I swear the planet's Radar net is coming out of your next paycheck!" Uso snapped
"Not my fault the radar is on the frits!" Raphael called as he flew from the roof and landed hard.
"It is your damn fault for messing with my equipment!" Cyrus retorted as he stormed out of the palace. "Of course all the Ragna-companies are out patrolling the countryside." He grumbles as he joins Raph.
"By all means tell me more about you two messing with each others' equipment. My attention is gained." Arccos chirped back, clearly not cutting any sass. Merely redirecting it.
"SHUT UP ARCCOS!" The two replied in unison
"I'll get my brigadiers evacuating the surroundings. We should probably secure that thing personally, though..." No shutting up, either. Arccos could be heard ordering her men to search the surroundings, making sure no one's been hurt. Not bothering to shut down her comms. Any wounded were to be taken to the former Royal Hospital, while the men should arm up from the reclaimed armory.
Uso chuckled a bit over the all hands channel.
"Alpha and Beta companies are on their way, but they are 10 mikes out. " Cyrus replied.
"Major on my 6!" Raphael called to the personal communicator he had given to Rubi.
"On it!" Rubi replied, clad in this new Styrling Muur gear running after the Raphael with the new IAW rifle she was temporarily given. "What the hell is going on?"
"Yeah, I don't blame them," Uso said, clicking her helmet into place, and running through the armor startup process, "I wasn't expecting someone to drop a ship on us either.... "
Uso would turn off the all hands channel for a moment to groan, and yell out, "FUuuuuuUUCCKKK!"
She'd then turn back towards the ship and make a rocket powered leap in that direction, crashing down in the middle of the city's main street before blasting off again towards the wreckage. Her voice would again appear on the all hands channel, "Alright, I'm going to go check it out."
The smoke was only just beginning to clear now. Observing the hull at a distance was already starting to give it some strange aspects, however. A few large gashes upon the superstructure seemed to glimmer every now and again... Also, whilst the fields that surrounded it continued to smolder, it was rather counter-intuitive that the ship itself seemed to merely smoke lightly upon the leading edge of the sideways obelisk. For all the carnage that the impact had wrought, it was not burning internally.
Corgan and his dog ran out of the palace. The Nepleslian already had his armor on and his shotgun out. "What was that!? More aliens?" He yelled to Cyrus.
"The fuck if I know! On my ass Corgan, we have shit to do!" Cyrus replied as he began sprinting towards the crash sight.
"...I swear you seem to be doing this deliberately Cyrus." Arccos muttered over the comms, falling in behind her employer and marching in towards the smoldering field of splintered buildings and glassy sand.
"Arccos, I swear..." He began
"We swear a lot of things."
He sighed and cut the link. He took a moment to enjoy the silence as he ran. After a few seconds his comms came back on but he didn't say anything.
Corgan followed Cyrus closely, staring at the crash site in disbelief. "Why does it seem like every species in the universe is suddenly coming to this shithole?" He asked Cyrus.
"Good question..." Cyrus said as he stepped up to the group.
Raph turned to Rubi. "Sorry about this Major." He said grabbing her by the waist and taking off into the air. "Hold on tight!" He said as he rocketed towards the crash site
"I think this is someone's idea of a landing..... I bet its spacers.... fucking spacers don't know how to land things." Uso thought out loud over the all hands channel, rocket jumping again, flying through the rapidly spreading cloud of ash, as she closed the distance.
Uso would turn on the speakers that were attached to her armor's head like cat-ears, "HEY! ANYONE IN THERE!?"
Damn thing was like a microcosm. Sitting out alone in the sprawling fields, it had the same effect as looking at a large ship looming in empty space. Only by standing directly in it's shadow could one tell that the strange, twisted hull was approaching something like thirty stories tall.
It made no attempt to communicate by radio. Perhaps one of the many, many random hatches had opened; But half of them had been ripped clean off in the decent, and there were multiple large gaps to peer through regardless. Some were big enough to walk through. It had definitely lost pressurization.. Or never had it in the first place, perhaps. The only clue that could be gained was the scorched patchwork of countless painted insignia. It was a little off, nothing outwardly recognizable, but it seemed to be freespacer art alright.
"Uso, I think this is more my department..." Arccos looked up at what could well have been the home of someone she knew, and for the first time in months now signaled her mind-ware to attempt a connection with something of her own people. Seeking out any sort of active connection.
Something sparked. There was chatter. But... Not organic chatter. Or probably not?... It didn't really resemble a syntelligence either. The main polysentience channels were just completely blank, despite multiple servers sending back a simple iconography display to inform Arccos which individual nodes were still operating. Many of them seemed to be locked, unfortunately.
"It's... Weird. A good chunk of its electronics are operating, but the chatter isn't recognizable A lot of it's just empty, though." Arccos reported to her various employers and clients.
"Yeah, giant spooky ship crashing on my planet. The thing looks like its right out of a horror movie... You guys get over here. We're sending in Raph first." Uso said.
Raphael landed gently and placed the Major on the ground. "Roger." He replied drawing his AMR and his Service pistol. He slowly approached the vessel.
"YOU, Local Flavor... Stay behind me." Uso said, her speakers blasting Rubi with her command.
Rubi, still shaking in her suit from taking flight, nodded and brought up her IAW, following after the neko.
Raph quickly moved to the opening. "Ready to breach." He said reading his weapons.
Arccos simply tapped her way in to the ship's various open servers, attempting to ghost her way along to follow the others without her physical presence being threatened.
Just looking through the gap was enough to make any internal radiation counters skyrocket. All sorts of broken piping was observable in the small space between the outer and inner sections, some containing thick bundles of armored wire, others softly draining out some kind of transparent fluid. Could well just be permafrost melting, considering the decrepit nature of the most part of the hull.
The interior was dark. Multiple rows of stacked shelves, nothing too extreme, except that the scale was a couple of multiples too large for standard humans. For all intents and purposes, it still just looked like a regular cargo bay, regardless.
"Ok... Raph as much as I'd like to use you as a night-light I think we should back off a bit. Arc... Grab our resident ambassador Corgi and get on the polysentence... see if any spacers lost a ship recently. I think now that we're here word is starting to get out about this rock." Uso said over the all hands channel, before turning to look at Rubi,
"You should back up a bit, that thing's hot... like glowing hot... ... and you have no idea what that means do you?"
"It will give you cancer, at best. At worst, your hair, fingernails and teeth will fall out, before you vomit out all your blood." Arccos said helpfully, before connecting herself in to the ship's long range transmitters, it had been a long time now since she'd done this. Too far out, and no guaranteed Freespacer presence meant it was unlikely she'd get to access to the Polysentience just in her free time...
"I know what that means." She said angrily before hearing Arccos list off terrible side-affects. At that point Rubi, decided to back up way the hell back.
Raph backed up and put his body between him and the Major. "Stay behind me. I will soak up the rads." He told Rubi over a private channel.
"So, I'm just going to ask for missing ships?" Arccos' voice drifted out of various comms, even from a handful of speakers inside the ship. Physically however she was standing stock still, as if her whole body was turned into an inert statue... Which in a way it was these days.
If there was anyone alive amongst the shattered wreckage, they had definitely turned their mind-ware off. The ship's forward antenna system was crushed, crippling the range, but it should have been still networking the freespacers within that range. Helpfully, the signal itself did provide her with these basic facts just out of basic optimization subroutines trying and failing to do their thing. As for actually drifting seamount the layout of the ship, a lot of it seemed to be backup data only. The cameras weren't functioning. Not disabled; They had all been removed. At least sixty, maybe more from minor systems.
Yes?" Uso asked, "I mean... We've clearly got a spacer ship here... it has to belong to someone. You don't just crash a ship into a planet by accident... normally. This ship has to be here for a reason. I'd like to know what that reason is and maybe your people know something.
If they don't, then we're going to have to get creative."
"Uhm... Well, they might not really have an answer, since I can't even bootstrap a connection to the polysentience with this thing. The transmitter should connect to something around here, even crippled like this, but it's just not connecting. So either it's been bricked, or there's just no Deoradh in range." Arccos' voice kept drifting out of various speakers, and comms. Sounding a little distressed, "It also looks like it's been physically sabotaged."
Deep within the mass of data, there seemed to be one filename which was still prevalent, reactive. The damage control system. It was reporting everything, in meticulous detail. They could probably even fix the antenna, with these kind of complex descriptions. It would take time to sort through all of it considering the calamity which had so recently occurred, but it was all still there, neat and orderly as ever.
Arccos jerked back to life, blinking each eye out of synch for a moment before looking up at the wreck. "I can maybe fix the antennae with some of the technical readouts. But we're not getting answers from outside this thing without flying out of this system."
More spiraling data. Just a couple of tags, shifting about, but... Was that list moving? Shrinking?
"...Uh... It may also be self repairing right now." Arccos offered those around her. "Might be some drones on board."
Another prompt. Something was asking to download itself into Arccos' mind-ware 'Crew priority control'.
Arccos opted for caution, removing her datapad from her pack and quickly booting up an emulated partition compatible with mind-ware formats, loading the priority control to her external device while spoofing her own mind-ware drive. She let it download to a part of her mind she could physically pull out if something was up.
The download speed sputtered due to the damaged antenna, but once it had finally burst to life, nothing unwholesome seemed to crop up immediately. No voice sounded, only a text registry off all the problems that had been reported within the other systems previously. The difference was, this version of the software had an input bar at the bottom.
"FREIND IS WELCOME. WHITE LAMENT IS HOME FOR ALL THE FREE." Chipper text, seemingly taking into account none of the horrid context around them. "DAMAGE CONTROL SYSTEM IS ACTIVE. THERE ARE SEVEN HUNDRED AND SIXTEEN FAULTS DETECTED. PLEASE SUGGEST A COURSE OF ACTION."
"Okay... I think I have control of maintenance systems now. I can maybe clear out the radiation leaks so we can get in..." Arccos looked to the others, as if asking for a suggestion of whether that was a good idea: To go on board the death ship.
"Ok, so fix it up, maybe we can use it.... What about the crew? Where'd they go?" Uso asked.
"All data aside from the backups has been wiped. So I can't tell you."
"No clues then? Come on, use those legendary Spacer-Powers of yours...." Uso asked.
"I can compile the backups and tell you probably just about everything that happened before this thing got wiped. From there I'd need to get in to the servers themselves if I'm going to do something to recover deleted data." Arccos pressed a few simulated buttons on her datapad, sending the signal to have the ship stablise its reactors as a first priority.
Corgan piped in with his two cents while running. "My gut says they're either dead or unconscious."
Arccos' input resulted in a massive wall of text, all sorts of systems blinking interactions with each other. The chattering noise from earlier seemed to sing in tune, only now it was a unanimous singular voice. She could finally understand them by observing the text dump on the maintenance list, only... Well, they were all saying exactly the same thing. "COMPONENTS UNAVAILABLE. WE ARE SEEKING." Four hundred and eighty two responses. If the hulk was Gypsy class, that was bigger than the entire crew. And whatever it was, it was awake.
"So who's betting we can get Major Kalan to scream when she sees my robot spider friends?" Arccos asked, as if to fill time for the responses to work. She guessed they were junkers. They were friendly either way.
Clanking. The rhythmic clamor of dozens of metallic feet. The shimmering effect from earlier was exemplified in the open spaces of the busted hull panels several stories above them, dozens of distant objects gleaming around within the dim interior spaces. Still the same voice. Still repeating, over and over. "SEEKING."
"Ugh, I'm going to scream. Did you have to set the Junkers to Maximum Creepy?" Uso asked.
Rubi tried not to seem like she was cowering behind Raph.
Raphael's wings were spread wide to hide the Major. He could feel Rubi behind him, shaking softly. "Stay behind me and everything will be fine."
"Seeking? What the hell are they seeking?" Corgan said, taking several steps backwards. He held his shotgun tight, ready to blast something.
"Compatible components to patch up the radiation leaks. We don't want any of that stuff getting in to the sand, or water, or people." Arccos informed, all the while looking to see if they actually had a creepy setting she could ramp up.
There was a bit of a problem with accessing the junker's exact personality settings. Namely, half of them were programmed to fulfill the 'wishes' of the ship, but they were not an integrated system in themselves. Most of them had probably been constructed at a later date from whatever had befallen this vessel. The construction dates were all over the place, stretching back as far as YE 32.
Still rumbling and bustling about within their containment, three junker drones managed to thud into existence at the end of the cargo section, all at the same time, practically standing onto of each other with their four stubby legs. The puck-like bodies were about half a meter wide each, and each bore a single camera eye of seemingly standardized construction... It was the security cameras. The ship was building more repair systems out of itself.
Not really seeming to look Arccos directly in the eye, the bumbling trio just marched right towards the crack in the hull, each of their twin metallic tentacles dragging along the corrigated floor panels beneath them and making a discordian racket of clattering steel.
Arccos gave a little grin, like these things were adorable to her. She actually bounced a little on her heels. "I think I get it. Something happened, and the ship's self repair systems didn't have enough raw materials. It started taking itself apart to give itself the capability to self repair but then still didn't have enough raw materials..."
All over the ship now, the spiders were seeping from the cracks and flowing down the sides. The three that had ignored Arccos did indeed seem to carry on and walk right past her... But were most certainly taking interest in the non-spacer organics standing directly outside. The forward-most one just perked up at Raphael with seeming want, tentacles looming about expectantly.
"If one of those things touches me, it's going to get its ass kicked." Corgan muttered as he slowly backed away in the direction of the palace.
It wasn't for the lack of trying. The marching swarm was completely out in the open now, showing the sheer scale of their numbers. It was a fleet of glimmering hides, all staring expectantly.
"Well, they poop tactical nukes." Arccos offered, "I don't think you're about to win that fight."
"... Tone down the creepy..." Uso requested, "... You're in control of them right? Because if you're not this is going to be a problem."
"Indirectly, they're like animals. I thiiiink they're sizing you up to see if you can be rendered down to your base elements by the Grinder system and be used to repair the ship."
Rubi poked the IAW out from behind Rapheal. "I don't know what that means but I don't want that happening!"
Raphael placed a hand on Rubi's weapon. "Steady Major..." He said loading his own explosive ammo, but not aiming his weapon.
Touching distance now. Without any form of formal retreat, the things just kept on marching upward. A few of the more distant ones didn't even see the group of investigators, and were heading towards the town itself. The ones closer up certainly had no concept of personal space, and were darting their tentacles around, as if trying to figure out exactly what they were looking at.
Corgan smacked his forehead. "The town! We need to protect the people, or at least evacuate right?"
"Request to join the crew of the White Lament." Arccos suggested. "They won't attack the ship's crew. I'll see about adding you all to the manifest registry."
A loud thrum could be heard from behind the assembled group. If they looked behind them, the Ragna-chooper was flying just above the skyline. It skimmed to the edge of the city where Alpha and Beta Companies dropped from the hovering helo. "Sir, we are in position to protect the town. Orders?"
Cyrus nodded. "Roger, hold fire. Wait until I give the word."
"Yeah, get the rest of the crew to keep an eye on those things, have em start getting people indoors or out of the town... Looking at you two Cyrus and Raph. Make it happen." Uso said.
Cyrus turned. "Roger." Raphael looked behind him. "Let's go Major. We have work to do.
Cyrus and Raphael moved quickly to join the Ragnarock mercs and evacuate the city.
Arccos' inputs over adding additional crew members was met with a bit a peculiar response. Some of the drones seemed to turn away, but then immediately turn back again.
"INSUFFICIENT COMPONENTS TO CONSTRUCT NEW CREW MEMBERS." They chirped, again a dirge of voices in unison "SEEKING COMPONENTS."
The organic fabrication section of the ship seemed to be bumped up the que of priorities. Whatever that meant.
Outside, in the real world, the mass of drones were beginning to become dense enough to bump into each other, moving the crowd outwards by pure force. The one directly contacting Raphael was half shoved into him without any will of its own, half decided it was okay with this fate and began trying to arrest control of one of his boots using it's spindly tentacles.
"Well... shit." Arccos, quickly clapped her helmet off of her head and dumping it in the dirt. "Uh... I'm going to have to reboot this whole ship's priority list for repairs, but I don't really know what that's going to involve just now. Give them corpses! It will distract them!"
Corgan commented angrily. "Maybe it wants our gear? It's not getting my arm, I know that much." Arccos' idea was sound but he wasn't sure that the people in town would agree. He tried her first suggestion. "Uh, I would like to join the crew of White Lament!" He yelled at the Junkers.
"Shit." Raphael said as the junker tried to takeover his systems. "The fuck you're not." He said grabbing the drone and hurling it back towards the ship. Then he flew into the air to keep the rest off of him.
"Give them corpses? ... Someone give them ace... The rest of these corpses are mine, and I'm not sharing." Uso rocketed up from where she was standing, and headed back towards the city, landing just inside the city limits with a rocket assisted slam into the ground. She reached down for her datapad so that she could remotely control the ship and..... realized she had left THAT back on the Queen's slave....
"Someone fix this, I'll be right back," Uso said over the all hands channel, making another rocket powered leap...
Arccos bit her lip for just a second before leaping in to action and heading for the ship proper. Vaulting over the Junkers and heading for the breach, as her mind ware fired in to action. She began to input various commands to try and get the self-repair protocols to give her a list of required resources, before bumping up the list what she could guess would require the most silicates found in this planet's most prominent resource: Sand.
The priorities list was, for the most part, in a constant state of chaos. The junker's individual servers were not completely integrated with the ship, suggesting even many of them were not technically crew members. They were attempting to help, attempting to patch the wounds of the vessel as best they could, but their separate understanding of how best to accomplish this was limited. The record of items previously repaired showed that even the navigation systems were not long inoperable Junkers had been manipulating the data, trying to turn themselves into a large enough force that could somehow bumble into the right answer, but the sheer dumb force was just continuously tripping over itself ad homenem.
All they wanted was a list of components which... Well, they wanted to 'fix' the crew. The list of components that they were seeking frequently read out like a shopping list of the exact parts that an adult type three spacer consisted of. If they were particularly interested in preserving the ship itself, well... They wouldn't have kept cannibalizing it to make more and more junkers.
The attitude of the ones outside hadn't shifted, but the sheer weight of their moving mass was giving them the inertia to grab at Corgan, Raphael, and Rubi in turn. They new exactly what they wanted. The only slowdown was that they didn't even consider their targets an enemy force. Just confusingly mobile resources.
"Oh damn... They just want their friends back." Arccos said a bit sadly over the comms. She was rather glad about her artificial lungs, had she still had her meat body, she'd undoubtedly have been panting and heaving at this point as she went through the hazardous climb through the upended ship. While her mind ware worked as hard as it could, she was still determined enough to stop this even if it meant putting a bullet in the control cores of these things personally. If they couldn't be redirected, then she would have to work through the list of their own self administered priorities. She worked on a quick script, setting it to automatically dole out commands through the input control to randomize the priority list as fast as the internal processors of her mind ware could input commands. Reset the internal priorities of the list to try and force them to continually re-initiate search protocols for prioritized resources that would continually change.
"Well that was completely pointless." Corgan said before turning and running away from the junkers and towards the city. He ran from door to door, yelling at people to get their asses out of town. "Come on people, move it! The robot apocalypse is coming!" He wondered if somehow some of them could be directed towards the nearby mountain.
Corgan would initially be met with some perplexed looks, including a young girl who'd ask, "What's a robot?" as she stood in the doorway of her home, her mother and father quickly reaching for her and trying to drag her back into the house, "Don't go outside honey!" The father said sternly, moving to stand in the doorway as the mother pulled the young girl back towards what they thought was safety
It took a long span of time for all of the Junkers to respond, with the orders seemingly making it's way outward from the center of the vessel, but the confusion of conflicting orders finally stopped the tide of mechanical insects in their place. They were still dutiful, still perched to continue at a moment's notice, but Arccos' new orders had at least partially succeed
The silver tide had halted.
Seeing that the horde of junkers had paused, Corgan tried to explain the situation to the girl's parents. "Sir, let me explain. Do you see those things?" He pointed to the mass of silver. "They are aliens. Right now they are sleeping, but when they wake up they're going to eat this whole town. If you are in it when they get here, then they're going to eat you too. Now, please get your family and get as far away from those things as possible. If you don't I will drag all three of you out of town myself. There is no way I'm going to let that little girl die on my watch, you got it?" He explained calmly, his tone making it clear he was completely serious.
The local man would peek out the door for a moment, "YOU PEOPLE OUR RUINING OUR PLANET!" He would snap, before slamming the door in Corgan's face, the sounds of people gathering up their belongs could be heard inside of the wood and stone structure...
Uso was perched on top of the Queen's slave, her power armor laying open in the spot where Errowyn's fighter was usually setup. Her black tights were clinging to her hips, as her hands clung to the datapad in front of her. The neko's hair all pulled back into a ponytail so that she could easily shift her attention between the pad and the city as she marked out just where she wanted everything to go. She couldn't help but smile, it was like playing a video game... only this stuff was really going to happen. Her funding was looking more and more secure. The I'ee would provide the Labor. The people were docile and the resources were close to the surface. What had started as a causal conversation was quickly turning into a large operation.
She was nearly ready to let herself feel like she had earned that title of empress.
A sudden, unexpected rolling thunder, like the old gods had responded to her self-importance with a gesture of pure spite.
It was a massive thing streaking overhead, a mutilated ball of flaming metal. Grey and green arcs of failing hull panels sheared off the imposing hulk and fell to the planet behind it, not just one large piece of debris, but a whole swarm of metal chunks flying in formation. Only the object at the very center held onto some vague semblance of a recognizable shape, some kind of pyramid shaped double-hull with shattered masts of bronze vibrating all around. It was... like the sails of an ancient seafaring vessel?... Who would design such a primitive ship?
Uso's sunny little spot on the top of the Queen's slave was briefly darkened by the ship passing overhead.... forcing her to look up, her eyes following its descent.
Some kind of glass mega structure on the rear of the behemoth exploded. If this was an attack, it was a suicide attack. That much was obvious.
More worrying was the fact that it was bearing down above the city, and not just some random location. Random shells of habitation sections and the broken cylinders of chemical containment tanks rained down from the sky in one long arc of continuous bombardment. Thankfully, it seemed to be heading towards some point at the outskirts, but that did not stop the sheer scale of the thing from dropping down hunks of metal the size of family cars.
Finally, cataclysmically, it broke landfall, erupting into a massive cloud of ashen dirt that plumed into the air like a titanic mushroom. The sound was deafening for miles around. And yet, silhouetted within that dusky cloud... It seemed the majority of the superstructure itself had not, in fact, detonated on impact.
Uso's jaw was hanging open as the cloud got larger and larger... the shield protecting the ship from the worst of it.
".......... OH COME ON!? REALLY?!?"
Uso dropped her datapad and went right to her power armor,
"Roll call.... Who's where?" She asked over the all hands channel.
"Present. Did we seriously have nothing which could have detected that ahead of time?" Arccos droned, somewhere between mad and bored sounding.
"Cut the Sass or I swear the planet's Radar net is coming out of your next paycheck!" Uso snapped
"Not my fault the radar is on the frits!" Raphael called as he flew from the roof and landed hard.
"It is your damn fault for messing with my equipment!" Cyrus retorted as he stormed out of the palace. "Of course all the Ragna-companies are out patrolling the countryside." He grumbles as he joins Raph.
"By all means tell me more about you two messing with each others' equipment. My attention is gained." Arccos chirped back, clearly not cutting any sass. Merely redirecting it.
"SHUT UP ARCCOS!" The two replied in unison
"I'll get my brigadiers evacuating the surroundings. We should probably secure that thing personally, though..." No shutting up, either. Arccos could be heard ordering her men to search the surroundings, making sure no one's been hurt. Not bothering to shut down her comms. Any wounded were to be taken to the former Royal Hospital, while the men should arm up from the reclaimed armory.
Uso chuckled a bit over the all hands channel.
"Alpha and Beta companies are on their way, but they are 10 mikes out. " Cyrus replied.
"Major on my 6!" Raphael called to the personal communicator he had given to Rubi.
"On it!" Rubi replied, clad in this new Styrling Muur gear running after the Raphael with the new IAW rifle she was temporarily given. "What the hell is going on?"
"Yeah, I don't blame them," Uso said, clicking her helmet into place, and running through the armor startup process, "I wasn't expecting someone to drop a ship on us either.... "
Uso would turn off the all hands channel for a moment to groan, and yell out, "FUuuuuuUUCCKKK!"
She'd then turn back towards the ship and make a rocket powered leap in that direction, crashing down in the middle of the city's main street before blasting off again towards the wreckage. Her voice would again appear on the all hands channel, "Alright, I'm going to go check it out."
The smoke was only just beginning to clear now. Observing the hull at a distance was already starting to give it some strange aspects, however. A few large gashes upon the superstructure seemed to glimmer every now and again... Also, whilst the fields that surrounded it continued to smolder, it was rather counter-intuitive that the ship itself seemed to merely smoke lightly upon the leading edge of the sideways obelisk. For all the carnage that the impact had wrought, it was not burning internally.
Corgan and his dog ran out of the palace. The Nepleslian already had his armor on and his shotgun out. "What was that!? More aliens?" He yelled to Cyrus.
"The fuck if I know! On my ass Corgan, we have shit to do!" Cyrus replied as he began sprinting towards the crash sight.
"...I swear you seem to be doing this deliberately Cyrus." Arccos muttered over the comms, falling in behind her employer and marching in towards the smoldering field of splintered buildings and glassy sand.
"Arccos, I swear..." He began
"We swear a lot of things."
He sighed and cut the link. He took a moment to enjoy the silence as he ran. After a few seconds his comms came back on but he didn't say anything.
Corgan followed Cyrus closely, staring at the crash site in disbelief. "Why does it seem like every species in the universe is suddenly coming to this shithole?" He asked Cyrus.
"Good question..." Cyrus said as he stepped up to the group.
Raph turned to Rubi. "Sorry about this Major." He said grabbing her by the waist and taking off into the air. "Hold on tight!" He said as he rocketed towards the crash site
"I think this is someone's idea of a landing..... I bet its spacers.... fucking spacers don't know how to land things." Uso thought out loud over the all hands channel, rocket jumping again, flying through the rapidly spreading cloud of ash, as she closed the distance.
Uso would turn on the speakers that were attached to her armor's head like cat-ears, "HEY! ANYONE IN THERE!?"
Damn thing was like a microcosm. Sitting out alone in the sprawling fields, it had the same effect as looking at a large ship looming in empty space. Only by standing directly in it's shadow could one tell that the strange, twisted hull was approaching something like thirty stories tall.
It made no attempt to communicate by radio. Perhaps one of the many, many random hatches had opened; But half of them had been ripped clean off in the decent, and there were multiple large gaps to peer through regardless. Some were big enough to walk through. It had definitely lost pressurization.. Or never had it in the first place, perhaps. The only clue that could be gained was the scorched patchwork of countless painted insignia. It was a little off, nothing outwardly recognizable, but it seemed to be freespacer art alright.
"Uso, I think this is more my department..." Arccos looked up at what could well have been the home of someone she knew, and for the first time in months now signaled her mind-ware to attempt a connection with something of her own people. Seeking out any sort of active connection.
Something sparked. There was chatter. But... Not organic chatter. Or probably not?... It didn't really resemble a syntelligence either. The main polysentience channels were just completely blank, despite multiple servers sending back a simple iconography display to inform Arccos which individual nodes were still operating. Many of them seemed to be locked, unfortunately.
"It's... Weird. A good chunk of its electronics are operating, but the chatter isn't recognizable A lot of it's just empty, though." Arccos reported to her various employers and clients.
"Yeah, giant spooky ship crashing on my planet. The thing looks like its right out of a horror movie... You guys get over here. We're sending in Raph first." Uso said.
Raphael landed gently and placed the Major on the ground. "Roger." He replied drawing his AMR and his Service pistol. He slowly approached the vessel.
"YOU, Local Flavor... Stay behind me." Uso said, her speakers blasting Rubi with her command.
Rubi, still shaking in her suit from taking flight, nodded and brought up her IAW, following after the neko.
Raph quickly moved to the opening. "Ready to breach." He said reading his weapons.
Arccos simply tapped her way in to the ship's various open servers, attempting to ghost her way along to follow the others without her physical presence being threatened.
Just looking through the gap was enough to make any internal radiation counters skyrocket. All sorts of broken piping was observable in the small space between the outer and inner sections, some containing thick bundles of armored wire, others softly draining out some kind of transparent fluid. Could well just be permafrost melting, considering the decrepit nature of the most part of the hull.
The interior was dark. Multiple rows of stacked shelves, nothing too extreme, except that the scale was a couple of multiples too large for standard humans. For all intents and purposes, it still just looked like a regular cargo bay, regardless.
"Ok... Raph as much as I'd like to use you as a night-light I think we should back off a bit. Arc... Grab our resident ambassador Corgi and get on the polysentence... see if any spacers lost a ship recently. I think now that we're here word is starting to get out about this rock." Uso said over the all hands channel, before turning to look at Rubi,
"You should back up a bit, that thing's hot... like glowing hot... ... and you have no idea what that means do you?"
"It will give you cancer, at best. At worst, your hair, fingernails and teeth will fall out, before you vomit out all your blood." Arccos said helpfully, before connecting herself in to the ship's long range transmitters, it had been a long time now since she'd done this. Too far out, and no guaranteed Freespacer presence meant it was unlikely she'd get to access to the Polysentience just in her free time...
"I know what that means." She said angrily before hearing Arccos list off terrible side-affects. At that point Rubi, decided to back up way the hell back.
Raph backed up and put his body between him and the Major. "Stay behind me. I will soak up the rads." He told Rubi over a private channel.
"So, I'm just going to ask for missing ships?" Arccos' voice drifted out of various comms, even from a handful of speakers inside the ship. Physically however she was standing stock still, as if her whole body was turned into an inert statue... Which in a way it was these days.
If there was anyone alive amongst the shattered wreckage, they had definitely turned their mind-ware off. The ship's forward antenna system was crushed, crippling the range, but it should have been still networking the freespacers within that range. Helpfully, the signal itself did provide her with these basic facts just out of basic optimization subroutines trying and failing to do their thing. As for actually drifting seamount the layout of the ship, a lot of it seemed to be backup data only. The cameras weren't functioning. Not disabled; They had all been removed. At least sixty, maybe more from minor systems.
Yes?" Uso asked, "I mean... We've clearly got a spacer ship here... it has to belong to someone. You don't just crash a ship into a planet by accident... normally. This ship has to be here for a reason. I'd like to know what that reason is and maybe your people know something.
If they don't, then we're going to have to get creative."
"Uhm... Well, they might not really have an answer, since I can't even bootstrap a connection to the polysentience with this thing. The transmitter should connect to something around here, even crippled like this, but it's just not connecting. So either it's been bricked, or there's just no Deoradh in range." Arccos' voice kept drifting out of various speakers, and comms. Sounding a little distressed, "It also looks like it's been physically sabotaged."
Deep within the mass of data, there seemed to be one filename which was still prevalent, reactive. The damage control system. It was reporting everything, in meticulous detail. They could probably even fix the antenna, with these kind of complex descriptions. It would take time to sort through all of it considering the calamity which had so recently occurred, but it was all still there, neat and orderly as ever.
Arccos jerked back to life, blinking each eye out of synch for a moment before looking up at the wreck. "I can maybe fix the antennae with some of the technical readouts. But we're not getting answers from outside this thing without flying out of this system."
More spiraling data. Just a couple of tags, shifting about, but... Was that list moving? Shrinking?
"...Uh... It may also be self repairing right now." Arccos offered those around her. "Might be some drones on board."
Another prompt. Something was asking to download itself into Arccos' mind-ware 'Crew priority control'.
Arccos opted for caution, removing her datapad from her pack and quickly booting up an emulated partition compatible with mind-ware formats, loading the priority control to her external device while spoofing her own mind-ware drive. She let it download to a part of her mind she could physically pull out if something was up.
The download speed sputtered due to the damaged antenna, but once it had finally burst to life, nothing unwholesome seemed to crop up immediately. No voice sounded, only a text registry off all the problems that had been reported within the other systems previously. The difference was, this version of the software had an input bar at the bottom.
"FREIND IS WELCOME. WHITE LAMENT IS HOME FOR ALL THE FREE." Chipper text, seemingly taking into account none of the horrid context around them. "DAMAGE CONTROL SYSTEM IS ACTIVE. THERE ARE SEVEN HUNDRED AND SIXTEEN FAULTS DETECTED. PLEASE SUGGEST A COURSE OF ACTION."
"Okay... I think I have control of maintenance systems now. I can maybe clear out the radiation leaks so we can get in..." Arccos looked to the others, as if asking for a suggestion of whether that was a good idea: To go on board the death ship.
"Ok, so fix it up, maybe we can use it.... What about the crew? Where'd they go?" Uso asked.
"All data aside from the backups has been wiped. So I can't tell you."
"No clues then? Come on, use those legendary Spacer-Powers of yours...." Uso asked.
"I can compile the backups and tell you probably just about everything that happened before this thing got wiped. From there I'd need to get in to the servers themselves if I'm going to do something to recover deleted data." Arccos pressed a few simulated buttons on her datapad, sending the signal to have the ship stablise its reactors as a first priority.
Corgan piped in with his two cents while running. "My gut says they're either dead or unconscious."
Arccos' input resulted in a massive wall of text, all sorts of systems blinking interactions with each other. The chattering noise from earlier seemed to sing in tune, only now it was a unanimous singular voice. She could finally understand them by observing the text dump on the maintenance list, only... Well, they were all saying exactly the same thing. "COMPONENTS UNAVAILABLE. WE ARE SEEKING." Four hundred and eighty two responses. If the hulk was Gypsy class, that was bigger than the entire crew. And whatever it was, it was awake.
"So who's betting we can get Major Kalan to scream when she sees my robot spider friends?" Arccos asked, as if to fill time for the responses to work. She guessed they were junkers. They were friendly either way.
Clanking. The rhythmic clamor of dozens of metallic feet. The shimmering effect from earlier was exemplified in the open spaces of the busted hull panels several stories above them, dozens of distant objects gleaming around within the dim interior spaces. Still the same voice. Still repeating, over and over. "SEEKING."
"Ugh, I'm going to scream. Did you have to set the Junkers to Maximum Creepy?" Uso asked.
Rubi tried not to seem like she was cowering behind Raph.
Raphael's wings were spread wide to hide the Major. He could feel Rubi behind him, shaking softly. "Stay behind me and everything will be fine."
"Seeking? What the hell are they seeking?" Corgan said, taking several steps backwards. He held his shotgun tight, ready to blast something.
"Compatible components to patch up the radiation leaks. We don't want any of that stuff getting in to the sand, or water, or people." Arccos informed, all the while looking to see if they actually had a creepy setting she could ramp up.
There was a bit of a problem with accessing the junker's exact personality settings. Namely, half of them were programmed to fulfill the 'wishes' of the ship, but they were not an integrated system in themselves. Most of them had probably been constructed at a later date from whatever had befallen this vessel. The construction dates were all over the place, stretching back as far as YE 32.
Still rumbling and bustling about within their containment, three junker drones managed to thud into existence at the end of the cargo section, all at the same time, practically standing onto of each other with their four stubby legs. The puck-like bodies were about half a meter wide each, and each bore a single camera eye of seemingly standardized construction... It was the security cameras. The ship was building more repair systems out of itself.
Not really seeming to look Arccos directly in the eye, the bumbling trio just marched right towards the crack in the hull, each of their twin metallic tentacles dragging along the corrigated floor panels beneath them and making a discordian racket of clattering steel.
Arccos gave a little grin, like these things were adorable to her. She actually bounced a little on her heels. "I think I get it. Something happened, and the ship's self repair systems didn't have enough raw materials. It started taking itself apart to give itself the capability to self repair but then still didn't have enough raw materials..."
All over the ship now, the spiders were seeping from the cracks and flowing down the sides. The three that had ignored Arccos did indeed seem to carry on and walk right past her... But were most certainly taking interest in the non-spacer organics standing directly outside. The forward-most one just perked up at Raphael with seeming want, tentacles looming about expectantly.
"If one of those things touches me, it's going to get its ass kicked." Corgan muttered as he slowly backed away in the direction of the palace.
It wasn't for the lack of trying. The marching swarm was completely out in the open now, showing the sheer scale of their numbers. It was a fleet of glimmering hides, all staring expectantly.
"Well, they poop tactical nukes." Arccos offered, "I don't think you're about to win that fight."
"... Tone down the creepy..." Uso requested, "... You're in control of them right? Because if you're not this is going to be a problem."
"Indirectly, they're like animals. I thiiiink they're sizing you up to see if you can be rendered down to your base elements by the Grinder system and be used to repair the ship."
Rubi poked the IAW out from behind Rapheal. "I don't know what that means but I don't want that happening!"
Raphael placed a hand on Rubi's weapon. "Steady Major..." He said loading his own explosive ammo, but not aiming his weapon.
Touching distance now. Without any form of formal retreat, the things just kept on marching upward. A few of the more distant ones didn't even see the group of investigators, and were heading towards the town itself. The ones closer up certainly had no concept of personal space, and were darting their tentacles around, as if trying to figure out exactly what they were looking at.
Corgan smacked his forehead. "The town! We need to protect the people, or at least evacuate right?"
"Request to join the crew of the White Lament." Arccos suggested. "They won't attack the ship's crew. I'll see about adding you all to the manifest registry."
A loud thrum could be heard from behind the assembled group. If they looked behind them, the Ragna-chooper was flying just above the skyline. It skimmed to the edge of the city where Alpha and Beta Companies dropped from the hovering helo. "Sir, we are in position to protect the town. Orders?"
Cyrus nodded. "Roger, hold fire. Wait until I give the word."
"Yeah, get the rest of the crew to keep an eye on those things, have em start getting people indoors or out of the town... Looking at you two Cyrus and Raph. Make it happen." Uso said.
Cyrus turned. "Roger." Raphael looked behind him. "Let's go Major. We have work to do.
Cyrus and Raphael moved quickly to join the Ragnarock mercs and evacuate the city.
Arccos' inputs over adding additional crew members was met with a bit a peculiar response. Some of the drones seemed to turn away, but then immediately turn back again.
"INSUFFICIENT COMPONENTS TO CONSTRUCT NEW CREW MEMBERS." They chirped, again a dirge of voices in unison "SEEKING COMPONENTS."
The organic fabrication section of the ship seemed to be bumped up the que of priorities. Whatever that meant.
Outside, in the real world, the mass of drones were beginning to become dense enough to bump into each other, moving the crowd outwards by pure force. The one directly contacting Raphael was half shoved into him without any will of its own, half decided it was okay with this fate and began trying to arrest control of one of his boots using it's spindly tentacles.
"Well... shit." Arccos, quickly clapped her helmet off of her head and dumping it in the dirt. "Uh... I'm going to have to reboot this whole ship's priority list for repairs, but I don't really know what that's going to involve just now. Give them corpses! It will distract them!"
Corgan commented angrily. "Maybe it wants our gear? It's not getting my arm, I know that much." Arccos' idea was sound but he wasn't sure that the people in town would agree. He tried her first suggestion. "Uh, I would like to join the crew of White Lament!" He yelled at the Junkers.
"Shit." Raphael said as the junker tried to takeover his systems. "The fuck you're not." He said grabbing the drone and hurling it back towards the ship. Then he flew into the air to keep the rest off of him.
"Give them corpses? ... Someone give them ace... The rest of these corpses are mine, and I'm not sharing." Uso rocketed up from where she was standing, and headed back towards the city, landing just inside the city limits with a rocket assisted slam into the ground. She reached down for her datapad so that she could remotely control the ship and..... realized she had left THAT back on the Queen's slave....
"Someone fix this, I'll be right back," Uso said over the all hands channel, making another rocket powered leap...
Arccos bit her lip for just a second before leaping in to action and heading for the ship proper. Vaulting over the Junkers and heading for the breach, as her mind ware fired in to action. She began to input various commands to try and get the self-repair protocols to give her a list of required resources, before bumping up the list what she could guess would require the most silicates found in this planet's most prominent resource: Sand.
The priorities list was, for the most part, in a constant state of chaos. The junker's individual servers were not completely integrated with the ship, suggesting even many of them were not technically crew members. They were attempting to help, attempting to patch the wounds of the vessel as best they could, but their separate understanding of how best to accomplish this was limited. The record of items previously repaired showed that even the navigation systems were not long inoperable Junkers had been manipulating the data, trying to turn themselves into a large enough force that could somehow bumble into the right answer, but the sheer dumb force was just continuously tripping over itself ad homenem.
All they wanted was a list of components which... Well, they wanted to 'fix' the crew. The list of components that they were seeking frequently read out like a shopping list of the exact parts that an adult type three spacer consisted of. If they were particularly interested in preserving the ship itself, well... They wouldn't have kept cannibalizing it to make more and more junkers.
The attitude of the ones outside hadn't shifted, but the sheer weight of their moving mass was giving them the inertia to grab at Corgan, Raphael, and Rubi in turn. They new exactly what they wanted. The only slowdown was that they didn't even consider their targets an enemy force. Just confusingly mobile resources.
"Oh damn... They just want their friends back." Arccos said a bit sadly over the comms. She was rather glad about her artificial lungs, had she still had her meat body, she'd undoubtedly have been panting and heaving at this point as she went through the hazardous climb through the upended ship. While her mind ware worked as hard as it could, she was still determined enough to stop this even if it meant putting a bullet in the control cores of these things personally. If they couldn't be redirected, then she would have to work through the list of their own self administered priorities. She worked on a quick script, setting it to automatically dole out commands through the input control to randomize the priority list as fast as the internal processors of her mind ware could input commands. Reset the internal priorities of the list to try and force them to continually re-initiate search protocols for prioritized resources that would continually change.
"Well that was completely pointless." Corgan said before turning and running away from the junkers and towards the city. He ran from door to door, yelling at people to get their asses out of town. "Come on people, move it! The robot apocalypse is coming!" He wondered if somehow some of them could be directed towards the nearby mountain.
Corgan would initially be met with some perplexed looks, including a young girl who'd ask, "What's a robot?" as she stood in the doorway of her home, her mother and father quickly reaching for her and trying to drag her back into the house, "Don't go outside honey!" The father said sternly, moving to stand in the doorway as the mother pulled the young girl back towards what they thought was safety
It took a long span of time for all of the Junkers to respond, with the orders seemingly making it's way outward from the center of the vessel, but the confusion of conflicting orders finally stopped the tide of mechanical insects in their place. They were still dutiful, still perched to continue at a moment's notice, but Arccos' new orders had at least partially succeed
The silver tide had halted.
Seeing that the horde of junkers had paused, Corgan tried to explain the situation to the girl's parents. "Sir, let me explain. Do you see those things?" He pointed to the mass of silver. "They are aliens. Right now they are sleeping, but when they wake up they're going to eat this whole town. If you are in it when they get here, then they're going to eat you too. Now, please get your family and get as far away from those things as possible. If you don't I will drag all three of you out of town myself. There is no way I'm going to let that little girl die on my watch, you got it?" He explained calmly, his tone making it clear he was completely serious.
The local man would peek out the door for a moment, "YOU PEOPLE OUR RUINING OUR PLANET!" He would snap, before slamming the door in Corgan's face, the sounds of people gathering up their belongs could be heard inside of the wood and stone structure...
