What's new
Star Army

Star ArmyⓇ is a landmark of forum roleplaying. Opened in 2002, Star Army is like an internet clubhouse for people who love roleplaying, art, and worldbuilding. Anyone 18 or older may join for free. New members are welcome! Use the "Register" button below.

Note: This is a play-by-post RPG site. If you're looking for the tabletop miniatures wargame "5150: Star Army" instead, see Two Hour Wargames.

  • If you were supposed to get an email from the forum but didn't (e.g. to verify your account for registration), email Wes at [email protected] or talk to me on Discord for help. Sometimes the server hits our limit of emails we can send per hour.
  • Get in our Discord chat! Discord.gg/stararmy
  • 📅 July 2024 is YE 46.5 in the RP.

RP: Pisces Episode 01 - 'Under A Blind God'

Yaichiro's voice could be heard again.

"Easy, you two! I understand you two have differing views, but if we don't calm down and actually start COMMUNICATING well, everyone may just end up dead. If one of you doesn't contact the Taishos of the 1st SF and 5th XF directly and invite them to speak, I will. I don't care who is at fault. I'm worried about the civilians on this station."
 
Irim's team ended up at the station's control center, meeting minimal resistance (just some custodians) on the way. All communications were restored. "Where's this Taisa Marina?" the Taisho asked, sounding mildly irritated.
 
(Assuming that she is using communications to ask...)

Yaichiro looked on his communicator...to see nothing short of a query from the 1st SF Taisho herself. He quickly replied as best he could.

"I currently don't know where the Taisa is...I last saw her in the Medbay at the breifing earlier, though. The same with the second highest ranked person present, Terry-Shosa. I am the 6th-highest ranked person, Santo Juni Kage Yaichiro, and the lowest of the Command Staff.

I am not fully aware what is going on, Taisho-Kessaku-sama... I've been ordered to arrest you by the XO, but was never given a charge or reason, and I don't think she has the authority to give that order, nor do I have the authority to enforce it. I don't know what you or the 5th XF are planning...but could you please move the refugees to a safer location before anything destructive happens? In the meantime, is there a location you wish me to report to? I am in the Concourse at the moment."
 
"There will be no destruction," Irim growled. "I am merely here to sort out this mess. When completed, I will be back to the front. And, I want that XO arrested immediately and brought to me."
 
Where she had been isn't important. What she was doing wasn't either. However, evidently, Marina was very pissed about Irim sending the fleet to her station; so much so, she showed up upon the control center, clad in a sea-blue Mindy, with her aether rifle fully charged.

"...it's been a while, Kessaku-taisho. What brings you to my Star Fortress?" Evidently, Marina had grown a pair since her promotion.
 
Yaichiro was now en route to the Command Center as quickly as possible.

"Taisa? Taisho? What's happening? ...I'm en route. I need to locate the Chief before I can try to bring any charges against her anyway...hopefully we can avert all this peacefully..."
 
Chief was raiding the armory for whatever she could get her hands on, using her resourcefulness to greatest effect. She still wanted the Taisho arrested for, as she called it, threatening action against an imperial facility. By rights the mere presence of the fleet in battle formation could be constituted as an aggressive action.

That and she was not fully in her right mind. An emergency low dose had woken her up but not restored her to her complete and calm demeanor. There wasn't actually any protocol to handle what had been and what was happening, so Tetsuko was pretty much making it up as she went along.
 
Irim's aether saber rifle flared up. "You would dare raise a weapon at me?" she asked, taking up a fighting stance. So, it is true...the investigation was a ploy, used to mask a rebellion. "This station," Irim proclaimed, "is once again under command of the Star Army First Fleet...and Taisa Marina, I believe you are out of a job. I am relieving you of command pending a formal investigation into the cause of this incedent."
 
"...you came here with an entire fleet, managed to rile up thousands of civilians, and even managed to get the 5th involved as well...and you accuse me of wrongdoing?" In her helmet, Marina was sweating bullets. "All simply because my communication monitoring team was slacking off and delaying messages, and I quarantined the station for the safety and the reputation of the Star Army!"

It was a bluff, Marina's armored stance - she stood no chance against Ketsurui Irim. But she had a responsibility to protect her command, even if it meant standing up to Yui herself. "If you leave now, and allow me to explain my reasons, I may forgive you for this slight."

...at least, that's what Tiberius said...right?
 
Having gathered every weapon she could carry in belt, bandolier, holdout holster, or mag-plate, Tetsuko located the captain and Irim in the same room. She wasn't armed to the teeth as the expression went, but the XO had made sure to grab the biggest rifle she could carry. A mexican standoff was about to occur.
 
"Master Sergeant!" Irim ordered one of her assault team members. "If this Taisa does not lower her weapon and dismount her armor in ten seconds, put an aether beam through her malfunctioning brain."

"AFFIRMATIVE!" the neko responded, aiming carefully.

"Frankly, I could care less what the Fifth Expeditionary is doing; even now, they're running away from Yamatai, while leaving our fleet to fight the Mishhuvurthyar. This station, however, is part of my fleet. So, what'll it be, tough girl? You going to be good?" Irim asked.
 
Marina swallowed. Death... This was the first time she had truly stared it in the face. It was...paralyzing.

Naturally, the situation was dire. Nozomi was nearly comitting treason, Marina's station was about to be comandeered by the homicidal Irim, the 5th ships were running away and violating orders to stay ashore, and Yaichiro probably had a huge fucking headache. Plus, some guy is missing a heart somewhere, and he can't be too happy. Considering how he's dead and all.

It's right about now where many would call it quits, surrender, die, what have you. However, in a rare few of those situations, there is a miracle, a deus ex machina if you will, that helps to confuse the situation long enough for action to be taken by our heroes, and for them to survive another day.

It's with this in mind that we go to Kessaku Irim, who is right now hearing a familliarly annoying voice over her comm...

"Heya Irim! This is Dastravi. What brings you to Pisces?"

If this doesn't work, I'd better update my backup.
 
Compared to Tetsuko, who had never had an ST backup, at all, and was still willing to put a bullet through Irim's left eye. She finally arrived on the scene, the rifle she'd taken from the armory leveled in an expert marksman's pose. Through Marina's heart first, and Irim's eye second. Clearly the Chief was suffering some sort of breakdown or another.

Her ship hadn't come in, and that was bad. Because she'd asked that ship to bring some essential components from a warehouse that was now a pile of irradiated rubble on a planet now belonging to alien space slugs.
 
A 1st SF soldier from either the Pisces armor wing or Irim's hit squad (it was unclear since they all wore the 1SF logo) fired an expertly aimed stun pulse at Nozomi's center mass.

Simulatenously, Irim jerked her saber to the left and fired, sending a beam of aether in a slicing motion down Marina's arm. The quick shot was intended to disarm (in both senses) the Taisa.
 
Tetsuko's nerves misfired, and her rifle went off, as she slumped spasming and squeezing the trigger reflexively, half from conscious action and half from uncontrolled nerve impulses, until the clip was emptied. Her already-fried system was taking even more of a beating from the stun pulse and possibly causing damage to her that the weapon was not designed to inflict.
 
Funny, how you never really appreciate your reflexes until they save you from your arm being sawed off.

Marina's reaction was barely able to avoid the saber blow...she wouldn't be able to survive a second time. Wisely, she dropped her weapon. She wouldn't surrender, but she wasn't going to die without at least having a chance to explain herself.
 
"Dismount!" Irim ordered Marina, her rifle ready.

A Mindy with green shoulderpads went to check on Nozomi, unzipping a bag of medical tools.
 
With a blush, Marina dismounted her armor. Stark naked in the middle of the room...how embarassing.

Meanwhile, Dastravi's voice kept buzzing in Irim's ear. "Helloooo? Is anybody home? I know you're here, and you brought the fleet..."
 
"Yes, yes...I'm here," Irim answered, while she shut her armor's weapons and CFS systems off and telepathically ordered her troops to do the same. "What do you want?" She gestured for Marina to be escorted over to the station's ready room where they could talk.
 
The medic's tools would return some...unusual results. Showing that there was extensive damage to Nozomi's nervous system from an earlier event, much earlier, which had interacted with the stun pulse to short out her entire system and was currently giving her arrhythmia, in addition to the spasms still wracking her body. They'd have to sedate her to keep her from breaking her own bones from the seizures.
 
RPG-D RPGfix
Back
Top