RP: ISC Phoenix [Interlude 2] - We know what we want

Crimson Kestrel, Hangar
Melissa shook her head at Zeta, frowning. "'e got a private call from Echelon, I think. Somethin' important came up - dunno what, said he'd see us back here at dinner."

"Sterile isn't really the word I'd use" the plastic server droid cocked its head, intelligence waking from behind it, eyeing where John had been. "Sorry, I was... elsewhere."

But John was gone.

Aiesu then started moving, a clunk with each step.

Rebeka's arms tightened delicately about the sleeping Seiren who now she cradled rather than draping, eyes on him as she watched, slowly rocking him back and forth. While she couldn't read, watch television or "see" in the conventional sense, she had a keen grasp of what the aliens here called "murzick". Her voice was surprisingly mild, soft as she hummed barely above a whisper a tune she'd heard while watching something with him.

On so many levels, she was far more like a lion than a mother; a thing that marched through rooms of people and ended their lives with the same regard for them as a hair-dresser would the hair on the tiled flooring. And yet on some level, this was intuitive to her. It came naturally.

The scene was broken as her gaze shifted; gaze resting upon John. It felt like cross-hairs had settled him as she stared back, that feeling of a lion in the distance watching filling him. Her expression was steely, calm, detached, resolved and as always seemingly bored and a touch sleepy.

Her hand began to move. Glued to the spot as she did something perculiar: Not reaching for a weapon but instead holding her index finger to her lip quite clumsily; a poor mimicry of a gesture he recognised.

"Sssshhh..."

And then soon she returned to what she saw as her duty in silence now.

This silence was of course soon broken by steps behind John as a familiar, curvy and white plastic face and a hand against John's shoulder from behind that made him flinch.

"You said you had a question?"

Crimson Kestrel, Mess Hall

Makari gave a nod to Zeta, "Sure thing, Sounds like fun. Let me grab a little extra gear then."

Crimson Kestrel, Hangar

Makari strolled in a little late as his idea of "extra gear" really meant all of his gear. You couldn't be too careful in the Nepleslian wilderness and plus, he didn't know what he wanted exactly at Karl's. So logic pointed to bringing everything. However, he did pack his still slightly bent autoshotgun to take and see if Karl knew any way to bend it back into shape without scrapping the gun for a new one. Worst case he'd mount it on a placard and marvel at his good fortune at not being shot by the damn thing on the last mission.

He gave a curt nod to Zeta, "I'm read as well."

"Look," Enzo explained, seeming a tad bit annoyed by all the interruptions. "I'm sayin' I'd let you fly the thing. You wanna fly somethin', it's already got an AI installsed on it, the wings are all greased up, the 'aftermarket' modifications are ready to fall off in mid-air-- what more could yous acks fer?"

The conman crossed his arms and moved back to his airbike with a shrug, declaring, "I guess if it ain't good enough for yous, it ain't good enough for yous. Nevermind it slipped tobacco past Yammie customs seven times already or that it's owned by an all-around awesome guy."

Crimson Kestrel, Cargo Bay

Focused on Enzo as she was Tamamo payed little mind to the arrival of Melissa, however in spite of her failure to display in outward acknowledgement of her presence the Nepleslian woman's presence was noted. Of more interest to the small Neko was the notification from Echelon that her acquisition of an AI was to be delayed, unquestioning of the development Tamamo's attention was grabbed by Vita's advice in relation to the Conman's craft giving Tamamo more to consider and tipping her attitude in the Conman's favour.

Shortly after Zeta arrived, and with her came the interesting bit of conversation suggesting that something important had come up with the Captain of their small independent group. Linking this bit of information to Echelon's delay Tamamo guessed that something was about to happen and that she'd learn the details soon enough.

Letting her gaze float over to the Hoplite, Tamamo tallied the work that needed to be done and wondered if she'd have it in working order before whatever important developments caught up to the group as a whole. Distracted from her introspection by the arrival of Makari, Tamamo twitched her ears listening to the newcomer's gait taking small note of what she knew of the loner turned team player and found herself a little uncomfortable with little aside from a milkshake in hand.

Distracting her from her self imposed tension was the voice that she had been waiting for as Enzo gave her a reply, refocusing her quietly intense attention upon the Nepleslian. As he walked back toward his airbike seemingly displaying a concession that his services were not wanted, the offer had managed to capture Tamamo's interest and she called after him, "I would ask that the aftermarket modifications not fall off mid flight, however you have my attention so I'll take you up on your offer. I will probably learn plenty from you and your Lady."

Taking a fresh drink from her milkshake she took the moment to carefully eye Enzo over the edge of the large cup before turning and starting off toward the Lady of the Night her mind made up. She was going to learn how someone flew outside of the law.

A quick trip to stow the airbike and a short elevator ride up onto the second deck of the Lady of The Night revealed a filthy cockpit. Enzo darted ahead of Tamamo to roll empty bottles into a box and dump an ashtray into a shopping bag before dusting either rock candy or methamphetamines (One never could tell with Enzo.) off of the pilot's chair. The green crystals glimmered and danced in the light as they clattered onto the floor and got quickly swept away. Without a second thought to the potential for lost drugs or candy the conman skittered over to the engineering console, the one whose chair had stains that could've belonged to any number of liquids, and began the start-up sequence.

It'd been a while since he'd flown her.

"Right," He started, with the assumption that Tamamo had followed him, "Does yous already know how to flies a ship like dis? Or should I hang tight while yous crams it yer 'tiny supercomputer' Neko brain?"

Crimson Kestrel, Lounge
John looked up, glasses slipping down his nose so Aiesu could see his damaged, turquoise eyes. He looked up at Aiesu, put a finger to his lips and made the same motion Rebeka did a moment ago, finger shaking a little. "Shh..." While his finger was in front of his face, he pushed his sunglasses back up into optimum position.

As John's gaze levelled, he could feel a primal fear welling up in him despite the harmonious picture Rebeka was presenting with Seiren in her arms, making his skin crawl and the pupils dilate - if his pupils could dilate properly at all. "I'll ask later..." he whispered to Aiesu through clenched teeth, reaching for a magazine with things that made logistics officer want to buy them and burying his nose in it.

One of the articles Aiesu could see was showing a cost-benefit analysis of volumetric compression applications in relation to cargo storage. Perfectly fine to do in space when anticipate to be activated for long periods of time, but if the ship on land or in the atmosphere, be careful lest the ship break its landing pad or drop out of the sky. The article also mentioned the reported confusion felt by how space and topology was messed with, felt by personnel who went between real and compressed space frequently, and the power draw requiring the Consortium components, which the logistics sector was slow to lurch into adaptation.


Crimson Kestrel, Hangar
When the Lady of the Night was powering up, John, or possibly Echelon had gotten the cue to open the hangar doors. The mid-morning sun poured into the bays, and provided a clear takeoff path. A simple vector was sent to the Lady to exit through the spaceport and go straight up to a good flight level at thirty thousand feet.

Over the din of the Lady getting ready to fly, Melissa saw that everyone was good to go. Seemed it'd be her, Zeta, Makari and Shayla enjoying a day out today, and they started walking down the loading ramp that the hangar doors had opened into, feet tapping against the metal of Sargasso's space station. They had a good five kilometre warm up walk to Karl's, then it was at least seven kilometres, just over the Long Road to get to the forest northwest of Sargasso, and from there, a nature walk and game trail was present for at least twenty kilometres.

Loaded with the right equipment, sporting a good rifle, and happy as a clam; Melissa started walking with her companions. "Carn ladies," she said as she walked past the Rebeka shaped divot in the spaceport floor, "March!" Within about twenty minutes or so, the group found themselves in front of Karl's. It seemed to be business as usual between lunch on a lazy day before lunch time, and Karl was behind the counter with a magazine and a store apprentice wandering around to make sure the floor was swept.

Back at the Kestrel, Allison and Vita continued working away on the Hoplite for Tamamo, and the view of the morning outside warmed up the interior of the Crimson Kestrel. No word had been heard from Luca though - he still seemed to be in a discussion with Echelon - and maybe someone else - in his office. Anyone walking past would've heard quiet speech from behind the soundproofed doors and walls, too indistinct to make out even if an ear was pressed against it.

The Lady of the Night

A casual pace on quiet feet lead Tamamo around the durandium hull of the Lady of the Night before the small girl ventured into the depths of the vessel earning her a brief survey of the contents within the cargo box. These treasures largely consisting of several crates, a couple suitcases, and a few assorted items of unknown purpose left strewn about the area, it seemed she wasn't to learn anything of note about Enzo from the survey.

Waiting for the elevator Tamamo sipped at her milkshake happily while musing over the various scents that decorated the interior of the vessel. Of those present most notable were the scent of Nepleslian tobacco and an earthen scent that reminded the small girl vaguely of compost. As the opportunity presented itself Tamamo stepped into the elevator as it arrived and rode the short way up to the crew section of the vessel before ghosting along the short corridor in pursuit of her 'instructor.'

When queried instead of immediately replying to the Nepleslian, Tamamo instead gazed out through the canopy of the vessel studying the now open hangar door of the Crimson Kestrel's modified cargo bay. The view gave her a decent amount of information about the sunlit tarmac outside and the general weather present as she took another contented swallow of her increasingly treasured prize.

Finally speaking up in response, Tamamo's voice was cool and soft, "I have all of the technical information for the OI-L3-1A Mule Ultralight Freighter, however I do not know what you have modified or added to the vessel. As such I can not give an accurate estimate of my capability to pilot your Lady of the Night."

Pausing seemingly in contemplative thought the small Neko took another drink of her milkshake, her dark jade eyes still focused off in the sunlit distance of Sargasso before she turned to Enzo and inquired, "Would you guide me and offer your experience, and advice? I would probably learn optimally by going through the actions, would that be agreeable?"

Pausing for another drink she gestured to the primary pilot's seat before inquiring politely, "May I?"

Crimson Kestrel, Hanger

Shayla had overpacked, thinking she needed to provide for the others accompanying her. The extra bags had been ditched when she noticed they had all properly prepared, with just one slim pack remaining on her back. Strapped over and across her pack was a large, jagged chunk of metal with a pipe attached in place of a hilt. It appeared as worn and used as the leather straps, which were likely made from some creature the other three had never heard of.

"So, let me introduce ya to Gale." She smirked, turning about so Melissa could get a good look at the makeshift weapon. It was obviously a piece of something larger, by all the rough edges. There was a line of paint on one edge, followed by the more complete (if weathered) letters GALE, which seemed to be the end of a longer word. "Careful if ya try to pet her...she tends to bite." Shayla twisted a bit so she could point towards one of the jagged edges, which she was obviously familiar with by now. The amazon had been carting it around back on Yamatai as well, although she'd spent more time trying to get it through customs than displaying it.

"I feel kinda underdressed." She chuckled, following the others on their march, not even bothering with shoes. Well, she could fly if she had to, after all.


Karl's

"So, what're you lookin' for here? Maybe an elephant gun or somethin'?" She barked a laugh at the idea. Shayla was happy to browse while the others took care of their firearm-related business. "I could whip you up a real nice muzzle loader, lots of smoke, really big bang. Pretty inefficient, though..."

"If I'm honest, which I ain't, but just this once..." Enzo smiled mischeviously and related as much as he could about the modifications made while he turned the pilot's seat towards Tamamo with a look of relish-- almost jealousy for her, "I might not be able to remember everythin' I fucked wit' on dis bucket. Engine output is increased on the uptake-- 'course dat means yous gots less top speed but more trust starting out. She oughta handle like a dream for a box wit' wings on it, I doubled up on heatsinks and gravitics so she coulds twist and toin better. That's alls I can remember that's got anything to do with flying."

Enzo didn't mention the ubiquitous hidden compartments or the 'scan-resistant' reflective lining on some parts of the ship. He wouldn't have been able to remember them all in either case, as he still occasionally pried off a wall panel out of curiosity to find a stash of guns, or trashed parts from an attempt to smuggle an Aether generator, or a dead cat, or a dead rat, or a live snake. In fact, just at that moment he knelt down and stuffed his head under the console for a moment before returning with a rusted L-shape that had likely once been a holdout pistol.

"Yeah," He reckoned, tossing the rust into the box with the empty bottles and the rock candy (which might still be drugs), "Don't use it for woik so much's pleasure these days so she's not a practiced whore like she used t' be."

Karl's

"Hey Karl, I've been trying to fix this beaten up auto shotgun I salvaged. Do you have anything that could unbend these barrels or some good replacements? It's got sentimental value. Worst case I'll mont the sucker to a plaque," Makari asked as he was browsing the shelves for any fancy, new ammo Karl may have gotten shipped in.

The Lady of the Night

Tilting her head as Enzo began to speak Tamamo watched him curiously, her gaze locked on the man even as she settled with a gentle fluid elegance into the offered seat. The small Neko confident enough in her motions, and in the availability of the offered seat so as to not need to truly look at her destination, the relaxed motion contrasting with her notably careful efforts to not spill any of her coveted milkshake.

With the careful balance of not making a mess of Enzo's ship, and not loosing any of her precious drink maintained Tamamo turned her full attention to the conman. He proceeded to admit the inability to remember the full extent of his modifications, which left her a little apprehensive not enjoying the hole in her data about the ship, however what he did remember thankfully told her plenty.

The increased acceleration meant to her that she'd have to be gentle with the controls as they started out. The improvements to handle waste heat and bolster the function of the engines, coupled with the previously stated increased acceleration output gave her the impression that the Lady of the Night was much like an Albatross, awkward on take-off and elegant in the sky.

Nodding mainly to herself as she watched him withdraw a chunk of rusted metal Tamamo took a steadying breath while she secured her cup between her thighs after a final drink. Looking over the console to orient herself, she set her hands to work keying the ship into a ready state. Working off of what she knew of the base vessel, while taking her time and ensuring that she made no mistakes with the sequence, she also kept her motions slow to be sure that if she was about to do something that wouldn't go over well with Enzo's modifications that he had plenty of time to stop her.

In response to the conman's finally comment Tamamo spoke softly, "It's a shame she doesn't get out more. Hopefully a pleasant jaunt today will make her feel loved. It would also be nice to see you take her out more in the future." With her words said, Tamamo gently eased on the power to the engines unsure of what to expect of from increased acceleration and content to proceed at an overly cautious pace rather than lurching forward unexpectedly. After all if she started slow, she could pick up the pace later, however if she went too fast she'd possibly end up dead and there wasn't much she could do to fix that.

Karl's

Zeta looked around the shop, even though she knew it as a back of her hand. What she wanted, should be here. After all Karl's has almost everything that Zen Arms could offer. She looked for particular shotgun. Although not one with a police/military look. She wanted one with wooden stock or rather full stock. She did not want this weapon for CQB. For CQB, she had her hands and revolver for that. She found one particular and grabbed a box of buckshot and box of slugs.

"Hey Karl," She said to the shopkeeper and put the shotgun and ammo on the counter. "Can you get me a reflex sight and side mount to hold ammo?"

Somewhere above Sargasso
The takeoff sequence was simple enough as Tamamo guided the ship outside of the Crimson Kestrel's hangar into open air - an unobstructed sky above as the craft's takeoff vector was vertical to begin with, to avoid the modest city skyline. They were in the middle of trying to put it all back together. Tamamo and Enzo could see construction scaffolds on some of the buildings, and assorted vehicles for the job like cement mixers and trucks full of materials and tools.

And people. For the size of the town, when it contracted back in YE33, it contracted hard - leaving a ghost town in its wake. Looking at the horizon, it was an expected-enough Nepleslian horizon, with buildings in the distance, miniature metropoli (metropolises?) were budding, sprouting, still trying to turn what wilderness there was of the Nepleslia Prime into normal, everyday cities, buildings, and heavy industry familiar to the Nepleslian, putting more clouds into the sky and blotting out that pesky sun.

But that wasn't where the Lady of the Night would be heading today - it wasn't going to touch back down for a while. It had a skyline to explore, and things were calm in all directions as the ship approached a good flight ceiling, components and trinkets inside rattling. Fuzzy dice suspended from the flight control sticks jangled and danced, as the wastemetal basket was clattering like a cutlery drawer being invaded by vibrators, while stuff could be heard rattling in the cargo bay from afar.

All in all, it was a very lived-in sort of ship. Soon, it approached an appropriate flight ceiling with its speedy acceleration. They could see the curve of the planet from how high they were now, and it was calm. Calm. And the fox was in control of the box.


Commercial Lane, Sargasso, Karl's Threepenny Bullets
Through the Gunshop, Zeta was familiar with some of the new changes here already. More shelf space was available for all a manner of weaponry for sporting and unsporting purposes, and the range downstairs had been expanded to match potential new clientèle.

In particular, Zeta noted that the shotgun slugs were rifled, so they were made to be fired out of a smoothbore barrel. Who knows what'd happen if a rifled slug was fired out of a rifled barrel - probably super rifling or the round would spin too fast and go out of control or boomerang back or something - don't ask me, I don't know how this works. The close quarter shotgun Zeta brought to the counter made Karl's eyebrow raise.

"Hm, I usually see mercs waving those things around, but I suppose its as good a sportin' gun as any," he said, making some last inspections on the piece. It wasn't fresh out of the box, so it gave her a discount of 100 DA, letting her purchase it for a smooth 600 DA. The only blemishes were its age, and a few marks on the external metal that didn't seem to affect the function of the gun.

However, he did come up short on reflex sights. "Sorry, sold out," he shook his head, but his smile returned a moment later, "we do have shell racks, and I'll throw one in for 40 DA." An assistant placed one down on the counter in front of Zeta. Six rings were there for shotgun cartridges, mounted to whichever side the user desired. "And for an extra 10 DA, we'll put it on ourselves." Zeta knew that Karl's handiwork with weapons and accessories was worth the buy.

When Makari placed the Gatling shotgun down on the counter, Karl's eyes boggled. "Uh, listen, hows about you leave that with me and I'll give you a quote," he stammered as Makari for fancy ammo, Makari was able to procure Mass-Driver rounds for his HHG, including the solid slugs which could be completely silent, putting the HHG's utility into play.

Melissa browsed too, waiting for the others. Nothing caught her eye - she had everything she needed.

Commercial Lane, Sargasso, Karl's Threepenny Bullets

"Sounds like a plan to me Karl, I've failed for a few weeks to fix this one. If you can't reach me, just send the invoice to the Phoenix and I'll take care of it when I return. How much for the ammo?" replied Makari with a small smirk to Karl's surprised reaction and gave Karl his number. He took a look around the store to see if he needed any other gear for this jaunt into the wilderness but decided he had everything else he needed.

Commercial Lane, Sargasso, Karl's Threepenny Bullets
"For that gatling shotgun?" Karl said as he looked at the nomenclature, and just by looking at the business end of the barrels he was able to make an educated guess. "It's sixteen gauge. Oddball by Nepleslian standards, I only have a couple of boxes of twenty hand and I usually sell the cartridges as single items for enthusiasts." He explained. Of course, the cartridges would be in the right containers, but since it wasn't that common - each was an individual piece than say, a box of twenty twelve gauge cartridges.

The customers who did like this ammo usually reloaded the cartridges manually with new powder, primers, wadding and shot. "I'd have to import some - and thank goodness I can afford to now - because the backpack on this thing looks like it can hold about two thousand cartridges." And when Makari bought the backpack in, he counted approximately seven hundred rounds of ammunition left.

He looked up at Makari. "I'll just include it with the quote, but if you wanna full backpack tell me now 'cos it's gonna be steep."

Meanwhile, Zeta's ammunition, the box of tried-and-true 12 gauge shotgun slugs and box of 12 gauge buckshot were 30 DA each.

Karl's

Shayla stayed within earshot of the others as they handled their business, idly browsing while she waited. She was fully trained in all the energy weapons the Star Army used, and was a good enough Nepleslian to appreciate all the firearms here, but they'd never really been her style. She liked the hands-on approach, which applied to combat as much as it did medicine. The officials on Yamatai had confiscated all of the firearms she'd made herself, so she couldn't even bring those along to show off and fit in. Now that she was thinking about it, where had that cute little secret agent gun she'd grabbed last time gotten off to? Tamamo had probably taken it apart when she wasn't looking, or it had just been absorbed into the general disarray aboard the Kestrel.

Commercial Lane, Sargasso, Karl's Threepenny Bullets

"I'm fine with reloading my own. Tack on some powder, primers, wadding, and shot to the bill, if you would, Karl. Thanks."

Two thousand rounds, Makari thought, that's a crapton of bullets. Gonna hafta do something about the overheat though.

"Oh, one more thing Karl. This shotgun could use some heat dispersion. It was fired constantly by it's previous owner until the barrels warped. While I don't imagine I'll be doing that much shooting anytime soon, it would be nice to know I had the option and not ruin a perfectly good gun in the process."

Commercial Lane, Sargasso, Karl's Threepenny Bullets
Looking at the barrels of the gatling shotgun, Karl thought of spaghetti. Lethal, spinning, lively, metal spaghetti. "I'll be sure to check it out," he nodded as he looked over to Zeta, with her shotgun and ammunition on the counter, "as for you, ma'am, you going to buy that?"

To recap, the price of the piece was 600 DA, plus 60 DA for a box of 20 buckshot cartridges, and a box of 20 rifled slug cartridges, totalling 660 DA.

Lady of The Night
Enzo's exhalation could be felt from all the way over at the pilot's station as he took a whirl in the stained engineering station seat. Being out of the cargo hold was like being out of town. They might as well have been on vacation from a stressful job, now, though they'd technically been on vacation the entire time. Up here, in the clouds, nobody could touch Enzo or Tamamo, and barring enemies with expensive toys they were safe. This was the entire reason Enzo had purchased his ship in the first place. Almost everybody who'd ever been angry at him was a two-bit chump without enough money to push around that they could properly chase a ship. Well, almost everybody. Well, a lot of them. Okay, enough to at least matter, right?

Enzo had pissed off a lot of people in his life.

"So here we are." He said, gesturing magnificently to the skyline in front of Tamamo, "Where d'yous figure we should go? Find a canyon somewheres? Sit on the middles of the ocean? Go unters the ocean? Into space? The galaxy is our oyster, baby."