RP: YSS Miharu Mission 4: The Fame and the Fury

[Doshii Jun]

Yukari frowned. "My attempts at brevity are always in vain," she said in Yamataian.

 

[Fred]

"No, not your accounts," was Kotori's rejoinder. "If you've still something like that currency card I once gave Yukari, though, that'd be independent from any of our bank accounts and thus Kikyo wouldn't be able to track it to us."

Kotori then added: "The NDI have made a pledge of assistance to Yamatai against the Mishhuvurthyar, though they haven't acted overtly on it. I'm a Ketsurui princess, so I plan to go and ask nicely for their assistance. That way, we might be able to get ourselves significantly more repair materials, a spacedock to properly fix up Miharu, and as many of their automated Uriko bombers as our fold sphere could carry. If we're lucky, we might even get Nyton a Super Phalanx construction platform."

Kotori manipulated the volumetric map, pivoting it in midair so that her officers could better see it. "So, we'll go from Yamatai," she pointed to Yamatai and dragged her fingertip toward Nepleslia's sun. "Then Nepleslia and we'll skirt DIoN territory until we reach Ether." Her finger reached Ether and she poked that spot for good measure. "We spend a couple of days there and once properly outfitted," Kotori's hand moved upward off what that volumetirc map depicted. "We'll fold up to the Blue Rift Expanse to settle things with Eve."

The Taisa's hands came back to rest on her desk's glassy surface and she looked expectantly to the others. "How's that?"

 

[Nyton]

"You were close enough." Nyton said aside to Yukari.

Although at the mention of a PHALANX platform his eyes visibly lit up. "That would be most excellent." he replied.

 

[Doshii Jun]

"Can we be certain Kikyo will not come stalking us at Ether?" Yukari asked the question more to make sure Kotori was sure. She was already doing the calculations in her head to figure out how many of the NDI's automated version of the Uriko could reasonably fit in the CFS bubble.

 

[Fred]

"Certain? No," Kotori replied earnestly. "But as far as calculated risks go, I find that one much more palatable. For Kikyo, that'd be a long shot. Even if she does learn we've been there, her information will probably be several days old - when it'll likely won't matter anymore. Either we'll have won already, or we'll be past caring."

 

[Nyton]

"It should work. Besides with the NDI being so quiet no one will ever expect us to go there for assistance." Nyton said. "As far as calculated risks go this is our best bet."

 

[Doshii Jun]

For the first time during the meeting, Yukari smiled. "We cannot fail now," she said in Yamataian. "We will bring the Second Draconian War back from the dead of history before Eve can rob its grave, and it will extract revenge upon her for disturbing its sleep."

 

[Fred]

Kotori nodded in satisfaction. "Then it's settled for now. I'm likely going to want to refine some of our preparations after poring over what we gleaned from the datacore files and the couple of days we have - but for now, we know where we're headed."

"Shosa, get us underway as soon as engineering gives you green light for using the fold drive. After reaching Nepleslia and offloading our passenger, we'll need to use distorsion speed instead of hyperspace to be less conspicuous. Make it so."

Kotori glanced from left to right at those assembled and finally gave them leave to go. "Dismissed."

 

[Doshii Jun]

Yukari stood up straight, confidence restored, passion flushing her mind. "Haw!" she said as she bowed, excited, then she turned on one heel. However, she caught Tom in her eyes half-way through her spin. She took a couple firm steps toward him, balanced on one leg, kissed him hard on the mouth, then winked at him. "Do not leave me waiting too long, Juni-san," she said, then exited Kotori's room.

She was the first one out, and she went straight to her and Tom's room.

When she left a minute or so later, she had her plasma revolver strapped again to her thigh. It is time to get a moving on!

 

[Rabbit Eclair]

Miyoko spent the rest of the meeting in silence and a slowly-growing discomfort at the subject matter. She wasn't a stranger to dangerous situations, but neither was she used to hearing such frank discussion of the risks. While Kotori had never exactly sugar-coated the facts in her briefings, Miyoko was still more accustomed to the more downplayed presentations that were given to the crew as a whole after the hard decisions were made.

Still, dread wasn't the only feeling rising in her... for once. Never much of a patriot, Miyoko had rarely viewed battles as anything more than just doing her job. And, as Kotori herself had pointed out before, many of the Miharu's assignments had been far from clear-cut Good vs. Evil situations. They'd been necessary, yes, but this was the first time since Taiie that Miyoko had felt that there was a clear moral imperative behind their mission. It was, after all, a bit hard to label mind-controlling an entire fleet to conquer known space as anything but capital E Evil. It wasn't exactly scientific, but there it was.

... of course, at the moment, even that was drowned out by the relief she was feeling from no longer being the focus of attention. After saluting Kotori and leaving the room with the others, Miyoko leaned on the wall a few yards down the hall, practically slumping with relief. Even so, there was work to be done. Kimura-hei, how's the search going? I might have a few items of interest to add to our list of keywords...

 

[Kyoki]

"No, anywhere in the room will do," Yuzuki answered, "It doesn't actually matter. The componants in this room that do the fabricating are in the air."

She had already been browsing through available alloys and compounds, compatable with the purposes she was going to put whatever metal she decided upon to. Some of the combinations were useless. Some of them were too difficult to mold, or create, with the atoms that the matter collector had accumulated. She chose a middle-of-the-road alloy; An offshoot of platinum. According to the readout it had similar conductivity, but Yuzuki hesitated using it, especially with the way the ship drew power. It hadn't been tested or certified under this high of a load. It grated her nerves, but there was no other choice.

She selected it from the panel, and dragged it to the appropriate place in the schematic notes.

"See?" the sprite-Heisho said as she swept her hands across the screens, "Watch this."

The air around the capacitor rippled and warped like the intense heat off a furnace. Then, just as quickly, the whole image resolidified. It was the same capacitor. The traces of tampering, however, had been removed and a new resiliant mount had been fabricated beneath it to replace the one that had been brutally hacked away.

Yuzuki crossed to the distance to the capacitor, the volumetric windows trailing, and opened one of the panels. After a brief look, she motioned the two Hei closer.

"The way the fabricators work, is there's these little machines in the air. They take and reform molecules using compounds gathered by the ship's matter collectors. Sometimes they take already existing molecules and reform or replace them according to a schematic that the ship stores in its memory. Like, look."

She put her hands on a pale green panel and, after a brief struggle, removed it. She turned it over in her hands, displaying it. "Sometimes materials are salvagable, like these little tan lines spiderwebbing here. This is a monitoring chip for the capacitor that links into the main computer, and these are the electrical conduits. Now..." Glancing back into the gap she had created, Yuzuki put her hand on another panel, and yanked. She put the new, wafer-thin panel on top of the other, and said, "Look. They're silver now, right? That's the new alloy. It's worked in with the old one, and in some places here, it's completely replacing the conduits that got burnt out by the ship's power demands. These capacitors are meant to be maintenanced like this with the right materials on a three-month basis, but with the way we're deployed, it doesn't get done that often, and we'll have to do it all over again, the textbook way, when we're back in a port and can, but that isn't..."

The Heisho suddenly broke off, stifling a yawn with her off hand. When she had finished, she looked wearily back to the panels. Without another word, she turned back to the capacitor, locked them in, and shut the grate.

"Sorry. I shouldn't be wasting time like this. Go ahead and take this one back down, and bring the other one up. Next time, Rin, you're doing the fabricating. I'll show you how."

Rin nodded as she listened to the explanation. She should've known this, right? After all, she was literally made for engineering. But, she didn't. Her shoulders slumped. She was still so very inexperienced and idiotic as to the ways of the elite engineer. But, at least she was and would be learning something.

"Etto, hai," she replied as she moved to pick up one end of the shiny, 'new' capacitor. It would be bad to drop and break it now! When it was picked up, she moved back to the lift to head back down to engineering.

'Ano, Nee-chan? Are you feeling okay?' the younger sprite asked telepathically, refering to the yawn. 'Also, I was wondering... how should I address you? You're higher ranked now but....'

 

[Kai]

Miharu, inform Nakamura-Hei that he is in charge of security efforts until I'm released from the Officer's meeting.  He's authorized to pull the following individuals from any duties to thoroughly scour you for intruders: Yamada Tsuya, Gunshin Kyoufuu, Miharu Nimura.  After a the search is complete, have them assemble in Hoshi's Port-side Armor Bay.  I will discuss my plans with them there.

Just as Kai finished his meal, he closed his volumetric window only to have another pop up. Reading it quickly, he would have nodded, but there wasn't really anyone to nod to. " Thank you, Miharu" he sent telepathically, rising and realizing he lacked a sidearm. Quickly, the Hei made his way to his room to retrieve said sidearm, while whipping up a Telepathic message to the three individuals whom were apparently under his temporary command.

"Yamada-Hei, Gunshin-Hei, Nimura-Hei. We have been ordered to thoroughly search the ship for intruders. I will search the upper deck, Yamada-Hei, please search the Main deck, Gunshin-Hei, please search the auxiliary ship, and Nimura-Hei, please search the subdeck. When you have finished, please meet me and Kurohoshi-Juni in the Port Armor bay. That is all, Dismissed."

With the message completed and sent, Kai picked his pistol and holster up, putting them around his waist. Looking around a bit, he also grabbed a flashlight before heading off to continue looking over the upper deck.

"Miharu, are there any access panels to behind the walls where I can look inside?" he asked, scanning the hallways for anyone new and suspicious.

 

[Gallant]

"...nee-chan is still fine, little sister." Yuzuki finished the thought, sparing Rin a weary smile. "And I'll be fine, I'm just a little tired."

She paused as another volumetric window popped up. As her eyes flicked over the text, her expression darkened somewhat, and she gained a more serious, dour look. Yuzuki buried a hand in her hair and left it there, holding the strands back, thinking.

"Nimura-Hei. They're pulling you? Any luck on the new couplings?"

 

[Nyton]

Nyton stood up and bowed to Kotori. He was excited at the prospects of the next coming days. He wanted to be ready and for that he had to prepare. "Kurohoshi-Juni, with me. Let's finish up this security sweep quickly. We have much to plan and only a few days to do it."

 

[Tom]

Tom grew excited at the mention of using Ether as a docking area to repair the Miharu. The plan to execute a deep-space repair would have taken a far more delicate approach and probably would have taxed the engineers to their limit. And doing repairs in or near a nebula... well, anything could happen there.

He saw how the talk of using drone fighters lit up Yukari's face and he breathed an inward sigh of relief. Yukari had been entering unhappy places in her mind during the meeting, with all the talk of subjugation and danger and death. It was good the Taisa had pulled her back with her revelation.

The engineer stood and waited for a chance to speak, one he was just about to take when the meeting was ending, when Yukari pivoted and smooched him on the lips. It was these little things, these little moments of forwardness from the demure Shosa, that always took him back.

The distant gaze in his grey eyes spoke to that, as did the slightly dumbfounded look on his face.

By the time he recovered from the momentary swirl of passion, the engineer was standing alone with the Taisa in front of him.

"Ah, Taisa," he said as he inched back to the door. "Just to confirm. We can run without replacing the wrecked capacitors on our ship. Otherwise, we have to wait for three days or cannibalize the ship for capacitor parts. If we're raring to go now, though, I can have one of my Heisho's alter the power distribution to use fewer capacitors while I work solely on the fold drive."

Tom was at the door by now. The memories of how he blundered at the end of the last officer's meeting were still fresh in his mind.

"If we avoid combat, we'll be fine. If we get into combat, well... not so good. Your decision, Taisa?"

 

[Aendri]

Kyou frowned slightly, though it wouldn't be obvious with her in the armor, and paused in her turning away from the fabrication bay. "Ah, Yuzuki-Heisho? Nakamura-Hei just told me I'm need for a security detail. It sounded fairly urgent, so I don't think I can delay it. It appears you will need a new second person for the heavy lifting, forgive me." She bowed slightly, waiting for a confirmation before turning to go get out of her armor. Doing a sweep would mean she would need to fit into spaces too tight for the armor, and she'd want a sidearm at the very least anyway, since they were looking for an intruder of some sort.

 

[Abwehran Commander]

Things seemed to have been settled as the meeting came to a close. Standing with the other officers, the small Warrant Officer bowed respectfully to Kotori before Nyton spoke up. "Understood, Claymere-Taii," Masako spoke up as she followed the tall Nepleslian.

 

[Fred]

"Many of the corridor panels can open up to grant access to the ship's life support systems and things like emergency rations, fire-fighting gear and the like," Miharu answered Kai. "Those are mostly on the main and upper deck. The subdeck leaves things rather bare and in easy sight."

* * *

As for Yuzuki talking to Nimura, the former sent a terse telepathic message back: "I barely started. You will have to delegate to someone else."

* * *

"Mmm," Kotori frowned thoughtfully at Tom's question. She made to cross her arms, but then raised one hand to her chin as she pondered over the matter: that made it look like she was mimicking the posture Nyton was fond of taking when he was putting serious thought into something.

"If I'm not mistaken, the capacitors were mainly added in so to give the ship a great deal of reserve power in order to keep Miharu's weaponry active while we keep shields, engines and other component working at peak military power. That means that if we get in a fight, operation of the main gun will be limited to none if the capacitors are unusable. Seeing we have secondary weapon systems and torpedoes, I think we will be able to manage until we get to Ether."

The nekovalkyrja Taisa grew more somber and she then loosely crossed her arms under her chest. "Tom, on the offchance that we have to cross over beyond the gate, we will end up purely dependent on our reserve power to maintain our CFS units without the use of our aether generators. It will be very important to be able to get the most out of of our power grid then."

"I also figure that the addition of energized armor may end up taking extra power that was not taken into account when this ship was still on the drawing board." Kotori grimaced at an unpleasant thought and added: "The Daughters of Eve apparently have considered fusion reactors as a non-aether power source to sustain their ships inside the space-time event, though I'm not sure we have much space to devote to extra power system."

The next words seemed to weight heavily on Kotori: "Given our communication silence and how we will be more than 100 light years from Yamatai, it is doubtful any escape pod we will launch can expect a rescue. Considering that, you've my permission to reuse the space they occupy to extend our power production capabilities."

 

[Aria]

Kimura-hei, how's the search going? I might have a few items of interest to add to our list of keywords...

"Nothing groundbreaking, I'd say," Takuma responded. His voice had a hint of frustration behind it with a happy tone plastered on top in a makeshift disguise. "Mainly information we already know and a couple mismatches. What are your new ideas to search for? I'll get the computer running on them so it'll be ready by the time you get here."

 

[PlaidMage]

Tsuya's big ears perked as though she was hearing something just out of audible range as she received Kai's message. She bowed deeply to the blue-haired sprite that had been guiding her through the armor bay, and when she spoke her tone was quiet and apologetic.

"I am sorry, Rei-san, but I have received other orders, and I must leave for now. I will take care of this - " she gestured to the armors - "later, and I hope that I will see you again soon. It was nice to meet you." Once those pleasantries were done with, she gave the armory a cursory look - fairly certain there were no intruders in there, since she and Rei had been talking there for a bit and she hadn't noticed anything out of the ordinary - and then left, taking the elevator up to the main area.

The young armor pilot hunted thoroughly through her assigned area. The only sections that gave her any particular trouble were the cargo bays, due to its sheer crowdedness, and the medical area - she wasn't quite ready to face Sanjuro again, and she spent a good few minutes staring at the door before she entered to look around. Luckily, he didn't seem to be in there. Once her sweep was complete, and she confirmed she had found no intruders, she contacted Kai telepathically.

"Sweep complete, Nakamura-hei. No intruders on the main deck. Do you have another task for me?"