Firebrand
Inactive Member
- RP Date
- 1/12, YE 42
- RP Location
- NSS Highlander, Deep Space
NSS Highlander
Deep Space, Nepleslian Territory
1/12, YE 42
The sleek, angled shape of the Highlander appeared in space, a series of vibrant flashes heralding the arrival of Nepleslia's newest gunship to an apparently empty part of deep space. The Highlander was a small for a warship, angular and aerodynamic. She was black as night like her sister, with numerous engines and yet more weapons hidden by her space-dark armor. She gave off an impression of speed and aggression, of the might of her nation and the skill of her builders. A medium sized escort, she was more accurately called a 'Gunship' by those who quibbled over such things, due to her high speed and ability to punch above her weight: the Highlander's spinal plasma lance could tear the guys out of a ship twice her size, while her twin missile tubes had access to some powerful ordinance. .
She was certainly a fighting lady, no-one could deny that. Beyond the weapons that gave her the power to to outfight anything her engines couldn't outrun, she wore a brilliant gown made just for the balls she was intended to appear at. This gown wasn't made not of lace and silk, but of metal and composites. The Highlander was armored in Zanarium and Durandium, a garment of subterfuge above undergarments of Nerimium and Leptonium. The Highlander and her sister were the pinnacle of Nepleslian engineering, and her crew had a right to be proud of it.
Almost immediately after arrival the vessel's energy barrier flickered to life and expanded, the invisible barrier visible only when particularly large particles of dust triggered it. Or when it flashed brightly and deactivated. The barrier shield had crashed, and taken with it the majority of the ship's systems. New as she was, the Highlander was newer than a ship expected to see combat should've been. She was still supposed to be in the yard to have the last of her modifications finished, in preparation for a special mission. Instead she had been forced out with a skeleton crew to meet an emergency distress signal from her sister ship, the NSS Chieftain. Thus, numerous portions of the ship were less than ideal: Her missile magazines were empty, her shields were having... problems; and she had only 11 of her full crew of 32
NSS Highlander, Bridge
Captain John 'Joe' Franks was not happy in the slightest about the current situation. The career officer wasn't happy about the situation his ship was in, wasn't happy about this mission, and he sure as hell didn't like all of the crew alterations done by the skull faced IPG Major. Just about the only thing that he did like was that the crew he had was good at their jobs so far, and that morale was relatively high.
Well, as high as it could be on an unfinished ship heading into the unknown. Speaking of the unknown, he looked at the forward display without getting up from his chair, letting his subconscious absorb and process the constant stream of systems information that wasn't vital at the moment. The Highlander's shield generators had been rebooted- AGAIN - after their latest crash, the ship coming online as the ship's AI and vastly depleted engineering staff worked around the problem. Sensors were back too, and information on the surrounding area was processed by the AI and sensor division before being thrown up on the main screen. It was a relatively slow process, as the speed of light put certain limits on how fast information could come it.
Still, it only took a minute for a blip to appear on the screen: an oblong dot a few hundred kilometers from the Highlander herself. The Sensor Operator, a redheaded man with a youthful, freckled face called out information about the blip... most notably about how the sensors hadn't detected the contact, but the IPG Distress Signal on it. With the powerful active sensors of the gunship directed onto the contact, more details became clear... and Captain Joe didn't like any of this.
"Rook," He started, looking over to the black winged executive officer to his left, "This looks fishy as hell. Get the Hazard Team to the Briefing Room in thirty minutes. While you're at it, get a coin to flip to see which of us goes with them. The other one of us will stay here and take care of the ship. We'll send a flash message to Third Fleet command now and inform them of our situation. If we get jumped, then whichever of us has the ship is going to have to make a judgement call on what to do."
The reason he thought this situation was fishy was simple enough: that contact wasn't the NSS Chieftain, or any Nepleslian ship, military or civilian. It was the blasted, open to space wreck of a Kuvexian warship.
NSS Highlander, Briefing Room
If there was one good thing about his new posting, it was that it gave Menelik Berhane plenty of time to do the three most important things in his life: Catch up on rack time from OCS, do what he was trained to do, and tinker . But he could definitely think of certain bad things about this ship: like how his rack time had been very sparse the last few days, or how the Highlander was heading out on a mission with a skeleton crew into possible combat.
Okay, that last one might have been a net bonus to the fresh 2nd Lieutenant, which certainly made him odd. But there were plenty of things that were odd about the second in command, discounting Gunny Kang, of the Highlander's 10-man Marine Squad. He was Hanyadi, and apparently some kind of Hanyadi nobility at that according to rumors. Other rumors claimed that he was the same Menelik Berhane who had initially designed the new Slayer power armors that were replacing AIR2 Lancers, but that couldn't be right, right?
Menelik was happy to let those rumors go about, but never to confirm them. It was an odd feeling, being happy: when he had first gotten to OCS, and even as he was on leave after completing it, he had been depressed, as if he had made a terrible mistake in abandoning Kikios. Now, though, after his leave and his arrival to the Highlander? He was back to his old self, filled with a purpose and vigor that worked well for a young officer. The Highlander was a choice posting compared to what he could've gotten. Sure he had triple the workload compared to when he'd just been a Corporal, but it invigorated him. 'Not to mention', he mused inwardly while thinking of a blonde woman smudged with grease and oil, 'there were other benefits to this posting'.
Still, as he milled about the Auditorium to find the Hazard Team, a part in the back of his head wondered why he was happy about. He constantly hit his head on the too low ceilings and the ship seemed like it'd glitch at any day, but there was certainly some good eye candy on board. Not that the eye candy was as big of a deal to him as it was to some of the other marines and crewmen aboard. It had to be the lack of space to properly exercise.
"Ah, what thuh blazes's thuh point awf wonderin' hooaah ah'm 'appy?" He said out loud, a smile on his face as he lazily leaned against a foam cushioned chair, ignoring the chair's creaking at his augmented weight as he used the lean to not block the walkway.
"Oh? What you so 'appy about todee, Lieutenant Berhane Aseri?" Came a voice, far too familiar to him and not just because its owner enjoyed teasing him. Turning his head and looking down, Menelik frowned at the voice's source: a dark skinned woman who was both incredibly tall and fairly slim, with a strikingly hawkish nose and dark hair tied into cornrows. If this had been his first time meeting the woman, there's no doubt that Menelik would've been confused by the appearance of a woman who looked identical to his younger sister, Tsigereda. Fortunately, this was not the first time he'd met her. Instead of confusion, his reaction was exasperation and a full revolution eye roll.
"Fer crissake's, Makda. Kayyun't ah be 'appy for once without ya 'avin' t' bother me? Don't ya 'ave sumone else ta bother, like thuh Captain?" Menelik asked.
"Nuh-ah. Hooaah ya worryin' about bein' 'appy? Do ya need me ta tell Kiki that ya'd like ta rest yowr head in her lap??" The AI of the Highlander, Makda, responded and asked. Menelik groaned, face reddening a bit as he considered putting the cheeky AI in a headlock. He decided against it, and Makda knew he wouldn't, which explained the smug smile on her face.
"It's like maah lil' sister jus' became way mowr annoyin' with ya, ya know raahyt?" Menelik groused, now seriously wondering why he was happy on this ship.
"Well, awf maah personality, 50%, is based awn her. Thuh remainin' 25% is based awn-" The AI started, getting Menelik to hang his head in defeat.
"Yes, ah know, Makda. 25% Lorath scientists an officers, an 25% Nepleslian scientists an officers. What, done thay pick thuh smuggest Lorath eend Nepleslians?"
"Well, yes." She said. "A daisy portion awf thuh Lorath addition ta maah personality comes from doc Aiesu Kalopsia, an a goodly portion awf thuh Nepleslian from Cassefin Montreal." Menelik groaned in a combination of defeat, weary acceptance, and awareness that this was quite the odd scene to the other members of the Hazard Team filing into and milling about the auditorium.
Deep Space, Nepleslian Territory
1/12, YE 42
The sleek, angled shape of the Highlander appeared in space, a series of vibrant flashes heralding the arrival of Nepleslia's newest gunship to an apparently empty part of deep space. The Highlander was a small for a warship, angular and aerodynamic. She was black as night like her sister, with numerous engines and yet more weapons hidden by her space-dark armor. She gave off an impression of speed and aggression, of the might of her nation and the skill of her builders. A medium sized escort, she was more accurately called a 'Gunship' by those who quibbled over such things, due to her high speed and ability to punch above her weight: the Highlander's spinal plasma lance could tear the guys out of a ship twice her size, while her twin missile tubes had access to some powerful ordinance. .
She was certainly a fighting lady, no-one could deny that. Beyond the weapons that gave her the power to to outfight anything her engines couldn't outrun, she wore a brilliant gown made just for the balls she was intended to appear at. This gown wasn't made not of lace and silk, but of metal and composites. The Highlander was armored in Zanarium and Durandium, a garment of subterfuge above undergarments of Nerimium and Leptonium. The Highlander and her sister were the pinnacle of Nepleslian engineering, and her crew had a right to be proud of it.
Almost immediately after arrival the vessel's energy barrier flickered to life and expanded, the invisible barrier visible only when particularly large particles of dust triggered it. Or when it flashed brightly and deactivated. The barrier shield had crashed, and taken with it the majority of the ship's systems. New as she was, the Highlander was newer than a ship expected to see combat should've been. She was still supposed to be in the yard to have the last of her modifications finished, in preparation for a special mission. Instead she had been forced out with a skeleton crew to meet an emergency distress signal from her sister ship, the NSS Chieftain. Thus, numerous portions of the ship were less than ideal: Her missile magazines were empty, her shields were having... problems; and she had only 11 of her full crew of 32
NSS Highlander, Bridge
Captain John 'Joe' Franks was not happy in the slightest about the current situation. The career officer wasn't happy about the situation his ship was in, wasn't happy about this mission, and he sure as hell didn't like all of the crew alterations done by the skull faced IPG Major. Just about the only thing that he did like was that the crew he had was good at their jobs so far, and that morale was relatively high.
Well, as high as it could be on an unfinished ship heading into the unknown. Speaking of the unknown, he looked at the forward display without getting up from his chair, letting his subconscious absorb and process the constant stream of systems information that wasn't vital at the moment. The Highlander's shield generators had been rebooted- AGAIN - after their latest crash, the ship coming online as the ship's AI and vastly depleted engineering staff worked around the problem. Sensors were back too, and information on the surrounding area was processed by the AI and sensor division before being thrown up on the main screen. It was a relatively slow process, as the speed of light put certain limits on how fast information could come it.
Still, it only took a minute for a blip to appear on the screen: an oblong dot a few hundred kilometers from the Highlander herself. The Sensor Operator, a redheaded man with a youthful, freckled face called out information about the blip... most notably about how the sensors hadn't detected the contact, but the IPG Distress Signal on it. With the powerful active sensors of the gunship directed onto the contact, more details became clear... and Captain Joe didn't like any of this.
"Rook," He started, looking over to the black winged executive officer to his left, "This looks fishy as hell. Get the Hazard Team to the Briefing Room in thirty minutes. While you're at it, get a coin to flip to see which of us goes with them. The other one of us will stay here and take care of the ship. We'll send a flash message to Third Fleet command now and inform them of our situation. If we get jumped, then whichever of us has the ship is going to have to make a judgement call on what to do."
The reason he thought this situation was fishy was simple enough: that contact wasn't the NSS Chieftain, or any Nepleslian ship, military or civilian. It was the blasted, open to space wreck of a Kuvexian warship.
NSS Highlander, Briefing Room
If there was one good thing about his new posting, it was that it gave Menelik Berhane plenty of time to do the three most important things in his life: Catch up on rack time from OCS, do what he was trained to do, and tinker . But he could definitely think of certain bad things about this ship: like how his rack time had been very sparse the last few days, or how the Highlander was heading out on a mission with a skeleton crew into possible combat.
Okay, that last one might have been a net bonus to the fresh 2nd Lieutenant, which certainly made him odd. But there were plenty of things that were odd about the second in command, discounting Gunny Kang, of the Highlander's 10-man Marine Squad. He was Hanyadi, and apparently some kind of Hanyadi nobility at that according to rumors. Other rumors claimed that he was the same Menelik Berhane who had initially designed the new Slayer power armors that were replacing AIR2 Lancers, but that couldn't be right, right?
Menelik was happy to let those rumors go about, but never to confirm them. It was an odd feeling, being happy: when he had first gotten to OCS, and even as he was on leave after completing it, he had been depressed, as if he had made a terrible mistake in abandoning Kikios. Now, though, after his leave and his arrival to the Highlander? He was back to his old self, filled with a purpose and vigor that worked well for a young officer. The Highlander was a choice posting compared to what he could've gotten. Sure he had triple the workload compared to when he'd just been a Corporal, but it invigorated him. 'Not to mention', he mused inwardly while thinking of a blonde woman smudged with grease and oil, 'there were other benefits to this posting'.
Still, as he milled about the Auditorium to find the Hazard Team, a part in the back of his head wondered why he was happy about. He constantly hit his head on the too low ceilings and the ship seemed like it'd glitch at any day, but there was certainly some good eye candy on board. Not that the eye candy was as big of a deal to him as it was to some of the other marines and crewmen aboard. It had to be the lack of space to properly exercise.
"Ah, what thuh blazes's thuh point awf wonderin' hooaah ah'm 'appy?" He said out loud, a smile on his face as he lazily leaned against a foam cushioned chair, ignoring the chair's creaking at his augmented weight as he used the lean to not block the walkway.
"Oh? What you so 'appy about todee, Lieutenant Berhane Aseri?" Came a voice, far too familiar to him and not just because its owner enjoyed teasing him. Turning his head and looking down, Menelik frowned at the voice's source: a dark skinned woman who was both incredibly tall and fairly slim, with a strikingly hawkish nose and dark hair tied into cornrows. If this had been his first time meeting the woman, there's no doubt that Menelik would've been confused by the appearance of a woman who looked identical to his younger sister, Tsigereda. Fortunately, this was not the first time he'd met her. Instead of confusion, his reaction was exasperation and a full revolution eye roll.
"Fer crissake's, Makda. Kayyun't ah be 'appy for once without ya 'avin' t' bother me? Don't ya 'ave sumone else ta bother, like thuh Captain?" Menelik asked.
"Nuh-ah. Hooaah ya worryin' about bein' 'appy? Do ya need me ta tell Kiki that ya'd like ta rest yowr head in her lap??" The AI of the Highlander, Makda, responded and asked. Menelik groaned, face reddening a bit as he considered putting the cheeky AI in a headlock. He decided against it, and Makda knew he wouldn't, which explained the smug smile on her face.
"It's like maah lil' sister jus' became way mowr annoyin' with ya, ya know raahyt?" Menelik groused, now seriously wondering why he was happy on this ship.
"Well, awf maah personality, 50%, is based awn her. Thuh remainin' 25% is based awn-" The AI started, getting Menelik to hang his head in defeat.
"Yes, ah know, Makda. 25% Lorath scientists an officers, an 25% Nepleslian scientists an officers. What, done thay pick thuh smuggest Lorath eend Nepleslians?"
"Well, yes." She said. "A daisy portion awf thuh Lorath addition ta maah personality comes from doc Aiesu Kalopsia, an a goodly portion awf thuh Nepleslian from Cassefin Montreal." Menelik groaned in a combination of defeat, weary acceptance, and awareness that this was quite the odd scene to the other members of the Hazard Team filing into and milling about the auditorium.
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