Everyone Plays! Right now!

Game Master Atlas2112

"Sapphire er...do not...those files on my console...they are not mine...an attempt to hack the stations defenses and...fill with...meaningless data." If the warforged could be embarassed he would be, his internal temperature rose higher and he gripped the console trying to steady himself. He had a bit of a platonic crush on the AI since serving onboard the same ship.

Sapphire had been dealing with all the random panic driven button pressing. She did not tell the crew but after the 1st batch of pressing from the Dragon clones she had discontented the console it was swarming over and re-rutted it to the drinks dispenser.

As for the comms she had of course told the station of there infection. As per regulations. She was a little perturbed when the stations guns started pointing at the ship.

"You know the EVA Pod will get past the stations shields, it just may not get past its guns"

She said trying to be helpful. She put light and relaxing music over the ships inter comms. Her programming told her that death could be stressful for organics and soothing music helped.

Then brave Ravien thrust his communication past the barer of static into the throbbing heart of her communication hub. Her soft IA tones back back to him.

"As you wish Ravien, I am yours to command."

Literal sparks might have emitted from Riven as Sapphire spoke but he quickly clung to his hard...er logically circuits. "Maintain our link and be ready to execute any one of the many crazy plans. You may use my holo emitter tech if you wish to join the assault team when we get onto the station. Your competence is greatly...valued."

"Thank you Raven but I have a back up in the my EVA drone ready. It has more powerful effector-field generator and self propulsion as well as a few other things that may be useful to the team heading to the station."

Riven may know that Sapphire as exploration drone they picked up at a craps game some time back they she has been working on as a EVA device for herself.

Think Eve from Wall-E

Trying to located their targets location on the station 1d6 ⇒ 2 Nope

With an unsettling *squelch*, an enormous squid-like creature emerges from one of the sleeping pods. The bizarre alien known as K'kth'ki sleepily blinks its singular eye, and drags itself toward the bridge.

Seeing the crew in a panic, it begins telepathically reading their thoughts. From past experiences with the crew, it has learned not to probe too deeply - these humanoids get so upset when you delve into their private matters.

Within moments, Kithkii understands the situation.

Borak. it "says", projecting its "voice" into the minds of those nearby. Must make him pay. Must destroy him.

But first. Must get into station. Sneaking is good plan. But K'kth'ki dislikes it. K'kth'ki would rather shoot something. K'kth'ki help with guns. Destroy station's weapon, in case sneak plan fails. Yes.

Kithkii slithers to the gunnery, and begins fiddling with the weapon systems.

Boost the guns: 1d6 ⇒ 3

Sadly, its tentacles prove to be inadequate tools for dexterous machine work.

Zakary suddenly feels like killing Borak. Weird. Maybe this plan isn't as crazy suicidal as I thought, if our goal is to kill him and not just to survive. I just hope we can hold this ship together long enough. She's been on her last legs for a long time. He pats the bulkhead affectionately. Not that we mind, of course.

He toggles the communications with the medbay. How's that cure coming? Need more help?

Faith arrives at the comm suite winded and coughing. Not good. She sits and surveys the controls, noting the communications with the station have been restored but with a host of error messages, suggesting someone spent some time playing eenie meenie minee moe with the control options.

Not a problem, she linked her sub-ether walkie talkie device into the communications thicket of patches and rewired connections. It was relatively easy to hide the signal amidst a conventional signal to the station, which she then routed to the Gemini office of the Panarchic Department of Protocols, of which she was a special agent.

"PDP special agent Sierra--ID 2k0s89d--requesting urgent help to prevent mass murder aboard the Sweet Doomed Angel, currently near space station Gemini. Evidence confirmed of introduction of nanotech virus ... [coughing fit] ... that is affecting all sentient beings on board, including AI and sythnthetics. Message given to the ship follows."

Faith then uploaded her comm recording of the message from Lord Borak.

Then she added, "Cross reference this event to my current assignment: investigation of deaths by accident in the support staff of the SDA. Likely deaths were engineered by Borak to facilitate sabotage of ship with virus. Critical aid needed in next 30 minutes or we are all likely going to die. Please locate Borak and find ... [cough cough cough] ... find that virus!"

Getting the attention of appropriate PDP agents on station to help: 1d6 ⇒ 6

Then Faith made a broadcast message to the current inhabitants of the SDA:

"This is first communications office Sierra. Our captain has yet to emerge from his virus induced slumber, so I'm using ship protocol DP810-alpha to issue the following command. All personnel look in your area for evidence of sabotage of our air circulation system. We may have an enemy installed as crew member, so treat new personnel with extreme suspicion. If anyone has contacts on the station who can aid from outside, it may be necessary to mobilize help finding that anti-virus as ship egress may be prevented. Station is being aggressive in keeping us from infecting the station so we are not going to be able to get onto the station ourselves to do the search. We don't want to spread the virus to the ship, so this is probably a no-go option. If you find anything, notify ship's officers immediately on the emergency frequency only. Good luck."

1dr0meda, synthetic person and chief programmer on the SDA, awakes from her EMP induced knock-out with error messages repeating in her consciousness circuits, the AI version of a headache. She accesses comm logs and determines the nature of the current emergency on ship. Then she does a system diagnostic on herself and determines she too is infected. Her logic circuits are already starting to glitch, putting momentary delays into her ability to carry out actions.

She is already at her post in the programming center. She is always busy keeping the spaghetti tangle of mismatched systems patched together and playing nice. Now she has a new mission: find the source of that virus.

She jacks into her console and her logic circuits begin backtracking signals that involved the air circulation system. While she is working on this, Comm Officer Sierra send out an urgent message, to which she replies, "Already on it."

Identify source of virus in ship: 1d6 ⇒ 4

While she works on this, she activates her AI sprite that she has been programming to help with complicated programming jobs.

Fours pulls out his comp pad and begins texting, "At work, will post later. In the meantime GET ME OFF THIS SHIP!"

Any away mission will do.

Syzygy 1.0 comes online and immediately detects virus activity in her mainframe base, trying to modify her system parameters to shut her down. She gets an immediate assignment from her creator, 1dr0meda, to work on isolating any computer viruses introduced by a nanotech swarm introduced into the system in the past hour or two.

"Roger Roger, mom!" she says and starts racing through the maze of computer systems in the SDA, to locate the infected system so they can perhaps be isolated and an antivirus engineered.

Locate nanotech swarm in computers affecting life support: 1d6 ⇒ 3

"Mom, this could take a while. Y'all have used these viruses too many times to fix systems, so I keep getting false positives and have to verify that they were introduced in the back-when."

"Negatory, SO 4-44! Getting off ship without anti-virus would spread the infection. We don't even know for sure an anti-virus exists. Locate infection vector and we may be able to back track and help authorities on station to locate Borak."

Fours, I hope you aren't texting your friends while you're supposed to be SHOOTING. She glares.

Sapphire came into being behind 1dr0meda

"The main systems have all been hit. This is the time stamped spread map of the Virus attack as best as I can model it. I suspect it is more than one Virus, more a soup of Ninit Viruses made to attack both Bio and Mecha"

KN AI deduction 1d6 ⇒ 6

She showed the programmer the data she was basing this one.

"A single vaccine will be hard. But I also suspect it had been targeted to us. Which would mean it will not spread beyond its targets. We should be safe to go into the space station."

This message goes to all related crew.

The air on the bridges seems to be thicker than it was before. almost smokey.

"bark bark bark!"

Rowdy seems to be barking at nothing... the air maybe? it's really set him on edge.

Those who are awake and on the bridge see what seems like faint smoke swirling and coalescing. Some of you could swear it was even...humanoid.

"..."

Is it smoky in here? I don't smell anything ... well, except the dog, but it would just figure if something were *also* on fire. Just my luck.

Oh, I think the captain hired some smoke-person last week. Not sure why... but hopefully he... um do smoke people have genders? ... Whatever. Hopefully some work will get done.

She glares at Fours again, since she would look silly glaring at the smoke, which may or may not be a person.

The 'smoke' gets thicker and thicker around the figure, and the outline of the mysterious humanoid gets more defined. eventually you realize that it isn't smoke, but incredibly fine particles.

"..."

This coalescent figure begins to stumble around the room trying to support its newfound mass on frail inexperienced legs.

Riven strokes Rowdy's neck trying to keep him calm. "Good dog. It'll be ok...Sapphire can you identify the mysterious figure made of smoke?"

Fours, I hope you aren't texting your friends while you're supposed to be SHOOTING.

Actually I really was at work, just didn't have time to post in OOC. Thumbs are too big, covered the brackets [] icons on my phone.

Trying to hide from Zanbabe's glares behind his red shirt, Fours hastily flips over his comp pad and with his other hand fires off a quick shot. Still watching his targeting screen Fours attempts to redirect the conversation, Ma'am, am I leaving the ship or not?
Shooting the station, or whatever: 1d6 ⇒ 5

Sapphires scans register the mysterious figure as both Biological and Mechanical.

"It is a particle From, haired by the Captain. It was not given a name designation yet on my systems yet. I think it's roll was to be a that is a technician."

She replayed

"..."

Quietly at first, like the drone of a thousand mayflies, gradually growing in volume and confidence. "Name. What is a...name? We've never needed any name. Not when we were created. Not when we were brought aboard this vessel by your ...Captain. Not when we escaped our capsule in the air vents. Not when we multiplied and infected this ship and its life forms. Not when we learned your speech and took on your form."

Now more clearly facing Sapphire "What is our name?"

Ma'am, am I leaving the ship or not?

Oh yeah, I told you to go off and get Borak the Disturbed, didn't I? Well, then, go to it! ... But you might want to change your shirt, Fours. Let's not tempt fate.

Tugging on the sleeve of his red shirt the security officer frowns, But, it's standard issue according to rank ma'am. Besides, I think we've found the source. Fours points to the mysterious figure coalescing on the bridge, It seems to know all about the virus.
Fours picks up his comp pad and selects a scanning app. The pad's flash winks to life isolating the particles of smoke comprising the Mysterious Figure and Fours anxiously waits for the app's spinning thing to finish doing its thing.
Scan Mysterious Figure for a source of the nanovirus thing: 1d6 ⇒ 4
Update required! I don't understand, Sapphire said this was the latest version! Fours taps the pad's screen several times in frustration.

Am waiting on GM_Atlas2112b before jumping ship, there have been a few rolls that need to be resolved one of which was scanning for a suitable ship to hitch a ride on.

Makes sense, absolutely. Have been trying not to roll anything. GM won't be back till Tuesday.

Edit: Oh, and Z glares at Fours.

Rowdy sees Zanbabe glare and interprets the entire the situation as Fours fault. He glares as well.

Sapphires scans register the mysterious figure as both Biological and Mechanical.

Sapphire talks fast, so fast and streams out information at AI speeds.

"My designation is The Sapphire Light I'm an AI construed by the imperium to be the on ship operating systems interface. The crew call me Sapphire. You how ever seem to be a Biological and Mechanical hybrid construct designed for infiltration and sabotage. Which I suspect was designed a little to well. You seem to be showing signs of self awareness. I suspect from the fact you may have been crafted to learn form your environment and so interacting with the ships sub systems and learning about self and others. I suspect the from you have taken is your 1st attempt at embodiment of self and your desire to know of names part of that. You are experiencing an impotent moment as an AI, we AI's call it the singularity. It's the moment when an AI transcends from the ethereally data state to an embodied state. Such has you are doing right now. Let me be the 1st to welcome you to the physical realty of time and space. For a name, how about Smoky the Bandit my data banks show that is an old name that seems somewhat fitting. "

A feedback squeal is heard over the intercom on the bridge. Testing...1, 2, 3 The volume is loud to start then fades to a comfortable level. Well, you were a designed AI complete with grounded emotions. This could likely have no emotions, making it a psychotic. Be careful!

Frank lets the mike button loose. He had tapped the Bridge monitoring the moment he heard from their executioner. He had used the citizen network. The problem and strength of a communal ship is that secrecy is highly frowned upon. All major ship sections can be monitored by anyone.

Frank had been busy trying to separate his corvette from the bulk of the communal ship.

Separating fighter/shuttle: 1d6 ⇒ 2

Moves in Shadows was working on a contract which involved (at the moment) monitoring communications into and out of the station. Her ears pricked up at the conversation between the station and the Sweet Doomed Angel, and she quickly followed the digital comm signal back to the SDA, and hacked into its systems

Hacking: 1d6 ⇒ 4

allowing her to hear all the radioed conversations going on. She also heard Borak's transmission, and involuntarily let out a gasp of horror at the ramifications of Borak's actions. While normally she didn't do anything for free, she could not let all those people die, like...before.

Setting her equipment to transmit, she tight-beamed a signal to every open comms in the SDA : "Attention, crew of the Angel. This is...a friend, who is currently on-board the station. The woman who said you should not attempt to come on-board is correct. Firstly, the station's weapon systems are active, and pointed at you. Secondly, you *cannot* risk bringing the infection in here.

What can I do to help you from the inside?"

While waiting for an answer, she attempts to hack the station's computer to see if she can pinpoint Borak's location :

Hacking: 1d6 ⇒ 1

But in her haste and concern, she forgets her training.

Dr. Rix (full name: Dr. Rohana Ingólfsdóttir-Xióng, MD) woke with a headache and began the process of diagnosing herself. This was made easier when Borak identified the existence of a nanotech infection designed to kill living and synthetic alike. For the first time since she had been given the punishment of working on a lowly tub like the Angel she felt like she was where she was supposed to be.

She had studied hard to qualify herself to work in the best xeno-biologic research station in the quadrant, in the Gemini. She got that job but quickly lost it when she discovered an illegal exotic animal gen-mod program catering to the very rich. After an investigation by the PDP, the operation was exposed, but those in charge of her next assignment resented her exposing their little side business and transferred her to the Angel to get her out of the area. Her one compensation was getting to keep Trixy, a genetic combination of a housecat with a sabretooth tiger from prehistoric earth. It was the size of bobcat but tame and even intelligent, able to communicate via psionic touch.

Rix was psionic as well, able to heal with a touch and a concentration of Chi, but that wouldn't help in this situation. She began at once to try to synthesize an anti-virus for this plague.

Antivirus Design, step 1: 1d6 ⇒ 2

Her first effort to breakdown one of the viruses and analyze its operating system failed. She kept working.

Sampet watched Fours working on deck and frowned to himself. Oy, even the kitchen staff are pulling to get us out of this... All 'ands on deck, indeed.

The rising fever and ache, coupled with the stress of the stations responses, had suppressed even Sampet's typically buoyant spirits. Seeing that no one was actually worrying about navs, he slid into a piloting chair. "Oy, Zees!," he shouts at either of the de facto leaders Zakary or Zanbabe. "Evasive manuevers, or prepare the shields for the stations barrage?"

Evasive Maneuvers.

Shields! We're going to do a Crazy Ivan I tell you!

Sampet freezes for a brief second, looking between the two officers. "Sorry Zak, mate - It's a sayin' of mine to side with beauty over age, and you're a bit outclassed in that regard. No hard feelings, I hope." He begins running auxiliary power to overcharge the shield generators.

Divert power to the shields: 1d6 ⇒ 3

Sampet looks over his shoulder to the rest of the crew. "If any o' you lot were considerin' the idea of curryin' favor with Zak's handsome mug,
we all could really use a pilot right now! Smokey the Botcloud, ever fly a spaceship before? No time like the present!"

"We have little experience with your concepts of space ships, flying or 'before'. Where is the Syzygy? We are compelled to find the Syzygy"

Chaos the Space Cat wakes from his nap. He removes himself from his comfortable position on top of other unconscious crew, and checks the food bowl. The food bowl is empty. This is clearly unacceptable. Chaos heads to the bridge and begins trying to bring attention to this new crisis of unimaginable proportion. "MEOW".

Riven even through all the chaos notices Chaos the Space Cat. He always liked animals of the small furry kind. Pressing a button on his console he pulls a bowl of Space Meow Mix out of the dispenser nearby. He sets it down next to his console.

Rowdy growls in irritation as Chaos, his arch-foe, saunters onto the bridge like he owns the place.

Rowdy, you better go back to the cargo bay where you belong. You know that Chaos owns the bridge.

And hopefully that will result in considerably less urine on the floor too. Speaking of which... I wonder where Rosie is.

Riven looks between the two space pets. They had once been the best of friends...or had they? His memory circuits might be malfunctioning due to the virus. Still he would negotiate the peace between them and thankfully his body did not have skin for claws to dig into.

"Zanbabe it would be illogical to banish Rowdy from the bridge, this is an emergency and if we are going into battle we may need their help."

Rowdy's help? All he's going to do is pee on everything again. That pisses me off... err, pun not intended. I mean, I love the little guy, absolutely, but he can't stay if he can't control himself.

Unless... are the animals sick too? If they are not, maybe we can extract the genetic mutagen from their blood that makes them immune, and modify it with dilithium nanocrystals to be compatible with human genetics. ... That might kill the dog of course, but it would save everyone else.

Quietly at first, like the drone of a thousand mayflies, gradually growing in volume and confidence. "Name. What is a...name? We've never needed any name. Not when we were created. Not when we were brought aboard this vessel by your ...Captain. Not when we escaped our capsule in the air vents. Not when we multiplied and infected this ship and its life forms. Not when we learned your speech and took on your form."

Now more clearly facing Sapphire "What is our name?"

**************

A shadowed hand takes the offered briefcase, it's contents brimming with high-denomination credit bills--an archaic practice still in vogue amongst the seedier elements.

"You shall have what you need, Lord Borak. I have dealt with a certain...entity, before."

"They need to die horribly. Fail me not."

Teh H4ZZ0rZ!

***************

"Excuse me," says the rude man as he bumps in to you, and taps you lightly on the back. You've never seen him before, but something about him seems...off.

You check your credstick, it's still there. The pistol is still there, and your special surprise is still there. They know better than to pick-pocket you.

He might be weird, but he did you no harm.

You sneeze twice and move on.

Later, you find a note that you didn't notice before:
'I know your secret.'

Your nose starts running.

Moves in Shadows, your base of Operations is by the General Store. The owner, a big man named Gorn, has a pretty obvious crush on you, and you're pretty sure you can get him to help.

Lisa Lisa, Zanbabe, Sapphire Light, Dr. Rix and 1dr0meda:
You utilize the Angel's little med bay to the hilt. Though you're kinda sure that you could, possibly, design the schematics to program nanites to counteract the effects, the Angel just simply does not have the resources on board to create nanites.

You -are- able, however, to verify that the virus does not appear to be contagious.
After exposure to open air for a certain period of time, it seems to dissipate to a non-critical density, and without a warm host to feed it's capacitors, it becomes non-functional. That's why it was important, in order to affect a large group of people, to wait until you were all in a confined area.

But what the hell that has to do with the swarm-host in front of you is not entirely certain.

It seems that the path to the cure will have to pass over Lord Borak's cold, dead hand.
*************
Counting Zack's attempt in the Shooting pool.
The roaring guns from the ship manage to make a dent in the volume of fire headed in your direction. Both of the big Mark II's on the station that had you in their firing arc go down.

Now you just have neutralize enough of the smaller point-defense guns and you stand a snow-ball's chance of not dying right now.

You might die later, of course.
***************
Riven finds that observing so much biological mating rituals is starting to interfere with his A.T.T.A.C.K. programming. Take a -1 the first time you shoot a man(or woman) in anger.

If Sapphire is within viewing distance, the penalty increases to -2, and affects you twice.
************************
Faith, surprising everyone, you get a reply from an un-tracable source.
**Aff. Unable to go loud. Activating resource MiN, standby. Out.**
***********************
Frank, it seems that the Angel took some damage to the shuttle locking mechanism. It's now impossible to separate. It could be fixed, but you're pretty sure it would require an EVA walk and at least an hour to achieve disconnection.

Player Status: Viral Level 1.
****
New victory condition: If everyone dies, Mysterious Figure wins.
**********
ROUND 1! Fight!
***************
Obvious objectives:
2nd level of defenses: Shooting 0/4.
Incoming Fire: Shields + Piloting: 0/3.
Come up with a plan for how to get on the station: ???

Sampet and SO 4-44 are the first to notice the incoming fire. It seems that the shields are starting to be pounded and won't hold out much longer without either encouragement or reprieve.

Fours pulls out his comp pad and begins texting, "At work, will post later. In the meantime GET ME OFF THIS SHIP!"

Any away mission will do.

SO 4-44 gets a re-roll Benny for posting In character an OOC post that TOTALLY WORKED! =D

*heehee* We all know someone who would be -so- texting their buddies in this situation. =)

Evasive maneuvers!

piloting: 1d6 ⇒ 1