As I Walk Through The Fields Where I Harvest My Grain

[Laira Darkhold]

Vulkan, let out a chuckle at the old Warlock, brushing a hand through his own short black hair and looking down at the ground for a second. "If I remember the specs, they aren't terribly hard to modify for size. That much output might be a bit of a stretch. I would suggest letting my boys on Hypori custom make you some for shields that strong. They would need to be big too, so if you plan on loading the ship with guns, you might be outta luck." His voice was now laden with a hint of back home country planet, something that came out every now and again when he was out with others with less than regal accents.

"It might take them a little while to get them made, but its doable given the schematics they cooked up." He said. Donor systems that big cost money, but what else did they cost? Time, effort, and information. "The receptor nodes are luckily very cheap and easy to install on a multitude of ships."

He laughed, dropping his hands to his side, "Yeah, you would be surprised how Abigail reacted. She said they made me look, some crazy word the kids are saying these days. But she didn't seem bothered by them, so I don't see a reason to change." The mention of his child. She spent a number of summers on Yavin in the Jedi Temple, and well, summers for her came around five times a year. Ember probably noticed her accelerated aging, but Draco had backed the Jedi there from saying anything about it to Abigail. And the last bit, was more a reassurance to Vulkan himself that he didn't care about Ember's opinion more so that a jab at the old man.

[member="Ember Rekali"]

 

[Ashin Varanin]

[member="Darth Vulkan"]

"That all sounds fine. We're not going to be loading these things up with guns, not excessively anyway. If push comes to shove, they're the anvil and the fleet's the hammer."

Ahh, Abigail. Alec had spent a long time in the Chiloon Rift, and Ember had spent a far longer time in the Tyus Cluster, so accelerated ageing was right in the Rekali wheelhouse. He'd never really asked about the whole issue with her. A decent student, not exceptional but still young. "Well, it's what family thinks that matters most, isn't it," said Ember with a shrug. "I just figured, man of business like yourself, you can't always stick to the clients that'll look the other way, not with the scale ArmaTech's operating at these days. Congratulations on that, by the way. Those corporate cities of yours are no joke. You've done as much as any of the old guard for raising the Mandos' profile on the galactic scene, and that's huge to me."

His attention drifted back to the statue. He felt a touch of semi-awareness, an analogue of intelligence, confirmation that he'd done the Force side of things right. "You're a self-taught man, right, Draco? Far as the Force is concerned?"

 

[Laira Darkhold]

"Sounds like they will be a pretty hefty anvil to me." Vulkan said, a letting his accent slip again. It was involuntary and he would have to concentrate to get rid of it again, but he wasn't concerned with how he sounded or looked. He was just a man today as far as anyone was concerned.

"You didn't hear? I stepped down from the day to day operations after Abigail turned fifteen. I wanted to spend more time with her." Her disastrous first time out adventuring not withstanding, he had fully intended on spending a great deal more and had so far, even given his current outlook on the Force. "She grew like a weed and I missed most of her childhood. I wasn't going to spend the rest of it behind a desk while she gallivanted around the galaxy with Force knows what." He wasn't concerned about her safety, partially because he had already wrecked that, but he was still overprotective, if not a little overbearing despite being greatly detached. "I still own the place, but I have a kid from Tanaab run it." A kid that Vulkan practically owned, and who was so terrified Vulkan would comeback for the job that he still worked overtime.

When the question about the Force came up, Vulkan thought for a moment. Self-taught, probably not. "Not exactly. The Obsidian Order was where I got my start, and I've had a mentor or two here and there. Mostly old dusty Holocrons though." Mentors like Death's Hand, Isley Verd, and Darth Carach, and holocrons like Naga Sadow's, the Dark Holocron, and a few from the Obsidian's collection.

[member="Ember Rekali"]

 

[Arage Bao]

"What do you mean they ain't up to specs?"

"What I mean is that this might not be the size of a moon, but we wanna make sure that the thing doesn't blow up the moment it powers up all its systems." Sam replied patiently to the engineer. Most of his focus was on the sheet of paper in front of him though, a little design he had been working on that might solve the heat exhaust-issue they had encountered fairly early into the design.

They had wanted to avoid the same mess the Death Star had to deal with - some punk riding in on a drak fighter and pulling off an one-in-a-million shot. Sure, it would probably take someone like Merrill to do it, but the Galaxy was huge and Sam wasn't arrogant enough to believe that they knew all instinctive astrogation experts.

Better to play it safe.

"Look, we gotta add an exhaust port. We can't use ray shields, because they won't let the heat pass properly, so let's look at solutions, whatcha say?"

The engineer scratched his head. "Well... what about an integrated shutter system? Random intervals it opens up to exhaust the heat."

Sam nodded. "Now you are thinking. So how do we handle the pent-up heat before we vent it?"

They would go back and forth like that for a while. Every once in a while Sam would make a few notations on his paper, adding details to the design, frowning when something wasn't adding up.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

[member="Darth Vulkan"]

"I can respect that," Ember said, as Draco mentioned retiring to spend time with his family. "I did the same. Just came out of retirement this year. I don't regret it, but I don't regret taking that time either, those few years." The number of Darksiders he legitimately trusted could be counted on the fingers of one hand minus a thumb, but shared experience wasn't the worst foundation for a working relationship.

At the mention of the Obsidian Order, his eyebrows rose fractionally. "That makes sense. You know I founded them? Well, not them them -- that territory and that tradition have gone through more skin than a snake -- but their original predecessor, the Templars of the Confederacy of Independent Systems. I helped teach their first members, Denko, the lot of'em. I don't know a thing about what they've turned into, though I'd say you're a pretty strong data point. As for holocrons...heh. Wish I had a few of those lying around. They'd be handy for teaching the kids, you know? I've got fething legions of Dathomiri and Vahla, neither of which are exactly comprehensive traditions or have much to do with anything as basic as the lightsabre. I'm always hunting for training materials. Matter of fact, on whichever one or two of these worldcraft we keep for the Clan, I'm seriously tempted to build an autonomous training facility if I can put together enough resources for it. You got anything lying around?"

 

[Arage Bao]

"Naw, that ain't gonna work... but now that we are talking Death Star... why don't we take lessons from the second version?"

Sam looked up from his paper, brow furrowed in thought. He wasn't all that well-versed with the details of engineering marvels that were prevalent all those centuries ago, but the engineer seemed excited now that he thought of it. So the Rekali clansman shrugged and then gestured for him to continue.

"Okay, so we know that the first version got wrecked because of a hell of a lucky torpedo shot. Presumably the Empire wisened up after that affair and decided to fix it - they couldn't just lock the vent up, because then the heat doesn't have a place to escape, right?"

He nodded as encouragement.

"Right, so what if we dot the surface of the planet with little, minuscule exhaust vents. Too small to drop anything dangerous through, but numerous enough that it will cause all the excess of heat to be vented away." the engineer started adding things on the board, a rough sketch of how it would look like et cetera.

"We could even piggy-bag off on that by maybe using that heat for something else."

Now Sam started to chuckle, before shaking his head. "Knew Ember didn't just assign ya to this for the hell of it. Whatcha think about?"

 

[Ashin Varanin]

[member="Samael Rekali"]

Nearby, one of the lesser Rekalis was trimming her nails on an axe blade.

"Like, geothermal power," she said, rolling her eyes in her best impression of a Shorn. "Neeeeext."

Vesta Rekali, known as Vesta the Coward for her constant flirtation with Dar'manda status, was not the best nor the brightest. She knew this, but she also knew that waste heat could be shunted into secondary power generation through Sarapin-style geothermal arrays. And even more, she knew that milimeter-wide ducts would have issues on a sphere covered in dirt. Projecting vanes, maybe, but even that would cook a ton of the surrounding soil. Fire hazard, reduced growing options -- nah.

Ignoring her distant cousin, she popped the tab on a can of DragonsFlame and guzzled blonde vapidity. She walked off with a rattle of axe on bulkhead, eyeing the place suspiciously. A belch punctuated her departure.

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Vesta the Coward"]

The engineer eyed Vesta suspiciously, before shooting Sam an awkward half-smile.

"Yes, like geothermal energy." the greying man scratched his rough-kept beard while staring at the drawing board. "The dirt might pose an issue, I will admit, but maybe..."

He suddenly snapped his fingers.

"We could set them up at the locations that are going to be filled with water. Steam lakes, things like that." there was some more pondering, then Dolf started to sketch the outlines on the drawing board - erasing parts of the previous sketch.

"Heated water without using up even more resources, could be a local tourist attraction mebbe. Even with these spheres it's gonna be rough out there."

 

[Ashin Varanin]

[member="Samael Rekali"]

Vesta poked her head back in. It sounded interesting.

"What about pollutants in the water? Reactor byproducts aren't just heat. So you'd need filters and serious water purifiers. Orrr I suppooooose you could vent just the heat through the water and send the cooled matter out the engine nozzles. Indirectly, of course, so the starweirds don't get into the reactor core. That's assuming we plate the entire superstructure in high-grade nullification resin or something better. You can't be too careful with starweirds. One gets in, that's all she wrote. Poof."

She vanished back into the guts of the thingy with a tink-tink-tink of axehead on structural joists. After a long moment, though, she re-emerged, placing her axe against the wall within arm's reach.

"Seriously, though." She raised her hands, beseeching Samael Rekali to understand the necessities of survival. "Starweirds."

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Vesta the Coward"]

Eyebrows furrowed in thought at Vesta's feedback every once in a while. Sam wasn't an expert engineer or anything like that, frankly this entire thing was way out of his league - mini Death Stars? It was insanity. He knew that the Roil had a distinct lack of habitable planets and the ones that were there... well they were weird, like extremely so. Something about being inside a highly-unstable environment of the nebula made their characteristics strange.

Sometimes crops wouldn't come up right and other times they would grow up in the span of two to three days, instead of the months that were actually necessary.

It puzzled 'em.

But mini death stars? The fact that creating artificial micro moons, covering them in dirt and water, then shoving 'em in the Roil for their colonists, was the most cost-effective way to handle this and the fact that they were actually doing it? Boggled his mind.

"Don't worry, Vesta." a statement that would probably not do much. Her contact with the strangeness in the Galaxy had left her just a touch... disturbed.

"Plating the entire superstructure with resin is probably outside of our budget, but I think utilizing filters and water purifiers are the way to go here."

Sam shoot a glance at Dolf who nodded back. Seemed the engineer was on board with that one.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

[member="Samael Rekali"]

He wasn't getting it.

"Look, look look look." Vesta took a seat and laid the axe across her knees. "There's starweirds in the Hard Roil. We've got half a dozen documented encounters, and that's just the things we know about. We've got enemies that use farsight and summon critters using sorcery that'd blast your mind just to look at it. There's Vahla sub-cults that can do things you do not want to know about. We could wind up taking a Nightsister death-curse, blood-trail targeted emanations and invocations of the Vitality of Dathomir. We could have the wrong person recite the Taurannik Codex, and suddenly we've got apocalyptic gods from beyond the Gunniga Gap materializing in our reactor housing. The possibilities are literally limitlessly bad."

The categorical listing of existential threats did not appear to be working. She clutched at her pale hair in frustration, as she ever did. "At least let's populate the interior with taozin. We'll give that taozin a lattice. Taozin love lattices."

She nodded to herself, in support of this self-evident truth.

 

[Arage Bao]

[member="Vesta the Coward"]

Dolf shot him a look and he refused to exchange it. Vesta might be slightly unhinged, but she was still family - no matter how far-off family it was and that meant something, at least to him. She deserved respect, her concerns had merit... if the solutions proposed were slightly off the charts in term of cost-effectiveness.

"I see your point." Sam replied with a firm nod. "I will bring it up with Ember, see what we can do about it."

He snapped his fingers.

"Why don't you make a list with concerns you have? That will make it easier for me to bring to him."

They wouldn't be bringing in live Taozins to populate the place. They were dangerous, for one, and maintenance would be a dang mess for the entire time. What they could do was maybe check in with Akure, see if they could supply 'em with some taozin amulets or whatever - to protect the engineers working in critical zones.

 

[Darth Metus]

The invitation came as a surprise.

Perhaps it was in light of recent events: a daring defense of a Station despite current affiliations. Or maybe it was simply a nod to the pair's history. Whatever the case, the personal datapad of Josiah Denko pinged with an encrypted missive. It spoke vaguely of an ambitious project and provided coordinates. The signature was that of [member="Ember Rekali"], and simply seeing that name caused the Exile to drop everything. He borrowed a TIE Fighter, one of the newer First Order models that actually had a Hyperdrive, and made a series of jumps to the destination. There were few stops along the way, mostly for refueling, for Josiah was excited to see what his old friend was working on.

And as the fighter dipped into realspace, he was not disappointed.

"Hoo boy." he breathed, before announcing his presence over the comm channels.

"Ember, this is Josiah. Got your invitation...Permission to come aboard?"

Now, the fact was that the Exile stuck out like a sore thumb in this gathering. He wasn't technically-minded or corporate savvy. The inner workings of vessels eluded him, for the most part, and it was a wonder he hadn't crashed a ship or two yet. However, what Josiah lacked in the technical, he made up for in the physical. Basically, he could fething lift. Maybe that would be something that could be put to good use, eh?

[member="Ember Rekali"] | [member="Darth Vulkan"] | [member="Aaralyn Rekali-Gyndar"] | [member="Mira Rekali"] | [member="Alec Rekali"] | [member="Samael Rekali"]

 

[Anija Betna]

[member="Alec Rekali"] [member="Ember Rekali"]

Jovan System

It wasn't somewhere she could recall having been before. But, she wasn't about to turn down the opportunity to be involved in one of the biggest construction projects in recent years. And from what she knew of it, it sounded pretty amazing. Micro-planets. She couldn't recall ever hearing of something similar before. They weren't large, in comparison to full sized planets - being only 3km across, but the process fascinated her. So, she'd rounded up what she could of some hardware she felt Ember might find useful. To be more specific, she'd packed three Bui'tsad Corvettes to the ceiling bulkheads with as many Vulcan Mass Driver Cannons as she could fit. She could easily get more if they were needed. But, this was a good place to start.

The stars snapped back to pinpoints as Anija felt the faint motion of the ship reverting from hypersapce. Instantly, she was on the comm. "Anija Betna calling for Aliit'buir Rekali. I have the items he ordered from Mandal Hypernautics. Where should I offload them?" Not that she probably couldn't figure that one out for herself,. but she didn't want to end up in anyone's way. From the looks of things, it was quite busy.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

Having left her grandfather to talk with Vereen, Alec returned to the bridge, where she was on scene to take the incoming transmissions.
The first came from [member="Josiah Denko"].

"This is Alec. My grandfather's meeting with someone here aboard the Rasho Mon. Come on aboard, or head down to Sphere One. Oren could use a hand moving the heavy stuff in the spaces where the hydraulic jacks can't fit. You're not claustrophobic, I'm hoping."

Alec switched channels to talk with [member="Anija Betna"]. Everything and everyone was arriving at once. Fortunately, they had a solid logistics platform nearby, in the form of Old Jovan Station.

"This is Alec, Anija. The Aliit'buir's indisposed at the moment, but we're more than happy to take those Vulcans off your hands. You've got offloading options at any of the docking ports on Old Jovan Station." The four-kilometre pinwheel rotated nearby, slowly.