Deep Black Sea: Across the Universe [Crew of the Gossamer, or ask before joining]

[Dash Kessler]

CURRENT LOCATION: Maintenance Tunnel D
CURRENT OBJECTIVE: Fix the Water Recycling System, Play Exterminator
FELLOW WRENCH MONKEY BRIGADERS: [member="Tegan Katarn"], [member="Losena Kyru"], [member="Hypatia Najwa"], [member="Sebastian Thel"]
APPARENTLY OVERPAID SECURITY: [member="Daymon Vale"] & Co

Having growing up on a space station famed for trafficking questionable goods and animals, more often than not bound for the dinner plate of the Hutts that ran the place with a pudgy iron fist, this wasn’t the first time Dash had had to contend with an infestation of undesirables. Glubex, Sand Gizzars, Effrikim Worms… Even a couple of orpali dragons. Stone mites, however. That was anew one.

As it so happened, however, the current pests in his life seemed to be more humanoid and feminine than arthropodic.

“Keep talking like that, cheeka, and I just might stop loving you.” Dash retorted as ducked out from the maintenance tunnel, dropping the last few feet that separated it from the decking. With his comm still on active broadcast, it was unclear if he was talking to Hypatia, Tegan or Losena. Given that they were all intent on busting his balls today, perhaps he was just saving time and nailing all three at once. “Of course, I never started, so…”

He let it hang there at that, turning his attention to the charge on his blaster. Thumbing the level up a notch just for good measure. With most of the sensitive systems offline while they were fixing the water recycling system, there wasn’t too much worry about using ion in such a confined space. Besides, with his modifications, the shaped-energy delivery system would come in handy if the buggers got too close. Definitely seemed to work on those Genosians.

Fortunately, the journey towards the armoury was quiet enough that he didn’t have to discover the effectiveness of his weapon. The corridors were almost eerily silent, in fact. So silent that you couldn’t help but imagine scuttering chitters just to fill the void. If anything, it was preferable to the image of them munching through deckplating and bulkheads.

“Don’t worry, Bast.” Dash cut in, pushing aside the burly looking security officer as he made a beeline for the jury rigged weaponry. Nose wrinkling with professional disdain. Leave it to a groundpounder to take a simple design and make it ugly as sin. Kark, he’d be dying of embarrassment lugging that thing around long before the stone mites could make an attempt. No, he was going to have to fix this, making a grab for the spacers tape. “I’m sure Captain Corellia over there is here to save the day. Hoo-diddly-yah and all that.”

 

[Delila Castillon]

Assignment : Get Us Water, Goof Around | Location : Ruins/Abandoned City | Allies : [member="Xin Boa"] , [member="Noah Corek"] , [member="Ivy Lasranae"]

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Hand shielded her eyes from the blazing sun. After being on the Gossamer for an extended period of time her eyes had gotten used to the artificial light levels on the vessel. Dust was kicking up around booted feet as they walked through the desolate streets. Assignment was to find water so she kept her eyes open for anything that may look like an old well or cistern first. Considering how dry the air felt her best guess was anything worth drinking was underneath their feet.


They had broken off from the main group but remained nearby, in no real rush. In her belief running around like a decapitated bird wouldn't help them. It would serve to miss any clues for water and not to mention any clues for something that would want to cause them harm. Keen eyes were keeping out for that possibility as well - especially considering the luck herself and Xin tended to have.


Shoulder nudged the Nautolan, in a teasing mood.


"Can't you use these things to find water?" Hand came up to tap a headtail to emphasize her point. "I mean, shouldn't they be honing in to the nearest water source like a little beacon? Nautolans, water. It makes sense to me."


Grin was shot in his direction, trying hard not to laugh.

 

[Xin Boa]

Assignment : Get Us Water, Goof Around | Location : Ruins/Abandoned City | Allies : [member="Delila Castillon"] , [member="Noah Corek"] , [member="Ivy Lasranae"]

Xin chuckled as he turned towards her. His eyes were behind dark goggles to keep out the sun and sand.

"How wud dat have worked? A million years of evolution of 'yup still in de water's followed by a few thousand years of 'hey boss, it's weird we're not in de water now?'"

The muzzle of his E22 rifle was pointed towards the ground. There was nothing yet to suggest there was any active technology in the area, but that didn't mean there weren't dangerous creatures inhabiting the ruins. Xin found it quite eery to walk through the remains of a long dead civilisation.

"Dat being said...I can feel moisture in de air. Just nuh which way."

 

[Noah Corek]

Assignment: Get the Gossamer Water and Screw Around / Allies: [member="Delila Castillon"] - [member="Ivy Lasranae"] - [member="Xin Boa"] - [member="Chip"]

Noah took a small sip from his canteen before he placing it back on his belt. During desert survival training the fact that water was scarce had been drilled into him and therefore when in arid environments he always made sure not to gulp down his water like his mind screamed at him to do. For a mission like this he had dressed very lightly. A coyote tan BDU top with the sleeves rolled to mid bicep, a moisture wicking undershirt, a pair of coyote tan BDU pants, a pair of combat boots with insulated soles to keep the heat from radiating into his feet, a boonie cap with the sides pulled up, a pair of sunglasses and a light blast vest. He had both of his sidearms in crossdraw holsters on his chest, his shotgun in a sheath on the small of his back, his vibro-knives in sheaths attached to the outside of each ankle and his honor blade in a sheath attached to his right shoulder.

Overhearing the conversations between the two behind him he laughed before turning around, backpedaling while he talked. "Don't mind Del too much kid. She's whatcha call: All bark and no-" His conversation with them was cut short there as he tripped over something. Well more like tripped and dropped down a good five meter fall into a small tunnel. "As soon as I open my damn mouth."

 

[Chip]

Location: Planet
Assignment: Babysit bored humanoids with cabin fever

Chip bobbed along in the air with the humans and the not-human, listening to their banter as they walked through the ruins of a long dead civilization. There were other teams of course, each of them had spread out to explore the lands around the perimeter of the old city. Each team had handheld scanners and one of the teams had a hover-truck with a long range scanner bolted to the back of it. This team though, had chip. And chip had the powerful sensor suit of his tiny little chassis to rely on. So as the humans bantered, Chip pinged the ruins with a dizzying array of sensors. Motion sensors, life signs detectors, energy field detectors, geomatic sensors, magnetic sensors, and a doppraymagno scanner pulsed out of Chip as visible and non-visible light, detectable and non-detectable sounds as he scanned the ruins around them. Passively, he continued to listen to the humans and tracked their progress with a gyrocomputer, but he could not help but to get sucked into the mystery of the ruined architecture and the uniqueness of their design.

Chip wondered for a moment if [member="Xin Boa"]'s moisture comment had been 'sexual innuendo', but his attention was quickly snapped away from the ruins and his own musings as one of his humans disappeared, tumbling into a hole in the ground. Concerned, Chip floated over the hole and looked down at [member="Noah Corek"]. "I too am detecting moisture." Chip said before noticing the small trail of red that slowly slid down the side of Corek's head. "Oh wait. You're bleeding. Nevermind." Chip corrected.

 

[Delila Castillon]

Assignment : Water! Annoy fellow shipmates | [member="Chip"] / [member="Xin Boa"] / [member="Noah Corek"] / [member="Ivy Lasranae"]



"Wouldn't you need a beacon in the early days when your fellow squids were hapless and flopping on the shore?"


This time laughter did break through, unable to help herself at the horrible reference to squids and Nautolans. Eyes took in the odd architecture as they strolled. Delila appreciated such things. Perhaps if her life had turned out differently she could have been some wise cracking archaeologist digging up ancient civilizations. Considering her interpersonal skills it was probably wise she had turned out a soldier instead, with her luck she would have ended up pissing off locals.


As Corek started to speak she and Xin looked at one another. Considering their time together both were getting good at reading one another and communicating without saying a word. Right now it was a raised eyebrow. As Corek fell into the tunnel, fingers curled around Xin's forearm, drawing him down for a comment.


"Don't know what he's talking about, you havent complained about my biting yet."


As she drew up on where Corek fell, eyes squinted down. The floating droid commented that Corek was bleeding but in her semi-professional opinion it looked fine. Like he fell on a rock. Not wise - what if he picked up some bacteria that didnt respond to their medicines?


"So....you going to climb out or...we'll come back later?"

 

[Xin Boa]

Assignment : Get Us Water, Goof Around | Location : Ruins/Abandoned City | Allies : [member="Delila Castillon"] , [member="Noah Corek"] , [member="Ivy Lasranae"]

"Mi ave gat thick skin," Xin murmured. Skreech, his monkey lizard, swapped shoulders again. He didn't seem to like the floating droid and was seemingly determined to keep Xin's head between them.

Another time and Xin might have made another comment just to pass the time. Regardless of Noah's call back up that was a long way to fall and sometimes these things took a moment to sink in. He hadn't heard any bones crack, at least.

"Yuh alright Corek?" Xin shouted down. "Mi did nuh bring much rope, but can run back." He really hoped he didn't have to run back in the heat breeze full of sand.

 

[Hazel Scheler]

Location: Piloting Transport Ship - Undesignated AT-120 Freighter
Mission: Explore nearby planet, Locate drinkable water
Role: Captain Transport Ship to planet and back again in one piece.
[member="Noah Corek"] [member="Chip"] [member="Delila Castillon"] [member="Xin Boa"]

With the third and final recon group deposited towards the south of the ruins, Hazel piloted the ship over the broad span of the ancient city. While the ground teams swept the land on foot, seeking out clues to remaining water deposits, she would continue to do aerial scans and keep an eye on the teams.

"I thought you would be joining them on the ground, Miss Scheler," Brom's voice intoned in the cockpit.

"When one of the teams finds something, I'll swing in to assist. Until then, I'm more use up here covering the areas where they aren't, seeing what they can't."

"Scans do not presently detect unidentified lifeforms or viable sources of water."

"Didn't think it'd be that easy, Brom. Take us as low as you can over the buildings and begin GPR Scans."

Hazel leaned to switch through the feed on a side holoscreen, tapping at the console when Team 1 turned up 3 members instead of 4.

"What... where the feth did Corek go?" she punched in a direct frequency, "Team 1, we've lost Corek's signal at Base. Please tell me he just fell in a hole and you didn't cap him in the alley."

 

[Noah Corek]

Location: In a Fucking Tunnel
Mission: Find Water and Kick Ass and I'm All Outta Ass
Role: Explore the Tunnel?
Crewmaters: [member="Chip"] - [member="Delila Castillon"] - [member="Xin Boa"] - [member="Ivy Lasranae"]

The first person who he decided to respond to was the one who had nearly screamed in his ear. "Awww you do care Hazel. But theory number one was correct. I seem to have fallen into some tunnel." Standing he retrieved a flashlight from a rucksack he was carrying on his back and attached it to the end of his rifle. Shining it down the tunnel he began to observe it. "It's definetely sapient-made. The wall are made from some kinda stone that looks like it was mined and then made into blocks."

When the floating droid they took along said he was bleeding he touched his gloved hand to his head and was rewarded with a small dab of red fluid on his fingertip. "Thanks for the heads up Chip." Once again he rummaged through his rucksack, this time withdraw a small first aid kit from which he withdrew a antiseptic wipe and adhesive bandage. After making sure the wound was clean he slapped the bandage over it and place the kit back in the rucksack.

Looking up through the hole Noah grinned towards Del. "Come on Del there is more than enough room for a party down here." Flashing her a wink he began to laugh his ass off. When Xin came to the hole he shook his head at his question. "Don't worry about it kid. I'll take Chip and continue to explore the tunnel. You don't just build something like this for the hell of it. But don't have too much fun up there without me you two." Flashing the two a final grin he shouldered his rifle and continued on.

 

[Xin Boa]

Assignment : Get Us Water, Goof Around | Location : Ruins/Abandoned City | Allies : [member="Delila Castillon"] , [member="Noah Corek"] , [member="Ivy Lasranae"]

"Alright, but voice check every few minutes," Xin replied. "Someone might ave built it for something, but other things might just call it 'home' now."

Xin stepped back from the opening and rolled his shoulders. If they lost comms Chip could probably float back up the tunnel and relay the signal to extend the range. Hopefully it didn't go all that deep.

Xin looked towards Delila. His eyes narrowed a fraction as a thought managed to catch up with him.

"Dat ah very specific question Hazel," he said into the comm. "Does he fall into tings often?"

Continuing ahead there was a narrow passage between tall, decaying buildings. Vines had stretched across it in several places but they didn't present a troublesome obstacle. Better than going through old buildings that might have become occupied by other creatures.

 

[Delila Castillon]

Assignment : Get Us Water, Goof Around | Location : Ruins/Abandoned City | Allies : [member="Xin Boa"] , [member="Noah Corek"] , [member="Chip"] , [member="Ivy Lasranae"]


"Likewise, let us know if you see anything interesting."


Delila gave one last look down into the tunnel. She would be on the lookout as they searched closer to the city center. It either terminated somewhere below ground or had to come out somewhere at or near the surface. She was already thinking catacombs or tombs of some sort. If they heard girlish screaming then her suspicious would be correct - dead bodies.


Hand trailed along the vines as they crossed under the arch. Odd tiny flowers had sprouted up along the base of the vine in stark contrast to the ruins. There was a brief drop in temperature as she crossed in the shade but it was only greeted with the blazing heat of the sun once more. Eyes squinted as they entered the city center. A long-unused fountain sat in the middle, half-destroyed and weather worn. At one point or another there had been water. Possibly nearby.


"I think Corek is flirting with you." A grin tossed in his direction as she dug around for some nerf jerky for Skreech. "Should I be concerned?"


Head tilted to the left, indicating she was headed into a large two-story building to search. Had to start somewhere and Delila was still hoping to stumble upon a residential area. Those typically had community wells.

 

[Oros]

Location: Stellar Cartography
Objective: Map Probable Candidates for Salvage Teams
Medical Officers: [member="Isis Varida"]
Science Officers: [member="Chip"]

Oros worked away in total silence, appendages telepathically manipulating the readout panels and sensor display before him. He had kept to himself mostly, ever since word had reached him of renewed conflict within Galactic Alliance space, the Celegian Jedi Master had been more withdrawn, almost reclusive. There was no sense in taking Captain [member="Jorus Merrill"] up on his offer to take a transport and return home, by the time he crossed the void the fighting would no doubt have been long since over. And yet, he had volunteered as this expedition's New Jedi Order representative, and now he could not help but wonder how much of his Order there would be left to return to.

For a species like his, innately telepathic, grief could be a contagious thing. So he had sought to isolate himself as much as possible, such as right now when the only other companion save for holographic representations of Firefist all around him was a rusted silver 3PO series protocol droid currently on low power mode. It was rude to assume that every member of this crew would be comfortable with his thoughts inside their head, so Q-3PO had been outfitted with a more advanced equivalent of text to speech for interacting with the others.

>> Science Officer Chip, it is time for your team's scheduled check in. Status report? Remember, Doctor Varida and I will need to run the proper tests on anything you find to determine if it is safe for organic consumption.

Oros had mapped out several more potential candidates along their present course, stellar bodies both displaying the right conditions for potential water and reachable on the Gossamer's rapidly dwindling supplies. Still, he hoped this world would be the one. They could only afford to choose poorly so many times. With nothing left to do for now but wait, he figured it was time to hover back up to the medical bay and check on his fellow medical officer. Isis was no doubt eager to test any potential samples delivered up from the surface as well.

>> Wake up, Q.

"Hm, oh? Yes, master?" dim photoreceptors suddenly glowed yellow, and a limp Q-3PO sat up at once, turning back and forth to process its surroundings, "You have need of my services?"

>> Headed to medical. May need you to translate.

"How wonderful! Did you know, that I am fluent in over six million forms of..."