The Galactic Wanderers

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Dahrinn (Groucho)

The Wizard
Original poster
LURKER MEMBER
FOLKLORE MEMBER
Invitation Status
Posting Speed
  1. 1-3 posts per week
Writing Levels
  1. Intermediate
  2. Adept
  3. Advanced
  4. Adaptable
Preferred Character Gender
  1. Primarily Prefer Male
Genres
Fantasy, Sci fi, anything in which the world itelf is extremely interesting.
One day, in the heart of the Human Empire, on the planet of Mars.

A young Human, born on the Earth, and raised on the planet of mars, named Reilly Atwood, was scavenging for materials in one of the red planet's myriad scrapyards, when he came across a seemingly undamaged military ship, and recognized the model as one engineered by the HCA (Human Colonial Armada.) to end a large string of pirate raids on weaker transportation-class ships. As soon as he pried the door open, it reactivated, revealing an extremely rare and valuable find... it still had a functional AI operator.
Following the careful instructions of the operator, he repaired the ship, at least to a functional state. In exchange for this, he was granted the title of captain, and immediately set to hiring a loyal crew, so that he could live his dreams of a life of excitement and adventures, becoming a ranger of sorts, going around and doing tasks others dare not attempt, in exchange for large sums of money.
The deadline for joining was a few months after the actual posters and online articles were put up, with the instructions to meet in the spot where he found the ship on a specific date, exactly six months after the ship was discovered.


Six Months Later.


As the future crew reaches their destination, a small clearing in the hills of rusted metal, Reilly Atwood, the captain of this ship, which he renamed "The Phoenix" waited as the ship cruised to the location of the meeting. He paced his way through the interior of the ship, quite clearly anticipating what was to come, and he had a big smile on his face. In his eagerness, he was also slightly impatient, and decided to talk to the AI aboard the ship.
"Well, Aika, this is it... this is my big chance! This is the start of our story! I mean... holy shit I can hardly believe it! Seriously, I want to thank you, for this opportunity, this means everything to me..."
He calmed down slightly, though his breathing remained heavy, a clear sign of anxiety... He spoke once more.
"Oh man... do you think I've got what it takes?"
He shook his head.
"No... I can't doubt myself now, the dice are already rollin'!"
His air of confidence slowly returned, as he sat back in a built-in couch facing the main door to the ship.

The ship was now nearly to it's destination.
 
Aret Mezido drove to the meeting point. His junker of a car had trouble navigating the the massive scrap piles. By now all four tires had been punctured by sharp bits of metal. He didn't care. Getting this job meant leaving this planet and this life behind. The vehicle rolled past a scrap hill and the ship came into view. "That must be it." He told himself.

The ship looked to be in good condition. It seemed to be military in design. He pulled up to the bottom of a rusting hill and stopped the vehicle. He put his helmet on and retrieved his shotgun from the back seat. Typically his combat suit would have been black and grey but he repainted it an olive green after leaving the police force. Aret slung his shotgun over his shoulder and approached the ships main entrance. "Ding-dong. Anybody home?" He was a little suspicious. A ship like this didn't come easily to civilian hands. There was a possibility it was pirates, thieves or rogue salvagers.
 
Wren tapped its leg armor, eager to be on the move. The rickety bus was packed full of humans, every set of eyes on the non-human in the vehicle. The Scavenger was less concerned with the staring and more concerned with the fact the stupid junker wasn't moving. It had no time to be sitting on some rusted human machine and oogled by Humans who have never seen anything different before! Standing abruptly, it made its way through out of the bus to where the driver was looking at the smoking engine. It pointedly ignored the whispers from inside the bus.

"How much longer will this be? Do not have much time to be sitting around being gawked at. Have important meeting. Must get off world." The driver looks up from engine and sighs.

"Look, kid. At this point, you're better off walking to where ever you're goin'." The Scavenger perked up at the idea. Of course, its legs are working well enough! A bus may be easier but obviously, easy was the wrong choice. Wren nodded and checked the location of the rendezvous one more time. It wasn't far from the roadside it was currently standing on.

"Novel idea! Will be going now. Thank you!" The driver just waved it off, ducking back into whatever engine made the rust bucket move. Wren took off into a easy jog, thanking its luck that the trek would be much shorter than any training it had gone through.

As it approached the meeting point, it felt the excitement and pushed itself to go faster. It crested the hill and gasped. The ship was perfect! Wren could see that at least one other being was waiting and eagerly slid down the hill, towards the ship. Of course, the idea that this was a trap wasn't too farfetched. It had been in situations like this one so Wren didn't actually approach the ship or the being, just stood in the clearing, just watching.
 
Aika sighed as the kid muttered. It had become an annoying habit of his, talking to her about things she couldn't care less about. She was a bit pissed off, if she was to be honest, that she finally got the opportunity to fly again and her captain is a kid whose nervous about meeting his own crew. "Yes, it does mean everything to you. No, you do not have what it takes. Yes, if you had dice, those dice would indeed be rolling right about now." Around this time, the Phoenix's external cameras noticed the presence of two individuals outside the vehicle, standing in a very purposeful manner. She ordered the Phoenix to open the closest door to them, and invited them inside, making sure to divert a small amount of power to the internal weaponry, just in case they were people of the less favourable variety. "Hey kid, you have company."
 
Raynar scanned his data pad it seemed the planned meeting point was ahead, though he still had access to some of his private equipment, a small litter of worker droids that were riding in their mounts on board the transport shuttle he drove to the meeting point aboard the transport bed of the vehicle under chains and straps were a container and a mount behind it held a cargo walker.

Cargo Walker
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The vehicles studded wheels made easy work of gaining traction on the rough terrain as it churned its way to the location, Raynar had came in a set of reinforced overalls and had brought a number of other pieces of PPE, most work places no longer supplied PPE and in the work place an injury can mean no pay, though he did have a stashed firearm, a high calibre pistol for if it was at all necessary to put a bullet in someone.

He was closing on his destination and the ship was somewhat visible though above the scrapfield, Raynar had a few options to reaching the zone exactly, driving over the mound, driving around the mound or driving through the mound, he didn't fancy the risk of crushing himself inside the mound and going around would take extra time, so the Lowbed began its clawing up over the mound, it wasn't half way to the top that the lowbed broke through the mound and churned its way through the mound to the other side as it threw scrap out left right and centre, it slid down the surface like it was surfing throwing up chunks of metal from the piles when it finally came to a hault, this old lady was tough as nails though as she churned her way forward before raynar brought her too a halt.

This ship was something far more military like than he was used too, what exactly had he gotten himself into this time...
 
Bret was sitting in a seedy bar on the outskirts of a small Mars settlement waiting for a client. His tumbler has only one gulp left as he toyed with it, turning the glass and sloshing the amber liquid it contained. Raising his glass to finish it off he glanced around the room as he set it back down with a thud resting his gaze on a man sitting in a booth alone, and dressed out of place for the location.
"You should learn to blend in." Bret said as he arrived at the booth. "Dressing like that here could get you shot." taking a seat across the table from his client he watched as the man turned his head to scan the room. "God Damn, could you get any more conspicuous?" Bret replied sharply as he ducked his head looking around the room.
"As a man as wanted as you, it is a surprise to see you so close to Earth... Do you have the intel?" Bret responded with a nod and scrached the side of his thumb.
"Funny thing about hiding is you don't have to run if you have the right skills and friends." as he spoke and scratched his thumb he pealed a small, clear silicone, patch off his thumb nail placing it next to the man's drink. "All the info you requested from the Saturn Deep Space Defense Grid... Quite a hefty bit of intel for some Martian Corp."
"What we do and why is not your concern. How can we be sure you didn't forge this?" Bret stood up and turned to the door looking back over his shoulder.
"The same way I know my account has the money you promised." Then he walked out without another word.

Walking only about twenty feet from the bar Bret stopped at a buss stop where another man was waiting as well. "When he accesses the chip you will receive a ping." He said without making eye contact. The man nodded before replying with a question.
"He didn't suspect?"
"No, by the looks he is a first time buyer. I could have have given him anything and he would have taken it."
The man nodded again as a taxi cab pulled up and Bret stepped in. "Oh, and you might want to be quick... The data on the chip is real." Shutting the door the Taxi pulled away as the man at the stop took two hasty steppes out into the street after the taxi. "Drop me off where 42nd Sol dead ends."

___---___---___
Bert stepped out of the taxi, now further out of the settlement than before, and towards an impound. The place was old and pretty much dilapidated save for the security shack. Walking into the shack Bret pulled out a small key card and inserted it into a dial pad, pressed a series of buttons, and removed the key card. from the large set of four garages came a large mechanical whirring and clanking until one of the door slowly rose open. Inside was a off road buggy with plated tires. "This bites... I was hoping for something more... Sophisticated." Bret scoffed as he walked to the buggy. "I guess this will do." He turned over the engine which resulted in a cough and hard sputter before ignition. "Not quite the first impression I was hoping for."

It was a long and bumpy ride to his next location, the Phoenix, Where he could hopefully continue to lay low while picking up some good data bits here and there for resale. Bret only hoped that the captain either, one doesn't know him or, two trusts him enough to give him a job. 'Who knows maybe they still need a Communications Officer or Systems Operator. Hell I could even take Radar.' Bret came to his destination and found that the ship had landed and some people had already started boarding and asking questions. Bret followed the rest Hoping that no one here had worked for any of the people or corporations he had hit lately.​
 
A Lone figure walked across the surface of mars, wearing a heavy blue coat with a grey hood that looked it was a moth's lunch. Several times, and pants that looked like it was taken from a bum, or stolen from a ratty store. Obvious by the aged look the clothes had, added with the tears and what looked like bullet holes all across the back. But for some strange reason, the figure seemed to not be wearing gloves or shoes, yet it looked like he/she was wearing something dark colored yet obviously made of metal. Hinting that the figure was wearing armor of some type, yet what would require such clothing to shield themselves when they could just walk about with their armor showing to the world?

It was strange indeed, but eventually, the figure got closer and closer to the meeting point. To the point that he/she was visible on the horizon, yet they stopped midway to the ship. Looking around as if making sure it wasn't followed, upon confirmation that nothing was following, they continued their path. Adjusting the duffle bag on their back, it got close enough to see that two people had already arrived, when for some reason. They pressed onto their wrist, and if anyone was close enough, they'd hear a slight 'errrr' noise come from the figure. Before giving a quiet "Checking." it wasn't loud enough to be heard, though if there was someone just close enough to hear, they'd hear that it sounded somewhat deep and clear as day, indicating a male was underneath that garb. With the task done, he walked at a faster pace, coming up near the one person on the ship and the one in the clearing.

Seeing as he didn't want to come off as 'unfriendly'. He gave a short wave with a "Hello." The accent which he spoke with clearly showed that he wasn't native to this planet.
 
As the doors to the ship abruptly opened, Reilly sprang up from his position, and rushed to rub the creases out of his leather jacket. He cleared his throat, quickly made his hair less messy, and struck a serious pose, before stepping out the of door to greet the first few of his new crew.
"Well, here I go." He said as he left the confines of the ship.

He chose not to arm himself for this occasion, as he was confident in Aika's quick-draw abilities with the ship's weapons... should things get ugly. He looked at the people who had gathered.

Three men in full armor, with a fourth individual driving a cargo walker. They all looked rogue-ish in some way or another. Reilly kept his head pointed in their direction, and his eyes darted towards the weapons on the ship, hearing the faint whir of the machinery within. He turned back and smiled.
"Uh... Hello! I'm Reilly Atwood, I put up the whole... 'Seeking Crewmates' advertisement."
He took a few steps forward and one to the side, motioning the strangers to step inside.
"This is the Pheonix, I... literally found her laying here, and I managed to fix her up. The AI is named Aika... She can show you around. I'll stay out here and wait for more people, thanks for joining."

He looked outward to see if anyone else was approaching.
 
Aret kept to himself as the other crew members arrived. He was starting to get impatient before the doors opened and the captain stepped out. Aret cocked his head to the right a little. The captain was a kid. He muttered to himself. "Crap. This kid no doubt has zero experience." Though, he was impressed that the kid managed to repaired this old thing.

Aret glanced at the others before stepping up to the entrance, and the captain. He held his hand out. "Aret Mezido. I specialize in Negotiation, gunnery and.." Gesturing to his shotgun. "Problem solving." Aret spoke confidently and slightly intimidatingly. He was trying to lightly scare the kid to get a feel for who he (Aret) was going to be working under. "But I'll take whatever job you throw at me."
 
Wren strode forward when the door opened and watched for a moment, taking in the structure and build of its new home. She was a very pretty ship and the idea of a ship with a proper AI is interesting and new. When Wren found an opening in Reilly's attention, it stepped forward to greet him. Its eyes were on its new captain the entire time, practically vibrating with excitement. Wren could tell the boy was inexperienced, young as well but so was it at one time. Everyone had to start somewhere. Although most don't start as the captain of a ship full of unknowns but everyone has a different idea of "beginner". Who was it to judge?

"Am called Wren! Doctor, but can work with robotics to a degree as well as study flora and fauna in spare time. Pleasure to make your acquaintance." The lights in the helm flickered, pulsed and glowed with every word. The suit was the only way it could communicate non-verbally. Like right now, the lights were bright and a pure orange, a sign of their genuine happiness and excitement. "Very thrilled to be here. Hope adventures will be many. Looks promising, captain."
 
Raynar began the activation sequence for a number of his droids that he had brought along with him before he left the cab of the low bed truck, unhooking the radio he made an attempt to transmit a request to the Vessel's Captain on a common frequency.

"Captain, please lower your cargo bay hangar, ill drive the low bed and my cargo on board"

Raynar assumed the ship had a cargo hangar door that could drop down though he couldn't exactly be sure with this exact type of ship, it had to have at least some form of cargo capacity and it must have a way to get it in that didn't block crew access, though for now he had no clue how to.

Raynar awaited a response.
 
Aika noticed a transmission that seemed to be directed towards the Phoenix on the common frequency. It was a simple and seemingly harmless request, but she'd watched a LOT of space films in her time and if there's one thing she knew best, it was that enemies always invaded through the cargo entrance. She put the cargo bay weaponry on alert and responded on the common frequency. "State your name and intentions, as well as the entire contents of your cargo. As I'm sure you're aware, this is a military vehicle and we are entirely capable of wiping you off the face of the planet should you choose to withhold information. The captain looks forwards to your completely voluntary joining of the crew that is in no way manipulated through the use of threats!"
 
The Man was quite shocked to see that the captain was a rather young individual, infact the captain reminded him of that one from the anime about pirates he had found a data entry about. It intrigued him, and made him wonder if the anime was still in action. But, he has business to attend to. He walked up to the young captain, and was about to hold his hand out before moving it back to his side. Deciding that he would not risk crushing his soon to be captain's hand. He just went with the classics. "My name is.....John.....But people call me Subject X....Technical Support and Reconnaissance." Clever choice of a name. Literally thousands of them. And that was his first choice, goodness, had his creativity downright got up and buggered off? He mentally sighed, hoping both the captain and the others bought his 'name'. So long as he didn't use "Doe" as his last name, he should be fine. Subject X nearly jumped as when the com-link stated a warning, causing his suit to utterly flip it's absolute shit. But thankfully, he managed to turn off the red hue and alerts his 'HUD' had taken. Though, he was still shaken from the way his suit reacted. Infact, he hoped his suit's little 'thing' didn't alert the voice/person on the ship, and it didn't do this whenever something such as someone sending a message over coms. For he could only imagine the migraines that'd ensue from his display going red with flashing alerts.
 
Reilly didn't nessescarily have a radio on him at the moment... but one was on in the ship, right next to the couches, which were near the door, so he got the gist of what was being said.
"Aika, let's not try to kill anyone before we leave Mars. But I appreciate your caution."

He turned towards his newfound crew members, his smile faded, and now he had more plain expression, and spoke casually.
"Ok... so a gunner, tech and recon, a doctor... well, we're probably going to spend a lot of time on outer colonies, so we'll be facing pirates, hostile alien fauna, ...hostile alien flora(?), maybe even uncover precursor artifacts. I'm gonna start off easy, and as I get a feel for how the crew operates, I'll move up to more dangerous tasks. I'd discuss pay right now, but I'd rather make sure everyone who's gonna join is here first."

He noticed another man (Bret) walking up, and adding himself to the list of people who looked significantly tougher than Reilly.
His smiled reappeared as he spoke. "Ah, hello! This is The Phoenix, I'm the captain, are you here for the job as well?"
 
Periwinkle Green, or Perri as she preferred to be known, was late.

Yep, it wasn't the first time she'd been late for something important, but this was more important than most. She wanted to get off-planet as fast as she could, before her parents could loop her back in with some excuse or another.

She dashed into the room waving both hands in front of her. "Sorry, sorry. I'm not usually late for things, especially stuff this important, but I had to wrap up a few things and there was so much frelling paperwork I don't even want to start complaining about that, since that's going to be a big portion of my job on ship. I don't mind paperwork when it's for good reason, but sometimes I think bureaucrats make up forms just to see if they can't trip people up."

She settled in on one of the couches and crossed her legs. "So, what did I miss?"
 
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Leone revved the engine on the trike, sparing a glance at his watch. He was late. A soft growl of annoyance escaped him as he accelerated along the barren stretch of road. The drive had been longer than he expected, but then again, time was always a struggle with the daemon. He distinguished it as night and day, and even then he had difficulties due to the different rotations of different planets and such.

He skidded to a stop once he reached the scrapyard. He swiftly gathered his things, his Buckshot slung across his back, his toolbox in hand, laser cutter hooked up at his hip. His gaze flicked about the place, assessing as always. This place was a goldmine. Of course, he ignored his urgings to go junking, as some of the humans called it, and hurried along to where this so called ship was at. He pressed a button on his helmet and it folded back into the collar of his black leather jacket. Seeing the gathering of rather troublesome looking men, a kid, a questionable, and a woman, standing and sitting around an old fashioned - at best - military ship, he approached with caution. He brushed some dust off of his jacket and assessed each of them carefully. He didn't say a word as he waited to see who was in charge.

His tail slowly flicked behind him as he deemed all of them dangerous so some extent, save for the woman sitting down and the obviously unarmed kid. He really wanted to know who was in charge. Quite frankly, none of the people standing around here looked like captain matierial. He knew he missed the introductions, but those petty things were irrelevant.
 
Raynar had a rather aggressive response sent over the comms to him, it seemed the ships lady was highly aggressive, that would make sense the nipper that appeared to be at the helm would logically have a "strong" highly aggressive woman behind him, Raynar had to think fast he didn't fancy getting turned to dust but he wasn't going to exactly play all his deck out wide for the lassy.

"Lassy put away those bedroom toys, Im here to do my job on the terms involved, obviously you see the rig on the back of my loader right as well as my bots then im sure you have a scanner, its not like I have to tell you but its quite clear walker parts, droid parts and equipment"

Raynar wasn't exactly telling the truth but he also wasn't lying, it wasn't exactly a single model of walker and droid parts though he could easily find an excuse for that, this lassy wasn't going to be getting on top of him in the very least.
 
"I'm very jealous of your bedroom if it was lucky enough to contain this kind of stuff as toys. And yes, I've already scanned your cargo but I like to give people a chance to speak for themselves, know what I mean? It's also very handy. You get to learn so much about the people in your presence." She smiled to herself within the safety of the Phoenix's hard drives. "Very well, I shall open the cargo bay. If you don't mind, I'd ask you to leave your luggage within the hold for now, until the captain gets around to clearing a more appropriate space for them." Next, she turned her attention to the kid and his new playmates. "You people shouldn't trust him when it comes to money. There's something strange going on with that, I reckon. He can afford to hire an entire crew, but I want one tiny engine upgrade and suddenly he hasn't got a penny."
 
They still used that type of currency? He wondered to himself, not that he was disappointed, but when he'd first 'landed' on the planet and was roaming about. He'd seen some people exchange this type of chip about for goods, so that made him think that people used a currency that some authors/directors shown in the Sci Fi films of old. Like Credits or something. Then again, it could be that some spots didn't have access to such funds, and so just used a valuable item as money. He'd have to ask someone on this topic. As for payment, he really didn't require it. Afterall, all he wanted was to get as far away from this planet and find out who did this to him, and see if they were still around. Hopefully they weren't, for that meant no hassle. But at the same time, also meant no answers. But back on the case at hand. "I don't really need payment...I'm just in it for.....The travel and....Adventures." Man, he sure was convincing with these 'statements'. Not. He would honestly be amazed if someone bought it, but he'd also feel a bit guilty for lying. The key word being 'a bit'. He leaned against a wall, looking at his "hand", clenching it a bit as if loathing the appendage.
 
Reilly spoke up in regards to Aika's comment.
"Aika, you underestimate the power of your current engine, it's not like we'll be trying to outrun other military vessels, now, I want you to do a quick scan of the surrounding area, see if anyone else is coming up. Also, take DNA samples of our crew."

He turned towards his new crew.
"If any of you got anything you want me to know, that may lead to me having trouble, I'd like you to say it right now. I'm not very old, but don't think you can just play me like an instrument, and if it gets past me, it certainly won't get past Aika, she's a military grade AI with no morality program. I'M a little scared of her."

He paused for a few seconds, in a small attempt to keep the mood light.
"But I got to say, I'm certainly excited, I look forward to many successful missions with as little trouble as we can achieve. I'm going to try my best to be captain. Feel free to enter and explore the ship."

He walked back into the ship, and loudly exclaimed.
"Let's get this show on the road! Aika, prep the ship for takeoff in the next few minutes!
 
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