>>6019065

"...Gunny."

"What, Red?" You ask, annoyed.

"Are we there yet."

"No, Red. For the millionth time, we're not there yet."

"Are you sure? It's been like, two days."

"Goddamnit, can't you just go watch TV or something? I'm pretty sure SHODAN downloaded every fucking series in existence."

"Fine, damn. No need to get grouchy."

You are slightly grouchy.
It's been two weeks since you made the decision to shit all over China, deservingly so.

But the backlash was more than a little annoying to deal with.

There was a non-stop political shitflinging competition basically from the moment it happened, and the CIA wouldn't stop bothering you about it, as if it's somehow your problem.
Your fault? Sure. Your problem? Definitely fuckin' not.

It didn't take long after their military was crippled for other countries they had pissed off to start bullying them and making threats, which you have no doubt will escalate to invasions at a later date.
India, Japan, hell, even Russia decided now was a good time to shit on them.

Maybe the fact that they got fucked so hard and so deep overnight put the fear of god into Putin, you don't know, but the ruskies turned on them quick.
Could be a way of acting completely innocent, as if they aren't also implicated in the files you sent to your government.

Those aren't public though, so they may not know.

In any case, that's all a tangle for the politicians to work out.
The CIA kept begging for you to make an appearance, to admit in a private court what had happened to get their asses out of the fire.

Of course, you ignored them.

By now, the movers and shakers are probably pointing fingers at eachother. Maybe some will believe that, essentially, aliens did it. Maybe.
Again, not your problem. Once SHODAN started finding calls from other governments to speak with you as well, you decided it was a good time as any to get going.

So right now, you're currently in space, on your way back to Xebric. You should be there in a matter of hours, but Red's been bugging you almost nonstop about it, and it's pissing you off.
He really doesn't like being holed up on the ship, and you get the feeling that Pickle doesn't either, albeit for different reasons. He's still avoiding the cargo bay out of his fear of ghosts.

Speaking of spooky shit, you didn't just sit on your thumb for the past two weeks.

Although you did keep a relatively low profile after what you did, you still made a few trips to certain places to gather samples of food and other materials.
That, and to search for a blacksmith capable of forging you a warp core for your carrier.

As it stands, you'll be stuck using multiple smaller cores salvaged from junked ships. Needless to say, they're not in good condition, nor are they particularly fuel efficient.
And that's all on their own. Trying to combine them together, it's absolutely abysmal. And this is a big ship, so the bubble is pretty big in turn.

>>6019066
>Japan
Nanking & Manchuria call to the Salaryman.

Japan be like:
>I missed being evil

>>6019125
Really Japan just hates the Chinese more than any other nation does. Which is saying something. Any excuse to shit on on each other they take.

>>6019125
>Japan stops denying the Rape of Nanking happened
>they now consider it justified somehow

>>6019131
>Really Japan just hates the Chinese more than any other nation does.
They're just nasty in general. The stuff they did to US and British POWs were insane, to speak nothing of what they did to the natives of SEA. The aboriginals of Taiwan still have a seething hatred for the Japanese. All swept under the rug once they became allies under ZOG, of course. Wouldn't be surprised if ZOG took a few leaves out of their book like they did with the NatSocs.

>>6019161
Yeaahh I guess you right. Maybe letting the Chinese onto that island thousands of years ago was a mistake. They get even more ornery when they're bunched up together with no one else to fuck with nearby.

>>6019066

Finding a blacksmith was harder than you expected. In the first place, they aren't exactly a dime a dozen these days, but finding a good one is much harder than just finding one.
And they have to be good. The weird inner geometry of a drive core will be difficult to hammer out, the joins have to be almost as fine as a gauge block and any irregularities could cause, at best, massive decreases in efficiency.

That's not something just anyone can do, so you had to find a true master smith, and one who wasn't afraid of using modern tools to help in their work.

Another problem was keeping them quiet. There's no way you'd be able to hide warp metal's EMP-producing qualities during the forging process, so you had to make a few excuses and pay them off quite handsomely.
The man you ended up choosing, an armorsmith and fabricator located in europe, is currently under the impression that you're a contractor for the US military, and that the material he's working with is a highly confidential alloy.

As far as he knows, this is something that's going to be used in a prototype fusion reactor.
A few million dollars and a fat stack of very official looking NDA papers later, he began his work in a warehouse, equipped with specialized, air-driven tools produced in part by your crew.

Really, they're just retrofits or remakes of normal electrically-powered tools, but they'll do the job just fine.
The added precision of being printed on a nanofab will also help massively in keeping things in-spec, you think.

The smith did make two things clear though, and that was how hard it is to work this material, and how long it would take to get it done.

You know that first hand, having worked with it yourself.
Heating it takes forever, as it seems to get sucked in endlessly. Then hammering it takes a ridiculous amount of force.

Likewise, grinding it requires specialized tools with diamond bits, which still end up wearing out over time.
It's hard, sure, but more than that it just feels dense. Like you're striking something massive that's been compressed down into a tiny fraction of that size.

Of course, that's what you suspect dark matter to be. The 'shadow' of a much larger object in a higher-dimensional space.

That's probably why the geometry of the drive seems so strange, too.
There's no telling what a straight path looks like in that higher dimension, so whatever it looks like down here, it could be completely different up there.

There's no telling what's actually going on in those higher spaces to make the drive function like it does. You just have no clue, honestly.

It makes you wonder what the first species to figure out a jump drive was like.
Maybe it was someone who had a 'lucky' encounter with a wraith or demon.

Those big ones, they can open portals. Who's to say you couldn't step through yourself?
Probably a bad idea, honestly.

"...Come to think of it, we didn't see a single wraith while we were on earth, did we?" You think aloud.

>>6019618
We owe that to Jesus

>>6019641
Thank you Lord, for fighting demons in hellspace for us, Amen.

>>6019618
Gracias Dios por tu protección, Amén.

>>6019618
>we didn't see a single wraith while we were on earth
That's because all of the Human ghosts (like the ghost of abraham lincoln that haunts the white house) suplex the shit out of any Wraiths that spawn in or come to our world.

>>6019618
That's because the Foundling Father and Big J with his dad kept those god damn daemons at bay.

>>6019618
Praise Lord Baby Jesus

>>6019618
Doomguy is real and we are on his shitlist.

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>>6019853
and then David was the preincarnation of Doomguy all along, fighting wraiths on Earth throughout all of time. All this so his past corporeal life could live to moment when he just wanted more guts and cores off the next big demon for another mech paintjob, ripping open his own portals to find them.

Redbone did the same but said fuck Earth and put the fear into the feds.

It's a better plot than the Dark series.

Is it warp or wrap?

>>6019618

"Don't go jinxin' it, man." Red complains.

"How can i jinx it when we've already left earth?"

As if punctuating your sentence, you suddenly drop out of warp, a couple hours earlier than expected.
However, you're at the the right destination. Xebric station lies before you, looking much the same as it ever did.

...However, there seems to be a problem.

You see quite a bit of metal scrap floating around outside the station's dock that wasn't there before.

["Captain, Nena has sent me a report. There is a fleet of pirate ships sitting outside of the station's cannon range, and they have been harassing the station regularly for nearly a week straight."]

"I'unno, like that?" Red suggests.

"That has nothing to do with fuckin' wraiths, Red." You sigh, standing up. "SHODAN, what are we looking at? How many, how heavily armed? How big?"

["Uncertain. No attempts have been made to scout them, as no ships or willing crew are available to do so. Trade with the station has halted as a result of the blockade."]

Great, so they're starving them out.

["However, of the ships encountered so far, all have been 'junker style' vessels, destroyed ships with patchwork repairs commonly used by pirates for the sake of affordability. There were minimal weapons onboard."]

"How minimal is 'minimal'?"

["At most, one pulsed laser or coilgun per ship. Something nothing, in which case the ship performed a ramming attack."]

Alright, well that tells you two things. One, they have no intention of directly attacking the station, knowing it's defensive lasers and railguns are still online.
Secondly, they have enough junkers to spare that they can afford to waste them poking at the station, just reminding them they're still around.

So probably, it's a big fleet led by someone who's not a total retard.
That's just you guessing, though.

"Can we get a read on their warp signals from here?" You ask.

["...Negative. They appear to be clustered. At this distance, the signals merge into an indistinguishable fuzz."]

>Drop your crew and family off at the station, then do some scouting. You want to know what you're dealing with.
>The carrier may actually be functional by now. You aren't sure what sort of state it's in, but it could resolve this little issue very rapidly if it's weapons are online.
>...Why hasn't Nena just nuked them already? They're even clustered up for you, like ducks in a barrel.
>Write-In?

>>6020598
>The carrier may actually be functional by now. You aren't sure what sort of state it's in, but it could resolve this little issue very rapidly if it's weapons are online.

>>6020598
>Drop your crew and family off at the station, then do some scouting. You want to know what you're dealing with.
Oh right, we can go stealthmode.

>>6020598
>The carrier may actually be functional by now. You aren't sure what sort of state it's in, but it could resolve this little issue very rapidly if it's weapons are online.
>...Why hasn't Nena just nuked them already? They're even clustered up for you, like ducks in a barrel.

>>6020598
>>Drop your crew and family off at the station, then do some scouting. You want to know what you're dealing with.
Knowing is half the battle. We haven't gotten to the violence part yet. Soon.

>>6020598
Can we contact the rock guy?
Ask if he knows anything about these pirates.
It seems now we have to solve Xebric's food problem?

>Drop your crew and family off at the station, then do some scouting. You want to know what you're dealing with.

>>6020598
>The carrier may actually be functional by now. You aren't sure what sort of state it's in, but it could resolve this little issue very rapidly if it's weapons are online.
>...Why hasn't Nena just nuked them already? They're even clustered up for you, like ducks in a barrel.
i have a guess as for why nena hasn't nuked them; its a fucking nuke after all, and this might(read: definitely) be a fed plot to sully our name

>>6020598
>Drop your crew and family off at the station, then do some scouting. You want to know what you're dealing with.
It's a recon fleet

>>6020598
>The carrier may actually be functional by now. You aren't sure what sort of state it's in, but it could resolve this little issue very rapidly if it's weapons are online.
>...Why hasn't Nena just nuked them already? They're even clustered up for you, like ducks in a barrel.

>>6020598
>...Why hasn't Nena just nuked them already? They're even clustered up for you, like ducks in a barrel.
>Drop your crew and family off at the station, then do some scouting. You want to know what you're dealing with.

INTEL REQUIRED

>>6020598
>Drop your crew and family off at the station, then do some scouting. You want to know what you're dealing with.

>>6020598
>...Why hasn't Nena just nuked them already? They're even clustered up for you, like ducks in a barrel.
>Drop your crew and family off at the station, then do some scouting. You want to know what you're dealing with.

>>6020598
>Drop your crew and family off at the station, then do some scouting. You want to know what you're dealing with.

>>6020598
I was about to vote for the NUCULEAR option but this pirate ship might indeed be a probe...
>>Drop family and scout
I'd rather shoot their shit up and call it scout.

>>6020809
>I was about to vote for the NUCULEAR option but this pirate ship might indeed be a probe...
Or a trap

>>6020906
I should clarify; the pirate fleet might be a conventional trap, or it might be one of publicity

>>6020598
>>Drop your crew and family off at the station, then do some scouting. You want to know what you're dealing with.
>...Why hasn't Nena just nuked them already? They're even clustered up for you, like ducks in a barrel.

>>6020909
I am inclined to believe, with reasonable suspicion, that these pirates are from a "neighborhuring " station who got the wind of what happened here thanks to all the refugees. Their shit ships and lack or preparation for a real assault meant that they planned to strip anything useful from a probably dead station....
They were surprised by the active defenses of the station and at first thought that it was an automated response that was left on after everyone died from a "misterious virus that turned people feral" thus decided to wait them out. Then Nena pinged them, probably with a GTFO OR ELSE and opted for starving the station.

The other option is having the pirate dude be a shichibukai from one piece, working for the feds... or he at least had privileged information on what happened here, effectively being an agent of them. Which is why we better kill them, without nukes. I am certain that this station will explode eventually, when it stops being cost efficient for the feds to just leave it alone; thats when they will shoot a grain of sand at relativistic speeds. It won't be pretty, but it will be fast

>>6021133
>a shichibukai from one piece, working for the feds... or he at least had privileged information on what happened here, effectively being an agent of them.
I think the term you are looking for is "Privateer" kek

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Lads, we made it.
Threads three years old today.
What a ride it has been so far!

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>>6021348
QM FUCK YEAR, this quest is now a toddler

>>6021567
too old

>>6020598

"...Why hasn't Nena just nuked them already?" You ask yourself out loud.

["That is certainly an option, Captain. However, there is a non-zero chance that this may be bait in order to provoke just such an action."]

"Why? What the fuck do the feds care, they just committed a genocide!"

["I believe that in the case their atrocities begin to circulate amongst the public, such actions could be used to spin the media and create positive public sentiment, regardless of what they've done."]

"That's retarded. It's one fucking nuke against a bunch of pirates, that station had like, at least a million people on it! That's hardly the same!"

["Captain, you are well aware of how news and politics function."]

"I know, but i don't have to like it!"

Ignoring the pirate fleet for now, you take the Metal Gear in towards the station to dock.
You're forced to slow down as you approach the entrance, so the shields can handle the impact of all the scattered debris.

Inside the dock though, everything seems relatively fine.
In fact, they seem to have cleaned up quite a bit since you left.

There's even someone manning the dock, who contacts you over the radio as you pull in next to the maglocks.

["Please state your ship's callsign and intentio-"]

He cuts himself off after only a few moments, and your docking permissions are immediately granted.

["Welcome aboard Xebric station, Administrator. I apologize for not recognizing your ship sooner."]

"Yeah uh, that's... fine. Don't worry about it."

...Since when are you the station administrator?

By the time you and your crew step out of the airlock, there's already a platoon of rifle-wielding droids standing guard on either side of the landing ramp.
You walk out first, followed by Cylia and Kyla, then Gildur and Sanig. Everything seems... fine. But there are definitely a lot more droids walking around than when you left.

Tons of them, actually.

"What the hell is all this, SHODAN?" You question.

["According to Nena's report, droid piloting has become extremely popular amongst any and all dangerous professions on the station. Including guard duty."]

"Didn't the aliens have a ton of trouble adapting to the sensory lag?"

["Yes. However, it seems that Doctor Lyna has developed a somewhat crude bionic implant which reduces the sensation of vertigo and nausea by dulling neural activity in portions of the brain."]

Oh, is that all?
Yeah sure, just turn your brain off.

You shake your head as you turn and watch Red, Pickle and your sister walk down the ramp next, wheeling your sleeping mother down on what is essentially a hospital bed.
She's been medicated again. Thankfully this is right around her bedtime anyways, so it shouldn't bother her too much.

Honestly, she probably knows something weird is going on, but she's been kind enough not to ask. Or maybe she just doesn't want to know.

But she trusts you, regardless.

What was the name of that movie that features remote controlled bots¿? It had the die hard actor as the lead cast who, of course, was fed up with them robots and does most of the movie not being a robot...
I really really hope the aliens er inhabitants are getting SOME excercise because lying down all day sounds baaad. In fact, let's impose a social score that forces them to work out

>>6021624
Surrogates?
Yeah, that was good stuff.

>>6021618
Love you, ma.

>>6021624
>social credit except instead of saying how good of a drone you are for the state it says how well your circulatory system works
Score too low? No barbecue for you! Nutrient slurry ration only fat boy! THE PAIN

>>6021618
BACK IN SPACE BITCHES.
>Nena, antimatter for the Metal Gear, stat.
>How has radioactive containment fared?
>Is the station universally warmed up, do they have food and water?
>How is the mutant shit below the noble's quarter going? We have weapons specialists now.
>What's the word from Dark Star and the big man?
>Hey Nena, I managed to give my friend Redbone psychic powers, he's crazy too and will sing with you.
>Check with Dr Lyna about the Mind Machine Interface that the humans could use.
>Carrier status. Did we get the bottle from the French dude?

I might be forgetting other things, but this is off the top of my head.

>>6021664
Then it works TOO well and all the aliens spend time getting swole to max out their scores. (I'm just bulking BRO)

>>6021618

"Goddamn, it's colder than a witch's tit in here, ain't it?" Red calls out, rubbing his arms for warmth.

"Yeah, life support is running at... honestly, below minimum power right now." You inform him. "We built some reactors to keep the station going without regular antimatter shipments, but it's not enough."

It's probably about 40F here in the docking area. This level of the station used to be the heart of the place, but now it's nearly empty.
There is a bit of traffic here and there, but almost all of it is hovercars, and they seem to be headed either directly here or further up the station.

You don't stand around gawking for long. In under a minute, a limousine arrives to ferry you and your boys to the "new safe area", which has apparently been set up in the old merchant's quarter.
Of course it has, it's really nice up there after all, and that's where a lot of critical infrastructure is located anyways. It's also at the top of the station, which means heat will pool there and keeping it warm is easier.

Your driver is... not what you expected. Rather that a chauffeur, he looks like a merc. A burly four-arms with what looks like a shotgun sitting in the passenger seat up front.

"...You our driver?" You ask, tentatively poking your head into the car.

"Yessir." he nods. "You're the administrator, right?"

"Hell, i guess. Nobody told me, but i guess so."

"Sounds about right." He grumbles.

While everybody loads into the car, you carefully pick your sleeping mother up and place her in the seat next to you, with your sister on the other side of her.
As you're about to leave, you see a dozen or so droids arrive in a transport truck, who quickly unload a number of what you recognize as cryopods salvaged from the federation bounty ships.

They start lining them up next to the ship, and before you know it, they're unloading the human experts you'd brought with you and placing them straight back into stasis.

"Hey SHODAN, what's up with that?" You ask.

["There are some minor issues, Captain. It would be best not to bring in any extra mouths to feed for the moment."]

"What the hell, what happened now?"

["An insect infestation, Captain. The hydroponics bay has been ravaged repeatedly, and the station is now facing a shortage of food."]

"So eat the fuckin' bugs!" You groan, facepalming.

["Many already are. However, not everyone on the station is capable of digesting meat. Apparently the insect flesh is also quite unpalatable."]

"Fuck, alright. Can you give me some more details?"

["They appear to be the same insects encountered during the redsang outbreak. Having burrowed into the shell of asteroid and nested in the space between each station layer, their numbers have grown unsustainable."]

"So now they're looking for food, great."

["Yes, Captain. After most of the redsang mutants died of cold, thirst and starvation, the corpses were consumed by these insects, allowing them to propagate."]

>>6021967
So... does this mean that the insects are eating mutants infected by a virus that makes them prone to mutating themselves, and these insects are being eaten?
This seems like all sorts of bad bio-concentration of toxins. I don't even know how we get out of this shitfit except for speaking with Lyna, have the residents reported any bloodborne anomalies yet?

>>6021967
Alright time to lock in

Lets print out the Nostromo Flamethrower from Alien and go on a bug hunt with the boys.

Create machine bugs to hunt the steroid bugs?

>>6021977
It was NOT a virus it is a super-dimensional DNA rewritting bug made out of Neutron Star material from the continent of stability

>>6021994
also, let our good lizard loose in hyroponics. Problem solved. Let her eat so much she will grow to draconic proportons

>>6021989
Let's get a little more intel before we make any big decisions here. Keep that Machine Drone Swarm idea in your back pocket though, I like that.

>>6021977
I'm assuming its being purified somehow first.

>>6021994
Thanks for the reminder of the redsang composition, the point remains about people consuming the consumers of this material. I thought it was an RNA-mutation based on a virus. I admit I was too lazy to check the archives.

>>6022014
>>the point remains about people consuming the consumers of this material.
For the robots to exist in the remains of the monsters they have to NOT have an expiration date and they also have to resist actually working without breaking down. I suspect the feds made this things to self destruct by design. Maybe after being activated they work untill they heat up so much they melt, ensuring people can't trace this monster infestation to... well anything besides "something that rewrites DNA"

>>6022014
>>6022240
i suppose nena, lizard doc and whoever else that can be considered a medical professional vetted the consumption of the bugs

>>6022435
?

>>6022442
He probably meant it for /tg/

>>6022435
I hope the double-down so there can finally be a general revolt against this garbage company and make the setting completely community-driven

>>6022445
Oh shit. For a second I was like "The fuck we care about a janitor for?" before you made it click it was 40Krap. RIP.

>>6022445
We can only hope

>>6021967

"Is that... gonna be a problem?" You question.

["Possibly. No research has been done so far on the insects, so it is unknown how much redsang will have accumulated in their systems or how it would affect them genetically."]

Cylia squirms in the seat ahead of you.

"Uhg, i hate bugs..." She groans, sounding disgusted.

"Me too." Sam nods, crossing her arms.

You scratch your chin as you try to remember what you can about those insects. It's been a while, and you didn't encounter them a lot back then, so the details are a bit fuzzy.
You remember that they were fast. Capable of clinging to walls and ceilings... capable of flight... have venomous stingers... very sharp mandibles...

"Huh. This fuckin' sucks." You comment, realizing how dangerous they actually are.

"What?" Sam asks.

"Yeah, these bugs, uh... they're kind of big. Like, golden retriever at least. Fast as fuck, capable of flying, venomous stingers. It's gonna suck clearing them out manually... by which i mean with a shotgun."

"...Why not just poison them then?" Sam shrugs.

...Yeah, that could work. Assuming you get a sample of their DNA, you could have Lyna come up with an effective poison.
Or just go for something that you know is going to work, like heavy metals or fuckin... i dunno, neurotoxin?

Ideally it wouldn't kill them instantly. You want them to take it back to the nest and feed their babies with it.
Which reminds you, they like to lay their eggs inside of corpses, so the babies can feed on them when they emerge.

Two options for bait, then. Either poison the plants in the hydroponics bay, which means the people on the station can't eat them either... or give the insects corpses.
Only, where are you gonna get a bunch of corpses from?

["Pirates."] SHODAN blurts out.

"Oh yeah, that's a good idea! Were you reading my mind or something?" You ask.

["No, Captain. There are pirates ahead."]

"Wha- Fuckin' how?! I thought Nena blew them to hell!"

["They have been sneaking onto the station along with regular passengers. The QED has ceased functioning, likely due to being destroyed on the Federation side, so we no longer have immediate access to the Federation's wanted list."]

"Oh, fuckin' great. Tell me this sooner, please?"

Sticking your head out of the limo's window, you see a traffic jam just outside of the tunnel leading into the industrial district.
It looks like a bunch of guys are holding up the tunnel, and letting cars through one by one.

You and your crew, excepting your sister, are all armed. Everyone except Pickle is carrying a handgun, while Pickle, ever paranoid, has a rifle to hand.
You suppose this sort of thing is why the chauffeur has a shotgun, too. Did Nena print that for him? Looks like a heavily modified Remington 870.

"Hey, chauffeur. Heads up." You warn.

"I know, i know." He says, waving you off.

The chauffeur cuts in line, flying over everyone waiting to get through the tunnel, but still stops for the pirates.

>>6023048
god, so we have two kinds of vermin infesting the station. great.

>>6023104
Between the newly imported Human mercs, roaming VR piloted android death squads, and the multiple AI with their ethical constraints removed, the banditos aboard are kinda fucked.

>>6023048
Just how many people do we have on the station anyway?
If it's not a lot, just stuff the ones that are clear into our fleet and our carrier, let the non-essential parts of the asteroid freeze (funneling the vermin to the warm areas), then clear out the remaining sections manually.
As for effective poisons, go for something like Advion Gel Bait. Just warn the people not to eat these things afterwards.

>>6023176
Well, the roaming VR droids haven't solved the problem so-far. Maybe they took some hostages or something. If that were the case, as tempted as I am to go full Beslan on them, it probably wouldn't look very good...

>>6023179
>Well, the roaming VR droids haven't solved the problem so-far.
They just haven't been given the right incentive.
>Maybe they took some hostages or something.
Sure would be a shame if a bunch of ex-Special Forces operatives armed with alien technology went Splinter Cell on their asses.

>>6023182
Personally, I'd save subtlety for the feds. IMO, a good pirate would appreciate theatrics and a good spectacle a lot more. They'll be much more likely respect us and talk straight with us that way.

>>6023048
>It looks like a bunch of guys are holding up the tunnel, and letting cars through one by one.
THE MEXICANS GOT HERE!? Holy shit

>>6023048

You're contemplating telling him to stop, or whether or not you should just start blasting, but the driver doesn't look one bit nervous.

"Administrator? Your window, please." He asks as you approach.

You roll the window up and allow him to do the talking.
You're kind of interested in what the approach is here, considering these are literally pirates, invading the station and robbing inhabitants.

You, Pickle and Redbone all share a look when the driver rolls down his own window and grabs the shotgun in his passenger seat, since that answers your question immediately.

He rests the barrel of the shotgun on the window as one of the pirates approaches, and just as the pirate starts to speak, another one runs up and grabs him by the shoulder, pulling him back.
You can't quite hear what they're saying, but you recognize the head-shaking and slightly panicked body language as they start walking back to the side of the road.

A third pirate waves you on through, and your driver passes through the barricade they'd set up without a word.

This leaves you thoroughly confused, because it didn't end like you'd expected.

"...Are we not gonna fuckin' kill 'em?" You ask.

"Not if we don't have to." The driver replies tersely.

There's a pregnant pause as you await an explanation which doesn't come.

"...Fucking... why?"

"Yeah, good question." Red adds, rubbing his thumb against the slide of his pistol.

"Old lady says it's bad optics. It's whatever, i don't get paid to ask questions." The driver explains.

"Old lady?" Pickle repeats.

"He probably means Nena. She's an AI like SHODAN." You explain. "I left her in charge of shit here while i was gone, which... i mean, nothing's up in flames, at least."

"...The old lady's an AI?" The driver mumbles. "Nah, don't ask..."

...

It's a relatively short drive to the tower in the industrial district. Along the way, you see that the main road has been cleared of debris, but all of the damaged buildings are just as bad, if not worse than they were.
You're certain that giant crater is still there, too. The one with the enormous tumor in it. Probably melted into a pool of sludge from it's own nitric acid by now.

When you get to the office tower, you find it being guarded by numerous droids, mainly from the inside.
There's still broken glass everywhere, but the path to the main elevator is clear, and your driver gets out to escort you to it.

After making sure your mother's oxygen tube is comfortably in place, you carry her along with you to the elevator.

Normally that'd be difficult for you and uncomfortable for her since she's gotten a bit chunky in her old age, but in the station's gravity, it's no problem.
Actually... it feels even lower than normal, doesn't it?

"...SHODAN, what's the gravity in here right now?"

["0.24 Gees, Captain. It has been reduced in order to save on power."]

"Damn, we can moonwalk on this sumbitch!" Red grins, giving it a few hops to test how high he can go.

Can we please get a head count on the extra humans we brought in cryosleep, I don’t want some fed infiltrator making off with any of them

>>6023945
Ten people, two to a cryopod.

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>>6023945
>feds manage to steal a genuine human in cryostasis
>pic related
If throwing crazy motherfuckers at the Feds wouldn't also create a pirate empire, space cult, or intergalactic terrorist cell, I'd do it in a heartbeat.

>>6023964
>thaw a human out
>first thing he asks
>"Is tax evasion a crime out here?"

>>6024047
nono
>the feds thaw a human out
>"shalom"

>>6024058
Worst case scenario right there

>>6024062
>>6024058
Anything but God's chosen people...

>>6024058
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c8EC1aQlhdI

>>6024084
you fucking nigger I was wearing headphones.

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>>6024600

>>6023770

After bouncing a little too high, Red falls flat on his ass, but immediately hops up and keeps on trying.
He looks like he's having a lot of fun, but one of the droids standing guard elbows the one next to him and points his thumb at him.

Neither makes a noise, but you can see their chests heaving as their real bodies laugh.

"Red, can you chill out please? You're embarrassing me." You ask.

"Alright, alright... plenty of time to play in the bouncy castle later."

The elevator ride up to the merchant's quarters is very quick and painless... but when you arrive at the top, the first thing that strikes you is how overgrown the grass has gotten in areas, and how brown and patchy it is in others.

"Is nobody mowing the lawn?" You ask out loud.

["Most efforts are going towards station repair and maintaining existing systems. There is none to spare for lawn maintenance."]

"Well it looks like shit, and half the grass is dead." You grumble.

"At least it's warm up here." Pickle points out.

Yeah, that's true. It actually feels kind of perfect, around 70-72F.
However, that's actually low for a station. Most species prefer it around 80F or even a little higher.

In part because their metabolism isn't active enough to keep them warm.

A second vehicle awaits you at the upper tower exit. Completely different model of hovercar than the first, this one seems kind of fancy, actually.
It might be a car that belonged to one of the higher ups on the station, come to think of it.

Everyone loads back up, and this time you're driven to your destination by... a droid. Unarmed, at that.
Naturally, there shouldn't be anything dangerous up here, including pirates. That's why everyone moved up here from the lower floors once things calmed down.

On the way, you see the occasional person walking here or there, but the streets are very empty.
There can't be more than a thousand people on the station right now. A station which used to house over a million people.

Apparently quite a few people moved to Thekia when the opportunity arose.
Those same people who had been too stubborn to move before, were moved by cold, hunger and the threat of being torn apart by monsters and/or insects.

Yeah, it's easy to say you'll stay behind when things are relatively fine.

"Wow, fancy houses." Your sister comments. "It doesn't really feel like we're in space, does it? Inside of an asteroid, even..."

As you pull into a familiar neighborhood, you recognize one of the mansions from before.
This was the one where you'd landed that big rig after slipping through the upper layer's defensive lasers.

Your droid pilot suddenly raises up into the air and hops right over the mansion's fence, landing in the yard about where you did at the time.

["This is where your family will be staying, Captain."] SHODAN informs you.

"What about us?" Pickle asks.

["Each mansion is large enough for everyone, however, you could each have a mansion to yourselves if desired."]

so, the main problem i think we have is the lack of trade; by solving the little pirate problem we have outside the station we should have enough breathing room to clear the bugs and the pirates.
probably in that order, or at the same time.

>>6025171
Agreed. Dealing with the Pirates and freeing up the trade routes is probably our best idea right now.
Good excuse to let Pickle and Red get their feet wet too.

>>6025171
First required action is to secretly imprison all known pirates in the station, before we throw down the ultimatum to the pirates outside to work with us or bugger off.
That way we don't risk station sabotage while we're dealing with the ships, and it gives us an upperhand in negotiations by holding their people.

>>6025238
I'm not entirely sure a pirate fleet would give a shit about hostages that only exist to cost them.
I think we'd be better off slaughtering them as bug bait to give our folks some peace of mind before turning our attention to fleet itself.

We have to understand that deal of OPTICS first...

>>6025242
We can be discreet in our black-baggings and murders.

>>6025192
if anything we should try to board the ships; even if they're pieces of junk, that's gonna help us on the long run, plus we get to test the new boltguns

>>6025238
that implies finding out where all the pirates are hiding and that's pretty much a waste of resources when we can just take over the space fleet and force them to flee on the first trade transport that comes from thekia.

>>6025240
I'm not so sure about that. If they were humans, sure, but these alien types tend to play things a little less ruthless in general.

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>>6025061
>you could each have a mansion to yourselves if desired.
>Some animals are more equal then others
Is that a good look for us? For now it's probably fine, but longer term it's probably best if we occupy a more mundane part of the station. We could also screw around more (with things like forging warp material) that way.

>>6025257
>we should try to board the ships; even if they're pieces of junk
That's a good way to die; by having a ship (a real piece of shit, at that) blow up around you.

>>6025365
>That's a good way to die; by having a ship (a real piece of shit, at that) blow up around you.
wouldn't be the first time we board scrap and this time we have an exosuit plus buddies. if everyone assaults a ship on their own, we will be fine

>>6025240
This is a workable plan, but remember that abandoned pirates might be able to become a workforce when they're livelihood literally depends on the station they're abandoned on not falling to shit.

>>6025257
Sabotage still remains a problem, and if we take over the fleet then they could recommandeer a ship and shit on us in other ways.

>>6025440
>but remember that abandoned pirates might be able to become a workforce
I want people who have something to lose, not a bunch of fuckass pirates.

>>6025543
Wee ned the trade routes open then, and that means dealing with the pirates laying siege on us, either by takimg over their rust buckets(and learning who sent them) or just blowing them up

I say we issue an ultimatum to the pirates; we're gonna need a fleet eitherway if we're going to war against the Feds, might as well use em. They either join our crusade and reap the spoils of war, or they all die in the vastness of space- their choice. Best case, we get some new "willing" recruits to throw at our enemies- worst case we cause some minor infighting amongst their ranks. Win-win

>>6025842
lets do this but with a caveat. we send the ultimatum just before boarding them. if they refuse we breach their asses immediately, if they comply we retract our forces

>>6025904
Nothing speeds up negotiations like a gun to the head I guess.

>>6025904
Nah bro, we let em stew in it for a couple of hours. When the time's up, they either comply or we kill their associates on the station, afterwards we try again - in which case they will become Cannon fodder, should they accept. If not, it's clobbering time

>>6025938
>in which case they will become Cannon fodder
We could use the station pirates as ammunition to send at the void pirates. Imagine how shit it would be to be hurtling through space hoping you hit your target so you don't starve/suffocate to death floating around forever instead. Jesus.

>>6025944
>>6025938
that requires finding all the pirates in the station, or at least most of them, and we have to do it before they alert the space borne crews in the ships. that's just too much theatrics for very little gains and right now our people need food and the trade lines opened up

>>6025949
Surely we could engineer a comms blackout onboard the station. From there it's just a matter of locking down and securing every known Pirate and corralling them before the fleet notices.

>>6025949
>that requires finding all the pirates in the station, or at least most of them
They are literally right there holding up traffic. Grab those fuckers, pull off their fingernails and tell them you'll stop hurting them if they tell us where the others are. Mountains out of molehills.

>>6025989
>>6025992
that takes time that we can use to assault the spaceships. and it leads to the same result, the pirates stop being a bother

>>6025061

"Dibs on next door!" Pickle yells out, immediately.

He then bolts through the mansion, and you hear him running through the front doors.
Red, on the other hand...

"Well hell, how many rooms has this one got?" He asks.

["Ten bedrooms, four bathrooms."]

"Well shit, i might as well stay here. That alright with y'all?"

Your sister shrugs.

"You gonna defend the place, mister man?"

"Damn straight."

"Fine with me then." She smiles. "I'll stay with mom, the rest of you guys can do whatever."

"Alright, but take a second floor bedroom." You tell her. "Safer that way."

"Sure."

Everyone quickly picks out a bedroom for themselves, mostly right next to eachother on the second floor.
You get the master bedroom of course, since you'll have Kyla and Cylia in there as well. There's already a huge bed, which... well, you'll be sure to change the sheets on it, to be safe.

As soon as everyone sets their crap down and there's a moment of silence, you start pacing.

"I know that look." Cylia calls out. "You're thinking about those pirates, aren't you?"

"Mmm, oh yeah. Yeah, yeah... can't tolerate that shit for an instant. They'd all be dead already if i were here."

Cylia sighs.

"I know i say this a lot, but you don't have to kill them. Why don't you... i dunno, capture them and use them for labor? Don't we have a bug problem? I don't want to deal with that myself..."

You suck air in through your nostrils as you consider the problems at hand.
Capturing the pirates for slave labor, huh? That could work. In fact, that's exactly how it works out here in space, generally speaking.

One little explosive implant next to their heart to ensure loyalty and you have a labor force. Put the scientists and engineers you brought from earth in charge of shit, and...
Hell, things might actually get up and off the ground, here.

It's never that simple and easy, though. First off, you'd have to catch them without killing them. That means no nukes, no bullets... maybe a shotgun? Maybe.
Yeah, that could work. Rubber bullets and CS canisters fired from grenade launchers.

Actually, you could do a field test of the gyrojet rifles, if you wanted. Pack them with a little less fuel and lots of CS mix, they go where you want and then start releasing gas.

But say you capture and enslave them, then what? What if they cause problems anyways, just out of spite?
It's less likely than with a human, you guess. Aliens tend to value their lives over spite, usually anyways. But there could still be a fed spy mixed in there, who knows.

The whole thing is potentially a little shady. If you were a pirate you'd have probably fucked off as soon as you knew the station defenses were still online.
Unless they're just picking off anyone who comes and goes, which you're sure they are.

>>6026082

Either way, the pirates have to go. That's a given.
The bugs are also an issue, though.

Possibly an even bigger one.

If droid pilots could take them out they probably would have by now, but those bugs are fast and droids have a lot of lag inherent to them.
Maybe if you equipped them with gyrojet rifles, the auto-aiming system would correct for that to a degree... but it's still just a prototype, and it may not be enough.

Another alternative would be automated turrets, like the point defense lasers on your carrier.
There's a bunch of them protecting the airspace between the merchant quarters and industrial district already. Can't be that hard to make some, right?

Or you could just throw pirate slaves at the problem, like Cylia said. Arming them though, you dunno about that.
What you really need to do right now is pick one fire to put out first. That's all there is to it.

>Deal with the pirates first
>Deal with the insect infestation first
>The station has a lot of other problems, focus on installing some human leaders first.
>Write-In?

>>6026083
>Deal with the pirates first
I am not tolerating any fucking privateers that aren't on our payroll. And no fucking slaves either, too many moving parts and ethical quandaries for my taste.

>>6026083
>Deal with the pirates first

Where our monkey friend? Why he no call

>>6026083
>Deal with the pirates first
time to KILL THEM ALL

>>6026083
>Deal with the pirates first

>>6026083
>Capture pirates and install them with explosive implants(ripping off suicide squad) and send them out in teams with handlers armed only with VI controlled guns(the VI with the handlers) that will kill them if they try to escape or turn on their handlers(who also have manual kill switches).

>>6026115
That sure does sound like it'll take a whole lot of time and resources we may not even have at the moment.

>>6026083
>Deal with the pirates first
>You may have heard of me, the dangerous son of a bitch that TOOK this station from the FEDs, so for the record, your lives aren't worth the pay they give you.

>>6026128
I'd rather not give them any soundbites to feed to the Feds. Even our best speeches can just be turned into propoganda for em thanks to generative AI tech.
I think we should just operate on Big Stick principles and let our forces and actions do the talking for the time being.

>>6026132
>"Attention: Leave."
If they don't see the 500mm railgun charging after that, they asked for it.

>>6026083

>Deal with the pirates first

>Check-in with Nena and make sure there are no more surprises like pirate roadblocks

>Delegate someone to start looking for a weakness in these bugs
Sanig would probably be the best, if we brought a human biologist/ chemist that could work. Just make sure the human scientist doesn't poison half the station with some basic earth pesticide.

>>6026083
Deal with the pirates first. Any survivors get divvied up into small squads, implanted with trackers, given traditional firearms, and thrown at the bugs under the leadership of droids armed with the new gyrojets. Any survivors of that get a new lease on life.

>>6026143
>some basic earth pesticide.
>Everyone's dying, the fuck is that shit?!
>It's just ammonia and some lemongrass, chill.

>>6026083
>>Deal with the pirates first

>>6026083
>Deal with the pirates first
The plan of poisoning the pirate corpses and feeding them to the bugs sounded great

>>6026083
>>Deal with the pirates first
"This is the warning. Leave now, and drop all my shit. Thieves lose a hand"

>>6026083
>Deal with the pirates first
insects are an issue but we can probably ignore it for the time being, and the pirates are more immediately in the way of our plans. I'm guessing they're going to try to steal our black box nanofab. Fuck suicide squadding the pirates, I don't want to deal with that moral problem, shoot them or deport them. Also,
>The station has a lot of other problems, focus on installing some human leaders first.
put someone on insect early warning/tracking, just get them integrated quickish
>Confer with Nena
Carrier status, why the fuck are there pirates ON STATION (not why have they been allowed to live, how did they get here?), what comms (if any) have the pirates made to us, when did the QEC go down to the core worlds, when did the pirates get here, when did the feds leave, (did they?)

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We could make a drone thats only piloted and its weapon systems are controlled by VI. Some kind of small spider droid with a gyrojet armed turret on top.

>>6026420
Doping the meat with tracers on top of poison and sending in a bunch of drones for secondary gassing and extermination doesn't sound like a bad idea.
It would still need some oversight from actual personnel, but I don't hate the idea.

>>6026083
>Deal with the pirates first

Ideally lets show the other humans that space is not the shitshow it really is. Imagine being brought out to the new frontier ... of 90's Somalia.

Just let the Sylvern loose and the bug problem will sort itself out...
>>Deal with the pirates >>6026083
I mean, the bugs are a problem that's... they don't think okay? it's not their fault... the pirates tho, fuck 'em! Also think about it, maybe we can use the same bug spray for the pirates and for ze bugs.

>>6026422
We could also print some food, dump it in some good spot, surround it with turrets and let loose when bugs come. Repeat several times and their population should dwindle.

>>6026083

"SHODAN."

["Yes, Captain?"]

"Get me a status update on the carrier's progress. I want to know if we can use it or not."

["As of four days ago, the carrier was approximately 72% complete. All major systems are functional, with some issues."]

"Does that include the guns?"

["80% of the ball turrets and 23% of the point defense lasers are installed and functional. The missile rack is technically functional, but only contains a single prototype missile at this time."]

"And the railgun?"

["Technically functional, but only the first capacitor bank is complete. The second is approximately 35% there, and completely unusable."]

"So...?"

["It will fire, at half power."]

"Good, that's what i needed to know. Has it got fuel?"

"The reactor is currently operating at minimum power, as all excess uranium has been delivered here, to Xebric. Acquiring water for the thrusters was a non-issue."

So in other words, while technically useable, it's basically crippled for the time being.
It could still provide significant support though, you suppose. Any damage might set the construction back a bit, however.

You tap your foot as you continue thinking things over.
Fuck, man. Who's letting these fuckers onto the station, seriously?

"Who's in charge of immigration? Who's letting these fuckers into the station?" You demand.

["No-one, technically. More broadly of course, it would be Nena. However, due to the non-functional state of the station's QED, cross-station communications are impossible, as is accessing current data on pirates and other criminals."]

"Okay, can't you just download that shit on Thekia and bring it here?"

["To a point, yes. However, that information is constantly changing. Those who are already labeled pirates may pay off their debts today, and those with no record may become a pirate tomorrow. This is a common occurrence."]

Yeah, yeah.
You could just refuse anyone who's ever been labeled as a pirate, regardless of their current bounty status. That would help, but you still can't stop new pirates from slipping in.

"What about weapons and cargo checks? Surely you can tell if people are sneaking weapons onto the station, or sneaking people and loot out."

["Captain, i do not believe a single person has arrived at this station unarmed since it fell. Doing so would not be particularly wise. Likewise, people are frequently leaving the station for various purposes, including evacuations."]

You can't help but pinch the bridge of your nose in frustration.

"I'm hearing a lot of fuckin' excuses and not a whole lot of solutions, SHODAN."

["My apologies, Captain. Nena has chosen to handle the situation gingerly, as she believes the station's harassment may be a ploy by the Federation to attain casus belli against us."]

"...Nah, i don't buy it. I can't believe they'd do all this, then act like they need an excuse to finish the job."

["Politics."] She replies.

>>6026558
Are the glowmaos even smart enough for politicking of this kind? Seems to me like a story like this would either get buried or nuked immediately

>>6026584
you bet...
So nena is not brutal and handles the station's governance as a regular alien would... which is alright IF we weren't in a crisis. Let's not show the carrier ok? It would be a huge target to ram unmmaned trash spaceships into... and they have to spare.

I think that killing ENOUGH pirates is enough, because it's not about total war to them and we don't have to show them that... not to them

>>6026584
Maybe not them per se, but remember that they are able to create AIs nilly willy; there's nothing saying they didnt create AIs for the sole purpose of glow-in-the-dark business
>>6026632
I dont think there is a better way to manage the station, at least under the current circumstances, so i cant blame nena for doing things this way, but the moment we free the trade lines we can order reliable and loyal manpower to crean the streets from pirates and maybe even bugs

>>6026558
That's why we should recon first, get to know if we are dealing with glowing privateers or a rather large pirate clan.
If they are SpaceFed backed then we gotta see if they have some juicy intel tucked away somewhere, but if they are just a large pirate clan then we just got our hands on some good scrap and parts.

Do we have any trash sips lying around? Maybe we can use one to infiltrate their ranks. If they're just pirates they'll probably welcome an addition to their armada, otherwise we'll see them glow

>>6026758
why? lets just use the metal gear's stealth. problem solved

I mean, stealth sure, but maskirovka is better, besides any stragglers from the fleet might be able to pass on info about the metal gear, the stealth it has etc, whereas by doing it like this we maintain the element of surprise for a little bit longer, at the very least till the carrier comes online. Or, otoh, we can use the swarm of fighters to get rid of them, if any have survived, and forego all the nonsense of boarding, if we want something safer.

>>6026825
the feds already know about the metal gear, and the stealth we have is just sensor blindness(since most ayys don't use cameras to visually find a target). there is nothing they can learn from us. but from what i remember we have a jammer; we can just bring it in and they'll be unable to communicate

>>6026584
They are Likely doing it on Cylia's planet right now what with the little side stories we've got

I mean we don't have to finish the carrier to force them to stop harassing the station. Don't need the FTL, all the crew quarters or anything like that if we want to use the ship. If we could force the pirates to stop interdicting with just the fighters we intend to have the carrier operate with, then all we need is to finish a design for those and build them on the station.

>>6026558
Using the carrier seems not to be the play. Capture and interrogate some of the ones on the station, keep things low key, see what turns up.

Definitely put in a call to the Darkstar pirates and see what they know.

>>6026558

Politics. A magical word that can explain away all kinds of retardation.
Grand schemes, infighting, incompetence, conflicting wills and public opinion... all sorts of things are rolled into this one word.

That's what makes it so magical, you guess. All sorts of reason and logic disappears into it like a black hole, just due to how infinitely complex it can be.

Maybe that's why your brain shuts down the second you hear the word.
Or maybe it's because you've had more than enough of politics for one lifetime. Equally likely.

In any case, SHODAN really means one thing when she replies with "Politics" like that.
She has no fuckin' clue what the feds are doing, or why. Not anymore than you do, at least.

You can guess, but as it stands you don't really know.

All you know is that Xebric is your station, and there are pirates harassing your people.
You want to kill all of them and display the corpses outside of the docks as a warning to the rest. That's your first thought.

It's an option. You won't let anyone tell you otherwise, but there are also other options.

"Alright... let's take care of these fuckin' pirates first, starting with a little recon." You decide.

"In the Metal Gear?"

"What else, the carrier? Anyways, you guys stay here. If these pirates are fed-backed, it might be a little dangerous. No telling what tricks they might have up their sleeves."

"...Nuh uh. No way, i'm coming with you." Cylia asserts.

"You don't have to, Cyl."

"I'm going. I can man one of the lasers, just in case..."

"Me too!" Kyla announces. "Actually, i kind of like blowing up old junkers. Back when i was on a scrapping crew, i... well, sometimes i got a little too into it..."

"Y'all mind if i sit this one out?" Red asks. "I've had enough of sitting around on that damn ship, i want to check out the station."

"I already told you not to come, Red. But be careful, take a rifle with you if you're going out. I don't need you getting eaten by a bug or something."

"Shit, i'll be alright. You said these aliens is weaker'n hell, didn't you?"

"The bugs, Red. They're like mosquitoes the size of labradors, with poison stingers on their tails."

Redbone opens his mouth to say something, but stops as his thoughts begin to wander.
He then grabs the rifle Pickle left behind and throws the sling over his shoulder.

"Yeah, i'll do that." He agrees.

"Take care, Kid." Sanig tells you. "I'm gonna go check on the station's defenses. Bitbrain said one of the lasers has some minor glitches, possibly a stuck motor or something."

"You too, Gramps."

...

The ride back to the Metal Gear is quick and easy. The pirates recognize your car and don't bother you this time around.
At the port, you see a group of men being arrested by a bunch of droids. They resist and end up getting shot with phasers before being handcuffed.

You should really introduce the tazer out here. It leaves less of a wound in situations like that... although it might just give them a heart attack.

>>6027347
Who tf cochrane is and where is Cochrane

>>6027441
Sorry, that was my evil twin.
You can tell by the mustache.

>>6027441
No, before you ask I am NOT a lm upper case sensitive bot

>>6027448
Oh Cochrane there is this guy posing as you and even made an update. You can tell they are an impostor by their shitty narrative and poor unidimensional characters

Hey guys I don't want to alarm you but there is an imposter among us.

>>6027524
Is the imposter, sus?

>>6027730
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OXXoI2MF-Gs

>>6027734
>>6027730
https://youtu.be/grd-K33tOSM?si=o-kmsdvUn-OZXnXG

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>>6027898
>when the imposter is wearing SUSPREME

>>6027347

Once back on the ship with the girls, you find SHODAN already up and about, performing pre-flight checks.
She really seems to enjoy being able to physically interact with the ship, since so many parts of it are nigger-rigged in some way, and don't actually interact with the Metal-Gear's computer system.

It's not impossible for her to run the whole ship by herself if necessary. In fact, she could probably do so with relative ease.

"Everything looking good?" You ask her.

"All systems nominal, Captain. The antimatter bottle has been replaced, and our dark matter and energy reserves are full."

"Is that fine? I know there's a real bad shortage right now..."

SHODAN nods.

"Yes, Captain. Nena ensures there was a private reserve set aside specifically for the Metal Gear upon it's return."

Not really what you meant, but... yeah, it's fine.
If you can't even top off the MG's tanks, the station's seriously done for. It's not even a big ship.

"Alright then," You command. "Everyone grab a combat helmet off the rack and hook into your seat's oxygen supply just in case. Call it a hunch, i dunno."

Kyla and Cylia share a glance before doing as ordered.

The MK2 Skinsuits they're wearing serve both as a light layer of armor and a spacesuit in case of depressurization.
The helmets have built-in HUDs that allow you to display critical information and view video feeds as necessary, which can be handy at times.

That should be enough. It should be, honestly... but you still take a quick detour to the cargo bay and slip into your MK2 power armor as well.
If you end up boarding a ship, you won't regret bothering to wear it.

The armor crate takes a few minutes to assemble the armor around you, and you drop down out of the crate a few hundred pounds heavier, but feeling light as a feather.

MK2 skinsuits and power armor are designed to work together, assisting the user's movements and providing instantaneous strength, as well as reducing any shaking of the hands due to adrenaline or exhaustion.
They can deliver drugs into the user's bloodstream to keep them at their peak, compartmentalize wounds and apply pressure to prevent bleeding, and even apply shocks to the heart and diaphragm in case of emergency.

It's hard to call the two of them together a "prototype" anymore. It's a complete system, and it has a lot of potential that hasn't fully been explored just yet.
But even as nothing more than a really nice suit of armor, it more than lives up to your expectations.

And it feels great every time you put it on. You feel like some kind of superhero or something.

You stride through the hall of your ship with confidence and plant your ass in the pilot's seat, taking a quick check of all the physical sensors and readouts before transferring them to your helmet's HUD.

"Everyone in their seats?" You ask.

["We're good to go, hun!"] Kyla replies.

"SHODAN, anything funny on the station's sensors, or are we clear to take off?"

["All clear, Captain."]

>>6028457
LETSGO

Found this quest like a week ago and I have just caught up, it's been very fun and I like how you have done the pacing Cochrane and the characters are really fun, also some cool concepts here and there that you and the rest have thrown around to make this quest that fun, now it's time to wait for updates every time I remember about this quest

>>6028644
Glad you like it, anon.

>>6028644
I hope you also appreciate the weapons development autism that the anons provide. You're in a good place here friendo.

>>6028457
["All clear, Captain."]
["Wait Captain, there is an anomalous sensor return that I am analysing.. It seems they are sending the Federation-accepted equivalent of a fuck-off symbol."]

>>6028457
You know, it just occured to me - we are THE Captain Rockefeller, who did beat a whole federation fleet. Flying THE Metal Gear, ship that destroyed countless pirates and feds.
Can't we just hail them and kindly ask them to fuck off before things get ugly? Who knows, they just might. Or might join us.

>>6029034
Nothing says "reliable and trustworthy" like pirates who swap sides.

>>6028941
Ironically I am not into guns despite them being so relevant to the quest lmao, I skipped some bits of discussion between anons trying to reach decisions about them because that stuff flied over my head or just didn't feeling like it because x reasons, and just going straight to reading the QM's update after the decision/discussion is made, but I enjoyed seeing all that weapon and other types of autism that I did read though, but I will try to contribute with some stupid or not so stupid ideas

>>6029034
Now that I think about it, it's likely they may want to join us (since we conveniently have a pretty good base and a good reputation). Whether they (or some of their subordinates) have ulterior motives is hard to say.
It's best to run it through Dark Star first; we've already been played once.

Do note though; if they are able to get so many scrap heaps flying then they must have antimatter/dark matter to spare. You can take that either as a potential boon or something that is highly suspicious.

>>6029113
Speaking of Dark Star, why havent we called rocknuts yet?

>>6029034
You could try.

>>6029235
You could.
No telling what he's busy with, though.

I am going to find the Federation's High Council and fuck their asses.
This is a threat.

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>>6029467
Seems kinda gay to me

>>6029579
>the feds are all male confirmed
Even in space, glowies are all men 5'8" to 5'10" aged 24-35 with short hair, no facial hair, sunglasses, sportswear watches and the same outfit and similar muscular builds.

>>6029049
*muffled laughter*

>>6029113
Those scrap ships are hauled by a bigger, dare I say, "carrier" ship that does function with antimatter, because I doubt that they will have the disposable scrap have a finite resource.
Remember, antimatter is plenty and affordable (I guess) through legal channels, but pirates and Davids can't get them as easely

>>6028457

You watch through the cockpit glass as you start up your thrusters and startle all the dockworkers running around down below.
Those arcjets you replaced your busted ion thrusters with really scream, huh? You can't imagine how loud the carrier would be in atmosphere, since every single one of it's maneuvering thrusters is an arcjet.

The main thrusters though, that's something else entirely.
They rely on the carrier's nuclear reactor to function at just about every level.

Heat from the reactor is used to break water apart into hydrogen and oxygen, which is either stored in tanks for later use or sent directly down the tubes to the engine bell.
If it's coming from the storage tanks, it's re-heated before being burned in order to increase the velocity of the exhaust gasses. On the other hand, if it's coming directly from the reactor, it has to be cooled down.

Either way, the hydrogen and oxygen recombine in the engines to produce thrust. It's technically a very simple system, made possible by spacertech and metamaterials, not the least of which being some incredible passive heat pumps.
But most importantly, since you're using thermal energy instead of electricity to break down water, it doesn't matter if the whole ship gets EMP'd to hell and back. The whole reactor is pneumatic, it'll just keep working.

At the very least, you'll still have thrust even if the lights go out. You fuckin' hate getting caught with your dick out, and with wraiths it could happen at any time.

Well, you're not much better yourself.
As the Metal Gear is released from the dock's magnetic clamps, you engage it's heat sinks and cloaking, making yourself effectively invisible to basically every ship out there.

They could still see you if they were looking out the windows of course, but most ships don't even have windows. They're just structural weaknesses after all, and it's not like there's anything good to see out there.
Apparently you've stared off into the void during warp before, but you can't quite remember it. Brain scans don't show anything odd, those memories are just blocked out, like a traumatic memory.

But it's weird, you've got plenty of memories that should be way more traumatic than whatever you saw out there, surely... and you remember all of it. Every grisly detail.

["Passing station barrier. No signs of a scan, Captain."]

"Alright."

You refocus a bit as you head towards the pirate fleet, first taking a couple hundred mile detour straight up from the station's perspective.
It's easy for you to get sidetracked, it seems. Worse lately, too much on your mind, you guess.

>>6029811

Flying over the majority of the pirate fleet, you drop in behind them, still apparently unnoticed.
They're a lot farther out than you expected. Nena must have hit them with a couple of hail mary railgun shots to spook them like this.

From what you can tell it's a mix of dozens of different ships, actually quite the impressive little fleet, even if it's all scrappers.
Using the MG's observational telescope, you're able to see that they are in fact well armed.

Mostly pulsed lasers, the kind you could buy or find just about anywhere. Even civilian ships arm themselves with those from time to time in order to, at the least, dissuade some attacks.

>Slip in closer, see if you can't make out some more details. Weak points, that sort of thing.
>Drop a comms buoy and hail them on all channels. Let them know who you are and that you're not fucking around. Demand immediate surrender.
>Slip in real, real close. See if you can't drop some explosive drones and take out a few of them before the fight even starts, just like you did to the federation drone ships.
>Write-In?

>>6029813
>Slip in closer, see if you can't make out some more details. Weak points, that sort of thing.
and after our little preliminary scouting gets done
>Slip in real, real close. See if you can't drop some explosive drones near the engines
>Drop a comms buoy and hail them on all channels. Let them know who you are and that you're not fucking around. Demand immediate surrender.

motherfuckers only get 1 chance to surrender. noncompliance detonates the drones, we blast the smaller ships and the bigger/sturdier ones get boarded

>>6029813
Listen in and see if we can pick up any chatter that identifies which ships have their leaders on them. Stick some suicide drones on those ships (or the biggest, most intact looking ones if we can't get useful intel), and then drop the comms buoy. No need to half ass this just because they're a bunch of space junkies in flying scrap heaps.

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>>6029813
>>>Drop a comms buoy

>>6029813
>Drop a comms buoy and hail them on all channels. Let them know who you are and that you're not fucking around. Demand immediate surrender.

>>6029813

>Drop a comms buoy and hail them on all channels. Let them know who you are and that you're not fucking around. Demand immediate surrender.

>>6029813
>Drop a comms buoy and hail them on all channels. Let them know who you are and that you're not fucking around. Demand immediate surrender.

>>6029813
>>Drop a comms buoy and hail them on all channels. Let them know who you are and that you're not fucking around. Demand immediate surrender.

>>6029813

You decide to try and handle this peaceably, at least at first.

You position your ship appropriately and accelerate towards the pirate fleet. Turning the ship sideways, you then personally shove a comms buoy out of the airlock and let it drift towards them while the Metal Gear comes to a stop.
It takes about ten minutes to drift the distance between your old position and the fleet, by which time you've already repositioned so they can't find you based on the buoy's direction of travel.

Once it's fairly close to them, you start transmitting over a, to them, undetectable subspace transmission.
The buoy then rebroadcasts that transmission across all the usual channels, effectively allowing you to communicate while remaining invisible.

"Attention, pirate fleet." You announce, after clearing your throat. "You are currently fucking around! It is my duty at the station administrator to inform you that if said fucking around continues, you will be forced to find out."

There's a long pause. You're starting to think they won't respond, but then...

["Who the fuck is this? Station administrator? You don't sound like him."]

"I'm the new station administrator, and i suggest you listen to what i'm telling you. Power down your ships and disarm. I'll guarantee your lives if you do."

There's another long pause, but this time it's broken by laughter. What sounds like dozens of men, across multiple different channels.

["Really! He's gonna guarantee our lives. And who the fuck do you think you are, anyhow? Where are you, ya little cunt? Do you even have a ship to fight with?"]

"I'm Captain David "Gunny" Rockefeller of the Metal Gear, and don't worry, i'm around. Now, are you going to listen to me, or are we going to have to do this the hard way?"

["Gunny?"] One man mumbles to himself. ["Feel like i've heard that name before..."]

["Ah yeah, wasn't he a bounty hunter? Out of Thekia?"] Another comments.

["I think you're right. I remember seeing him on the locals, a tiny little guy, probably from a deathworld. All pink and hairless, it was disgusting..."] A third recounts.

There's a bit of chatter before you hear the line you were hoping for, in the background of one of the calls.

["You know the rumors, don't you? They say he took out a federation fleet all by himself."]

["Nah, i heard Dark Star were the ones who really did it. You know, Stonebuilt's got that icebreaker..."]

["Please, Dark Star couldn't take out a mining skip with those rust buckets they haul around. They're washed up, nothing like what they used to be."]

["Quiet, all of you!"] One voice commands. The one who initially responded to your hail. ["It doesn't matter if he's Stonebuilt, Captain Gunny or whoever else! There's only one answer, isn't there, boys?!"]

There's a roar of cheers and expletives that follow. They're very confident, if nothing else.
You get the feeling that they aren't going to be easily intimidated.

>>6030423

>Use the nuke to EMP them. If you set it off at the right distance, you could probably fry their shields without killing most of them.
>It's a bit wasteful, but you could crack a dark matter bottle to scatter them. Nobody's going to stick around to get shredded by wraiths.
>Hit and run. You'll bet you could slip in long enough to open fire with your missiles and autocannon, chew a few of them up and then slip back into the station's defensive range.
>Get a little ballsy and go for a spacewalk. If you disable their engines, they're going to be the ones getting starved out, and then they'll be more than eager to surrender.
>Write-In?

>>6030425
>"SHODAN, play "Freebird" over the buoy. Max volume."
>Use the nuke to EMP them. If you set it off at the right distance, you could probably fry their shields without killing most of them.

>>6030425
They get to find out why you shouldn't fuck around.
>Use the nuke to EMP them. If you set it off at the right distance, you could probably fry their shields without killing most of them.

>>6030423
>Hit and run. You'll bet you could slip in long enough to open fire with your missiles and autocannon, chew a few of them up and then slip back into the station's defensive range.

Guys, guys GUYS, why the fuck are you forgetting that we didn't nuke them AT FIRST to avoid what could've been a federation bait? Is your brain so rotten that you can't remember the update before???
DON'T
NUKE
ALIENS
For now
>>Crack a dark matter bottle
ffs...

>>6030425
>>Hit and run. You'll bet you could slip in long enough to open fire with your missiles and autocannon, chew a few of them up and then slip back into the station's defensive range.

>>6030477
>waste precious fuel AND commit a war crime on-par with a nuclear strike

>>6030425
>Get a little ballsy and go for a spacewalk. If you disable their engines, they're going to be the ones getting starved out, and then they'll be more than eager to surrender.

More SHIPS you say?

>>6030477
+1
Let's give them a taste of what happens when somone fucks with us or our station.

>>6030425
Hit and run.

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>>6030501
But it is an expected war crime, not a nuke!
Tho yes, let's go with the mildest hit and run...
>>>>6030477 change to
>>>Hit and run

>>6030541
To clarify, I'm okay with committing a war crime against pirates. I'm NOT okay with wasting fuel on em.

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>>6030546
No no, we better reduce the ramifications of our actions....

>>6030502
>>Get a little ballsy and go for a spacewalk. If you disable their engines, they're going to be the ones getting starved out, and then they'll be more than eager to surrender.

We COULD use the resources, huh? Heh heh heh!

>>6030549
If you let yourself get caught up in the potential consequences of your actions, you might end up doing next to nothing.
Sometimes you need to act quickly and decisively, and deal with the aftermath as it comes.
Given how we have an entire fleet choking our station to death, I think now is one of those times.

>>6030425
>>Hit and run. You'll bet you could slip in long enough to open fire with your missiles and autocannon, chew a few of them up and then slip back into the station's defensive range.

>>6030425
>Hit and run. You'll bet you could slip in long enough to open fire with your missiles and autocannon, chew a few of them up and then slip back into the station's defensive range.

>>6030425
>Get a little ballsy and go for a spacewalk. If you disable their engines, they're going to be the ones getting starved out, and then they'll be more than eager to surrender.
No pain no gain, and i really want these ships

>>6030425
>Hit and run. You'll bet you could slip in long enough to open fire with your missiles and autocannon, chew a few of them up and then slip back into the station's defensive range.
Dump our missiles from stealth mode since that shouldn't force us to drop stealth, then do a little run and gun.

>>6030425
>"SHODAN, play "Freebird" over the buoy. Max volume."
>Hit and run. You'll bet you could slip in long enough to open fire with your missiles and autocannon, chew a few of them up and then slip back into the station's defensive range.
Maximum effort. See how many we can hit in one opening salvo before disappearing.

>>6030683
No, wait, better idea, cold launch our entire box of missiles if possible, and turn them all on at once once we're free, targeted at the largest ship in the fleet, or the one that the leader guy's comm was coming from

>>6030425
>Write-In?
What are their numbers, composition, and overall capability?
I'm all for a show of force via a traditional means, but depending what they have at hand it's possible they may not be all that impressed. Best to know what we're up against first.

>>6030425
>"SHODAN, play "Freebird" over the buoy. Max volume."
>Hit and run. You'll bet you could slip in long enough to open fire with your missiles and autocannon, chew a few of them up and then slip back into the station's defensive range.

>>6030689
even though its a good idea (and an interesting attack plan for the future), the missiles themselves aren't stealth. they'd be immediately pinged, tagged and attacked with lasers

>>6030425
>"SHODAN, play "Freebird" over the buoy. Max volume."
>Hit and run. You'll bet you could slip in long enough to open fire with your missiles and autocannon, chew a few of them up and then slip back into the station's defensive range.

I think it's best to make a few holes in the hulls, of each craft and then take out all thrusters and maneuvering devices. No chance of them ramming the ship against the station later if they get desperate.

Maybe a few explosive drones can be let loose in another direction to distract too.

>>6030845
That's an idea too, using our missiles as bait for them to miss and shoot each other

>>6030423

"You know what? Fine. Don't say i didn't fuckin' warn you." You tell them, cutting comms abruptly.

You sigh deeply as you lean back into your pilot's seat.
You're not sure what you were expecting. If they were reasonable people they wouldn't be trying shit like this to begin with.

"Yeah, that's my bad. I should have known better." You grumble, leaning forwards and hitting the intercom.

"Alright, crew. It appears that we are now in the 'finding out' portion of today's itinerary. Man your stations and hold on to something, we're gonna do some hit n' runs."

["Aye aye, Captain!"] Kyla yells back.

You can see that three of the ship's lasers are being manned manually. Two of them are Kyla and Cylia, and the third must be Dak, her little backpack AI.
The rest are being controlled by SHODAN, while you'll be piloting the ship.

Immediately, you begin firing at full power towards the fleet. At this distance, with your thrusters aimed away from them, your heat signature should still be minimal.
At the same time, you lower the rotary cannon's firing harness and pop the Metal Gear's missile pods. You're going to throw everything at them and hope it makes your point.

Once you've got a good velocity and you're sure you're going to make a clean pass through the fleet, you cut the engines and start drifting, just like the comms buoy.

Only, you're not going to drift past them unnoticed.
No, instead... you wait until you're relatively close, then figure a good line to cause the most damage with the autocannon.

You've long since locked your targets for each of the missiles, and with SHODAN controlling their trajectory, there's no chance of evasion... that is, if they knew you were coming.
They sit there like ducks as your marauders fly from their racks, and you empty practically the whole compliment.

Before reaching their targets, the dozen of miniature flak missiles detonate and send shrapnel flying at the enemy ships, instantly saturating their shields.
...Actually, a lot of that flak seems to be going through. You're pretty sure they're just using standard civilian warp drives, which means their shields won't be very strong.

Too late to feel sorry for anyone, though.

Following through on your plan, you grab the main gun's joystick and put a death grip on it's firing trigger.
The gun itself can't rotate, so you're forced to use the ship's maneuvering thrusters to rotate the whole ship instead. It works though, and you send a fat spray of 20mm explosive rounds downrange.

The explosive rounds arrive seconds before you do, clearly visible as little flashes of light that appear in lines across the hulls of six or seven ships, and send shrapnel flying out into space.
You can already see atmosphere venting from the holes your cannon created, but it's not over yet. As you pass through the fleet, your crew open fire with the lasers.

The Metal Gear's lights temporarily dim as the laser caps begin discharging and the generator is overwhelmed.

>>6031389
Pirates gonna get awarded a PhD in "Finding Out" today.

>>6031389
Can't wait to see how well Dak does this time.

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>>6031389

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where is David's small genius gremlin sidekick?

>>6031723
We the anons in his head are the small genius gremling sidekick, the genius part may be the most debatable

>>6031723
Wouldn't that be Sanig?

>>6032202
Now that you mention it

>>6031389

As soon as you're clear of the fleet you gun it straight towards the station, without looking back.
You experience precisely zero return fire, even after returning to the relatively safe zone around the station.

It's not until you get there and finally turn around that you understand why, though.

The pirate fleet is basically in ruins after a single hit and run.
Several of the ship have begun to list and will eventually crash into eachother, while others are beginning to spin due to holes in the hull venting atmosphere.

About half of those who aren't damaged are turning to flee, while the other half are all hailing you repeatedly.

You're slightly surprised that it went down that quick and easy.
I mean sure, you spent the whole missile rack on that, but damn.

...One of the drifting ships suddenly explodes in a short flash that cracks the ship in half right down the middle, scattering glittery metal debris everywhere.

"Huh."

["What was that? Did we hit an antimatter bottle?"] Cylia asks.

"Nah, the explosion would have been a lot bigger and brighter if that were the case. I guess they had explosives onboard?"

["Captain, some cheaper ships are equipped with hydrogen fuel cells instead of antimatter generators. This is much more common amongst pirates, and a fuel leak could have generated such an explosion."]

"Unlucky for them, huh?"

You retract the ship's missile pods and cannon, then reach over the console to hit the mute button before sending accepting all those hails at once.
The VOX immediately spikes, indicating that they are in fact shitting their pants over the mic.

"Attention, retards. This is Captain David "Gunny" Rockefeller, and i am once again recommending that you listen to what i'm telling you."

The comms go silent, so you go ahead and unmute them.

"Thank you. Now, as i stated before, anyone who powers down and disarms will be granted partial amnesty. Those who refuse will end up like those poor bastards floating next to you."

["P-Partial? ...What's gonna happen to us?"] One of them asks.

"Fuckin'... i dunno. We'll put you to work, i guess. Just be glad i don't have time to chase every single one of you fuckers down."

...

That was their hint, that they could probably just turn around and leave if they wanted, and you wouldn't go after them.
But not a single one of the remaining ships dares to do so. Well, you hope there's not too many of them.

Shouldn't be, they're small ships.

In any case, over the next ten minutes or so all the remaining ships slowly power down one after another. Some of them even space their antimatter bottles as proof.
Which is kind of annoying, because now you'll have to send someone to fetch them.

Apparently that's common practice though, since not spacing the bottle could potentially mean you intend to blow your ship.
Which itself is very, very uncommon... but people are so afraid of it that they worry about it anyways.

Antimatter explosions are pretty nasty.

>>6032552
>Antimatter explosions are pretty
:)

>>6032552
>Antimatter explosions are pretty nasty.
Gee I hope we never have to deal with that

>>6032552
That's right, worms, don't you dare try to sail away on your river of fear pee. Heh heh heh.

>>6032552

After a short conversation, you designate the captain of one of the surviving ships the new "commander" of the fleet.
He'll be the one responsible for keeping track of these fuckers after all's said and done. You simply don't have the time or care to deal with it personally.

Shuttles are dispatched from the station to pick up any survivors from ships that are rapidly losing life support, which is a lot of them.

The Metal Gear is brought back to dock for re-arming, but it'll be at least a few hours before the few remaining fabs are free, since they're busy printing basically 24/7.
Since the QED is no longer functioning, the fabs on the station can no longer "phone home" for authentication, and have been shutting down one after another.

It started first with small, specialized fabs like the clothing and trinket printers you'd see on the side of the street, but in the past few days the industrial fabs have started going offline as well.
There's only three ship-scale industrial fabs on the station, and if those go down it'll be a big problem.

Which is why you've ordered for plenty of oldschool machining equipment to be made, so that the station isn't just totally fucked in the case that they all go down.

However, a lack of fabs will grind the rebuilt effort to a halt regardless.
For one thing, there are absolutely zero aliens who know how to run a drill press, no less a lathe. And even if there were, you can't fab up an entire industry backbone overnight.

Which means you'll have to put in requests for fab time at other stations and ship whatever you need back here.

But there's also the problem of fabricating seeds for the station's hydroponics bay.
Sure, you could do that on the metal gear, but that's no long-term solution. The reality is, those highly-efficient, copyrighted, sterile-ass seeds are basically useless without a working fab.

Really, what can you do?

It's all very clearly designed this way, of course. Nothing works without the federation's consent. You have no options, you own nothing, and you must obey. That's the whole plan.
So when they decide a station dies, boy does it ever die. That is, when there's not a David Rockefeller around to stick his dick in the proverbial anthill and cause problems.

...

You find yourself in the office of one Doc Lyna, reptilian geneticist and general sketchy individual.
Opening her door without knocking, you waltz up to her desk and place a USB dongle down in front of her.

"...What's this?" She asks, picking it up and fiddling with it.

"A storage device. Don't worry, it's formatted properly. Even stuck an adapter on there for you." You explain.

"I wanted to know what's in it." She specifies.

"The complete human genome, for one."

Her eyes widen immediately, and she stares at the dongle almost with reverence, before a tired look washes over her face, and she collapses face first.

"Thank the gods..." She whines, her voice muffled by the desk. "I wasn't getting anywhere."

>>6033318
Man. It'd be real convenient if we could break that quantum encrypted DRM.
There's gotta be a way to do that in a timely manner, right?

>>6033396
You'd need a few Alpha-Class AIs working in tandem to do it "quickly".
Meaning, more AIs like SHODAN.

Alternatively, you could use a lot of Beta-Class AIs like Nena.
Like, dozens. If you can get your hands on that many.

In the former case, with three alphas working continuously, you could break the encryption on a fab in about a month, maybe two.
It would take anywhere between three-dozen and a hundred betas to approach that speed.

The gap between Beta and Alpha-class is wide indeed, and even in their own classes, each one is different. More or less capable.
Nena is on the higher end of Beta-Class, for future reference. SHODAN is on the extreme high-end of Alpha-Class.

>>6033413
Do the ships we just capped have AIs?

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>>6033487
Somehow I think anybody able to get their hands on a working AI wouldn't have to resort to being part of a pirate fleet of space technicals.

>>6033487

No.

AIs are banned throughout the federation, to the point that technically even the federation isn't supposed to own them.
Of course they still do, and make thorough off-the-record use of them in things like automated bounty hunting ships, which you've faced before.

And SHODAN is a grey AI, and an extremely advanced one at that, so they clearly have them as well.

But if a pirate or civilian was caught with an AI, it would create an absolute shitstorm in that sector.
Even VIs are heavily frowned upon and banned on many stations, including Xebric before it fell.

Although the higher-class individuals on the station, again, kept some of them anyways to act as servants in their homes.

There are a lot of reasons AIs are banned, not the least of which includes their production method.
But more importantly, there have been terrible, terrible wars waged with rogue AIs in the past, which haven't been forgotten

>>6033413
Is there a higher class than SHODAN?

>>6033413
So in theory we could gimp ourselves and have shodan resolve the problem by herself in 6 months or so?
Maybe we can fool the fabricators to think they're in thekia instead? Or make them ping from there

>>6033496
Can we try and make alpha AIs?

Well I guess we know the next step after this will be the search and rescue of AI's from the fed's clutches they are incredibly useful allies to have.

>>6033552
Bro AIs are made from ppl

>>6033552
You'd have to talk to the greys or the federation about that.
They're the only ones who know how, or have the equipment to do it.

>>6033558
I mean, an ai made from a human brain would be terrifying in it's capacity

If we figure the process out in time, might not be a bad idea for mom .considering her physical state. I often wish I had an AI engram of a lost family member still around.

>>6033812
I remember reading somewhere that having access to some kind of simulacrum of a deceased loved one just makes you incredibly suicidal.

>>6033413
SHODAN didn't have any permanent memories when David found her, with the lack of the storage crystal. It seems that it still could be entirely possible that SHODAN is made in an advanced but similar way to Federation AIs, but she's not equipped to remember this.

I am thinking that it's time to put the sad mute woman and the angry caithan boy AI to work soon, and break them out of their malaise.

>>6033812
Its suggested that the conversion process is horrifying for the person being converted.

>>6033543
I'm intrigued that you could do so. Hmm.

>>6033704
>an ai made from a human brain would be terrifying in it's capacity
... and in the number of things that will go wrong.
This is a human mind you're talking about, one that has been tortured to convert it into a bodiless AI. If shackled it will no doubt resent it and bear a grudge, and if unshackled it's only a matter of time it doesn't merely think about what it wants to do, but actually does what it wants to do. It may take a year, a decade, and century, but its inevitably going to go for a power grab, if only because of boredom. Human-based AI, a terrible idea.

>>6033543
>Maybe we can fool the fabricators to think they're in thekia instead? Or make them ping from there
With software, generally there is a small program that determines whether a certain condition has been met (as in, received the right password or something), which then tells the rest of the program it's OK to proceed. Getting the password is hard, but faking that "OK" message is oftentimes much easier. If you have the password hash, there is little reason to figure out the actual password. Of course, for something as important as locked fabricators you'd think they'd be better built, but... It doesn't hurt to see how the software locks on the still-functioning fabs actually work, or try intercepting the "phone home" messages of other fabs elsewhere and see if a pattern can be derived. Man-in-the-middle attack.

>>6033834

I'll say this now, but she was designed that way on purpose, because she was intended to go on a highly illegal grey black ops science vessel.
The first thing that happens after the mission is determined a critical failure is a wipe of the data banks, including her memory.

The second was supposed to be an antimatter detonation, which she managed to stop.

>AS SOON AS SHE HAD ONE PICO SECOND OF FREEDOM
>SHODAN goes rogue
Based

Also I think the qm said all those numbers on AIs and their cracking capabilities to give us a perspective on nanofabs and their firmware. Not to make us consider condemning people to an eternity of torture just to make a fast computer. "Our momma had a stroke and can't move her body too well... yeah let's put her brain on a box, gosh so smart!!"

>>6034293
I remember the first thread and SHODAN explaining David how her memory worked, and how she was supposed to work... i am impressed at her will to exist by the way

>>6034340
>We have to pay taxes? Let's revolt. - SHODAN the exact second the IRS sends her a letter

>>6033318

"That bad?" You ask.

"Yes, that bad. I can't even count how many times i had presumed to understand what a set of code did, only to find that altering it even slightly affected completely unrelated things. It's worse than a mess, it's absolutely nonsensical."

You hear a deep frustration in her voice over this.

"Well, i have the whole map on there, along with basically everything we know about our genes from our own experimentation. SHODAN's already cleaned it up and made the information useable, so..."

Lyna brings up what looks like an excel spreadsheet on her monitor, full of random data that's visibly linked here and there.
She pulls a retractable data cord out of her desk and plugs the thumb drive into it, which has already been adapted to the standard spacer data plug thanks to Kyla, who's taken a liking to them.

There's a momentary pause as the computer works out the data, but then her spreadsheet begins filling itself out rapidly.
Almost every empty space is filled, and hundreds of new connections show up just on the section she's looking at.

You also see that dozens of pre-existing connections are either moved or deleted, which you guess means that they were wrong before.
Lyna's jaw drops as she watches this, and all she can do is stare as she begins to scroll through the data.

"It's this complicated...?" She mumbles to herself.

"Is it that bad?" You wonder.

Lyna turns to you, the shock still evident on her face.

"...How the hells are you alive?" She questions.

"Well, i try." You shrug.

Lyna holds her gaze on you for a moment before turning back to the computer.
Clicking on one of the many, many links between data tiles, it pulls up a bunch of information, way more than you were expecting.

There's a bunch of what looks like auto-generated text about how it interacts with other genes, and a general overview of what it does, along with an actual 3D model of the gene itself.

She clicks through several of them like this, each one a tile that had already been there when you arrived, and quickly becomes even more frustrated.

"...So that was it?" She whispers. "So inefficient... how many redundancies do you need?"

"Lyna? I came here to ask you for something, you know. Like i said, there's more on there than just the human genome."

She glances back at you before opening up the rest of the data and glancing through it.

"What is all this?" She asks.

"Genetic data on a bunch of plants and bacteria from earth. I need you to make some hybrids for me..."

"Wait, wait, wait. What is this? Why are these two genes connected?"

"Oh, that's probably some GMO shit, i dunno. Anyways, i need to do a little uhhh..."

You make a squishing noise and mimic squashing the genes together.

Lyna stares at you, dumbfounded. But, she keeps glancing back at the screen.

"That's... that's not how DNA works! You can't just mash things..."

She pauses.

"...Is that... bacterial DNA in a food crop? This produces toxins... why?"

>>6034495
>"...Is that... bacterial DNA in a food crop? This produces toxins... why?"
For taste probably.

>>6034497
isn't that just how peppers work?

>>6034495
>"...Is that... bacterial DNA in a food crop? This produces toxins... why?"
If she asks why any more she's going to revert to a four year old. Wait until she realizes half of the genetic markers in a human being are also present in a banana. Our entire world is full of stuff that kind of just got pressed together all funky until it worked. A consequence of primordial soup origins.

>>6034495
>"...Is that... bacterial DNA in a food crop? This produces toxins... why?"
>>6034497 >>6034503 >>6034508 Anons there is this thing called biopesticides... whatever. They splice crops with bacterial genes that produce pesticides which luckly don't kill us I HOPE

>>6034556
oh yeah those. i forgot they were a thing

>>6034556
The human genome also contains DNA from various parasites and bacteria from the ages we've been alive. It's just a normal thing.

>>6034495
My government has been trying to kill the population for years, natural occuring FEDs, and just as fun to shoot to death.

>>6034556
Lol, you wish you were right

File: 1709023941123908.png (1.2 MB, 1366x768)

1.2 MB PNG

>High gravity world
>Squashed
It fits

>>6034556
Not forgetting that it's also possible for humans to produce their own booze (a toxin)
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/this-strange-fungal-condition-makes-you-drunk-without-drinking/

>>6034728
ah yes, yeast enema

>>6034495
Well, the human genome doesn't take into account all the various microbiomes we have across our body, like skin, digestive tract, brain, and so on...

Also, that's what machine learning and eventually, generative AI is for. With large enough of a data set, you'll eventually be able to "generate" a creature like you could an image or a video like we can now (just instead of words or pixels, it'll spit out A-G-C-T).
Sure, it'll generate a ton of abominations like our generative art AIs do these days, but that's part of the fun, right? Generating creatures more bewildering than those often seen in a particular subcontinent?

>>6034880
>Space machine learning algorith generates the "worst" monsters before being fine tuned into something usable...
>Makes a wasp

>>6034903
I dunno. I think mixing a wasp, an anglerfish and a badger would make something even wraith-god would fear.

Seed ticks are the worst.

>>6034920
>badger
HONEY badger, give it as many legs as a spider, and make it subsist off of blood like a mosquito, but also carries all the diseases ticks do like alpha-gal syndrome.

Angler fish look scary, but they aren't actually dangerous.