*Sigh*
*Clunk... CRASH... BANG!*
Oh for... stupid neural net log thing's not bloody turning on...
*SMASH!*
Ooh, Ow, bloody useless piece of... hang on, urm...
*Rustles through papers*
Aha, instruction manual, there we go. Now then... safety *Pft*, power plant set-up, power plant usage, yada yada yada
*Flicks through pages*
Where in Sirius is the bloody page on th... oh, there it is...
*Takes Slurp of tea*
Right, neural net log set-up, Ok, *reading* Step one, connect neural net log to power plant through ship-wide power distribution circuit or SWPDC, never give these bloody things easy abbreviations do they. Blithering idiots sittin' all full of themselves cos they got smart-arse manual writing jobs. Bloody Libertonians.
*Slurp*
*Shuffles and stretches a bit*
*Crack*
Ooh me back, oh, that's better... Right, well the bloody plug's already in all the way down there. So... connect neural net log blah blah blah, okey dokey step two, press on button. Duh? I'm not bloody stupid. When green light shows, power is on and neural net log is recording audio.
*Slurp*
*Sigh*
Well I pressed the bloody button didn't I? I wouldn't be checking this bloody manual if the bloody light would bloody well come on would I you bloody useless piece of junk, don't I get a bloody step 3 in case the bloody light doesn't come on.
*Slurp*
Oh for Pete sake come on...
*BANG!*
Work you bloody useless machine, oh, hang on a sec...
*Clattering and clunking*
*Slurp*
*More clattering*
Ah, there is a rag here
*Squeaking*
Oh, THAT bloody green light, well there's no bloody point putting the light UNDERNEATH the bloody dirt, is there you bloody useless piece of metal.
*Slurp*
Right, so that works, what's next?
Okey dokey then... oh for Pete sake, bloody missed a spot.
*Squeaking*
Ahh... well, it's all clean, even got that bloody coffee machine making something that resembles tea, talking of which.
*Squeak*
*Slurp*
*squeak*
This bloody chair's squeaking again, right, OK, I'll put that onto the list, new chair.
*Sigh*
Anyway, you listening to me over there, bloody machine with your little green light?
*Squeak*
*Slurp*
And you know what, just for that, I'm not gonna put the bloody cup back down you bloody squeaky oo-jit, really need a new bloody seat if this thing's gonna fly any time soon.
*Slurp*
Ok, well basically I'm James. I live on Waterloo Station, where I give lectures about Spatial Economics. It seems all the smart-arse types who bloody well think they know everything come up from their cosy little Cambridge University dorms to come and see some economics in real life. They bloody hate it. All the oily ships and heavy containers. Idea of dirt and hard work scares the most of the bloody lot right back to their mothers. *Slurp* Hah, me and the other 'lazers' had a right laugh about one kid, was bloody scared of everything. The bloody barman smiled at him and he cried. Mind you, if our barman smiles at you, you got a bloody good reason to cry. *Slurp* Oh, just for info, Lazer is the term the space-faring folk give us non-space-faring folk, lazers as in lazy. Stupid really, seeing as how they just sit around drinking bloody tea when they're here, out of my bloody tea maker I might add, and leave us to do all the unloading and such. Do far more bloody work than they do. *Slurp* That and the fact I gotta put up with the bloody brat parade from Cambridge once a bloody week. *Sl...* Oh, it's empty.
*Squeak*
*Beep*
*Gurgle*
*Sploosh*
*Slurp*
Ouch, bloody hot piece of...
*Squeak*
Right anyway, so working for Interspace isn't so bad, at least it's relatively safe. I mean, My old man bloody went and got himself blown up. Silly old guy, armed forces ain't no place for a bloody plonker like him. Not with them bloody Kusari lot blasting at you. Ah well. *Slurp* ah, hot hot hot, ow damn. Another good thing about being here actually, I don't have to see my bloody mother, she lives on New London, and 'unfortunately' I don't get much time to go visit. Well, especially recently. Since I bought this bloody wreck of a Camara freighter from that strange bod about three months ago, I've spent more or less all my spare time here, fixing here up and getting her, well, you, space worthy. Figured I'd take one of those corporate trader agreement policies. It's a case of I can earn my money how I like, and they'll either insure my ship for me, or give me one, though the latter's unlikely 'cos bloody Interspace are rather greedy. All I have to do is log everything I do money-wise, and send them 10% of my profits. I can also get myself escorts, paid for by Interspace, well, if I give them another bloody 10% anyway. Wonder if that tea's... *Slurp* Ahh that's great. So yeah, I'm gonna apply for that once I get a new bloody seat for this here Camara. *Slurp*
*Slurp*
Ah... all rightey then. Well, I haven't used this bloody log much to be honest, perhaps I should. *Slurp* Anyway, I left Waterloo without much of a problem, got everything registered and sorted, and now I'm out on my own. *Slurp* I made it into bloody Liberty fairly easily, a few bloody Mollies wanted to kill me before I'd left Bretonia, but the BAF just happened to be patrolling nearby, so I got clean away there. *Slurp* When I got into Liberty, I headed straight for Newark Station, Interspace's base in Liberty. I'd already checked that they carried standard tea leaves so I could restock there, and the bloody boring trips through the trade lanes had caused me to exhaust my supplies already. *Slurp* Anyway, I got chatting to this Deep Space Engineering guy, bloody weird he was, had grey hair, but bloody looked like he was 20 or so. *Slurp* Anyway through conversation he mentioned that the debris field around Pittsburgh was full of old bits of scrap metal. He also told me the name of this guy on Pittsburgh who bought scrap metal for a bloody fortune. Says he extracts something from it that makes it profitable even to buy it so bloody expensively. Well, needless to say I jumped straight into Tamara, that's what I've called this bloody ship by the way, Tamara was my sister, but died when I was a kid, so Tamara, Camara, ah, never mind. *Slurp* So yes, I got straight in and came here to start collecting metal. *Slurp* I've sold a full hold already, and made about 300,000 credits from it, so it's bloody brilliant. Interspace might frown on their 'workers' mining, but money's money' so they don't bloody care how they get it. The debris field's pretty bloody busy, seems loads of people are selling scrap metal to this bloody guy, but I got me a nice little spot. *Slurp* I just run this little mining program I bought on Pittsburgh, and the ship's guns and tractor work automatically to cut away and reel in scrap. Gives me time for a nice cuppa and a chat to my log.
Popped back to Newark today for a bit, just to send a little message to my bloody mother to tell her that I'm working in Liberty now. *Slurp* She's gonna hate that, can't stand bloody Libertonians she can't. Let's be honest, don't much bloody like them myself, but they're growing on me. *Slurp* Oh, I needed some more tea as well. I've decided to leave a bloody big bag of dried tea leaves in the cargo hold, so I don't have to go back so bloody often, I just have to refill the tea machine myself. *Slurp* Bloody Libertonians, all they ever do is bloody moan about my tea drinking. Bloody kill me if I mentioned their doughnut eating, burger eating, eating in general or anything else at all to be bloody honest. *Slurp* But ah well, at least they require provocation to shoot me, unlike that bloody Rheinlander. *Slurp* Was just bloody passing by and he's fighting with some Navy bod. None of my business, but the sod shoots me. Accident or not, still sapped my shields. *Slurp* Hell of a punch them bloody cannons of his had, scared the bloody hell out of me. Oh, that reminds me, I bought myself a few new gadgets on Newark as well, new weapons, new shield, new thruster, countermeasure, and a mine dropper, just in case. Cost a bloody arm and a leg, but will hopefully save my arse some time. Right, well, I'm heading back to Pittsburgh now, so I log on again later. Ok, that joke was bloody terrible, sorry.
*Slurp*
*Ah... that's the ticket*
*Slurp*
Right then, well, I'm still on my bloody own, mining away.
*Slurp*
You know, as I was about to leave Newark last time I was there, I realised I'd left this piece of gold I'd found in the bar. *Slurp* Anyway, it was right where I bloody left it, on my seat. Well As I was leaving, a noise came up from the bar. *Slurp* Being a bloody nosey chap, I went over to see what was what. This independent trader was yakkin' his mouth off to another bunch of Indie Interspace Traders. (Independents, like me, on a contract type thing) *Slurp* He was only telling his bloody life story, so I turned to leave. As I did, this bloke next to me told me to hang on, that this fella' was supposed to be telling everyone this bloody great trade route. *Slurp* I stayed put, just to listen in. The trade route was hardly as amazing as it was supposed to be, just take military vehicles from Munich in Rheinland out to the front line of the Bretonia/Kusari war. (Namely Leeds and Tau 31) Then just sell them to whichever bloody side happens to be watching you. (Selling to the one that's not watching results in pain) *Slurp* Then go to Glasgow outpost and take a load of Neon back to Munich. Going through the Sigma's, then Kusari and then the Tau's, you can take trade lanes the whole way, which is actually quite safe for some good money. Hmm...
*Beep*
*Gurgle*
*Sploosh*
Ah, new cup tea, comes out at the right temperature now I fiddled with that bloody machine. *Slurp*
Well a group of us got talking afterwards and turns out the Battleship Macduff in Tau 31 buy the Military Vehicles for far more than the bloody Kusarian's would ever offer, cos they have to protect the bloody planet side operations or some such. *Slurp* To be honest, that's good, cos I don't much like the bloody Kusarian's, maybe cos I'm Bretonian myself. *Slurp* Anyway, turns out it's still pretty bloody dangerous, but if you've got a transport, they can have rather nice shields, and can as such get you through any fire fight in that area with no bloody problems. *Slurp*
So ye', I've decided I'm gonna go do that, help out the troops, once I get myself a bigger bloody ship. I think there's a guy on Planet Manhattan who sells transports. So once I've mined enough, only another couple of weeks, I'll get me one of them and go try this out.
Rightey-Ho *Slurp*
Well, I sold my old Camara, didn't bloody get much for it mind, but the junker I sold it too was a bit shady and I didn't want to argue to much. *Slurp* So Anyway, with all the money I've saved up from this bloody mining malarky, I bought myself a nice little transport. It's nothing spectacular, but it's got just the thing I wanted, and advanced power output thingy for a decent bloody shield. *Slurp* After buying it, I flew it to planet Los Angeles to buy what I had been told was the best shield for a transport type ship. Costing 2 bloody million credits, I had the choice of the type of shield, Graviton, Molecular or Positron. *Slurp* I got myself the Graviton, as I know for a fact the Blood Dragons use some lasers, (Just some handy info I picked up along the way) and as I'm going through bloody Kusari for most of my flight, I figured it may be best to have the best defence against them. I also had to see if the equipment dealer could sort out my tea-maker, so that it ran off of the bloody transport's power supply. The guy I got it from moved my log and tea-maker and a few other odds and ends but couldn't get the tea-maker running. *Slurp* So the guy on LA got it fixed and I went on my way. I headed to Bretonia first, back to bloody Waterloo. Figured I probably could have sorted all the bloody paperwork for my ship change at Newark before I left, but what the hey. *Slurp* So, I got there OK, no problems with the paper-work, and headed straight out toward Glasgow outpost to pick up the bloody Neon. *Slurp* Well the trip through to Munich was really rather painless, the trade lanes weren't disrupted and I had my feet up drinking bloody tea most of the way. Apart from through that Sigma 13 system. I couldn't see a bloody thing, so couldn't relax at all. *Slurp* Well, here I am now on Planet Nuremburg, having sold the Neon, stocked up on Military Vehicles, and settled down for a nice night's kip in my surprisingly spacious cabin.
Ok, I headed back to bloody Tau 31 today. Only just made it here to the Macduff. Bloody Outcast. Broke my bloody tea-maker as well... scum. Ok, I came into Tau 29 after an uneventful trip back through Kusari, and was half way down the trade lane to Nago station, when the bloody lane went down. I noticed some enemy contacts on my radar about 14K away, (This was only using the old IFF-type faction detection system, didn't bother to check their specific transponder IDs) so I flew off to one side, intending to curve around and pick up the next trade lane. (Nago to Freeport 6) One of the bloody enemy contacts, An Outcast called Virused in a big, scary ship, came within 10K of me, either through them attempting to bloody intercept or because I flew to close, and over the open comms system, issued a 'stop' command. I presumed he meant me, but thought I'd check, so I asked if he meant me. I was still flyin at this point and just got the the next trade lane by Nago when he confirmed what I'd bloody feared. He did bloody well mean me. Already zipping through the lane, I got a bit cocky, and just replied by saying 'Nah'. That didn't go down to well. Virused bloody chased me to Freeport 6, and on to the Tau 31 jump gate. I jumped, and headed straight for the trade lane. At this point, my radar was still clear and I thought I'd lost him, but no such luck. As the lane powered up and sent me hurtling forward, the Outcast appeared from the gate, right behind me. Here's where things went really bloody bad.
*Clunk*
Where's my... Aw yer, it's bloody broken.
Well, the lane went down again, half way to Holman. A bunch of local outcasts, in relatively small ships. Normally not a problem, but I was bloody stranded, and Virused caught up with me. I sat still and pleaded for my life. Then came the bloody demand. 4 million or die. Now having only just bought my first load of Vehicles, I had no money left, so I pleaded and tried offering my bloody cargo so as to spare my life. Virused was having none of it and began a 10 second countdown, in which I was to pay, or be killed if I didn't. I pleaded one last time, trying to convince him of my poverty, but to no bloody avail. Shots were fired, I think a bloody big torpedo hit my shield, and before I could react, my shield was down. I powered up all the engines and took a few shots to the bloody cabin, hence the broken tea-maker, while smacking the console to activate my shield batteries. Virused raced ahead and shut down the regenerated trade lane before I could reach it. By now my cruise engines had charged and I was flying away, hitting the bloody counter measure button faster than I thought possible. Somehow, probably due to my spam of counter measures, I survived, stayed in cruise, and made it to Holman, where I docked with the trade lane to the Leeds gate. All this time being taunted as a 'chicken'. The lane stayed tight the whole way and I turned right at the Leeds gate and didn't slow down until I was safely moored with the Macduff.
*Sighs*
Well, now I've got about a day to wait while my ship's repaired, and while I try and fix the tea-maker. The Armed Forces guys are quite friendly though, and paid me 1.6 million for my shipment of military vehicles, plenty to cover the bloody repairs. Without the Outcast, I still think this route's a good one, so I'm gonna stick with it, it's got a good time-frame as well, about 6 hours flight each way. Meaning that on a normal, bloody outcast-free day, I can go there and back to whichever end I'm at, and stay the night. Talking of which, I'm off to the bar, see If I can't find me some nice army gals to talk to. See ya.
Ooh, my head.
Sheesh.
Good to see they serve cider on this ship. Back in Liberty when I was mining on Pittsburgh, all they served was Liberty Ale... Blegh.
Oh, I've been moaned at by the bl... sorry, by the bl... you know something, this is gonna be hard work. The flipping armed forces have moaned at my apparent 'overuse' of the word 'bloody' oven the comms, so I'm going to try and cut that out, and I guess it wouldn't hurt to do the same here...
Didn't manage to get anywhere last night, none of the army gal's were remotely interested in me, a boring old trader. I did run into an old friend of mine though, Charles Breen. We naturally got talking about old times, and what brought us here. We'd grown up together on Planet New London, and we started out at Interspace together, but he didn't like the desk job much, so went to work for Bowex. He flew as a copilot for this Bloke who had a 'Firefly' Transport, or some-such. Anyway, he'd recently been fired for some little thing with one of the route manager's daughters. Something to do with a party, a lot of drink, and a pair of her knickers found in his desk. He was now with Planetform, as a security liaison officer something fancy like that. He basically spent most of his time sitting around shuffling paperwork for Planetform and the Armed Forces.
As the evening continued, I got slightly intoxicated, and have consequently lost numerous memories. I do remember though, that I've now hired Charles as my co-pilot in exchange for a 20% of my profits.
Well, that's cool I guess...
But the tea maker's still broken, and he won't let us leave the Macduff until it's 100% operational. Which should be by tonight.
*finishes cup of tea*
*puts mug down with a clunk*
*sighs*
Ah, James is a good guy, but he hasn't got a clue. Within a day of starting with him, I've cleaned this old rusty thing up so much you wouldn't recognise it. This old log he got from his Camara, well, now I've cleaned it's base unit, it's not so bad. It's got a multi-user functionality, and I've even bought a second audio input/output connector for it, not that we need it, 'cos there's no space in the cabin for two people really.
Well, at the moment, James is asleep in the back of the cabin. I've insisted that we fly this thing in turns, so I'll take it from Nuremburg to Macduff, and James will do the other bit. While I'm piloting, he can kip, and whiles he flies, I can. Which is great, because it means we can effectively work this ship 24/7.
What I have been doing though, is calculating a few things. I've got everything arranged with Interspace, and just need James to sign off on it (I haven't even mentioned it to him yet) but I'm going to get us a Train. It has, most importantly, a larger cabin space. It has a small kitchen, two sleeping quarters and a sensible sized cockpit, well, it's more of a bridge really. The only small drawback is that Interspace say that as we're working from an 'Independently contracted' ship, basically one they don't own, we'll have to have an official Interspace accountant to fly with us. This only applies for ships with larger cargo holds, but I think James will go aright with this. The extra guy's paid by Interspace, so not from our profits, so he's no extra cost to us.
The other great thing is, once we have the ship, if we save up enough, we can pay for an engine upgrade that will make the ship powerful enough to tow another cargo section. This will effectively multiply the cargo capacity by 1.5, and considering even before that it's three times bigger (so 3 times the profits) than this transport. I've heard of Trains getting a fourth cargo section, but Interspace won't let us get one, which is a shame. They say the ships are too unstable with that much cargo, and as such they won't insure them. No insurance, no flying.
Ok, well, we're just passing Holman now, so I'm off, I'll mention this to James when we get to the Macduff...
