To: Sunny, AFC. Subject: Impressive jump Capabilities

[Enkidu]

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Subject: Impressive jump capabilities
Sender_ID: Erinyes
Transmission_Priority: Low
Transmission_Encryption: Civillian
Transmission_Source: Barrier_Gate_Station, Coronado, Barrier_Worlds

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Engine oil, huh? I was hoping that was where you'd take it.

I'm an combat aviator by trade, Mr President - but I've lived enough years in the shadow of the moral high ground to serve as my own competent crew chief. Mechanics interest me, Sunny. I like to know why things work. Where my breathing gas comes from, why my shields operate. Why I'm alive in an environment dedicated to insuring my death. How to trim the outputs, where to cut the mass. Funny story, Sunny. I knew some bored ex-IMG burning their currency on the Dublin ring, crazy guys of course - all the Hood tournaments are rigged and the track asteroid encrusted garbage. The game rules, what little there were, dictated no performance mods. Stock ships, no juicing up the thrusters, no tampering with cruise timers, no funny business with the roll control, and, most critically, no shaving the structure. Their pit crew see a panel out of place or an atmospheric spoiler missing, you're down five million credits with a bottle to the eye and a punch to the penis. If you want to go light, you load less fuel and risk crashing out for the paddies to pick your skulls. That's the way of it.

So these boys were trying to cheat - of course they were, they all were that year, it was part of the pride of the competition. But they couldn't cheat obvious, there's no showmanship in it. Navigation lights, Sensors, Peripherals - there was nothing that wouldn't get noticed ripped that was worth the ripping - and these were smart guys. So they asked themselves, what's the one surface nobody would dream of you cutting up?

They sanded the cockpit visor.

Simple really. Meteor resistant transparent nanopolymer comes off nice and smooth under an angle grinder. They took three layers out of her, shaved six hundred and fifty eight kilograms off her and still kept the pressure seal tight. They waxed her till she was shiny enough to look right under inspection then took her to the track, sure that they were going to make a killing.

Oh, they made a killing alright.

That fighter won them the race, Sunny. Then they tried to play it again, a rock strayed between the gates and decapitated their best man. These are space ships. Every constituent component is tuned to the slimmest of margins, every digit, every angle, every circuit, is devoted to keeping you alive. I have no truck with kit bashers - I trust people to do their jobs. If you're going to be a modder then you need to know how to hold a wrench. That's the rule of thumb for not having your ride combust around you.



To survive in the border worlds, you either need a logistical train thirty light years long or calloused thumbs. I couldn't afford the former - but I'm the next best thing. If you ever need anything hotrodding I'm game to play. It's the least I can do since you fused all that H-fuel for me.


I'm curious to see what work you'd like to fire my way, Mr President. This whole thing is childhood fantasy wish fulfilment, Sunny. I'm going to have a lot of fun with it.

-Nez.

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THE SYNDIC LEAGUES
(A co-operative of Rheinland's outlawed trade unions, determined to take the underworld for themselves.)

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