...it's just it's the last one and I'm always running out of time either in the morning before work or during lunch. I will make an effort to get at least a couple replies in today, though.

-- Bob
---------
The Internet Is For Norns.

OOC: Submitted for your approval and commentary, Takes place well _after_ the Boskone War. Given one 'rule breaker', that being the Adjusted Mass Reactionless system I have been using in Hephaestian motors all along, I believe this turbine could be built, though I am pretty much neglecting the problems you'd run into with simple air friction..
The uses for 'a whole bloody lot' of cheap electricity are manifold. One is massively overpowered comm lasers, for deep space messaging. Another is high-energy physics experiments with a _real_ kick. A Third is, well, running a mining platform, with all-electric smelters and furnaces and extractors and liquificators and, etc, etc, and.

Before the turbines go online, Hephaestus will be powered by a brace of 'Adjusted Mass Pseudo-Diesel' generators, with all the lubriciation and metal fatigue problems conversant with them.
banged it out in a night, had the Air Bearings sitting in the back of my brain again. Air Bearings are real, there are 'microturbines' suitable for running quite a lot of different electrical loads that use a flying turbine, and they are quite nice to work with - if there's any problem, and you have ethernet connectivity to the microturbine (which is a standard 23" telco rack width), it'll email you.
Begin Story!

*DwindleBlat!*
...
*DwindleBlat!*
...
*DwindleBlat!*
"Whurragh?"
*DwindleBlat!*
"Oh, hell. Enter!"
The door whooshed open, revealing the rotund form of Mr. Sparky, a broad grin on his face.
"Napping?"
"Meditating!"
"Napping."
"No.. well. Maybe?" I made a sharp gesture of dismissal. "I was trying some of the meditation techniques I picked up during the Boskone War. They really helped to keep me stable then, but these days.. I just end up sleeping."
"Heh, that's because you're not stressed like that anymore, thank Bob."
"So true. So what you got, Mr. Sparky?"
"Come on down to Storage Five, I think we're going to go operational, and I want you on hand for the first full-speed test."
"Oooo!" I bounded out of my chair eagerly, and the two of us went hustling down the halls of Hephaestus, headed for the central-most storage bay in the 'underside' of the giant chunk of Alaska that I called Home.
We fetched up in front of the final door with matching grins, and Mr. Sparky opened the door with a flourish.
"Allow me to present the Sparkman-Hermes Fluidic Bearing Reactionless Drive Electrical Turbine!"
I've never failed to be impressed by something that _deserves_ to be referred to in Initial Capitals. This certainly qualified. Down the center of the bay was a device that looked like nothing so much as a massive beer bottle, with it's neck stuffed in a steel doughnut. The 'base' of the beer bottle, however, was a lovely air intake, smooth and polished, with vanes that looked sharp enough to cut light in half. The outer surface was also smooth and polished, a glossy mirror that threw distorted reflections of my own awestruck mug back at me.
I grinned at Sparky.
Sparky grinned at me.
"So what'd you end up using for the bearing material for this bad boy?"
"Air."
"Whaaaa?"
"I stole some ideas from the turbine generators dirtside, which is where the air bearings come from, but primarily, the whole turbine thing.. well, check this out."
Sparky cranked up a simulation on his laptop, showing a rapidly increasing heat spectrum in the generator core, followed shortly by the cheesy cartoon-boom-boom effect Hermes liked to use as shorthand for 'catastrophic structural failure'. We got into the technical side a bit more, and I walked down the massive air return channel for a few yards, before it started _really_ sloping into itself.
"So where does the air go from here?" I asked, peering into the jet black, vaugely fuzzy depths.
"Goes through an air maintenance block, and then a series of radiators that should be able to lose 200% of the heat load from the generator, if we can keep them in the shade, then back to the front of the room."
I nodded sagely, and we went back to the laptop and ran through a couple more simulations of the new turbine system. This time, the generator's heat spectrum stayed in the blue, with some minor yellow hotspotting in the generator core. Sparky pointed out on the real deal the heat sinking that should take care of those hot spots, and we ended up at the front of the room next to the door, laptop in hand.
"So.. we gonna fire it up?"
"You bet, WG!... but we're gonna get to a safe distance first!"
We went to a nearby control room, the one for the vacuum lamination line, which wasn't in use at the moment. Sparky had a short conference with Hermes, and the panels and screens came up to show a myriad of views of the big turbine, with a big red button on the center MFP.
"Have at it, Boss!"
"No, Mr. Sparky - this was your project, it's your button."
Sparky grinned, and pressed the virtual button firmly and confidently. I was expecting lights to dim, rumbles to rumble, something impressive. But, instead, the turbine on the displays lifted slightly ("Magnetic suspension, really, not 'air bearings'" Mr. Sparky revealed), and began spinning.
It turns out, the necessary power to _start_ such a significant mass turning, while certainly not a sneeze, doesn't put a major load on Hephaestus' current electrical system. None of the lights went dim, and the power gauges on the panels barely flickered, regenerating swiftly.
The digital readout for RPM ("are we really going to need all six digits of that? Shouldn't there be a decimal place in there?") rose slowly and smoothly to 3000 RPM, and hesitated there.
"Here goes.. First Stage Turn On!" Mr. Sparky intoned dramatically, grasping the first lever of a throttle quadrant with his right hand and rolling it forward. The RPM meter spun up slowly and smoothly again, passing 6000 RPM and sitting at 15k RPM when Mr. Sparky let loose of the throttles.
"Magnetic suspension nominal, Energy flux approaching unity, temperatures well below expected range - I'm locking out a couple radiators from the flow matrix" Hermes chimed in, and I started paying closer attention.
"Looks like everything has evened out, folks" Sparky stated cheerfully, eying the collection of readouts. "I'm gonna go for Stage Two spinup."
"Go For Stage Two" Hermes agreed, and Sparky grasped the second lever of the throttle quad, and rolled it forward, slowly and smoothly. I was so distracted by the care he was putting into it that I missed the RPM meter, and when I looked at it afterwards, it had leveled out at 30k RPM and change.
I sat back and studied gauges and meters as Sparky did likewise, and he turned to me with another repetition of his heartfelt grin. "Everything's stable as a rock, but the amount of air we're flowing through this.. well, I wouldn't wanna be a dust bunny in there, lemme tell ya!"
I grinned back, and Sparky turned back to the controls. "I think we look good for Stage Three, Hermes, but let's let this soak for a few minutes. How's heat looking?"
"Heat's well within tolerances, but I'm getting a bit better efficiency off of the radiators than we'd planned, so we're actually a bit cold."
"I think we'll leave it that way, at least until we've soaked the system at full speed for a day or two."
"I concur. Boss, whaddya think?"
"I think this is awesome, guys!" I replied cheerfully, ignoring the operational question that Hermes had posed to me. "How much juice are we gonna be able to get out of this, again?"
"oh, a terawatt, final spec, if we run it up to overload. My best estimate says 750 gigawatts sustained, for as long as you care to." Sparky said nonchalantly, and winked at the video pickup. While he and Hermes shared a chuckle, I considered those numbers.
I'd read them in the emails Hermes and Sparky had shared with me regarding this project, but it hadn't really sunk in, until Hermes compared us to Hydro Quebec, calling them insignificant, saying they could only generate 'a mere 30 megawatts sustained'. It was madness, really, but we had a couple projects on the board that could _use_ that incredibly amount of juice, and that's not mentioning the speed increases we'd see in shifting to straight electrical furnaces instead of solar-fired...
"Hermes, I think we're ready for Stage Three, now."
"I concur, Sparky, temps are low and stable."
"Initiating Stage Three." Sparky said, grasping the third throttle in the quad. He rolled this one forward excruciatingly slowly, and I was still able to see the meter slide upwards almost disturbingly quickly. 60k passed by, and Sparky finished the throttle at 72k RPM.
"That's.. signifigantly fast."
"You ain't seen nothing yet." Sparky stated, arms folded across his expansive chest as he watched gauges and readouts steady. "Temperature still seems a bit low, Hermes, did you open up all of the radiators?"
"No, Sparky, I still have two banks closed off. The eight remaining are operating at 165% efficiency from estimated"
Sparky shot me a raised eyebrow look that I returned with interest, then turned back to the console, his fleshy fingers tapping rhythmically against his knees.
"What do you think about Stage Four, Hermes?"
"I'm good with the idea. Everything looks stable here."
"Let's do it. Initiating Stage Four." Sparky matched word to deed, laying his hand on the final throttle in the quad, and taking a deep breath before creeping the throttle down its track. The RPM meter held my eye, swiftly spinning past 100k, and finally stabilizing at 155k RPM.
"Green?" Sparky asked, a hint of nervousness in his voice.
"Green. Temps _still_ low, And getting lower. I closed off a third bank, and have an estimated 180% efficiency rating vs. initial estimate on the radiators."
Sparky removed his hand from the throttle quadrant and dropped the lock bar in place, then asked Hermes to deactivate the throttle control. She acknowledged, and Sparky turned towards me.
"155 thousand RPM, that's, oh, 2500 revs every single second.. and it's stable. The only thing left is to make actual connections and start sucking juice out of the generator, and we've got all the electricity, in any amount we'll ever need." Sparky finished his speech and leaned back in his chair, whoofing out a heavy breath.
I got up, leaned forward and clapped him on the shoulder. "Good work, killer work in fact. Build two, and rig the power for changeover. Draw any resources you need." I said. Straightening, I turned to head for the door. "Oh, but one thing, Sparky."
"Yeah, boss?"
"Two week vacation before the build starts. You need it, you deserve it. damn fine job, bro, damn fine."
I walked back to my room whistling, pondering the possibilities inherent in damn near unlimited free electricity..
Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979

Yes, I'm serious.
No, I'm *NOT* joking.
Just logged into it myself, greets you with "Welcome to the Issue 9 Open Beta!"
Time to hit the Copy Tool!
Global: @Jimmy Amp
"Broad-minded is just another way of saying a fellow's too lazy to form an opinion." -- Will Rogers

February 29, 2012

"Are you sure you want to do this, Ramona?"

The woman in question turned to face the man who had addressed her. "I'm sure, Jake. Look at her - she wants to fly. I know it. Besides, aren't you at all curious whether your drive unit will work?"

"I guess... but Hans and I only put that together to soak up the last of the goop! We never thought you'd actually use it!"

Ramona grinned. "You should know me better than that by now, Jake. Let's get this birdie in the air, and prove my grandpa was right to believe in the design."

Three years earlier

"Have you heard? They're terraforming Venus!"

"No kidding? Cool..."

"What, isn't ruining Mars enough for them?"

"And what's that supposed to mean, Hans Bachmann?" The only woman at the table glared at the taller of her two companions.

"I'm just saying those people are already turning one unique world into a copy of ours. Why let them do the same to another unique world?"

"Well, if you don't like it, why not do something about it?"

"Ramona, are you crazy?"

"No, Jake, I'm not crazy. I just want Hans to stop harping about the fact that some brave people are opening up new places for humanity to colonize; places that we won't have to take away from people who already live there, I might add."

Hans glared at her. Finally, he asked, "If you like what they're doing so much, why aren't you out there with them, Ms. Ramona Jackson?"

Ramona thought for a moment. "Tell you what - you and Jake help me build something that'll fly into space, and I'll go join them. Deal?"

"Deal. You won't do it, I'm sure."

February 29, 2012

"So, is Hans off sulking somewhere because I'm actually keeping my end of the bargain?"

Jake shook his head. "He doesn't want to see you crash."

"I'm not going to crash! Don't you trust the plane that the three of us built?"

"I trust it. I don't trust the goop. And I don't like that personality in the plane's computer."

"That's okay - she doesn't like you, either. You know she's only a vegetarian because you're a cattle rancher..."

Three months earlier

Ramona grunted as she reached for the dangling computer cable. "One more, and ..." She plugged it into the back of the laptop Hans had welded in place beside the seat. "... Done!"

The computer switched itself on. "Hello," it said in a pleasant contralo. "I'm Avril; who are you?"

"Um... er... I'm Ramona..."

"Hi, Ramona! Are you my pilot?"

"I... I guess so..."

Just then, Jake poked his head into the cockpit. "How are you doing in here, 'Mona?"

"Jake Turnar, how many times have I told you not to call me that?"

"Hey, you! Don't call my pilot 'Mona'! That's not her name!"

Jake's jaw dropped. "What the hell?"

A feminine face appeared on the laptop's screen. "And don't swear!"

February 29, 2012

Ramona put her foot on the lowest rung of the boarding ladder. "But it doesn't matter whether Avril likes you or not, Jake. I'm the one going into space. And even if you don't trust the engine you and Hans built, I do."

By the time she was in the cockpit, he was gone.

Three days earlier

"That's it - it's installed. And I'm washing my hands of the whole matter. You should have tried harder to convince Ramona to stay here."

"You know her better than that, Hans. Once she sets her mind to something, she goes through with it."

Hans shook his head as he gestured around with one hand. "And whose idea was it to build one of these? There's no room for a passenger, let alone any cargo!"

"Hers. It's what she wanted, after all. So..."

"So?"

"So, what are we going to call this thing?"

"The aircraft?"

"My name is Avril," interrupted the cockpit speaker.

Jake groaned. "Not the plane, Hans... the engine."

Hans thought for a moment. "We built it, so we'll name it after ourselves."

"That sounds good to me," interrupted Ramona as she squeezed in between the two men. "But it's not an engine - it's a drive. No," she reconsidered, "it's an overdrive."

"Oh, hi, Mona." There was a crackle of static over the ship's speaker, and Jake quickly corrected himself. "Er, Ramona. So, it's the Ba... No. Absolutely not. They won't care that the spelling is different - we'll get sued!"

"Only if they find out," answered Ramona with a grin.

February 29, 2012

Ramona settled into the pilot's seat. "How are your systems, Avril?"

Avril's face appeared on the monitor. "I think the drive needs some music to work properly."

"What are you waiting for, girl? Play it!"

"Which song?"

"You know which song."

The speakers in the back of the plane came to life. "You wake up in the morning, from the alarm clock's warning, take the 8:15 into the city..." And the engines came to life.

Ramona finished the pre-flight checklist, strapped in, put her helmet on, and switched on the radio. "Wetaskiwin Tower, this is experimental aircraft CF-105-Z requesting clearance to taxi and takeoff."

"105-Zulu, this is Tower. You're clear to taxi and takeoff, Ramona. Good luck, and don't forget to call."

"Thank you, Tower. And I'll let you know when I've found a place on Mars, Mom."

Two minutes later, Canada saw the first Arrow flyover in over five decades, as it headed for stranger skies...

Got a prediction? Something to say about an episode? Even just word of a fresh sub?
It goes here.
And, speaking of fresh subs...
Ja, -n

===============================================
"I'm terribly sorry, but I have to kill you quite horribly now."

I have discovered a client side modification that exchanges one of the chest emblems for the United Nations logo.
Here's a few example pics of how it would look and how large the emblem is.





It's not a large file at all. If you want, I can email it to you. Or you can download it and the instructions for adding it to your City of Heroes Data folder from here:
Electro's Mods Yahoo Group #4
Just do the normal join up and download from the files area.-Logan
-----------------
The only good Marvel is CAPTAIN MARVEL!
SHAZAM!!
-----------------

sora wo aogi hoshi yo michite
tobi tatsu no ashita eno brilliant road
kokoro no aosa ono te ne daite go far away
urayamu koto ni narete shimattara
hokoreru jibun ga tou zakatteku
mie nai tsubasa de habataku no fly higher
yume wo egaku no wa "hito" ni umareta kara
sora wo aogi hoshi yo michite
tobi tatsu no ashita eno brilliant road
kokoro no aosa kono te ni daite
anata to nara yowai jibun wo sarake dashi te hashiri daseru no
mirai yo douka mugen ni tsuzuke go far away
dareka no shita rail ni toraware
fuman wo noberu jinsei wa ira nai
honno wazuka na ikioi de let us go
toushin dai no eyes mitsume aeta toki ni
tabi dachi wa itsu datte kodoku
semete sono te wo nigiri shime te
ureino egao kokoro wo sasuyo
atashi ga ite anata ga iru kono hi wo zutto wasure nai darou
namida wa mune no naka de nagasu no go far away
mie nai tsubasa de habataku no fly higher
yume wo egaku no wa "hito" ni umareta kara
sora wo aogi hoshi yo michite
tobi tatsu no ashita eno brilliant road
kokoro no aosa kono te ni daite
anata to nara yowai jibun wo sarake dashi te hashiri daseru no
mirai yo douka mugen ni tsuzuke go far away
tabi dachi wa itsu datte kodoku
semete sono te wo nigiri shime te
ureino egao kokoro wo sasuyo
atashi ga ite anata ga iru kono hi wo zutto wasure nai darou
namida wa mune no naka de nagasu no go far away

Brilliant Road to Tomorrow, by angela, lyrics by atsuko, music by KATSU, from the album voice of the sky, 2003. Plaing time 4:48

As much as the repeated "go far away" lyric hints at this being a Gate song (those who recognize it will know to where ), I think that would waste the song's potential. The repeated singing about "kokoro" puts this in the running as one of the "instill confidence" songs that Bob is looking for for DW VI. (A few lines of the song are darkly ironic for the Evangelion setting, but Doug wouldn't know that...)

Ah, yes; English... Here's the uncredited translation from the US edition of the CD:
Look up to the star-filled sky
Take off to the brilliant road that leads to tomorrow
Embrace the heart of blue in my arms, go far away
If I get used to envying others
Those parts of myself that I am proud of will recede from me
I will fly higher with my invisible wings
Because I was born as a human, I have a dream
Looking up to the star-filled sky
Take off to the brilliant road that leads to tomorrow
Embrace the heart of blue in my arms
If I am with you I can run and expose my weakness
Please let an infinite future be continued, go far away
I don't want a life of complaints because I am imprisoned
by the rails someone laid
With a little power; let us go
The moment we rivet each other with our life-sized eyes
The departure is always lonesome
At least, I squeeze your hand
Your troubled smile stings my heart
I'm here and you're here, I'll neer forget this day
Tears are meant to show only in the heart; go far away
I will fly higher with my invisible wings
Because I was born as a human, I have a dream
Looking up to the star-filled sky
Take off to the brilliant road that leads to tomorrow
Embrace the heart of blue in my arms
If I am with you I can run and expose my weakness
Please let an infinite future be continued, go far away
The departure is always lonesome
At least, I squeeze your hand
Your troubled smile stings my heart
I'm here and you're here, I'll neer forget this day
Tears are meant to show only in the heart; go far away

-Rob Kelk
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

This thread is for quotes that *aren't* in any written works - for those scrips and scraps that you figure someone else might use but you never will - or just bits that you find entertaining. Feel free to poach.
--------------
"If you have a Destined Savior - one hero about whom the fate of the world revolves, don't let him or her be horribly traumatized as a child. It will give the forces arrayed against the poor waif one more thing to attack with. It will leave them suffering and whimpering when they should be saving the world. Worse yet, it will lead to the creation of scads and scads of Horriby Emo Fanfic, and no one wants that."
----
"Sometimes, I lie awake at night and rederive forgotten bits of physics in my head."
"Sometimes, I lie awake at night and try to figure out what orders to give to my faithful gerbil worshippers this week, and what miracles to perform on their behalf."
----
"Why is he doing that?"
"Because he thinks it makes him look cool."
"It *does* make him look cool."
"Shut up! Don't encourage him."
----
He was smiling that smile - you know, the gambler's smile. The one that says "Someone's about to get taken for a whole lotta money, and I don't *think* it's me."
----
Getting in contact with a highly skilled, black market cyberdoc: 1,200 nuyen
three square inches of doublethick nanoweave, precisely placed: 15,000 nuyen
general medical fees associated with the process: 7,000 nuyen
that moment when the vampire realizes that your carotid arteries are armor-plated: priceless.
----
It's true. When the little green man warns you that you really ought to stop harrassing him and go away now, he *might* be bluffing.
----
"Dude! I couldn't deal out ranged damage if my life depended on it!"

"Y'know...that's just not a good sign."
----
Mr. Simpson had a problem. He had a little girl, who he loved with all his heart, who was as precious to him as his own life, and he knew - he *knew* that some day she would grow up. She would grow up to be beautiful. He was sure of it. She would grow up to be stunningly beautiful and ferociously intelligent and classy and charming and all of the boys would want her. They would want her. Those dirty little boys with their dirty little hands and their dirty little minds would want her, and some of them might even be brave enough to ask her out. She might say yes. Those little dirtbags didn't deserve his daughter! He had to keep her safe. He had to. They were going to ask her. He couldn't stop them, unless he killed them all himself, and he realized that killing off the slightly under 50% of the world population that consisted of Males Who Were Not Him was probably a little beyond him. In any case, it was an uncertain solution. He might miss one or two. Uncertainty meant imperfection, and for his daughter, everything must be perfect. He'd simply have to make sure that she never said yes. That's all. Still...how was he to do that? He had to think. Think!

So the other day I get this idea - it hurt, it really did. When I shared this idea, people wanted to see how it would look. So, here she is. Sexist Male Fantasy.

Yeah, I worked this into a standalone short-short, as I mentioned I might in the other thread. Enjoy.