First, I see that the tagline at the top of the page currently reads "Chapters 3 and 4 of Drunkard's Walk V are now in preread." Have you folks been holding out on us, or is this a chapter split?
Second, did you ever post all of Chapter 2 to rec.arts.anime.creative, Bob? I only recall ever seeing the first half of chapter 2 there. (It might be worthwhile re-posting both chapters 1 and 2 just before posting the new stuff, anyway, considering how long it's been. (Assuming you're going to post it to usenet, of course.) I'll have to do the same with a couple of my 'fics...)

-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

Sorry I haven't been around lately. I noticed that someone's taken off without me, but that's okay. My bad anyways for not being around. I plead addiction to anime - my torrent for Eureka 7 finished downloading and I went nuts.
Anyhow, Since practically everyone else has done an origin story, I'd figure I should do one as well. Also, I need to get my character at such a point where he can believable disapear for the time I'm unable to post here. My Ship Date is starting to loom close and I think it'll be a while until I can do much of anything online (I know bootcamp's a given, but I dunno about A-School yet).
Anyhow, this is all, of course, pending approval. I may need to change some stuff in my character bio and ship information if it does all get approved.
(EDIT: For spelling fixes and such.)

First off, I welcome the contributions, corrections, input, and participation of any ham or non-ham 'Fen.
Radio Frequencies
Many 'Fen went into space on little more than a wing and a prayer. Some of them forgot to bring even so much as a cellphone, or were unable to. Most 'Fen, in contrast, brought along at least one radio, since in Space, Noone Can Hear You Scream.
This has led to a confusion of standards and frequencies and methods, though a few have gained prominence. As interconnections via Interwave increase, more and more individual 'Fen are becoming FCC compliant. More on this later.
FRS/GMRS
These cheap and readily available radios operate in the 462-467mhz range, and are theoretically unlisenced by the U.S. FCC. There are subtle differences between FRS(unlicensed) and GMRS(licensing required), none of which are terribly relevant in Fenspace. Almost all FRS/GMRS radios started as handhelds, though many have been 'modded into' installations or vehicles.
CB
Citizens Band radios, operating in the 26.965-27.405mhz range, are a perfect match for Fenspace. The incredible diversity and commonality of CB equipment meant that a fairly large chunk of 'Fen had one on the way up, or brought one with them. Handheld, 'Mobile' and 'Base' units are all common.
Cellular
Cellphones came up to orbit as well, and suprisingly, many of them work. Hephaestus is a cell site, as are many of the larger permanent structures. Cellphones operate on many frequencies and standards, including the following: 1710-1755 MHz and 2110-2155 MHz(3g data/voice), 1850-1990 MHz (PCS data/voice), 824-849MHz and 869-894 MHz (PCM cellular), and the '850, 900, 1800, 1900' GSM bands.
Cingular wireless has moved into orbit as well, and has behaved surprisingly well, after the first cell sites it deployed were returned to Cingular headquarters on earth, along with the entire Cingular storefront on The Island, and a note reccomending they 'play fair'. Now, instead of charging four to five times the initial pricing and eight to nine times the contract pricing as compared to Terrestrial plans, Cingular's "sky prices" are actually somewhat cheaper. Cingular sites may be found at The Island, Stellivia, Phobos, and many of the permanent communities on Mars. SV Gnarlycurl also has a Cingular site.
Amateur Radio
Amatuer Radio is spreading like wildfire through Fenspace. The massive amount of frequencies and equipment available to even an entry-level licensee, as well as the 'Hephaestus Grant' (Hephaestus resells many brands of amatuer radio gear at list cost or below), have contributed to the acceptance and spread of the lisences and equipment. Also a factor is the FCC's attitude that "General Mail, Stellivia, L5 Earth-Luna" is a perfectly valid address for licensing purposes.
Amatuer radio of various flavors can function in many bands from 1.8mhz to over 300ghz, providing an incredibly diverse array of frequencies and channels. Most common is 2-meter (144-148mhz), and 440 (420-450mhz).
Data Radio
While most of the previously named methods are almost exclusively voice, there can occasionally be heard a 'databurst', sounding like a UsRobotics modem being fed through a garbage disposal. This is usually two AI's communicating at high speed. Dedicated data is often transmitted via Wi-Fi (2.4, 5.8ghz), Wi-Max (variable from 700 mhz to 66ghz, depending on equipment), ISM (902-928mhz), and many dedicated lisenced data-only radios anywhere from 2ghz to 60.
Modulation
Aside from cell phones, almost all public communications in Fenspace are unencrypted Frequency Modulation (FM, yes) signals, providing very high voice quality. Cellphones use an encrypted digital transmission scheme, while secure comms can use any number of encryption or obfuscation techniques, usually AI moderated.
FTL/Wavenet/Interwave
In open space, radio signals travel at (obviously) the speed of light. Since space is big, this causes problems involving communications lag. A number of fen inventors have developed their own FTL radio systems. Each one is a bit different, but they all operate on the same principles as FTL travel.
The "standard" FTL radio used in Fenspace has an estimated signal speed of 10000.0c, bridging the gap from Earth to Pluto in just over a second (but calling the nearest star is a six hour round trip for one signal. Remember, space is big). As befits the patchwork that is the realspace radio network, the FTL system's total available bandwidth and general reliability depend on what device was handwaved to create the FTL transponder in the first place.
The system that's achieved the greatest penetration is the Interwave. Interwave transmitters are large and power hungry, but they provide enough bandwidth to act as the backbone for FanNet. Some notable Interwave nodes exist at:
Crystal Tokyo
Earth
Tranquility Base, Luna
Stellivia
The Island
Grover's Corners
Phobos
Mars
Starbase 1
Hephaestus
Starbase 2
Greenwood (Rockhounds, Inc. Homebase)
Hooking it All Together
The most common method of 'mediating' between different communications types is to have an AI take care of it, as this sort of work appears to be a nearly-effortless task for most of them.
Addressing
The non-voice-only services, such as cellular and Internet, have extended their addressing conventions to Fenspace, rather smoothly, all things considered.
Cellphone and Telephone- Using US convention, users dial a '1' to access Long Distance numbers, then the country code, then the number. This makes my dad's (made up but plausible) speeddial 11-907-373-5309, which calls Earth, Alaska, Wasilla, Dad.
All other Fen cell calls are considered 'local', given the massive location changes that are not only possible in Fenspace, but easy. For example, to call The Jason, I would dial 867-5309, with no long distance or country codes.
For dialing from Earth, the country code for Fenspace is +42.
Internet
Shortly after it was clear that long-term habitats outside of Earth's atmosphere were both here to stay, and connected, the IANA assigned the .space TLD.
This met with resounding indifference. Applications for other TLDs were processed, and the current list of TLDs that are only available for people and organizations whose primary operations are off-planet is as follows.
.merc - Mercury
.venus - Venus
.luna - Luna
.lib - Lagrange or Libration points
.mars - Mars
.belt - Asteroid and Kuiper belt
.jup - Jupiter and moons
.sat - Saturn and moons
.fen - For all things fennish and off-planet.
The IANA only approved .fen after over a year of repeated applications (one application submitted a day, by several interested parties), the first .fen domain, Kandorcon.fen, went active January 10th, 2010.
Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979Wire Geek - Burning the weak and trampling the dead since 1979

I'm pretty sure this one was previosuly recomended here, don't quite remember the plot, but it involved Xander getting engaged to a godess or somesuch. However I still have the following quote from it in my quotes file.
"But Cat, dear, you can't just keep the devil's head in a box. It might go bad. And it is somewhat rude."
Some quick googeling however didn't turn up anything. help?
E: "Did they... did they just endorse the combination of the JSDF and US Army by showing them as two lesbian lolicons moving in together and holding hands and talking about how 'intimate' they were?"
B: "Have you forgotten so soon? They're phasing out Don't Ask, Don't Tell."

... But I WILL! Mua hahaha!!

-Logan
-----------------
"Wake up! Time for SCIENCE!"
-Adam Savage
-----------------

Here's my idea for my entry into Fenspace. Part tramp steamer, part news van, part data haven. All disfunctional family. Comments? Complaints? Nitpicks? Flames?
---------------------------------------------------
Ship Name: The Inelegant Truth
Created by Jonathon Helscher (Herr Bad Moon)
Registry Number: SPS-253
Base Hull: 175ft Alaskan Commercial Crab Fisher
Drive Type: Speed (Cruising: .07c Flank: .09c)
Owner of Record: Jonathon Helscher
Flag of Record: Nominally United States of America, but only if you squint
Purpose: Medium cargo hauler and news cataloger
Launched: April 27th, 2009
Crew:
Jonathon Helscher, Captain/Owner/Action! Historian
Cynthia Gunderson, First Officer/Pilot/Ship Surgeon
Deidrict Dieter Gunderson, Engineer
Percival Perry Doper, Communications Officer/System Administrator/AI Psychologist
Jeremiah Breckenridge, Security/Bodyguard/Cook
Toni, Ship Gopher/Official Ship Kid Sister
Supplementary Crew:
Callisto (Ship AI)
Gay Deceiver (L.R.D.'s AI)
Brother-Captain Galvius (Mainframe AI)
Supplementary Vehicles:
L.R.D. (Little Red Deathtrap): Handwaved 1990 GEO Metro. Serves as all purpose ship shuttle. Gay Deceiver vehicle AI.
Little Nicky: Handwaved jet ski which serves as a sort of space ATV for when the crew goes EVA.
Known Vehicle Quirks:
* She dives like a crippled whale: - Despite being equipped with a speed drive, given a straight line to go in, the Truth can make faster headway than her outward appearance and even engine capabilities would indicate, but can't turn worth a damn and can be out maneuvered by ships of similar speed. No amount of tinkering with the engines has yet to improve this state.
* Rough Seas Ahead: - Whenever ship speeds exceed .06c, the Truth will begin to exhibit gravitational anomalies that resemble a ship rolling in rough seas. Increasing to flank exacerbates this.
* Gravity's a fickle bitch: - Whenever the ship enters its night, artificial gravity ceases to work until dawn. Nobody knows why this happens, so everyone sleeps in sleeping bags that are anchored to the floor.
* Bitch, get your hands OFF my men! - The ship AI Callisto is jealously protective of the male members of the crew, treating any women that speak to them with deep suspicion, let alone those who board her. This barely hidden hostility becomes an order of a magnitude worse for girl AIs that the Truth comes in contact with. This makes the crew something of social pariahs in some fendoms, and like B.A. on A-Team, the crew have to come up with lurid and increasingly ridiculous ways to work around this. This jealously does extend somewhat to First Officer Cynthia, but not to ragamuffin Toni, who's too much of a cutie pie.
* While the enemies of the Emperor still draw breath, there can be no peace: - Something went wonky with the application of handwavium to Jon's personal computer during its uplifting to its current status as super!computer. The AI was supposed to be a nondescript male of the faceless office worker type. But somebody didn't do a good job of purging the hard drive so instead, what was created was one with the heroic, if scary and kinda evil religious zealots of the Imperial Space Marines of the Gamers Workshop variety. Brother Captain Galvius thinks of himself as a fallen soldier serving as a machine spirit entombed in a virtual coffin. He considers Jon to be his Chapter Master and the other members of his crew to fill various roles in line with those in the Empire of Man. Given the state of relations with most of the governments on Holy Terra, and the Truth, Galvius believes they have come under the influence of foul Chaos sorcery and encourages anybody who will listen their next job should be to burn the heretics. Still, he does his job of data retrieval and broadcast of Jon's writing with competence. His security functions are actually kind of scary after you really look at them, and Perry gets queasy just thinking about it.
* The enemy of my enemy is my enemies' enemy: - The three principle AIs that live on the Truth all hate each other. If allowed, they will bicker to an extent that ship efficiency will drop 30% until they are hard lock separated from each other's networks.
Known Crew Quirks:
* Are we there yet? - The social dynamics on board eerily resemble those of a family on an extend road trip, constantly getting on each others nerves and only getting along when they can jump ship for a day or two. And though Cynthia has reluctantly taken up the role of Ship Mom, nobody wants to be the Dad. Jon owns, and theoretically is in charge, of the boat, but he acts more like a passenger and only gives orders akin to go here how fast can we get to Luna? and Hey, I just got off the comm with some of those weirdo's in charge of terraforming Venus. Yeah.... we can't go back there for awhile. And guess where we gotta be by Friday. Dieter gives ever indication of settling into the surly uncle model. Perry is too busy trying to avoid having a nervous breakdown keeping the peace between the AIs. And Jeremiah says that he doesn't get paid enough for that. Toni just rolls her eyes at not being asked her opinion.
* Fighting the media is like wrestling with pigs. You might win but you will get dirty: - Don't call them journalists. Just don't. It won't end well.
* This will keep me from curing cancer, making it so my birthday isn't a national holiday. And you know how much I hate to work on my birthday! - Cynthia has very little patients for all things Fen. While in med school, she was tolerantly amused by a roommate that was really into Buffy and Angel, but living in Fendom has left her stressed out and jaded. Geeking out over something in her prescene causes a angry explosion in a one to one ratio.
* They kick high.... really high: - Perry's has a poorly hidden facination with magical girl shows and the members of Crystal Millenium and would have eventually joined the faction if he hadn't taken a job as sysadmin for a apparent cargo hauler. His mood improves when in contact with fellow enthusiasts, but this doesn't happen often given the rest of the crews scorn for the genre.
* F*ck you! F*ck you! F*ck you! You're cool. F*ck you! I'm out. - Dieter Gunderson hates everyone on board except his daughter Cynthia, and only stays on because he can't bear to see his beloved ship captained into an asteroid by some punk suburbanite kid who never had to really work for a living. So he sits in the engine room or the cargo hold, tinkering with various hardtech fixes. But even there, when he can almost forget he's not hurtling through the vacuum of space, he still hates everyone. So very much.
* And Iiiiiiii will alwaaaaays luv youuuuuu! - Jeremiah is a former Secret Service agent, who left under undisclosed reasons. Physically imposing at 6'3 and having played tight end for Maryland, he knows how to use it for intimidation factors when necessary. He makes a mean curry though.
* If this were cave man times I'd be married and have kids! - The runaway orphan answering only as Toni has a tendency to be moody, short tempered, sarcastic, flighty, lazy, smug, and frankly a gigantic bitch at times. So she's a normal teenager. On a crab fisher. In space.
Faction: Technically none, though Jonathon is a member of the Blue Blazer Irregulars.
Home Port: Port of Tacoma, Washington State, United States of America, Earth
Current Location: Northern polar orbit around Mars
Status: ACTIVE
Trivia:
* The Inelegant Truth used to be the rusting hulk of the commercial crab fisher Autumnal Equinox, owned by Dieter. Dieter lost it in a drunken card game to Jon in the spring of 2008. Nobody knows this, but Jon was cheating in the last hand when he managed to mark the aces. To this day, Jon's ashamed of this act but will never admit it.
* The Truth serves as the base and transport for Jon's quasi-journalistic enterprise that's part blog, part gonzo reporting, part living library. She runs cargo on the side to keep the ship running and the crew fed and paid. Accusations of actual journalism annoy the crew to no end.
* The Truth mounts an aft mounted deck cannon taken from a WWII era submarine, waved to fire in space and modified do so without a crew. Towards the bow is the turret system that was scavenged from a Sherman tank. Welded and sealed to the hull and jury rigged with a firing system that can rotate the turret far faster than the original could. These, along with the ships speed, serve as the primary deterrence from Black Hats.
* Even though the car AI Gay Deceiver was named after the car from several Robert Heinlein books, Jon doesn't actually like any of them overly much. The only other car AI name he could think of was K.I.T.T and Gay's gender ended up being female so nix went that plan. He does finish all conversations with her by saying you're a smart girl, Gay, mostly because she likes it and doesn't start as many fights with Callisto.---------------
-Jon
Being the Mariner hitting coach is like being the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher at Hogwarts.
-Poster on USSMariner.com
---
Jon
"And that must have caused my dad's brain to break in half, replaced by a purely mechanical engine of revenge!"

That's the end of the Mayan calandar, if you missed that line in the Grand Unified Timeline.
First, the concept, then the supporting details:
In brief, that's when someone finds proof of alien intelligence. It's not first contact, it's not even planetary ruins or a wrecked ship - and no one in the character space is going to know about it for a while, because it's a two-year trip back on a straight line for Sol.
================
December 12, 2012
Unnamed system, approx 1000ly from Sol
(find a registry number that's suitable)
It was three years since the USS Miranda launched - she'd been the result of probably the only wide-spread privately funded space program that would ever exist, a collaboration between several major colleges, the SETI group, and (in a burst of mad brilliance that had pulled in most of the individual donations) the Trekkies. The actual structure of the ship had sort of accreted on the back side of the Large Array radio telescope framework that was her major hardtech "eye" for Serious Astronomy, and most of the internal volume was tankage for the two strains of handwavium that fed the ship's engines and power system, but in that breif period between when Handwavium became relatively public knowledge and when the mundane governments cracked down on it, they'd gotten enough funding in place, and with the enthusiastic design and programming assistance of hundreds of people too attached to their regular lives or unwilling to jump into the black on a wing and a prayer they'd gotten environmental and suplly systems that could actually support a five-year mission.
They'd followed a somewhat irregular course to this point, with regular stops to point the Main Sensor Dish back at Sol to get a look "into the past" in the sky beyond, but this was the furthest out they'd get, it was time to turn back for the long trip home, with only two stars on the way to break up the trip. For now, though, it was time to put the Big Eye to its other use...
The ship flipped gracefully in space, the sensitve radio ears designed to listen to the whispers of the stars now seeking out the sounds of civilization... and for the very first time, there was something to hear. Not the multitudinous cacophony of an inhabited, technological world's communications, just a single signal, a candle in the endless night playing out an endless loop of squawks and chirps, several voices in an approximation of harmony before breaking up into recogniseable cheers, then breif passages of single voices, before repeating. The whole thing took about twenty minutes to cycle.
It was remarkably similar to to recording made for the drone they'd been getting ready to drop off in this system themselves, to mark the furthest extent of human exploration. Sometime in the tenth hour of the ship-wide party following the announcement of the find, the captain wondered if there would be video screens when they physically examined the beacon, as they'd planned to leave running on their own.

=============

The nature of the aliens, how long ago the beacon was left, how long it would take to find them even if the Miranda gambled on their being freindly, willing and able to provide resupply if they blew off returning (because they are at RTB with only a very narrow safety margin) and how anyone else will take it is up to developement, and this is strictly an Idea Box submission - there's lots of story before winter 2014/2015, which is the absolute earliest the Miranda could be back.
And yes, though far from show-accurate, the ship is named that because it's basically a big round platter with a thicker addition on the back and two engines hanging off the bottom. No rollbar, and the upper surface has a small forest of antennas. THere's also a carefully maintained dived between the 'waved systems (drive, enviro, navigation) and the pure hardtech (astronomy, mainly) espescially in the computers - the Science Network has absolutely no wireless access, the wired network is maintained in different access spaces than the 'wavetech data lines, and even the power supply is fed through three stages of hardtech converters and regulators to avoid the possibility of handwave info contamination. Transfer to the 'wavetech system is very rare, because it means burning one of the limited supply of CDRs on the hardtech side - there is no transfer back from 'wavetech to hardtech, ever. Serious Science has no room for waving hands.
- CDSERVO: Loook *deeeeply* into my eyes... Tell me, what do you see?
CROW: (hypnotized) A twisted man who wants to inflict his pain upon others.
For the next 72 hours, Itachi intoned, I will slap you with this trout. - Spying no Jutsu, chapter 3
"In the futuristic taco bell of the year 20XX, justice wears an aluminum sombrero!"hemlock-martini
--
"Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles
woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows

Could some one put up a link to the FFML? I lost the link when my computer crashed last week, and i have not been able to find it since then.Those who fear the darkness have never seen what the light can do.

What's with all the deleted posts in the Other Fanfic area?--
"I give you the beautiful... the talented... the tirelessly atomic-powered...
R!
DOROTHY!
WAYNERIGHT!
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.

As I recently finished the Tenchi Muyo! Ryo-ohki OAV series (and GXP) this question has been bugging me and I figure I'd get other peoples opinions.
Given their TM Cannon depictions (power and personality), is it at all possible to consider the Chousin as avatars of the Three?
(I have an Idea for a Stagger based around the answer to this and I want to know if it's viable.)
(P.S. Chapter 3's in pre-read! Wahoo!)