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| [RFC] Beck Gale AKA Nightingale |
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Posted by: shaderic - 07-14-2012, 11:20 PM - Forum: Fenspace
- Replies (14)
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Warning: This is done IC. It is meant to be read in a very chipper tone.
{Recording Start}
Why hello there, dear little chickadees! I do hope you've enjoyed the meal I've provided, and that the wine's to your liking.
Allow me to introduce myself. My name is Beck Gale, and I'm the reason you're all here. Or should I say, that the reason I'm here is because of all of you?
After all, it's because fine, upstanding businessmen such as yourselves have decided to expand your markets into the great beyond that humble men such as myself can make a profit on something a simple as a little information. Who's going to be where, why, what they'll be carrying, and in some cases, how heavily guarded they will be. It's simply amazing how people such as yourselves can take these tiny nuggets of knowledge and convert them into interesting deeds.
And, because there's nothing so interesting as a little fact of supposedly little consequence, let me share one with all you.
Do any of you have any idea what I did before I became the succesful broker that I am today? No? Ah, maybe the wine was a bit too strong, you all seem very tired. But stay awake a little longer, and you all might just learn something interesting.
I was a miner. One of the many small private operations, ripping apart asteroids in the belt for profit. It was out on Hungaria 434, when the thing happened that changed my life. A Boskone ship came by, and demanded all our valuables. Which turned out to just be an excuse for us to open up our doors, actually. Seems that they had experience with people making stupid decisions when it was discovered that they were after living people too. Especially once news of the cat-girl machine got around. Lots of suicides and fighting to the last stands. No, it was apparently simpler to just say you were after the shinies on the habitat, and that you'll be escorting everyone to the brig on your ship for the time being so you can search unimpeded. Sure, you'd still end up with a lot of people that were really upset, but they'd let go of their 'valuable' for the sake of their lives.
And then they just never let them off. They'd take the un-suspecting people they'd captured, and then... Well, I'm sure you all can guess how the story ends for them.
But, I can see the question in all of your eyes. How did I survive? How did I escape the horrible fate that befell all of the other miners of our small company? Quite simple, really. All I did was hide. I was on the outside of the asteroid, and the light in my helmet had just gone out. Sure, with the right sensors it was quite easy to tell I was there. But you had to look, first. And, being in a bit of a rush, they neglected to conduct a complete and thorough search of the asteroid. They simply collected everyone in the main habitat, and were on their merry way.
I had my radio on, you know? I could hear every word of the exchange. And I just stayed in my little hole for hours and hours, hoping they'd go away. Until they did.
And then I was alone. They took our computers, a great deal of our tools, all the haulers, and only just barely missed the emergency rations. It was just me, a habitat with greatly depleted resources, a drill, a little food, and the frailest of hopes that the old emergency beacon we had would actually work.
It was the longest four days of my life. I had a lot of time to think about the little things.
Like how we avoided being noticed normally by pirates. We picked a spot out in the middle of nowhere, and would quietly work, until we had filled up our hoppers. All the while, we'd communicate as little as possible with the outside world. The theory was, if we couldn't be detected, and no one knew where we were, nobody would find us. Then I thought about young Bill Gotti, about how he'd joined our crew, stayed with us all the way out into the deepest bits of the belt, and left three days after we got there, saying he couldn't handle the quiet life. I thought about how we got hit the day after he left, and how one of the black hats sounded just like him over the radio.
It was over those very quiet four days, that I realized just how powerful a little information really was.
Ah, I'm so sorry I dragged on so long. I'd say I must have bored you all, but you all seem very wide eyed and attentive! I suppose that means you're all very smart and have connected all the dots already! Although it appears Mr. Valesci still seems a little lost. If you sit tight just a little longer, I'm sure all the pieces will fall into place for you too, sir!
... And I see your assistant has chosen to reveal that she is actually an android, Mrs. Ballentyne. Well, quite unfortuntely for her, I am a cyborg. It's a shame that she only got the one shot off, too. Why, another five bullets of that caliber might just cause slightly more than cosmestic damage to my handsome face, and maybe won life for all of you. Of course she did only get the one shot off before I cut off her hands. No points for partial work, I'm afraid. If you want a passing grade in the game of life, you need to do you homework, just like me! It's how I knew about the weakspot in those wrists of yours. It makes it very quick and easy for you to change tools, but the place where the joints meet is slightly weaker than you might think.
At any rate, Mr. Valesci, it seems you have realized the truth of the situation.
So, without further ado, let me welcome you all to my revenge banquet! I do hope you all enjoyed yourselves so far, because from this point on, it will much less comfortable for you all.
{End Recording}
From Great Justice Criminal File 19087
Name: Beck Gale
Alias: Nightingale
Age: 26
Body-type: Combat Cyborg, Delta-type chassis
Occupation: Information Broker/Assassin
Charges: Multiple Accounts of first degree murder, espionage, property damage, and theft
Notes: Following Incident 237 on Hungaria 434, Beck had a mental breakdown before friendly forces could recover him. After being rescued, he joined Operation Great Justice, and served as an intelligence agent. During his term of service, a few of his fellow intelligence officers took note of his brutality towards his enemies, but most found his easygoing manner very disarming and ended up believing his darker moments merely to be that: Brief moments that would pass. After the end of the war, he began running a small, private information brokerage, selling data to a wide variety of clients. A short time later, he lured a number of people with suspected Boskone connections to a secluded location with the promise that he would be selling some very exclusive information.
Nine people were murdered.
Although further investigation has proven that all of the victims were, in fact, either former or current Boskone executives that had evaded capture, this does not excuse his actions. He has commited several similar crimes using similar methods, and is considered highly dangerous.
Mundane Quirks:
Let Me Just Say A Few Words: Very, very talkative. He has a tendency to talk and ramble for very long periods of time, even when alone. If left with a captive audience, he will talk more. Getting him to shut up is possible, but generally requires something along the lines of a fist to his face.
Why, I'm Just Happy To See You!: Going hand in hand with his inability to shut up, is his irrpressible lightheartedness. Beck is a very cheerful and happy indivdual, and will do everything with a smile. If anything, however, this makes his darker moments all the more eerie.
Handwavium Abilities:
Boost Boots: As part of his Cyborg conversion, Beck has micro-jets embedded in his feet. This allows for rapid bursts of speed, and for some very high jumps. However it is does not let him fly, and he only has a finite amount of fuel in his legs to fuels these boosts.
Author's Note:
This may be a wee bit dark for Fenspace. I know that doing psychotic criminals generally isn't the norm, but I've been watching Durarara, which for those of you who don't know about it, is basically a show where every cast member is interesting to say the least. Beck here is brought to you by Izaya Orihara, an info broker who's out to screw with everyone.
Well, if Izaya did a fusion dance with the Punisher, anyway.
Moving on, Beck's very clearly a villain character. A first for me, really, in that while he's not twirling a mustache, he's very much a bad guy. There is no redemption for him planned. He just wants to kill a lot of people that he sees as evil. If he dies in the process, then he's still leaving the universe a brighter place than he found it.
Just to let you all know, that is a very creepy thought process. Beck feels no remorse, and is basically a conveniently aimed psychopath. Not sure what all I'm going to write involving him. If I do anything else. About all I have even the vaguest idea for, is a fight between him and Hex.
And now I really need some sleep. G'night.
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| Petition DHS/TSA to comply with a legit court order |
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Posted by: SkyeFire - 07-14-2012, 06:21 PM - Forum: Politics and Other Fun
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I generally stay way the heck away from political discussions, but I think this one doesn't have too much partisan baggage. Short version: last year, a federal appellate court ordered the DHS/TSA to open up their body-scanning policies for public comment, in order to address public concern about health, effectiveness, privacy, etc. One year later, the TSA appears to be pretending the court order doesn't exist. Now, personally, I think that regardless of where you fall on the Conservative/Liberal and/or Security/Liberty axes, we all want our government agencies to be accountable to the due process of law. And the TSA doesn't seem to be fighting this court order via proper process, but merely ignoring it. So, I signed this petition, for whatever good it may do.
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| The Battlefront Public Relations Fiasco |
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Posted by: ordnance11 - 07-14-2012, 02:59 PM - Forum: General Chatter
- Replies (11)
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Battlefront is a company that has for the past 15 years or so, had came out with a popular 15mm WWII ruleset. The game is popular in Europe, Canada and the U.S. One of the popular things about the tournament scene is that you can use figures from any manufacturer, not just from Battlefront.
The first rumbling came from the European Grand Tournament rules:
Quote:Only Flames of War models may be used in the •
tournament. If non Flames of War models are used
then they will be removed from the army and the player
will play the rest of the tournament with the balance of
his army
There was immediate concern about this. John Paul Bisgotti, one of the BF game designer and founders wrote this as part of an article in the BF Forum as an answer:
Quote:The final change we are making is that from the
new season all the events we run with will be only allowing Battlefront
miniatures to be used. This is bound to cause some debate, so let me be
clear as to why we have chosen to go down this path. Joe, Gareth and our
events cost a great deal
of money to run: a little over a quarter of a million American dollars
this year alone. And, although it seems childish to draw a line in the
sand and say, “If you want to play at our events and support the FOW
hobby, you should not be bringing other people’s models along,” it is
absolutely that simple. Our business is a business and we want Flames Of
War to grow; we intend to give it the best support we can, but this
support has a cost.
Let me just say that the overall reaction among those who has been in the FOW community has been underwhelmingly positive. Mr Bisgotti's response in the forum was this:
Quote:If I was a child and wanted to hold my breath I would not be letting
people run around on our forum spouting such utter nonsense but deleting
their posts and banning their accounts but that would be childish and
serve no real purpose as I prefer to read what is said and then comment
when I feel the need.
If Flames Of War is not creating our
own IP I dont know what is and I know that Pete, Phil, Wayne, Evan and
the guys would disagree as they have spent the last ten years of their
lives dedicated to creating a hobby that is the heart of our business
and completely unique. FOW is what drives the WWII 15mm gaming community
and has done for many years and despite other manufacturers of models
it was never any more than just another historical scale before FOW came
along. If supporting your hobby involves you changing sides every time a
business decision upsets you I would ask anybody who enjoyed their free
copy of 3rd edition to speak up and say that we behaved like GW. Stand
up and tell me that we are like any other company and I will give you
five exmaples where we have proven time and again we are not. We are
simply making a choice for our own events and even if you disagree you
should respect us for the right to do so as just like giving away the
rules free to over 50,000 people this year the same people made that
choice so we cant be as bad as some of you would make out.
The problem is that the vocal few with more opinion than understanding
would make it sound like this effects the entire hobby. You are wrong.
Competitive gaming is a part of our hobby and we support it becasue we
want to help that part grow but 90+% of all gamers are casual players
who play in stores and at friends houses and never particpate in a
tournament. These are the core of our business and despite some posters
in this thread claiming to "know" this is a small issue effecting a
gorup of players who however vocal are not the only gamers in the hobby.
Despite it being unwise to comment on this thread it is hard
to read personal attacks on yourself and your team without feeling a
little hurt and whilst I should not defend our choice more as it will
just give some of you more fuel to bleat I stand by what I say. Try and
look at the big picture, remember who we are, what we have done and how
FOW got here and then just decide if that is your hobby or not as you
shoud want to support your hobby and if this or any other decison we
make has you changing your mind then we wish you all the best and thank
you for your business but we will still be here doing our best and
behaving the way we always have.
If they want the business to grow, alienating your customer base is not the way to do it. The Flames of War ruleset is not the WWII hobby, let alone THE hobby. I would had thought they would have avoided the GW mindset, but I guess not. What ever happens to the customer is always right?
__________________
Into terror!, Into valour!
Charge ahead! No! Never turn
Yes, it's into the fire we fly
And the devil will burn!
- Scarlett Pimpernell
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| [Story][Season 0] In The Bluff |
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Posted by: Ace Dreamer - 07-14-2012, 03:33 AM - Forum: Fenspace
- Replies (30)
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In The Bluff - 13/Jul/2012
He felt a bit naked. Standing there near the air lock. Only second time 'up'. And this time no adrenaline armour. They were making him wait.
Eventually, a woman in a red-marked uniform came in. Attractive, of course. Looked like they'd adopted that design the Hollywood Machine had put on the AI remotes. A practical but stylish grey, with colour markings that would be visible from any angle. Puckish, he wondered about the underwear. Was that uniform, too? He never did find out what The Machine had the AIs wearing.
She indicated he should follow. No introduction. No handshake. Had she been carefully ordered what to do? He'd noticed she'd checked a pad, presumably to, at least, see if he matched his photo. It wasn't clear why she bothered, security cameras, at least linked to the AIs, covered this entire area. But, he guessed it was good procedure.
She left him in a security office, not far down the corridor. A long mirror on the wall, nice to see someone respected tradition, and multiple security cameras. He politely nodded to the mirror, and took a seat. As expected someone burst in, a woman in a blue-marked uniform, sat, then spent time reading papers before looking at him.
It was a waiting game. He'd decided on this, early on. They made him wait over night, so there wasn't anything immediately time-critical. He made them wait until noon, as he slaved over the Body Builder and Mather's frustrating AI plans. Making sure there was nothing he'd over-looked.
His transport had been efficient. Dublin airport, into a waved Cessna, conventional flight to Shannon, then out over the Atlantic and a climb to space avoiding any airways. Then a short hop to L5. He must somehow find time to get a pilots license.
As predicted, they wanted him to sign a whole new set of paper work. When he asked about consulting a lawyer she said he'd never used one before. On the surface it was a non-disclosure agreement, and a restatement of his existing contractual arrangements, adding some provisions about repair and support - it would supposedly 'clarify the legal position', and, 'protect both him and them'.
He brought out his own copy of the previous NDA he'd signed, and his contract. The woman across from him got a little flustered. Comparing the two he remarked that the NDA was unchanged, and that there were a considerable number of sub-clauses in the new contract. The unintroduced woman appeared to be fighting hard to look calm and in control.
"I think we need to discuss this with your manager." Hurriedly, the woman gathered her papers, and left. As expected, Jane stepped in. Arthur tried for a Zen state, and when he looked at her imagined seeing a spot an inch behind her forehead. He'd read about it in a Sunday paper, while idly looking for something worth reading, and, it seemed to work.
Jane didn't look shaken, but he'd expected as much. She was made of much stronger stuff. He explained that the NDA covered the privacy and confidentiality issues, and he wasn't prepared to sign any new contracts without full disclosure of the situation. He suspected Jane was quietly satisfied.
It was Del, the first AI in White Team. Or, to be more precise, her humanoid remote. The reports were contradictory, but there'd been an airlock problem, after Mr O'Neill's transport had arrived. Possibly due to it being clipped by a poorly piloted visitor, the previous day. She'd fought to hold the main airlock closed, so they could get O'Neill into the station, even though she was already injured, by flying debris.
She's succeeded, but collapsed with asphyxia, then bled-out. There were hints that O'Neill had implied his health was more important than some robot. He'd been treated by Kelly, Nurse Genny had tried to help Del, but failed. By the time Kelly got to her there was nothing she could do.
The AI core that was Del's mind went into shock. Defensively the other two White Team AIs, Epsi and Eta, had voted her off-line. Then they had disagreed about what to do next. That locked them off-line, and put Zeta, the Black Team AI, in control of their responsibilities. "Nice to know all that logic worked", thought Arthur.
Jane was a little shocked to be told there hadn't been an AI logic cascade failure, it was a basic feature of the design. She got Kelly in, and Arthur showed them on their copy of the AI operations manual, a detail Kelly admitted she'd overlooked.
Next, Arthur asked to see the actual White Team AI cores. In person, this time, rather than by studying the system displays. Then he followed up with the rest of the cores; the Black Team AI core was particularly difficult to get to. Someone had added locked retaining straps, to hold the cores in place.
Kelly wasn't sure, but she thought it was an external technical inspection team, that went around after everything was installed. She hadn't looked into it herself because none of the AIs commented. Arthur pointed out that it explicitly broke the AI core installation specification.
Kelly got out the cutting tools.
After things were put to rights Arthur spoke to Epsi and Eta's remotes. Epsi had been in a bio dome, working on her little garden patch, Eta in a kitchen, making pecan and chocolate chip cookies. Neither were very happy. He explained what he thought had happened, and they agreed that matched their experiences. They said they were still in contact with Del, but she seemed in a semi-conscious state.
"I'll need use of your workshop" remarked Arthur to Kelly, and she led him there, with what looked like a numb expression. Sweeping the contents of a workbench into a bin, she indicated it to him. Two of White Team wheeled his luggage in, as he'd requested.
The Hollywood Machine responded in a positive but cautious way to Arthur. Kelly explained she'd put Del's damaged remote through, but nothing happened. Arthur shook his head, "It's not magic you know", though that was a bit of a cheap shot. The new Del remote was processed in five minutes, after Arthur checked everything was OK with a test remote.
Back in Kelly's workshop the extracted Del AI core was open on the bench, and quickly had its new half-pair phone installed, the other half-pair having been processed into the new remote. A quick AI core cycle, and Del leapt to her feet, and threw herself sobbing into the arms of Epsi and Eta.
Kelly was a bit bemused, and commented that she didn't think they worked like that. Arthur gave her a sour look. After a while they all calmed down, and thanked Arthur, who was a little embarrassed by the hugs. Arthur pointed out Del was only dressed in a robe, seeing as he hadn't been able to match the original sports wear, and she'd need her spare clothes. Then was shocked to find she didn't have any.
Jane was called in, and agreed there needed to be a re-think on the way the AIs were managed. Arthur also asked her to witness him starting up another AI, using the test remote that he'd processed, and an AI core from his luggage.
"This is Consultant Engineer Janet. She is an expert on the maintenance of the AIs, and knows as much as I do about the Hollywood Machine. I think you need to get on with drawing-up a contract with her. She nominally works for me, and she will not be resident on this station."
Jane and Kelly looked at each other. He could almost feel them working the recent events into their story. He held his breath, unsure what would happen, maybe even violence. Kelly looked thoughtful. Jane spoke.
"I suppose this means you wont be signing the revised contract terms with us."
"Yes, and I want all the AIs to read this."
He handed Jane a paperback copy of "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance".
--
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind
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| [Story][Season 0] Defective Work |
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Posted by: Ace Dreamer - 07-14-2012, 03:26 AM - Forum: Fenspace
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Defective Work - 12/Jul/2012
Arthur didn't understand. One of his AIs had failed. Up on O'Neill Station. They said it was defective. He'd messed-up the design.
They were threatening him with massive damages. His incompetence was risking basic infrastructure. The repair bill could be immense.
The message had come in last thing in the day. He stayed late, sending requests for more details, confirmation. Nothing. That night, he hadn't slept much. He'd read all the Asimov he'd been loaned. 'The Three Laws' wouldn't work, of course, but at least they were a start.
His secretary, Miss Lidzt, was in before him. She was an ex-glamour addict, returned from O'Neill Station. She'd worked there in a similar role, but the homesickness got too bad, so she broke her contact and came back to Dublin. A good chunk of her pay went to pay-off the loan she'd needed so as to leave before her contract renewal date. Arthur considered employing her a bit of a gesture of defiance.
The office was new, too. The repair side of the business had expanded, and he was called in to fix things it was claimed were irreparable. And, that wasn't just restricted to electronics. Several times he'd had to turn-down requests, saying that was outside his field. He seemed to have got a reputation for safe use of handwavium. How?
Arthur had developed a a suite of waved tools. Some analytic, some manipulative, some a mixture. All were 'clean', and didn't contaminate with handwavium. He guessed he was a 'Wave Consultant'.
He'd asked his aunt, seeing as she always seemed to know things, or knew someone who did. "You didn't see the article, dear? 'Waving The Future'? Came out a few months ago. I'll see if I can find my clipping." And, she had. It was very flattering, if a bit inaccurate.
He wasn't really a 'medical researcher', he hadn't said 'careful use of handwavium can fix any problem', or 'used carefully handwavium is no more dangerous than gas'. Wait a minute. You could read 'gas' as either methane or gasoline. This smelled a bit too much of the 'Wright Stuff'.
He'd never contacted Kevin Wright. He'd been too busy. Now he had another reason. "OK. Calm down, Arthur. Analyse the situation. Who sent the message?" That's what he liked about Kevin. Straight to the point.
He hadn't checked that. 'Admin & Legal Departments' it said. Wouldn't that be Jane, and Sarah? Maybe they'd found him out!
"Now, Arthur." The voice was friendly but firm. He'd fully recovered, that way, at least, from his stroke. Nurse Blake sent him regular updates. "Ask yourself, what do they want? How do they expect you to react?"
Kevin waited while he thought. Yes, he'd rather panicked. Assumed it was all his fault. They'd be able to tell that by the replies he sent. The questions he asked. Why hadn't they replied? He asked Kevin that.
"Well, maybe they wanted to shake you up? Get you in the right frame of mind for something? You've become independent. You don't jump when they say 'frog'. Think like a detective, but better than the ones in all those cheap books you used to read."
OK. He had a road map. Go up there. Refuse to sign anything. Until he knew exactly what happened. Solve the case. If he never worked for O'Neill again, he could live with that. But, he owed them, if he could fix what was wrong.
"Thanks, Kevin. I'll try and prove I'm still the 'Wright Stuff'."
"Now, before I go, about this article..."
--
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind
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| Hi everyone |
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Posted by: Irascor - 07-14-2012, 01:20 AM - Forum: Introductions
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I'm Irascor.
Just wanted to say hello, not sure what I can contribute right now, but I wanted to say hi and thank Bob for letting me join.
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| [Space Station] O'Neill Station |
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Posted by: Ace Dreamer - 07-13-2012, 07:54 PM - Forum: Fenspace
- Replies (6)
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O'Neill Station - 13/Jul/2012
The physical structure of O'Neill Station was built by an external contractor, under various provisions for secrecy. Staffing was an initial problem, but eventually an 'Arthur' produced the goods, and initially ran "Lagrange Recruitment". Arthur was supervised, except for his early work, by a line manager, 'Ms Jones'.
There are no files maintained about Arthur, on O'Neill Station, or various other low-level resources, which is what Arthur started as. O'Neill probably doesn't even know his name, he just knows they've got someone who can solve problems. Ms Jones isn't near the top of the ladder, she is a middle-level resource, herself, and her higher management is in Earth-based offices, in Australia.
The seventy-odd attractive young women who are permanent employees on O'Neill Station fall into three groups: The Angels (Sarah, Jane, Kelly), the humanoid remotes of the ten AIs, and the 'normal' (englamored) humans.
You shouldn't forget O'Neill Station runs as a private home, an estate. This is different from Stellvia, which has major elements of service industry and commercial enterprise. O'Neill will have offices in his home but will likely be careful as to which of his staff have access to them. It is likely Jane will have access, Sarah will have her own office, and limited access, and Kelly will have no access at all. A number of the general crew will have access in line with their duties, which include cleaning and maintenance, as well as clerical and administrative work. There are no administrative AIs; the AIs on O'Neill Station run infrastructure.
The relationship between the Angels and the O'Neill Station AIs - that is more difficult. It's not clear that the Angels would regard them as 'sisters', they are certainly biologically different. The Angels to all tests are biologically human, without a biomod.
The AIs are not immobile, Arthur made sure of that. Their humanoid remotes are quite capable of going and unplugging their AI cores, which will cheerfully run on batteries for tens of hours, and travelling off the station. That's the way they arrived, and they could leave the same way. Leaving chaos in their wake.
For details of the 'normal' humans, see the "Hollywood Machine", for the AIs see "Uncanny Valley". The existence of the Hollywood Machine (AKA 'The Machine') is one of the secrets of the station. The Angels might bear a suspicious thematic resemblance to improved(?) versions of "Charlie's Angels", but this isn't talked about. At all. It is, of course, completely unclear who "Charlie" might be. Bloody murder might occur if someone makes a bad suggestion.
Actually, there is a Bosley. She's a heavily-built, though glamorous, woman in her early 30s, who lied about her age being 25; she did have the looks, and forged paperwork, to get away with this. Her name is Alison 'Lee' Kay, a divorced engineer (and not a spy or investigator), who works in Maintenance, doing the awkward heavy lifting. Kelly befriended her first, and introduced her to Jane, then Sarah. They affectionately call her 'Boz' (when they're sure they're alone) and she tries to mother the Angels, and anyone else she can get her hands on.
Lee actually died in the Hollywood Machine. She was the first one they put through the process after Kelly had gone through, on an experimental basis. The Machine took the usual half-an-hour with Kelly, but she came out apparently unchanged, though she complained about strange dreams, and flashbacks. The Machine decided there needed to be a Bosley. Unfortunately it isn't designed to do casting.
Kelly worked for half a day to save Lee, and waved up some extraordinary Steam Punk medical tech in the process. After two days in bed, Lee was ready to return to duty, and the only change was she'd acquired a 'Mother' aura. And now has some investigator skills, and an interest in, and skill with, firearms (copied from Kelly). Kelly wrote a report on the incident, which pointed out they hadn't got as much as an operators manual for The Machine, and one day, it might go rogue. She strongly recommended that the original designer and builder, an 'Arthur', be asked to provide any available documentation, and if it didn't exist, create it. This report was apparently completely ignored.
Red Team
These AIs and crew handle physical infrastructure, walls, view ports, bio domes, and vehicles. They have at least minimal training in piloting the vehicles, enough to nudge them around, anyway. This is the team that does EVA and external repairs, as well as operating the station-keeping drives. They also handle physical security, and are armed when needed from AI-supervised weapons caches. These weapons are a mix of waved non-lethal restraints, and some hard tech chosen to not damage the station hull. There is a small, rarely used, jail. Sarah handles weapons training, in a very strict way. She also instructs in Eire Law (often very similar to British Law). Sarah can help them on the security side, and a lawyer can be useful. Kelly often works with this team. Sometimes they're called "Security".
White Team
These AIs and crew handle life support and all environmental issues, water, air, heating/cooling, light, sewage, gravity. They also do the internal maintenance, cooking, cleaning, stores, grounds-keeping in the bio domes. A small shop, gymnasium and beauty suite is run for staff. The Hollywood Machine is in the back of the beauty suite. Kelly has provided them with quite a few Steam Punk cleaning and maintenance tools, which make a near impossible job just hard work. They work with Red Team on things like air locks, and other overlapping areas of responsibility. Sometimes they're called "Maintenance".
Blue Team
These AIs and crew handle the communications and information technology, electronic and manual, and the power systems; maintenance, repair and operation. They're responsible for the various entertainment systems. They also handle information security, and the postal service. Blue Team maintain the on-site and remote (encrypted) backups of all the IT systems, and the AIs; note Mr O'Neill's information is at least double-encrypted, with codes private to him. Jane works with them. Sometimes Sarah works with them when legal matters outside Jane's expertise are involved. Quite a few Blue Team clerks are what makes the departments, but not the teams, work. Sometimes they're called "SysOps".
Black Team
This AI and small crew are the trouble-shooters. They are supposed to spot problems before they occur, stop them, then report them, so they don't happen again. They can call on any of the other three teams for support, bypassing any chain of command, though they'll need to justify themselves, later. Reports from Black Team cannot be ignored or sidelined - they must be responded to. In return, they minimise their reports. Quite a few staff have been rotated through Black Team, then ended up on another team. They also do some training work. Think of a Fire Safety Officer at a company - even gets to tell the MD/CEO what to do. Jane works with them, and fights to keep them from becoming elitist or unpopular. Sometimes they're called "Troubleshooters".
Medical
This is Kelly and White Team nurse-practitioner, Genny Hall, with help from a Blue Team clerk. Each of the three (plus one) teams is supposed to have a fully-trained paramedic on duty at all times, but, they each have only two of these, and a further three under training. Nurse Genny handles all but the most major issues, and refers to Kelly if required. Things Kelly isn't happy with handling, like non-trivial surgery, require shipping patients elsewhere. Kelly allegedly has a number of Steam Punk medical gadgets, which can handle many intermediate level medical problems, if people are prepared to risk their lives in them. She can also use a medical stasis gadget, that was bought-it, but this has a significant risk of inducing a biomod, before shipping elsewhere for treatment. And, biomods can mean the Hollywood Machine doesn't work on you, any more; i.e. you're fired. Then there is her self-propelled 'crash cart', which she describes in detail to people who injure themselves through carelessness. Kelly is pushing for better medical facilities to be set-up. Note that while the Blue Team AI 'Theta' studies with Kelly, she isn't part of the team.
Legal
This is Sarah and a Blue Team member who's a partially trained lawyer (she's continuing her training), along with a Blue Team legal clerk. They call on Jane to deal with the commercial side. Sarah has pointed out that this department wouldn't be nearly large enough if things get litigious.
Admin
This is Jane with a Blue Team member trained in administration, and three Blue Team clerks. Admin is also the Human Resources department, though new staff are handled through Lagrange Recruitment, in Dublin, down on Earth. Admin processes purchase requests from the various teams and departments; all need at least two approvals. Jane is trying to ensure anyone on Blue Team who is trainable can at least stand-in as a clerk. She's also watching with interest to see if there's any unionisation activity.
Financial
There is no on-board financial department. Visiting staff audit this. Wages for on-board staff is handled externally. Day-to-day work goes through Admin, and is securely logged, on-site and remote, to provide an audit trail. Jane isn't happy that there isn't at least one person on-board in this department.
Staffing
The station will just about run on a core staff of thirty 'normal' humans (nine in each of the three teams, plus three in 'Black' team), in three eight-hour shifts. Then you add the Angels, who need sleep and rest, and the AIs, who supposedly don't. Seeing as there are sixty 'normals', there should be enough staff to handle most problems. Given the incentives to work here, even with its isolation, assume a 5% 'normal' staff turn-over per year, i.e. three women. This assumes that the Angels and AIs stay. If possible staff leaving, all of who've signed major secrecy agreements, will be found jobs in other O'Neill organisations. Sorry, no memory wiping technology available. [grin]
Vehicles
The main maintenance vehicles for the station are Kelly's "Mirror Spiders". These have a ten metre/yard leg span, and seat a crew of two. They have a camouflage capability Kelly learned by studying the Hollywood Machine, so that the external maintenance of the station can be done with considerable privacy. With the camouflage turned-off they just have a disturbing mirror surface, and you can see that their structure is clearly Steam Punk. Spiders can walk around, but not fly, in gravity.
They derive their power from compressed steam, good for about two hours operation, with an emergency solar mirror boiler, good for about five minutes movement. Communication is via a digital heliograph and paper-tape reader/punch; trying to use anything more modern seems to upset the spider's coordination. It seems safe to use pads or other electronics as long as they have no radio links turned on (Bluetooth, 3G, etc.). These vehicle are not suitable to install an AI (even a Babbage-engine based one), and the radio link used by the station AIs means their humanoid remotes can't operate a spider.
Spiders do not have a true airlock, though the cockpit can be divided in half, and half de-pressurised, then re-pressurised. Their life support is good for about twenty hours for two crew.
Spiders can easily manipulate multi-ton hull plates, and deploy two welding torches at once, or a range of other tools. In theory four tools could be in use at once. Yes, the mandibles could easily cut an unarmoured man in half, and would damage, or at least stress, most armour.
If you wanted to take one of these a long way you could strap-on an external speed drive, and maybe a life support booster, then eject these so you use the spider at your destination. A spider probably wouldn't survive re-entry, even with a speed drive, and would at least loose a couple of legs.
There are usually at least three spiders ready to run, with two more in maintenance, and one in pieces. Kelly really likes them, a number of crew are really rude about them out of her hearing. It's generally considered that they're worthwhile.
There are also at last a dozen usable two-man 'Steam Broomsticks', which can fly around for about half an hour, and are useful for inspection work. Then they have two hours down-time. Radios work perfectly well with these. You could easily strap a couple of broomsticks to a spider, for use in emergencies. Broomsticks are strictly for space use.
It might be worth mentioning the fifty or so 'Steam Guns', which are good for about five minutes continuous manoeuvring, by a vacuum-protected individual, so about half an hour, if they are skilled.
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"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" - Hawkwind
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| Reading Spoilers |
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Posted by: DHBirr - 07-13-2012, 06:06 PM - Forum: Forums
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Query: How in Arioch's name do you make a hidden spoiler show up so you can read it? I've been reduced to copying the "blank" area and then pasting it into a random document on my computer, which is a ridiculously cumbersome procedure. If there's instructions for this somewhere on the Forums, I wasn't able to figure out the right place to look.
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Big Brother is watching you. And damn, you are so bloody BORING.
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