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[Cknarf]

"Yes, officer." Frank nodded.

 

As the tech got to work, Frank looked to Faed.

 

[Khelish]

 

"Away, getting Indigestion." He winked.

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

Officer Vitelli did a quick scan of the system and black box. "It's clean.They had a throttle malfunction."

 

"Okay, here you go. Sign here. Get out of here, and be careful with it," the officer said and handed Frank the fix-it ticket, and he went back into his patrol car.

 

Officer Vitelli started to walk off then turned around. "You know that's a sweet set of wheels. And they got those things figured out down to the hundredth of a kph for top speed, unless someone went in and tampered with the governor on it. I know 'cause my cousin did that to his. Now I can't prove nothin' 'cause I just ran the tests I was told to run, but trust me, you gotta be careful runnin' at those speeds. And if you see a flashing light, you pull over in the future. This ain't no fun and games. Bob over there got a little overheated 'cause some Asari Spectre pulled some sh*t on him earlier. So you guys be careful and obey the law, okay?"

[Cknarf]

Asari Spectre, huh?  lolboss.

 

"You won't have to worry about any more trouble from us." Frank put his hands up. "We've got just a few more stops to make, then we're heading straight home."

 

Probably.

 

Frank waited for the police to clear out, before starting the car, and reverting it back to wheeled mode. They pulled away, and headed into the next dome.

 

"Good work back there, Slick." 

[Kel Riever]

 "I think we could have made that dome lock," Faed replied as he sunk into the back seat.  "One time, I'd like to actually lose the chasers instead of talking around them."

Not having forgotten Frank's omni-tool, he removed the piece of technology, placed it in between the front seats behind the shift, and put his original, much less impressive Blue Wire Tool, back on.  There was a sudden desire on Faed's part to rip off the mask that let him survive and to breathe the air for himself. He quashed those thoughts, instead rerouting on the HUD the most direct path to Deng's.  

"This way.  Deng has almost anything I can think of that no one else has.  If we spend the time looking for it, and if it is on Caleston."
 

[Terca]

Noveria, Hades Rift. EK Composites (previously)

 

"Founder anything that attempts to escape."

 

"Yes sir."

 

The order would create the largest amount of destruction over Noverian skies since its conception. As it turns out, Cerberus was quite invested in Composites, though at the beginning of the Assault that hadn't appeared to be the case.

***

 

Akvia was slight for Turians, and a testament that unlike humans a female of a species with masculine traits didn't necessarily mean it was bulky. She was making good use of that now, though, as she pushed with her team through the long and fortified corridor which connected the central 'module' of the facility with its factory arms. Cerberus has obviously thought ahead when they had designed the wings because there were regular outcroppings from the walls which created impeccable cover to fire from. They were staggered in height and width so that there would be regularity to the firing pattern. To fight through the death alley would be a fruitless endeavor for many...

 

Many, not all.

 

Fire team 2 was making unrelenting progress and by no fluke. The central postings were some of the shortest but most plentiful, meaning that they were densely populated but lacking in cover. Clearing them out had required a combination of cryo explosions and neural shocks to harass the central lane. Forced to the sides and the more defensible panels they became less arranged and their rounds started coming much more slowly and in less concentrated bursts. When they were together is when they started suffering the most. 

 

Saboteurs supported by ghosts started making speedy gains and pushed closer and closer to the stronger walls until they could use homing charges to prime the steel. Once cryo blasts froze the metal sub-zero the intense heat of the charges being detonated shattered the walls. It was short bursts later from shotguns and assault rifles that dealt with the remaining rabble. With this cycle of suppression, cornering, and culling they were making good progress with minimal sustained damage. By the time the twelve of them were halfway up the hall their momentum was forcing two members to watch the read to make sure that they weren't accidentally passing anyone by who might attempt to shoot them from behind. It was a smooth operation thus far, and at the head was Akvia.

 

It was a bit odd to see a lightly armored individual with Armigers as the fighting style of the different units contrast so heavily. Armigers provided immense fire support for sustained periods relying on armor and tech along with their armor. Lightly armored units were usually Cabals who had other methods of demage mitigation, or very rarely technicians. Akvia was one of the latter, and used her tech skills the same way one might expect a Biotic would. The techniques were only recently given to them by the STG who had been working with tech for many, many years.

 

"Commander, we have cleared the path to wing one. Radar mapping is going to be uploaded to the shared net." She stated as her fire team holed up for the next push. "No difficulty here, progress is agreeable. They lack heavy weaponry as of our progression but I expect it once we enter the factor."

 

"Noted. Follow alien protocols."

 

"Of course." She replied as she motioned for one of the Saboteurs to pay attention. The Armiger looked up and caught an omni-tool pulled from a man wearing a curious button on his lapel, flipping it over to look for a model inscription. Cutting off LEADCOM¹ the woman called towards the saboteur. "Analyze using a cold suite²."

 

As the soldier nodded the readout on Akvia's helmet notified the Turian that the capacitors for her armor were fully charged to regular capacity. Good.

 

"Push on my mark. Turret marked on 3d mapping, Saboteurs disable once shields removed on A. Ghost and Havoc cryo suppression on B."

 

Eleven simultaneous 'Rex' echoed in her helmet, the Turian equivalent of 'Hoorah'. She clicked her mandibles, pleased.

 

***

"Beginning interception of Cerberus aircraft." The Pilot announced as the ship's combat suite came online to start dealing with the escaping craft. The ship wasn't designed for Air-to-Air combat in space or on the ground, so much as it was designed to provide Close Air Support (CAS) for operatives on the ground, dealing with multiple soft targets quickly. It was by all means a mobile fortress. It meant that the ship would need to move quickly in order to deal with the fifteen targets that were now scattering.

 

Lifting up into the air another hundred meters swiftly it used three main sets of measures to begin picking off the escapees. Air-to-Air defenses on the wings were normally used on smaller aerial vehicles significantly below, so it began to rotate slightly to lead off shuttles. The shots pierces the front or rear of the ship forcing them into dives into the snow and ice.

 

"The Shuttles are headed towards a single location."

 

"Signature ping off our starboard, doesn't match Citadel Register."

 

"Sensor array is detecting a large source. At least frigate."

 

**

1. Leader Communications; Heard by Deidrus, Fire Team Leaders, the XO, and the pilot.

2. A Cold Suite is a partition of an operating system isolated from other processes so that the main systems cannot be compromised. Used to analyze foreign technology without the risk of countermeasures.

[Cknarf]

"I think we could have made that dome lock."

 

I know.

 

Frank was a little disappointed in himself, for giving up so easily.

 

If we had more places to run...

 

The domes of Caleston had very limited exits.  If they managed to get through one dome, they'd like just get sealed in the next anyways. Now the massive wards of the Citadel... Those were a different story.  

 

Maybe next time.

 

He changed course, and headed directly for Deng's electronics.

 

------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

After some quick, yet conservative, burns down the streets of 412, they arrived in front of Deng's.

 

Frank stepped out of the car and leaned the seat forward, allowing Faed some room to get out.

 

"Lead the way, Slick." Frank said, while equipping his omni-tool.

 

Wonder if there's anything for me in here?

[Cainhurst Crow]

Essul put the bandage on his arm, covering the medigel on the wound with a bit of a wince as he flexed his fingers, joints cracking slightly in his left hand as he rolled his wrist experimentally. It wasn't the pain he winced at, since his nerves were in a constant haze thanks to his meds, but more the cold of the medigel that made him shutter. The slimy cold feeling right before the anesthetics kicked in always made him uncomfortable.

 

He glanced over to VERA, still in his quarters, still in her holographic form as he rolled his neck, "Any chance I can ask a favor of you? Something to help me out and something to deliver to your boss when she has some free time?" he asked simply, standing up rather then sitting down as he paced the room slowly, stretching his legs with each step.

 

Who knew going through emotions could actually do a number on ones physical body? Essul needed to get some air, and get some violence out and onto something, and he had a good idea where to turn to do it.

[Kel Riever]

Faed went through the familiar, slow-sliding automated front door of Deng’s, ahead of Frank and Eteon in a bit of eagerness.

“You again?”  Mr. Deng shouted from the back.

The scene hadn’t changed, Faed noticed as he waved to Deng.  Everything was still packed in wherever it could be fit, smelled musty, and reminded him of his old uncle’s ship cabin.  Though he could barely fit through the shelves and stacks of hardware in most places, Faed lauded, “I haven’t come away without something useful here yet.”

One of the stacks of routers leaned ominously towards Faed, but he deftly pushed it back into balance.  There were a few kiosks for selling software products, though most were dusty.  Faed, with the discarded interface he’d rescued in his hand,  stepped between two of the kiosks to search a shelf for something that caught his eye.

[Redbelle]

Jess arrived on the bridge and stopped to lean against frame of the door. She looked around and spotted only a few people. A few were the dock staff keeping an eye on the ships readouts at the backup engineering station. There to liase with the roaming teams of engineers and try to make sure they didn't do anything to the ship that might cause it to hurt the docks.

 

Over by the nav table Jess heard the sounds of movement and someone working behind it. Dahlia she hoped, making the ship ready to move. Jess checked her watch. She'd said they move in an hour and time was fifteen minutes before that. In reality they had several more hours to take before the window for catching their comet closed and would require a new flight plan.

 

And awkward as it was for her to admit, she'd lost track of the people who were coming with her. She needed to get the comms up and running. Make sure people knew who it was they were supposed to be talking to who could co-ordinate among them. That meant taking the time to break in the new bridge staff and assigning positions. The first one to put into a seat had to be the one who could out the call out to return to the ship.

 

Jess stepped out of the door and the heavy rolling door grinded to a close behind her as she came down to where her seat was. The throne that had replaced it was gone. Her old and worn chair back in it's place. Really little more than a stool that say in front of a command and control panel that let her see the ships status. So many red LED's shining across the board.

 

Time to make it green.

[Kel Riever]

“Where do you want it, sir?”

“Right over there,” Morgan replied.  The dockhand moved the floating loader, piled with a few crates far heavier than a person could lift, effortlessly.  Morgan had picked four of the new crew to help with getting the supplies to their quarters and for food, to the kitchen stores.  Each of the crew went to work breaking open the crates and distributing their contents into smaller bundles for carrying.

“You asked for this, special,” The dockhand said to Morgan about one rather long crate that was quite apparently different from the rest.  It wasn’t large but it was long and made of a protective ceramic.  “I don’t know when you’ll be back on Caleston, but I sure could use that favor you’re telling me.”

Morgan nodded. “Don’t you worry, you won’t have to wait forever.”

With a smile, the dockhand shook with Morgan and left.

Carefully, Morgan eyed the crate, checking for any sign of rough handling.  Finding none, he punched in the password he had assigned to the crate via the dockhand.  A green light flickered and Morgan opened it up.

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

Dahlia noticed Jess' arrival on the bridge and jumped to attention as she did when Aria walked onto the bridge. "Captain on deck!" she shouted.

 

Everyone on the bridge stood at attention facing Jess.

 

She didn't know what to expect from Jess. She knew what Aria expected, so she erred on the side of caution. Sloppy was not tolerated.

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

Essul put the bandage on his arm, covering the medigel on the wound with a bit of a wince as he flexed his fingers, joints cracking slightly in his left hand as he rolled his wrist experimentally. It wasn't the pain he winced at, since his nerves were in a constant haze thanks to his meds, but more the cold of the medigel that made him shutter. The slimy cold feeling right before the anesthetics kicked in always made him uncomfortable.

 

He glanced over to VERA, still in his quarters, still in her holographic form as he rolled his neck, "Any chance I can ask a favor of you? Something to help me out and something to deliver to your boss when she has some free time?" he asked simply, standing up rather then sitting down as he paced the room slowly, stretching his legs with each step.

 

Who knew going through emotions could actually do a number on ones physical body? Essul needed to get some air, and get some violence out and onto something, and he had a good idea where to turn to do it.

 

"That depends upon what you would have me do," VERA replied while flipping the heel of her foot in and out of her pump. Then noticing the apprehension in Essul's bio-signs, she took a drag on her cigarette. "Of course, Essul. What do you need me to do?"

[Redbelle]

Jess winced. "Thanks luv's. But if I want someone to yell everytime I walk into a compartment I'll hire a dwarf in bright colours with a stick with bells on. He can jump on people's consoles every now and then and shake his waggle stick. you can save your vocal's luv's. I'm going to be in and out a lot". She moved towards the nav table and gave a half grin. "Besides, this ship doesn't do military. I figure those command academies do something to a persons mind if they need someone to tell them who they are and where their at. We got the nav systems running Dahlia"?

[Cknarf]

Wonder how old that thing is?

 

Frank ran a finger across the screen of an ancient CRT monitor.

 

Huh.

 

Frank turned his attention to a small, bright-yellow device on one of the shelves.  It was about the size of a PDA, but much thicker.  It had a tiny screen, and appeared to have physical buttons.  He took the item in his hands, and examined it closer.

 

So this comes out...

 

He removed a gray-colored cartridge with silver specks.  There were remains of what looked to be a label, too far gone to read.

 

Neat.

 

"Are you looking for anything specific?" He asked quietly, while popping it back into place.

 

Totally buyin' it.

[Cainhurst Crow]

"That depends upon what you would have me do," VERA replied while flipping the heel of her foot in and out of her pump. Then noticing the apprehension in Essul's bio-signs, she took a drag on her cigarette. "Of course, Essul. What do you need me to do?"

 

"There's some data on my terminal. Most of its heavily encrypted,and a few seem to be image files, but theres at least a few megabytes worth of information I'd like to see decrypted. Tell your boss its a gift from a now rogue agent lf the hegemony, requesting amnesty aboard this vessel." He said as he walked towards the door, pausing as he looked to the AI.

 

"When the captain wants to talk. Tell her I'll be at the vr training room. And..." he paused as he looked away a moment, voice stifling at the last minute. "Thank you, VERA....for everything. " he said before he left the room, heading to the VR with some close quarters practice sparring in mind.

[Terca]

The Cabalist was a bit less interested in the items than her two cohorts in crime, given the amount of tech there. She wasn't really one for the old tech that Frank was looking at, and didn't have a shopping list like Faed. It wasn't the place for old tomes or blade edging materials so she was a bit out of luck. Well, that was also compounded by the fact that she was physically larger than any of the aisles and had no doubt in her mind that attempting to walk between the dusty stacks would lead to a cascade of century-old materials.

 

And worse yet, the liability that came with it.

 

So she stood near the entranceway and glanced around at the different items with passing interest. Every now and then a metal or plastic angle would catch her eye and she'd peer more closely at it, be unable to recognize it, shrug, then look to something else.

 

"I wonder what the oldest piece of tech is in this place..." She said aloud, fighting to keep the disinterest from her voice. "I don't recognize half these things."

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

Dahlia sat in her chair and spun to face her terminal. She flipped a few switches. "Board is...." 

 

There was a sizzling sound and smell.

 

"Just a minute," she opened the panel and pulled a dead mouse out of the unit by the tail. "It appears we have some... creatures, Jess. Let me try this again...." She flipped the switches. " Board is green. We're good to go, Jess."

[Kel Riever]

Faed was rummaging, and first answered Eteon’s question.  “Oldest piece of tech?  I believe I saw an old Earth floppy disk in here one time, but haven’t seen it since.  It probably hasn’t left here, though.”

“As far as specific goes,” Faed then answered Frank, “Aside from the problems with this interface, no.  But I’m sure I’ll find something.”  In the middle of his search, Faed stopped and lifted the computer interface he had come with.  Using a small tab on the edge of his gloved hand, he popped open the device.  A quick scan and he popped something out of the motherboard.  “Ridiculous, tossing this away…”

Faed pulled a small box from the shelf in front of him and waved it in the air towards Deng, who had maneuvered to watch them suspiciously from the far end of the aisle. “This,” Faed told Deng, before taking the item from the box and replacing what he’d popped out.  He closed the computer interface again, but something caught his eye.  Faed reached out and pulled a cube off the shelf that was about 25 centimeters a side. 

“I’m not much for fighting, I admit,” Faed said, perhaps detecting something in the Cabal’s tone, “But if you use any sort of biometric readings or feedback, there might be something here for you.”  Faed walked down the aisle, and not finding what he wanted on the shelved, brushed the dust off a kiosk and read the menue.  “It isn’t a direct system, per se, but I can rig something up that might give you more…useful information.  If that sort of thing matters to you.”

[Cknarf]

Frank curiously fiddled with the device.

 

Access panel...

 

He pulled away a small cover on its backside.

 

(+) - [  1.5v   ] - (-)

(-) - [  1.5v   ]- (+)

 

"Hm." He shrugged.

[Terca]

The Turian's expression raised with the simple mention of biometrics.

 

"A boost to my biometric sensors would be awesome, if I could get a more efficient program to filter through information." Eteon said, tapping a finger against the outside of her thigh. "I have shotgun microphones which are used during high-stress ops because they effectively let you listen through steel. Unfortunately with that comes the problem that I need to sort through the information manually thanks to the frequency acceptance. The tech on board my Cabalist armor doesn't have a sophisticated enough system to actually determine ideal wavelengths-"

 

She stopped herself before she got too in depth with probably her single weakness, super powers. Heros of Turian lore were rarely of mythic ability, just strong warriors, but she had a weakness for the extrasensory powers of some human characters. Cabalist armor gave her some of those 'powers' and she had researched them fairly extensively. It meant she was prone to babble about it. So she caught herself.

 

"Basically I need my programs to be able to determine based off of the whole frequency range what exactly I'm looking for. A trigger sounds like this, mumbling sounds like that, and they all have the same noise to them. I can't preset it to search for that specifically because it just can't figure out how to best single out noises on its own. If you could get me a better reception array that would be awesome." She paused. "And also probably time-costly. Probably not the best use of it."

[sH0tgUn jUliA]

Janiri - Vayne and Irina

 

A box was delivered to the ship addressed to Irina Sloane, Crew Lounge. It was from Charlene’s Gift Emporium. Septerax didn’t know what to make of it since everything always went to the crew member’s quarters.

 

He contacted Irina. “Sloane, I have a package for you, and it’s addressed to the Crew Lounge. Don’t you want this delivered to your quarters?”

 

Irina was still sitting in the lounge with her feet up on the table. “No. Send it up here.”

 

“What’s in it?” Septerax asked.

 

“Stuff.”

 

Septerax shook his head and instructed one of the crew to take the box up. It weighed about 25 pounds. A few moments later the package arrived.

 

“Here’s your package,” the dockworker said.

 

“Thanks. Set it over there,” Irina smiled and walked over to it.

 

“What’s in it?” Vayne asked and turned to look.

 

“You’ll see.” Irina replied. She moved a table in the corner of the room, took her knife and cut through the tape on the box and opened it.

 

“A tree? A plastic tree?” Vayne asked skeptically, raising a brow as he regarded the plastic plant.

 

“Yeah. It’s festive. You just watch,” Irina said and she began to set up the tree. “Well give me a hand with this.”

 

Vayne grumbled, got out of his chair, and lumbered over. “I don’t know what you need me for.”

 

“You just need to hold the top of it upright. Now lift it while…. I slip the base under it and tighten it…. Perfect,” Irina turned and smiled at Vayne. Then she began to unfold the branches.

 

“Hmmm. It looks life-like. It even smells life-like,” Vayne remarked as he stood close to it, taking in a deep breath, "Hmmm...Kinda minty. Still don't see whats the big deal though. Why even set up a tree in the first place?”

 

“It’s a Christmas Tree,” Irina replied while she was getting the lights out of another box. “My people celebrate Christmas this time of year.  It used to be a religious celebration, and it still is in some quarters of my home planet, but mostly it’s just some commercial thing. I prefer to celebrate it by setting up a tree like this and having a get together with friends. The tree brings back old memories for me. Good memories. And friends? Well you can’t go wrong there, can you?”

 

"Nostalgia and good times, huh? Alright, I can get that." Vayne laughed as he looked to the tree again, still looking curiously at it as he shifted his attention to the lights, “Let me give you a hand with that.”

 

Vayne began to help string the lights around the tree after seeing what Irina was doing.  When they were done, Irina plugged them in.

 

“Ta da!” she sang. “Well, they all work, but we’re not done. We have to hang ornaments on the tree. Now be careful with these. While they’re non-breakable they can fall off pretty easily. They used to be hand blown and hand painted, did you know that? Some real craftsmanship went into them.  Very thin glass, but now everything’s plastic and safe. I’ll hang the large ones on the bottom, you put the small ones on the top.”

 

“Sounds like this holiday meant a lot on your world, at least at first.” Vayne remarked as he looked at the tiny looking plastic ball, bright red with some gold designs on it, before setting it as gently as he could on the tip of a branch, and watched it tumble off after a second or two, "Kalros's ******...Okay, let me try that again." he said as he got back into it, determined to see this through.

 

“Aw, that’s alright. I won’t tell anyone,” Irina winked, “Hey, you know it looks really nice, now. Just like at home. Thanks for your help, Vayne.” Irina gave Vayne a little peck on the cheek.

 

“H-hang on a sec." The old krogan stammered in surprise, not having expected the kiss, from irina of all people, "Just 'cause you’re Krannt doesn’t mean….”

 

“Vayne, that was for ‘thanks.’ And we’re friends, okay?” Irina smiled, and then she put her arms around him and punched him. “I was worried about you when you were wounded, ya big lug. You gave me a scare.”

 

The old Krogan smiled. He put his arm around her and held. “That, I understand.” he said as he looked at the tree, seeing it light up and decorated. He had to admit, something about it was pretty nice.

 

"So...what happens with the tree now?" He began, remembering some of the old traditions on his own people, usually ones around the holidays involving ritual sacrifices or celebrating whatever old gods the shamans talked about that year, "I'm guessing we don't do the krogan thing and light a bunch of them on fire now that they're all decorated. So what now?"

 

"Well, for one thing, I think it's bright enough that we don't need to have these lights on all the way," Irina said looking at the tree. "Hey VERA, would you mind dimming the overhead lights in here?"

 

"How much do you want them dimmed?" VERA asked.

 

"Just start dimming them slowly. I'll tell you when to stop." Irina said, and VERA began dimming the overhead lights. "Okay, stop. Perfect. Now what we do is make some punch, and have the kitchen send up some snacks. I'll have to check with the gang on deck 4 about the punch. The tree stays here until New Years. Then we take it down, put it in storage until next year when we take it out again and remember all the good times we had together."

 

"I'll start. Vayne, if it wasn't for you, I wouldn't be standing here alive," Irina said, and she walked over to another box. "Here, I bought you something." It was a box that weighed about 10 lbs. wrapped up in gift wrap with a bow attached to it. And she handed him another box that was small and heavy for its size, also wrapped up the same way.

 

Vayne was silent as he looked at the box curiously, the gift wrapping and more specifically the bow bafffling him. He held the 10 pound box in one hand as another gently grabbed the corner of the wrap, tearing it wide open with a single motion as he looked at the gift, curious what it was.

 

Vayne held the shotgun in his hand as he examined it. It was heavy in his grasp, perfect weight for him and his personal taste. He blinked some moisture away as he looked to Irina.

"This...this is a good gift. It’s been a long time since I got any sort of gift..." he said as he looked to irina apologetically, "I...I didnt get you a gift. Could I get you something...I got more than enough arms to spare." He said, not sure what he was supposed to do now.

 

"Ah, don't worry about me. I wanted this to be a surprise," Irina said standing watching Vayne admire her gift. "Just if you see something you think I'd like sometime you can get it for me. It doesn't have to be a gun.

 

“I'll tell you, though, this was hard to find. VERA found it for me. What do you get the Krogan who has everything? Something to keep him from getting his hump shot off. This one came all the way from Earth, and I modified it to fit you. Ammo's in the other box. It's tri-ball just like I use. This gun's a bit too much gun for me, though. One advantage of these weapons over the modern stuff? An engineer can't make them overload."

[Redbelle]

Jess nodded. "Let's see if we can get the old girl working". Jess said as she brought up her comm. "Duncan. I need you up on the bridge".

 

"Bridge! Sure! Um.... That's....".

 

"Five minutes mister. That's four more than you need. Be here". Jess cut her comm and sighed as she eyed the mouse. "Pete's sake. I thought we'd gotten rid of those things. One shipment of grain and your paying for it for the next year".

 

Two minutes later Duncan popped out of the lift to the bridge. Still holding his bags in either hands. "Oh wow"! He said looking around the bridge. "This place is huge"!

 

"Big enough for a game of field hockey....". Jess nodded before pointing to a station. "...You do comms? There's your seat".

 

Duncan looked over and moved to his station. Setting down his cases and pulling the chair back on it's rails. He sat and then scooted the chair back in. The chair had straps and a soft gel contoured seat that molded to his body. "Hey... Isn't this a....".

 

"Crash couch". Jess confirmed. "Back in the day before Mass Effect fields the ship could only accelerate as hard as the crew could stand G forces. You can see how the seats all face away from the engines. Back in the day the crew needed to sit in these anytime the ship accelerated past 2G's. Each couch monitors the crewmen and if they start to pass out each couch has needles to shoot a cocktail of drugs into you to keep your bloodflow up. Back in the day this ship made it close to 9G's of acceleration and only lost 3 crewmembers. Without these couches the whole crew would have died". Jess grinnned as she imparted the ways the ship had once operated. "But that was before the ol girl was outfitted with mass effect fields. We've a lot of mass to shift but the ships engines were built to move more mass than most shipbuilder's plan for nowadays. That said, keep your chair functional. The doc will keep the cocktail mix viable. If Iyana knew she could drop the mass effect fields and accelerate the ship past 9G's the boarding party would be dead right now".

 

Jess tapped the comm station. "Now take a moment. Then give me external comms to our crew. I've uploaded my comm groups to your station so you should be up to date".

 

Duncan nodded and set about familierising himself with the equipment.

[Kel Riever]

Faed shook his head in agreement as Eteon spoke and went through the menu on the kiosk.  "I like Turian code.  Efficient. Clean.  It is designed to run quickly.  Sometimes, though, it misses its mark on detail.  I think that might be your software problem.  That means I need....Palavan Knight...series 8.9....all right that isn't here.   So 8.7.  Then there's the hardware issue..."

With a turn of his head, so that only his examining eyes gleamed through his visor, Faed looked Eteon up and down.  "A better receiver would have to be jury rigged, if that isn't a problem for you.  I am not a hardware specialist, however, if VERA has access to standard military databases from across the galaxy...and I have this suspicion she does...I can work with it.  We'll need some better cabling, though.  For your suit."  Faed, almost obsessively, moved over another aisle where boxes marked only with odd code were stacked high.  He pulled one out.  It was a relatively flat box, square in shape, about twenty centimeters per side.  "A good spool right here, if a bit old.  Better for staying cool, though.  I mean, off someone else's sensor."  Any signal traveling along a cable, no matter how small, was a good way for an enemy to detect movements.  At least that's what Faed thought.

"Hey," a shout from Deng startled everyone, "You gonna pay for all that, quarian? Where's your friend the asari?"

[Kel Riever]

Morgan undid the clasps and lifted the large lid on the box.  Inside was exactly what he had asked for; a series of M-8 Avenger Assault Rifles and M-3 Predator Pistols.  His past experience as a Shadow Broker agent had given Morgan the tools he needed to find black market arms dealers wherever he went with relative ease if it was a highly populated civilian center.  Calleston had even been easier than most, given the military presence.  Sure, he probably could have ordered them through Naleena, but why spend credits when a deal for something else could be reached?  Morgan would have to remember to take care of it later.  The good news is the list of favors he owed was relatively short these days.

Of course, the crew would need to be trained, given the minimal experience they seemed to have.  It wasn't about having a hardened group of ex-marines on board.  It was that everybody needed to be able to defend themselves and wherever they were going, nobody on a pirate vessel had the luxury of being unarmed.  That was a job Morgan was good at, and it would be a great way to get to know the crew.

On the left side of the container, packed with particular care, was a special package Morgan had anticipated the most.  He pulled out the white plastic box and opened it to examine it contents.  They gleamed as they caught the light.

"Perfect," Morgan admired.

[Cknarf]

"Don't you worry about it, old man." Frank brought up his omni-tool, and headed over to Deng. "We're more than good for it." He said, opening his bank account. "Check that sh*t out."

 

Step off, fool. I'm straight ballin'.