hexarchate_rpg | Move 7 (Chapter 1.7)

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moves: chapter 1

Move 7 (Chapter 1.7)

Time: 361
Place: Station Moongray, at last!

[GM's note: If your characters wanted to make any preparations or do any interactions in between Move 6 and Move 7, that's totally fine--just start a thread here with an appropriate subject header so everyone knows. If it's more in the nature of character RP than plot-related RP, it's also fine to start a separate character RP post.]

The Wasp
The Wasp is securely docked under Kaliyan's guidance in one of Moongray's bays--pretty roomy, but Moongray must be used to receiving shipments of raw materials for any fabrication, plus any specialty equipment they can't make or replace with what they have on-station.

In response to Alaric's last communication with the Wasp [Move 6], it responds with a box containing the Wasp, a bag-of-water human figure, and the Rebellion's logo and a "1." Then it pauses and sends two juxtaposed illustrations, one of a moth inside a box with a specifically Nirai voidmoth logo, and one of three moths outside the box.

The welcome on-station
When anyone who's coming on-station emerges, Andan Bokali and Nirai Pavn lead the way.

The group is greeted by Station Administrator Nirai Paerani Shan--who watches them from behind a translucent partition. Shan is a short, stumpy woman whose every inch of visible skin is covered with tattoos and/or implants. The lenses covering her eyes combined with the colorful, shimmering shawl she's wearing makes her resemble a butterfly. "So what's this I hear about trade goods?" she says through an intercom system that distorts her voice.

A rather harried looking group of security workers appears at another door that is blocked by yet another translucent partition. Interestingly (and this was not mentioned in the briefing materials), their leader appears to be a broad, muscular lieutenant seconded from the Kel--the Nirai uniform looks like it only barely fits him, and the golden Kel ashhawk at his breast gleams in the lights of the docking bay.

"Before we start negotiating," the lieutenant says after an inscrutable look in Shan's direction, as if he's used to her jumping the gun (so to speak), "I will have to ask you all to submit to a security and medical scan, for everyone's safety. It might tickle if you have any implants." He holds up a handheld scanner.

Bokali looks bemused. "I always do love being the guinea pig for any bored diseases, but I don't even feel so much as a sniffle coming on."

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"Training history" was unambiguous, given how little of it he's done on the Wasp. Well. Explains Ankat, earlier, which means Ashari since no one's let their two Kel off their tethers, assume the same with Cousin Imsayed for now, and that Sulen either has the story in full and was testing him or that they (or Virmad) had done a spot of scrying.

He's going to miss this tablet, which had so much more storage (and show episodes) than the one in his pack. But bad idea to leave something contaminated on in the vicinity of his other devices, even if that contamination was a competent enough shooter with heretical targets.

Face perfectly straight, he asks after the creators of the game.

[What I'm getting is that Mikodez should steal an entire room of equiptment for Sasha to get into her OK graces.]

[new icon :D (((A model of stylish rectitude as always)))]

Iawa is still standing by the boxes, so he flips the screen to them. "I'll make one for Iawa too!"
To Sasha again, "Will anyone else need these?" If these are designed to backfire in his hands, the other members of the away team could discover that first.

[I bet they're going to trip into the sanitation ecosystem and be eaten by mobile mold. No promises about not pushing Iawa into the paths of rampaging Nirai, though.]

"Are you dressing Yisran up as anything? Personally I think it's more of an emuherd mix than a foxhound. Last I saw it was in the common room, under the couch."

Edited (maybe space emus are miniature and live in burrows idk) 2017-08-25 05:25 (UTC)

"Yehan and Sasha, I understand you have concerns about the other moth nearby, and their ... perceived claims to your persons. Regardless of the movements of the Butterfly Lens, you may-" *pauses mid sentence* "should never be alone while on station. We should be able to control access to the Wasp ... One second"

He stage whispers into the microphone "Kaliyan, remember, any intruder who gets on board won't just press gang our crew, they'll take ALL of our pickles."

"Anyway, feel free to come back here if you need a little private time," He smiles apologetically to Yehan and Sasha. "If you're ever by yourself or will soon be, send me a memo. Acknowledged?"

"Ashari, sir, with respect, do you have a plan to contact Nirai Remi? If he's not in an external liason role of some description, we shouldn't count on establishing contact him during the course of events."

Sasha's not entirely sure what "signifier" means in this context-- nothing to do with jeng-zai, surely?-- but she understands Fox.

She replies:

thx! bokalis tablet has the spy virus but methinks its nirai make

from administrator??

[Mildly-illicit security consulting firms are not where one learns detailed control over the written high language, but from Sasha this constitutes friendliness, archaic pronouns and all.]

“Make sense for the crew of uncooperative smugglers to stick together on the station. Yehan, Sasha, hopefully no one will try to hassle you with your overprotective captain on your back.”

“If anyone gets too insistent, well, we can always unleash Alaric on them.”

[did we decide to use fake names by the way ?]

[We probably ought to generate fake names so nobody can find our escapades in the history books later. Shall we say Yehan did this during transit? And maybe make a table on the wiki so we can keep track of people?]

[I have not, but I am imagining it. Probably even harder if you substitute "with" for "about".]

"Acknowledged, and appreciated," Yehan responds. She's mildly concerned for her own safety, but more worried about who might already be held inside the workings of the Rosemallow ship. Alternate history Naxorians are as suspicion-worthy, in her opinion, as any other Naxorians--if not more so. But there's a mission at hand, so she steels herself and focuses on it. "By the way, I've compiled a list of names that should be appropriate to our respective cover stories. Sending that through now."

[If you all want to comment with your preferred fake names and cover stories here, then we can do as Zuhrovet suggested and put them on the wiki for clarity? Yehan's cover is Miqol Veraaz, and she's pretending to be one of the moth's crew.]

"If he's working on rifts, I was thinking of talking to him, or having an assistant do so, under the guise of getting feedback on my rift-centric art project. Once things get into full swing, we should be able to contact him one way or another, whether stealthily or with... a little more force."

[OOC: who is Yisran again? I can't for the life of me remember. :') ]

[Very good idea. Ashari's going by Andan Ri, currently, though I can't remember who came up with that one.]

Ashari has been trying to not make it look like they're too closely acquainted to Sulen or anyone else from the ship, at least in front of the station folk. That said, they're not failing miserably, but it's still clear to anyone who cares to look closely that they're slightly more attentive to Sulen for the two to just be acquaintances or fellow travelers.

Normally, Ashari is much better than this, but they did think that Sulen was dead until recently, so they're slipping up more than they normally would.

[Sasha and Alaric left to their own devices are kind of terrifying-- Sasha just built an illicit weapons factory and Alaric is threatening to rework the invariant drive-- so in-character direction is definitely appreciated! Though I cannot promise Sasha will appreciate it.]

[Thanks! Here's a start on the wiki table.]

[Ankat's dog, aka the best character in the game!]

Edited 2017-08-25 23:07 (UTC)

[Ditto, if there is anything productive you would like to me to do - scope out the station, sabotage somehting, technobabble at the Nirai - please feel free to ask and/or order.]

Edited 2017-08-26 01:09 (UTC)

[Sorry, tripping on relative pronouns. Is Mikodez planning to lose the lokwors? His own tablet? Sasha's test scissors?]

"Oh, this game won some indie prize around 410-- I just grabbed something with reasonable inventory code out of the grid. Enjoy!

Make me an air gun if you get a chance? And tell Ashari to check their messages."

[Sasha's former coworkers included quite a few would-be Shuos who couldn't hack the Academy; thus, Sasha's plan for dealing with baby Shuos is smite early and often. If Mikodez avoids getting anyone arrested he'll be ahead on her scorecard.]

[

]

"I'm slowly working my way into the station grid," reports Sasha, "though I haven't tried to access specific message accounts."

[Sasha will take Bayan. I'm sort of tempted by Noémy as a surname, which I guess is a medieval form of Naomi, but I don't see many accents in h*-archate names and perhaps I shouldn't analyze this question too much.

Sasha's still planning to pose as the moth's IT person.]

[Given the VAST number of languages I see as existing in the setting, you're welcome to go with diacriticals--there's a lot of room for people to have names that feel right to them. The high language is the lingua franca and is very, very loosely based on Korean grammatically, although not phonologically, but given that even I'm not fluent in Korean I'm not going to hold anyone to that.]

The expression in the lieutenant's eyes turns just faintly speculative as he returns Virmad's smile--a professional smile, but not without warmth. "Sorry about this," he says, waving the scanner again. "It's protocol, and for your safety just as much as ours. I'm Kel Teo, by the way."

The Station Administrator, for her part, bows more or less correctly in return, which is pretty much all you can expect from the average Nirai.

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Page 3 of 7

Move 7 (Chapter 1.7)

Re: earlier, on the Wasp, with the printers - paging Mikodez

Re: marching orders? - paging Ashari, Sulen, GM

Re: [manipulating Nirai: brainstorming]

Re: Flashback: In-n-Out of Character Plans (Mikodez to Ashari Memo)

Re: Flashback: In-n-Out of Character Plans (PAGING TEAM)

Reply: Sasha to Virmad

Re: Flashback: In-n-Out of Character Plans (PAGING TEAM)

Re: Flashback: In-n-Out of Character Plans (PAGING TEAM)

Re: [the Rosemallow ship and 3D printer]

Naming our cover stories - Paging everybody?

Re: Flashback: In-n-Out of Character Plans (PAGING TEAM)

Re: Flashback: In-n-Out of Character Plans (Mikodez to Ashari Memo)

Re: Flashback: In-n-Out of Character Plans (PAGING TEAM)

Re: marching orders? - paging Ashari, Sulen, GM

Re: Flashback: In-n-Out of Character Plans (PAGING TEAM)

Re: Flashback: In-n-Out of Character Plans (PAGING TEAM)

Re: Flashback: In-n-Out of Character Plans (Mikodez to Ashari Memo)

Re: Flashback: In-n-Out of Character Plans (PAGING TEAM)

Re: [manipulating Nirai: brainstorming]

Re: earlier, on the Wasp, with the printers - paging Mikodez

Re: [seals-also GIP]

Re: Flashback: In-n-Out of Character Plans (PAGING TEAM)

Re: Naming our cover stories - Paging everybody?

[hexarchate names]

Re: hello, scientist