We left Ash with Rennie and the Rambler, while Sami and a few other brave ysoki took us out into the graveyard to find stuff for our ship. We selected the best looking wreck for our purposes, and, leaving Lexx up on the truck, four ysoki, Sresaka, Widget, and I went down into the wreckage. We had just about found something interesting when we noticed that there were some odd sounds coming towards us, and also that none of our new companions were armed. Khefak started popping up everywhere. It turns out that they were attracted to the sounds we were making. And, also, sounds our weapons were making! A quick radio to Lexx and a few of his well-tossed grenades got some of them to leave the ship, and we were able to kill off the rest. Now, we’ll continue our search for good stuff. Quietly.
Rae
Ysoki Mechanic / Xenoarchaeologist
No matter where you go. . . there you are.
This day keeps getting more awesome! I got to buy some new clothes for our trip north, and we went to visit Bodger and Chief to give them the money for parts we’d needed for the Rambler’s upkeep. I think we made some friends there!
Then, we flew over the Aries building. We did not make friends there. In fact, they told us to fly elsewhere.
After that, we finally made it to Khefak Depot. My cousin Rennie was there to help us! He is going to paint our ship completely different– I think he’s going to use lots of color and make it look like a scaled rat. I trust his judgement, though I was kinda sorry to see he no longer has a pink mohawk.
We are parked between a Vesk military vessel and an explorer ship. More potential friends!
We’re going into the starship graveyard with another ysoki named Sami as our guide. We just need to find a smarter computer, a better power supply, and an aft weapon.
Now the damage report machine’s exploded!
We landed at home! Well, Akiton. Which is home! Widget seemed excited. I had two days of patching electrovore-chow so we could safely land, and had time to give Widget a few upgrades. He has a proper body now, but can still extend his arms to grab things.
So, we delivered the lady to her brother. I think there was some espionage going on. They were so happy with us, they gave us 2000 credits! We can use that to make the Rambler even more awesome than it already is. Except, I scared the poor guy we were trying to buy parts from, he made us take what we needed for the ship without paying. I forgot everyone at home gets stuck paying protection money, and he thought Widget was part of organized crime! Maybe Widget shouldn’t have been carrying around the body bag with the dead electrovore in it. We sold that! The electrovore, not the bag. Anyway, I think I need to take some money back to the guys that sold us the parts.
After buying some supplies and eating a lot of weird stuff, we got called by Felicia’s brother for another job. A spying job! We have to visit a place owned by Aries Industries to get some shipping information– sounds very easy! And, we can do it on our way north to Khefak Depot. I’m hoping the starship graveyard will have some parts we can liberate for Rambler. Then, back here to Estuar.
Keep Your Hands Off My Power Supply
Okay, so, Ash thought we should vent the atmosphere from the ship to get the electrovore out where we could attack it! I think maybe Widget would be okay, but I like breathing, and I walk around without boots on a lot, so was not keen on that idea at all. The getting the creature out where we could attack it sounded good. So, we filled a big battery with yummy electricity, then powered down the ship. Putting on environmental suits was also a good idea, even though the ship would be fine for a day without power. After eighteen hours of drifting in the dark, I figured the critter wasn’t too stupid. It waited until we left the room and sucked the battery dry. Hmph.
Well, we decided to shut down the ship again, but without anyone in the room other than Widget, and Widget was doing his best to look like a ceiling fixture. He nearly succeeded catching it, too, diving into a panel to follow it after it appeared, but when he shot it, it apparently released a lot of energy on poor Widget (he is okay– just charred a bit). Sresaka came to the rescue, yanking some wall panels off to find the scene of the crime, and clawed the heck out of the creature. Finally, we just kept an eye out.
While I was fixing some stuff in engineering, it appeared and got me pretty good, but I made sure everyone heard my fairly loud squeak. We were able to attack it as a group, and were successful in driving it off. After a while of seeing no more new damage on the ship, Widget found the creature’s corpse in a power conduit.
So, we’ll be limping to Akiton a bit later than planned, but we won’t be bringing an infestation!
How do we kill it, Ash?
Ash woke up finally, and he took over piloting while I ran to engineering to help Widget. We got away from the interceptor, and plotted our course towards Akiton. Lexx told us we could change the name of the ship, So Ash and I got into the transponders and fixed things. The Astral Queen is now known as “Rambler.” We are gonna need disguises now. Sresaka needs a wig or something– it’s harder to hide a vesk in plain sight.
I got to sleep in engineering!
We were having a grand time being our own crew, until the starboard engine decided to do a whole lot of nothing. We pulled off a few panels and discovered some cables had been cut. With teeth! I was pretty sure I didn’t do that in my sleep, so we looked at a few other systems and saw similar damage. We’re patching as we go, even though Ash doesn’t like it. Finally, I happened to be opening doors in all the cargo bays, and found one already ajar. And, I found an egg– empty. Lexx took one look at that, and considering what is happening on the ship, he says we have an electrovore in the innards. Not good! They eat electricity. One of those “maintenance” guys with guns must have dropped it in here while Ash was napping. I hope there aren’t more surprises waiting for us.