NationStates Jolt Archive

[ooc knolage, this is being carried out in very secreat :P]

after the hugely sucessful Chimera project, in which Cairn Tarra played an important part, the nations of Cairn Tarra and The Vortex Corporation have decided to expand on some of the ideas put forward but rejected during the brainstorming session at the Corporation's Shipyards.
Tarran Chief Astrophysist, Isthus Treeson, several of Cairn Tarras best Bio-Structural engineers and designers will be joining the Corporation's best avalible partical physisists. The project will take place on The Stratos Shipyard, the now legindarry Teo Holtzman-Wisewood will also be supporting the project remotley form the Tarran capitol of Yagdrassil,

*A hyperspace window opens in open space near Kharak. Three ships emerge, there sleek biological design and huge sail arrays to there aft tell of there Tarran design:-
The Voidstalker, a 300 meter long ship, its vast sails, nearly 200m hang up and down off its aft quarter,
The Shadowseaker, its sister ship, identical in appearence
The Stormcaller, even at its small size the 500 meter ship seems much more impressive, it is sleaker, and more menaceing then the other two ships, its sails extend left and right from the hull as well as reaching up and away from the ship.
Seven smaller ships, up to 50 meters and of similar design circle the trio,
***
The collective fleet moove inside the Stratos Shipyard, a huge bay dore sliding shut behind them*

After the doors closed, the CairnTarra ships landed in the main hangar. Normally, a battlecruiser or at least a destroyer would be under construction here, along with groups of smaller vessels. Now, it was deserted. While the seven smaller vessels were redirected to touch down in frigate docks, the larger ships landed in the primary hangar.

"This is Stratos Central Command to CairnTarra flotilla. On behalf of the Corporation, we welcome you to the Shipyards of Kharak II. You are free to leave your vessels, and hoverdynes are standing by to unload your equipment.

Please have your research teams meet our personnel and scientists in Conference Room Z43. The guards outside your vessels will take you there. Please excuse us for not receiving you personally upon leaving your vessel, but we are very pre-occupied with last minute changes to the setup of this research."

And indeed, soon after groups of hoverdynes and CairnTarra crews started unloading luggage and equipment, which would be taken to the appropriate spaces. The heads of the scientists from CT were received by a Captain of the guard, who started leading them to the appropriate conference room, after informing them of the fact they could shower and refresh after the briefings.

Once the effects of the crew have been offloaded and the usual plesenteries have been exchanged, the crew go to there quarters, there homes for the next while, the main science teem of some 7 Tarran individuals make there way to the confrence room to have the first of meny meetings
when they arrive they find the Corporation's science teem already seated, one stands.

"welcome to the Stratos Shipyard gentelman, we are looking forward to hearing what you have been working on.... please"

he gestures to the empty chairs, the Tarran team take there seets, Isthus Treeson stands and makes his initial adress, reeding from a sheet

"Hello again, it has been meny years since i stood here with you, discussing the Chimera Project. Some of the faces have changed, and we have a new brief"

he removes a small crystal from his pocket and sets it on the table, he sets a smal lazer pen beside it and swiches it on, the light refracts in the crystal and creates a large projection on the roof

"As the figures show, We have a substantial power surplus from the solar sails in the three capitol ships of our fleet, the purpose of this project is to use this power, to turn theese three ships into powerful tools for Cairn Tarra, the Corporation, and Sisguardia's Piecekeeping efforts, partley through the use of your own powerfull beam projecters, but also..."

he swaps the crystal, the roof is filled with the symbollic writings of high physics, it takes a short while for the rest of the groupe to make much sence of the numbers

"to develop a new tool, a scalpel, and a hammer. a Gravimetric Effector of immence force and power.
as i discovered after my time studing the hyperspace drives and information you so kindley provided, if we take a core of antimatter, preferrably dark-antimatter, and into it, project a streem of basic protons, the resulting reaction regulated correctally should create a cascade of gravatons. it is our mission to build the technology, about thees equations, that will allow us to project points of positive and negitive gravity anywhere within the vacinity of the three Capitol ships"

OOC: From the name "Effector", I deduce that someone has been reading Ian Banks. Well done - it's time we hade some Culture-style tech on NS. In fact, we could probably do with a Culture-style nation... would be a laugh...

As Isthus Treeson lectured his audience, the Corporate employees in the room were quick to take their notes. In addition to the seven scientists from CairnTarra, the Corporation had supplied six of it's top scientists in gravimetrics, physics, astrophysica et cetera. The seventh member of the team was Koran Manaan, normally head engineer of entire shipyards.

However, back in the days he had been an exchange student in CairnTarra, and he and Isthus knew each other quite well. When Koran had learned his old friend would be leading the science mission, he had given command to his...well...second in command and volunteered to fill the role of engineer for the project.

In addition to Koran and the six scientists, a small number of students was added to the project. Each student was one of the best in his or her area of activity, and all of them had a thing for new, breakthrough technology.

As Koran listened to Isthus, he simultaneously ran a mental check on the preparations for the research. They had prepared four large science lab for this project. A portion of the central computers' calculating capacity had been reserved exclusively for this project. Several old ships that had survived the Chimera decommisioning had been towed to the Shipyards to run tests with any new weapons that would result from the research.

Yes, everything was in place. All he had to do now was actually completing the research. The division of tasks would be clear on this project. Isthus would be head of the scientists, including the Corporate ones. Koran would lead the engineering part of the process, meaning that he would build, install and test everything the scientists came up with.

Returning his attention to Isthus' speech, he reminded himself to reserve a sector in the system for testing runs. After the speech was finished, he would immediately make sure that happened.

ooc:
"From the name "Effector", I deduce that someone has been reading Ian Banks."
..
..
Damn... Rumbled :P

ic:

Isthus continues..

"A final point, one of logistics. Everything that can be put together here will be, however. we understand that some of the Tarran bio polimers may be a bit byond even the Corperations grand knolages, the smaller ships we brought will serve as a ferry between here and Sisguardia, we can use the makers on Yagdrassil to fabricate anything else we need, assuming we have the reasources.
My associate Teo Holtzman-Wisewood will be in charge of things at that end, he will also be helping us put together some new polimers using a technique he is working on,
of cource the entire resource spectrum of tarra will be at our disposal if required, the high council has given us a very high priority.

he lovers his voice and smiles slightly
which is somewhat unusual concidering im running the tarren side of the project...

Anyway, shall we start with a tour of the ships,
*he glances at Koranand smiles*
though some of you know the layout better them some of us. Then some light lunch has been set out for the team in the Stormcaller, then im sure we should take a look at the Corperations labs,

...

the insides of the three ships is like nothing the Corperations teem had seen beafore, the corradors were black, lit only as they walked through them with a green yello light which seemed to eminate from the walls themselves.
They went to the engin room first. the hyperdrive unit was the only clearley recognisible thing in the room, its collections of mettal boxes and consoules sat unconfortabilly with the somwhat grotesque tarran interface units the only other things in the room were the two tarren drive systems, masses of crystal, glowing with an etherial blue light and opaque polimers discuising the delicate parts of the drives,

they mooved on to the gun deck, this was a huge empty space populated with one or two small needle point EMP projecters, the majority of the work would end up here it seemed,

finally, the bridge, two members of crew sat at a tabel and played cards. oblivious to the visiting dignatories, there purpose was to keep asn eye on things, should somthing go a mis. the bridge itself was like a cathedral, small desks of controalls scattered round the fklore in a symetrical pattern.
the roof was a blaze with colour and light, reedouts and scamatics, statistics and pictures from every system on the ship,
in the center of the room, a raised plynth with a chair, surrounded with flat panels made from the same material as the roof, evidentally the caprains chair, it had the apperiance of a stone circle.

As the tour through the Tarra ships went on, Koran walked up to Isthus.

"Isthus, everything is ready to begin the project. I must say I am very confident that we will succeed, though it might take the engineers a while to familiarize themselves with your technology. I've also arranged for squadrons of Pulsar Gunships to continuously guard your vessels when they transfer resources to this facility. I thought it would be better if we sent some firepower along to ensure their safety.

And...ehm...oh yes! That reminds me. The calculations and formulas that you have used in your presentation are being uploaded into the computers right now. They can do most of the mathemetic work for us, so that our teams can focus on design, transformation and construction. We have quite the powerful computers here, thanks to DLM technologies. But tell me, with which part of the process would you like to start?"

Damn... Rumbled :P
ooc: Who said it was a bad thing?

"i should like to keep a close eye on the regulation of the antimatter-proton streem, we should set about designing mechanical level fail safe devices if the graviton streem starts to look a bit unstable, an uncontroalled reaction could well suck half the galixy into a black hole, thats a job for the engineers, and the computers...

we need to think about delivery of the gravaton fields... ive been thinking on this, there are two ways to go about it:
we can launch the antimatter from the ship, and fire the proton beems and whatever other things we will need to project to get it to work, this way, if somthing goes wrong, we have a while to get away, however it wonmt be nearly as accurate or versitile as the second option...
if we can find a way to minipulate the gravatons once generated fire them into fields and arms it will be much more controled and graceful, we will have to find a way to 'moove' gravatons though... which could be challengeing,"

While he looks at the magnificent ceiling of the room, Koran thinks a moment. In his extensive memory, he browses the various projects that he has been involved with. Then, he remembers the Hoverdyne designing projects, where he was involved as a junior assistant.

"We do have a technology that contains small matter and particles in forcefields. On our artillery hoverdynes, we use so-called BPLL-12 "Defiance" Ejectors. They are used to lob unstable, overpacked proton particle clusters in high ballistic arcs towards the target. These protons are contained in Schröedinger repulsor fields to hold them together for a limited amount of time. We might be able to adapt this technology to our needs, though it takes a lot of power to create Schröedinger fields. "

Isthus smiles

"perfect! we have a lot of power on the ships, i think we could use the concepts of the Shcrodinger field to design somthing which has an effect on gravitons,
we could use it to project the gravitons, assuming we can reverse engineer it so that it uses less power, and can be effective over a larger area and for a longer time, cource all we need it to hold are gravitions, i think this is one for a few initial experiments, when we get a graviton generator online, a very small generator...
can you have a few of theese 'Defiance' vachaels stripped of the field generator and the generators brought here, also the copies of the reaserch you used when you put them together should make this a lot quicker."

"I'll arrange for it immediately"

Excusing himself, Koran wanders off a little and starts giving instructions through his earpiece.

Isthus activates a desplay beside him, his finger run quickley over the touch sensitive screen, the roof clears of all its previous data, a representation of the Stormcaller appears, it zooms into the aft quarter hundreds of smaller readouts appear by the sails saying 'Idal', or 'Non-Transient',
Isthus mooves round the small screen and types in more information

the small readouts clear, and redraw,:


History: Previous Transience and Power Draw:
Spiniker Not Deployed
ForSails Not Deployed
Aft Upper Dorsal:
27 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 54000Mw
33 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 66000Mw
33 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 66000Mw
33 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 66000Mw
-------Upper Aft Dorsal Power Output : 318000Mw
Aft Lower Dorsal :
27 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 54000Mw
33 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 66000Mw
33 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 66000Mw
33 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 66000Mw
-------Lower Aft Dorsal Power Output : 318000Mw
Radial (port and stbd):
27 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 54000Mw
-------Radial Power Output : 54000Mw
Planar (port and stbd)
27 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 54000Mw
33 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 66000Mw
33 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 66000Mw
33 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 66000Mw
--^port v--stbd
27 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 54000Mw
33 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 66000Mw
33 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 66000Mw
33 units 2000Mw/unit[continuous] : TP : 66000Mw
-------Planar Power Output : 636000Mw

Avalible Absolute Power at 70% Transience = 1326000Mw (continuous)
avrage power draw : 6000 Mw
Power Draw by HSWG(Hyper Space Window Generator) : 100,000 Short Term

Isthus waves for Koran's Attention and pointes up at the screen, he mouths the words.. is that enough power?

Koran, still giving orders over the radio, looks notices Isthus is pointing at a screen. He walks over and as he looks at the digits there, his eyes widen. Giving Isthus a thumbs up, he nods.

"David, never mind about those additional power generators. The Tarra vessels have more than enough excess power of their own"

"you see, its all in the phase, what we have out there are pritty much solar pannals, its because there surface molecules are phased to interrupt photon phase, it creates a king of photonic resonance.... and gives us about 1000% more power then a streight thermal inducer sail"

Isthus closes down the screen

"id very much like to see this Lab of yours beafore we get round to sitting down for tea.
i hope they havent alocated the shoebox we were sitting in last time"
*he smiles*

Koran laughs: "Of course not! Our scientific facilities are much more impressive than that, I assure you. Please, let me show you."

He starts heading towards the ship exit, and Isthus follows him. Chatting about the good old days, they reach one of the main elevators within a few minutes. As they get in, Koran types a command into a control panel, ordering the system to take them to the appropriate deck.

Half a minute later, the elevator doors open. As Isthus and Koran step out, they find themselves in possibly the largest space in the shipyards, save for the main dock. Here, almost an entire deck has been converted to a scientific facility. Everywhere they look, equipment has been set up, scattered across the hall. It varies from simple boxes of nuts and bolts to a complete hyperspace testing engine.

Between the various areas, large computer terminals are located, where men and women are doing their daily duties. As he looks up, Isthus notices even more science departments floating in the air, kept in balance by the same Zephrim drives that hoverdynes use.

Koran explains to him that this system allows them to work project-based. With every new research project, the seven hovering platforms are aligned in the most optimal position to enforce the more fixed parts of the science facility. This adds a huge amount of flexibility to any research activity, and would probably come in handy.

At the end of the hall, a medium sized construction facility is located, where designs can be converted to actual, tangible testing models in oder to run tests and make diagnoses.

Koran invites Isthus to take a look around the huge hall, which is basicly a combination of a laboratory, intelligence mainframe, construction bay and research department.

Isthus's eyes light up, and there is an expression of child like glee on his face, he nearly dances over to the nearist pieces of equipment querying there computers to find there function

"this is Fantastic! i have never seen this much... Stuff!"

the next hour or so is spent in the labs, Isthus and his coligues begin the process of familiarising themselves with the equipment avalible. soon however Isthus is notified that dinner has been provided on the Stormcaller,
the deligation moove to the lounge in the front of the ship
it is lit in yellows and greens sughgestive of a summers evening in a forrest, the tabel is layed out with meny different plates, the traditional Tarran delicasies are there along with the chef's best guess at some of the Corperations food types,
the tarran deligation are famished after the day of activity and begin immidatilly to eat

several months have passed since the first steps were outlined to the assembled comitty of scientists on the station, several months have been spent stairing at computer screens and blackbords with numbers staring back, physical progress is slow, but Oh what they have learned, the server alocation for the project now stands at 7 terrabytes of raw analytical data,

The faces have changed, the some of the tarrans have become homesick and left, other fresh-faced bright and fast minds have joined the project. Isthus Treeson has lingered, as head of the project, and head of the Tarran school of physics it is his duty and will to see the project through to absolute compleetion, some of those from the Vortex Cooperation have been reaissigned by will, or agenst it, there numbers have remained the same, Koran again has lingered. partly out of involvement with the project, partly because he is worried about the gradually deterrorating state of his Tarran friend and counterpart
it would be a shame to loose Ithus, his unaugmented mind could usually keep pase with that of the biomechanical powerhouse that Koran posessed.

The science has mooved on, one entire deck on each of the three ships has been compleetly removed to accomodate the prototype Effectors, and more space has been cleared to refit the gun decks with best Cooperation beam weponery Tarra can afford (and in some cases byond that). The Effector principle itself, though untested, is in the final stages of theoritical rambeling.

".... and so, the gravaton pulse passes along the spacial corridore created by the Koran-Shrodinger field projected from the ship, remember beacuse of the nature of the field, the gravatons wont effect real space until they immerge from the tube. *he pauses for breth....* ..... ....."we are currentally looking at using Fienmann Topagraphy Theory to make holes in the Koran-Shrodinger field and disperse the gravatons more equidistantly, creating a 'field' of garvity, whos intensity is governed by the phase of the gravitions... in theory anyway"

there is a beeping noise from his pocket, he removes a small device and studies it, then sighs deeply

"any non scientific crew who arrived with the Oberun and the Zenith are to report to the Rohan and the Isin respectivaly, you have been temporarilly reaisigned... Phoenix crew. prepaire the ship *he speeks the last part in a tone of great disbelieve*.... make ready for..... battle. All the rest of you asre dismissed, get to work, there is a great deal still to do beafore we can prototype theese moddels"

the class empties. but Isthus stands still at the front of the room, his eyes stairing into space.

Koran walked back into the room, having forgotten his notes. There, he saw Isthus standing, with a very worried and depressed look on his already tired face.

"Isthus, what is going on?"

he stands still for a moment

i have no idea, but im sure it is not ment for me to know, this much i gather

Transport ships Rohan and Isin have been called back, along with the Phoenix, the Phoenix crew were told to make ready for battle
he bows his head slightly
i cant think of Yagdrassil in flames, it makes me..... sick. To see whats left of our race slaughtered in restanceless carnage. Worse, to be the last Tarran,
but there was no encoading on the transmission, the coades wernt given. I just alwaise worry about the knife edge of Tarra's existance, what are we now, 100, mabey 200 million. we were once 4 times that.

he gets a glass of water

ooc: wait, your nation got destroyed?

ooc: Cairn Tarra is still alive and well.... Isthus is rembering the time when the origional Tarra was destroyed, and going on about how terrible it would be if it were to happen again

"Prepare for battle? Who are you going to engage? Or are you being attacked?"

"i just dont know, this is all the information i got"

he passes the communicator to Koran

<Treeson: Dispatch 2 empty transport ships and the phoenix to return immediatally brief the phoenix crew to prepaire for battle, do not hesitate
Te'ar Eannais, by will of the council>

"That's certainly not a lot of information. Do you want me to order my intelligence division to find out more?"

Isthus smiles weekly

"thats a kind offer, but honistly i wouldent waste reasources on it, im sure it will either all come to nothing, or ill be informed when i have a need to know.. Te'ar Eannais has got a bit carried away with this secrecy in the military, ill ask Teo to have a word with her when im sending my report, even if it dose escilate, the majority of the fleets of tarra rest here,
*lowers voice* in verious states of compleetion

im sure if somthing bad happenes we will be the first to know.. who would attack Tarra anyway, we are passive, religiously so.

anyway, i did some maths last night, well geomatery really, we can get total coverage with 7 dispersal nodes on the prow and one faceing aft, mabey 2 aft on the stormcaller, seing as we have the extra power output there.
What news on the beam cannons. you said youd have a run down on what our feeble budget can streach to, and what we can squeese past your markiting department with some stelth accountency

*he laughs*

ooc: im drawing up pics of the ships now, as a guide, This (http://www.coreline.net/edina/4.jpg) is what the Phoenix looks like... im also doin the GDP for Tarra, it wont be much :S

"Ah yes, the beam weaponry", Koran replied. "We've run some tests, and we think we can place the same ion weapons that we use on your vessels. Also, several of our older weapon models might be suited. Especially the huge amount of power from your solar sails will make them function just fine. Let me show you, so you may see what we have in stock for you."

Koran activates a projector, and after he gives several quick command, a group of displays appears:

http://homeworld.sierra.com/images/hw/guide/research-ioncannon.jpgIon Cannons:
High-powered beam weapons are a tactician's dream and an engineer's nightmare. The size-to-power ratios were completely unworkable until the development of the "Zahakur" chassis provided the room to employ a truly deadly directed beam of charged ions. The Cannon draws power directly from the Capital Ship's main drive not only to supply the superheated hydrogen ions but also to charge the tens of meters of super-conducting magnetic coil that focus and accelerate the beam.

http://homeworld.sierra.com/images/hw/guide/research-gmissile.jpgGuided Missiles:
Missile technology has been available since the dawning days of space exploration but has always been irrelevant for weapons systems because of the slow speed of any kind of non-fusion engine and the lack of a warhead that could effectively harm an armored starship. The Plasma Bomb solved the latter problem but it wasn't until the development of the Super Capital Ships, that a platform existed to house and power missiles that were large enough to carry the reaction mass needed to pursue a combat vessel. Using a variant of the stored plasma warhead, the Guided Missile actually draws superheated plasma into its internal magnetic containment field. When the missile is launched, this field is then shaped and vented to simulate a traditional chemical-rocket exhaust in order to give the missile high speed and maneuverability necessary to engage a fusion-powered vessel.

http://homeworld.sierra.com/images/hw/guide/research-heavyguns.jpgHeavy Guns:
The final advancement in ships' powerplants opened the door for truly massive-bore mass drivers and the turrets needed to support them. Mounted only on the largest of vessels, these turrets pack enough power to cripple or destroy a smaller vessel in a single hit. These heavy gun systems are so massive that the magnetic couplings have to draw power directly from the main drive in order to rotate the weapon mount inside the turret housing.

Isthus looks at the screens, he seems to have a little dificulty comprehending the nature of the devices, but finally speeks up

the Ion cannons are doable, they will pass streight through any kind of effectorial field,
if we have a fixed position heavy gun, mounted along the center axces of the ship, i think the shier velocity of the slug wouldent have too much trouble with effectorial fields, unless they were antiphase...
i think we will skip on the missiles. theres nowere to mount them really, and by the tiume they thred there way through the efector fields they will have spent half there fuel load.

"Good choice. Generally, kinetic weapons combined with energy based weaponry can take on most enemies. Now, assuming that the average capital ship will be about 300 meters long, let me see..."

Koran made a few quick calculations on a nearby control panel, and then turned to face Isthus again.

"On a 300 meters long ship, we can mount two ion cannons, plus two heavy mass drivers. That's a lot of firepower, but it will only be suited to take down stationary objects or large ships. Strike craft will have to be caught in the effector field first before the tracking systems can target them.

Can you agree with that? Oh, and by the way, will you have your ships built at our shipyards, or will you keep building them yourself?"

Isthus manages a slight smile

the ships dont need built, so much as refitted, we have already cleared out 3 deacks for the effectors and other wepons, we just need to put them in and refil the hole,

i think we only need one heavy mass driver per ship, the ion cannons will be easier to install, and power, and they are less effected by the effector fields...

i think...
fixed mass driver and one mounted Ion cannon towards the front of the ship, and two mounted ion cannons, one on the left side, one on the right.

and the main purpose of the effector fields will be as a defencive and preventitive measure, i dont think we will be using them offensivily....

Isthus activates a tabeltop desplay of the top down plann of the two 300 meter ships, and programms some changes, the desplay shows the position of the new hardware on the ship

if we can get theese installed, we will built the effector rig in the space leeft over, and i think we can set about putting the prototype together,

another display shows a much smaller tarran transport ship with some makeshift alterations, disproportionatilly large sails and an ugly cannon likeappendage adorn the ships previously unspoilt shape,

i think we can have the prototype working in a few months..

"Excellent! We'll start construction on two Ion Cannons and a Heavy Mass Driver immediately, and as soon as the ship is ready, we'll install them. Of course, it'll take some design alterations, since your ships have differing lay-outs from ours, but I see no real problems there."

dont forget there are 2 shis in that size braket, Shadoseeker and Voidstalker, need those ulterations....

Stormcaller is 500m long, i think if we equip it with 5 ion cannons and 1 mass driver, 2 ion cannons each side and 1 infornt,
the mass driver infront as well

in total...
3+3+5... 11 ion cannons
and 3 mass drivers...

"Ah yes, of course. Forgive me, my mind is still fuzzy and I was all out of coffee this morning. Eleven Ion Cannons and three Mass Drivers it is. By the way, I suggest we give some of your naval crews training with our war simulations, so that they can learn how to handle those weapons."

of cource. we will send a few systems anaylists along as well, the wepons interface system will have to be connected to the Tarran NIN onbord and fed to the bridge

(occ: Nural Interaction Network..... but also Nine Inch Nales.... LOL thats good)

the days pass, the assembly bay becomes a hive of activity as the great Tarran ships have 3 entire decks pulled out of there structure to make room for the new arsenal, there is a strange merging of the two distinct technologies, the Tarran work crews grow and prune the ships hull, while the Corperations's engineers assemble and lift the huge wepons into place,

in the labs the computers are running 24/7 on the highley complex physics that Isthus, Koran and there team of bright and young mindes from boath nations have created, the labs particle acceleratior, and atimatter generator have nearly been burnt out from over use, every day a new refinement is made, a new theory hatched and another Gigabyte of information is passed to the computers for testing and anaylisis

infront of the three ships a smaller ship nears the compleation of its alterations, abnoramally large sails are fitted and finally a strange bulbous appendige is hung from the bottom of the ship, this is the prototype, the first, The Vortex-Piecebringer it is called, and it is nearly ready, infront of it Isthus stands in the middle of a circle of scientests and engineers, looking at a display linked to the central computer

"WHAT DO YOU MEEN THATS AS SMALL AS IT GETS, We couldent fit 2 of those in the Stormcaller, let alone elevin! why is the prototype so big"

"its the controal cercitery Isthus, it has to be that big, the ammount of processing it has to do, that thing is half a LAMMAS worth of processing power"

Isthus sighs, and looks downcast

"You all have a job to do then, make it more efficant, it shouldent take up soo much BLODDY SPACE!.... Get mooving... id like to see theese ships working beafore i die you know..
please tell me were still on shedule for the test... please.. let one thing go right this month."

he sends a message to Koran,

***
Have you finished the calabration of the effector prototype, i would very much like to get some tea and sort out the testing proceadure beafore i finally get some sleep
***

********
It was completed half an hour ago. It's all standing by and you can come take a look if you want.
***

[i]Isthus Makes his way into the ship and dose a quick inspection, the brodge is a mess of pannels and computers form boath cultures, mechanical, electronic and biological all functioning in a strange disinont harmony of data, there are a few tecnisions huddeled round some screens making some final ajustments... happy with what he has seen Isthus makes his way to a small dining room where tea has been layed out for the crew, Isthus and Koran,
Over tea they formulate the mission plan for the first test of the system, it is to take place in a remote and deserted void of space, it is to envolve the tarran prototype vessal now called the Vortex-piecebringer and a Vortex science ship, the crews will be as minimal as possible to avoid any fatilites if somthing dose go horribally wrong,
after tea, everyone settils in to try and sleep.. to call tomorrow a big day is to make a gruesom understatement

The next day

Black space. Bright stars, far away, but nothing but the cold void in the immediate environment. Then, two hyperspace gates open, and out of each comes a vessel.

"Peacebringer, this is the Caal Shto. Please proceed to target area. We'll stay in position and take measurements during your trials."

"Peacebringer to Caal Shto, understood. Proceeding to target coördinates."

Minutes later, the Peacebringer was in position. When they reported that, the Caal Shto opened a small set of cargo doors, and groups of targeting drones exited the vessel. Taking positions around the peacebringer, they would be the materials on which the testing of the Effector and the weapons systems would take place.

The probes were constructed of different materials. Also, while some remained stationary, others upheld predesignated speeds and trajectories around the Peacebringer.

"Peacebringer, this is Caal Shto...our readings show a full power supply and all systems seem to be online and in the green. Please commence the procedures as soon as you are ready."

"rodger that, commencing primary test"

the captin, a young tarran scientest of some 20 years by the name of Annin Cairndrasil, he wiped the sweat off his forhead with a piece of cloth as he closed the voice link, he clutched a small piece of rock in his hand and seamed to regain some of his focus, presenting a stern face he issued the command

"Bring the secondarry collecter array online, calabrate the effectoral computer....."
"ok, online, recieving telemetry"
"wait until we get to 90% power transience then engage the sequence"
"...70...80....90%.... Sequence start"

the lights in the bridge dimm and flicker slightly, there is a sound reminicant of everyone taking a sharp intake of breth at once.
outside the ship nothing much appears to change

"well?"
"+18G sir"
"show me, send a probe"

one of the vortex drones makes a pass accross the front of the ship at full thrust, as it crosses the axes of the ship it wobbles slightly and seems to slow down

"YES! congradulations, first test sucessful, we have a projected gravity field, the Effector works!.... bring us to 1kG, use the verrible system dynamic, lets stop it dead thistime!"

the drone makes another pass, again as it reaches the axcess of the ship it slows, this time, it stops pinned in place by 1,000, times the force of earth gravity.

"drop the field, we dont want to brake the drone"

the captin smiles as the drone flys back to the Caal Shto,

"this is Vortex-Piecebringer to Caal Shto phase one sucessful"
"we saw it. piecebringer, congradulations!"
"we would like to start the combat defence phase"
"ok, initiating"

Annin closes the link again

"Tie in the FTRG and the Tac-com"
"updating NIN... done... its online"

Another combat drone lines up a few thousand meters from the piecebringer and launches a slug of metal at 10m/s... the slug stays on cource until it gets within 500 meters of the ship, then it seems to be scooped out of the way by an unseen force, it flys to infinity.

"fantastic!... launch two at once bring multytasking online"

the drone launches two slugs in quick sucession, again they fly towards the ship, the effector field begins to divert there cources away from the ship

"power loss"
"WHAT!"
"i dont know, failsafes have locked in"
"shit! BRACE FOR IMPACT"

the first slug misses by a margin, the second one however slams into the solar array tareing right through the delicate photo decay material, its resonance destabelised the rest of the sail panel seems to burn away into nothing

"Were hit! Lower Dorsal quad 3 is out, power down 8%"
"report on the effector!"
"the matter chamer is inert, the failsafes have powered everything down"
"where did that power loss come from"
"im diagnoising that now....... it seems a failsafe on the Koran-Shrodinger generator field triped, we will need to look at the system in more deatail uning the Corperation's computers, when we get back."

the comm blurs into life a tentitive and nervous voice..

"this Caal Shto.. Piecebringer, advise on current status"

Annin replies, sounding just as shaken

"were ok, just a scratch, one of the fail safes cut in,"
"what went wrong"
"i dont know. The data recorders will have picked it up, lets go home,"

the drones fly back into the hull of the Caal Shto, and the Vortex-Piecebringer pulles along side it, a gate is opened and the two ships return to the yard


ooc: Fynmann Topilogical Rift Generator

Koran and Isthus sat in a corner of the scientific facility of the shipyards. They had been analyzing the flaw in the system for the past few hours, and they had identified what had went wrong. Eventually, it turned out to be a small series of tiny, incremental mistakes, but together they had cuased the malfunction during the exercises.

Now, these mistakes were being corrected by the construction crews, as Koran and Isthus debated the potential tactical uses for Effector weapons. Soon, they would try a second time, and hpefully the whole project could be called a succes afterwards.

for 3 months the three ships sat in the dock, all had been fitted with there convensional weponry but still they lacked effector systems,
for 3 months Isthus had survived on 3 hours sleep a night,
for 3 months he had spent every waking moment with one purpose.. one question in his mind,
"How do i make them smaller"
for 3 months the problem had remained, though they performed excellently and to the criteria required of them, the Effectoral drivers were just too complocated for the computers on bord the Tarran ships to use in harmony. test results had showen that if any of the ships were required to use more then 3 of the effectors at once the resulting gravametric chaos could tare the ship apart.
The Corperation couldent help either, the NIN system was just too alien for any kind of intogration with one of there more powerful computer systems, and to strip out the NIN and replace it with somthing a bit less archaic ment having to intograte the tarran engins with the Cooperations's computers, a prospect no one wanted to embrace.

eventually Isthus cracked, he sent a message home, and took a few days off to wait for the responce

((ooc: gona get DLM involved! watch this space!))

-edited out due to total dumbness-

ooc: ed: blame my spelling.... everyone else dose.. ill update this post in the morning with some real plott as opposed to tired chris rambeling... night all.. ok plott:

its been several days since Isthus had sent word to the council, the only responce he had got was 'please stand by'. he had kept himself buissey by working on the interface units, the NIN's and testing more and more anial refinments of the system, they had made remarkible progress.. the effectors could now performe manipulations in gravametric flux down to a metre or so... Isthus hoped they would one day be abel to use the effector to open hatches, and performe needle accurate manipulations... But still the processing overhead was just too much for any of the three great ships to overcome.
one day Isthus say somthing on the SNN that grabbed his attention, he tracked down Koran immideatilly

"koran, have you seen what they did to the council members?? they piped there conshious into onbe vessil...!!.... do you think you could get some copies of there reaserch, a system like the would Revolutionise Tactical wepon controal"

"Of course. But the information is too sensitive to broadcast. I'll send a message right now, and a ship carrying the appropriate documents will probably arrive within a few days."

"YAY!!!!!!! :D"

Isthus nearly skips out of the room in joy, a few days later, the bridges of the three ships are undergoing a stripdown, Isthus is more or less wired to his computer knee deap in maths and programming code trying to see if direct connection would be enough to run the system efficantly, he counts the days til the reaserch arrives

Isthus stands on the bridge of the Vortex-Piecebringer managing the tests of the latest effectorial upgrade,

"ok, bring us to... 10279kG"
"powering the fields, emmiting.... its up and stable"
"ok, send the signal"

outside in the cold blackness of space a Cooperation combat drone lines iutself up with the ship and fires an ion cannon.. The beem of white light could obliterate the ship, but in proximity it turns red, and loops out of the path of the Piecebringer. Isthus smiles, he speeks quietly

"the gravitational force of a sun, we can ulter the cource of the entire spectrum of dangerous particles and waves now...
gravity kicks ass...
Teo would be prowd... oh! that reminds me,"

Isthus takes out a small communicator and types a quick message,

"ok everyone, best speed to the canteen"

the little ship swallows the combat drone and dissappears into a hyperspace gatew bound fot the shipyards... another small achievement, but still one hurdel remained

Whilst the Tarran ships were docking after the field tests of this morning, Koran was looking at the data and video recordings of the exercise. This incremental improvement of the Effector technology came at a very welcome time. The crews started to get tired, working for so long on a single project. Of course, they all got plenty of entertainment and time off, but this project required high amounts of concentration and information capacity. This new achievement would return optimism to the scientists and engineers working on the project.

Smiling, Koran sent a message to Isthus.

Congratulations! Perhaps now, we can truly say that this project can almost be called a succes.!

Isthus checks the message, glances up, hoping to get a glance of Koran, but seeing nothing he types a reply

"The individual Effectors are ready, its getting them to work together thats the problem....
Though if we have achieved this much, the rest can be done at yagdrassil, perhaps we should take everyone home"

he checks his other messages, nothing from teo, he looks dissapointed and continues toward the canteene

# Return message #

It is your project and your choice. If you think it could be done better back home in Sisgardia, then that is probably the best option.

Isthus thinks over the problem at dinner then sends his responce

"i must bow to the council in this matter.. ill prepair a message for them, then we will see"

A few days later Isthus catches up with Koran in one of the labs,

"Just the man!... i was in contact with Teo... is there ANY way we could get the council project reserch data to him?he is adapting LAMMAS to be controled by... 'interfaced' people... clever... i wish i had thought of that"

"Isthus, good to see you again! We don't get to meet up a lot these last few days, do we? But as for your question, I'm sure something can be arranged, but what exactly are lammas?"

ooc: slaps himself in the head... DOH!... it was bound to happen sooner or later :S... chcek the edit for clarifiaction on lammas :P
ic:
Isthus smiled...
"I Think we may be on the verge of a brekethrough... Teo Holtsmann-Wisewood, and Ja'annis Tolin are in DLM working on updating the LAMMAS system, augemnting it with human nural interface structures to add to the processing efficency..
I think they will be sending blueprints.. or at least outlines through very shortly.. so we can start making the phusical alterations to the ship... then we just have to wait for the hardware to arrive.."

he looks very pleased

"i think we are but a month away from getting theese ships out of here, im sorry the project overrann a bit. Im sure we will be abel to sort out some sort of payment for going over time"

"Well, as long as you allow us to also use this new found technology, no payment is necessary, of course. And as for needed data, I am authorized to transfer any data you need to the appropriate bodies and insitutions. CairnTarra is a regional neighbour and a good ally, and therefore we fully trust you."

isthus smiled

"my dear friend, this project wouldent have started if it haddent have been for the help you and your nation levvied. the Effector technologies are joint property... use them however you wish.. as will we.
as for the fleet, our ships will answer to your command when circumstances demand it, they are honourbound"

he looks out a nearby window overlooking the assembly bay, looking somewhat more somber for a moment

"I will be glad to get home.. Its been marvelous here, but i miss the trees."

"I understand. I also miss the sight of by homeland. But we are almost finished here. And when we're done, I think it has been worth the effort. Thank you for you generous statement and the dedication of your ships to our defence, should that be needed. Please know that similar ties also exist between our fleets and your own homes."

"oh... that remindes me...."

he flips out his communicator and types a small message, and a string of data commands

"ill have all the data on the council project sent on a ship... minimises the chance of it getting stolen, if the ship goes alone there will be less hance of its dection awell...
with your permission of cource?"

"Of course"

ooc: about time we close this rp, wouldn't you say? One last exercise maybe and then it should all be functioning as supposed to.

ooc: in that case well get the ships towed back to tarra and finish them there... about 2 more posts... but yea!

ic:
a transport ship backs out of the yard and makes best speed for the Sol system,

Isthus is wedged under a controal panel in the main bridge of the stormcaller, there have been a few modifications, the bridge is more spartin, the central captins controll platform is still there. but most of the other panels have been removed to make way for a circle of 9 chairs arround the controll plinth, they are surrounded in strange embrios of machenery only just fitted according to designes provided from DLM. The bilogical computer core has not been installed, insteed there are a plethora of jerry rigged controles, wires comming out of the flore, screens bolted on to the back of makeshift desks...
The front of the bridge is desplaying an image of the inside of the hanger, troops of support staff and technisions swarm arround the ships, mooving things.,.. prepairing...
Isthus makes some more adustments and the desk he is working on lights up, power at last.. he wheels out from under it triumphantelly, stands, dusts himself off and hits some keys on the newly rigged panel

"Stormcaller to Triumverate... hello? hello?"

"Shadowseeker acnolages"
"Voidstalker recieveing"

"Thank goodness.... comunications are up, status reports?"

"Shadowseeker is good to go. VTX has lent us a conventional computer to get the hyperspace calculations fed into the engine"
"Voidstalker is still in a mess, the NIN wount surrender power routing controll to the emergency controlls"

isthus smiles, then puts on an offical voice

"Stormcaller is good to go, the NIN gone into manual controll mode... we're more or less green accross the bord, appart from the effectors of cource, ill be pioleting her myself....... We leave in three days!"

"Tuasal!"
"Onariche Tuasal"

"Stormcaller out"

Isthus triumphantelly taps the terminate connection button on the panel and turns to view the bridge,

three days later, the fore of the hanger is deserted, the atmosphere has been pumped to vacuum and gate of the hanger swings ponderously open to allow the entry of three VTX tugs,
they silentaqlly attached there tractors to the three Tarran ships occuping the hold, and pulled them out slowley.
On the outside the three ships looked compleet, inside it was a very different story, on the bridge of the Stormcaller Isthus looks worried

ooc: more to follow.,. im haveing trouble getting the pics for the ship scanned :@

[not-too-sure-wether-i-have-made-an-offline-archive-of-you-yet-and-dont-want-you-deleeted-BUMP]

ooc: is there a way to make backups of theese threds offline so that i can use them as evidence for snackey-tech?