NationStates Jolt Archive

[OOC: Join in with any character you like. This is a freeform RP, so that means anyone. An Emperor on vacation, a bored buisnessman, a galactic traveller, a misdirected mage... anyone.

Information on Khrrck, as always, can be found here (http://www.nationstates.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=127421&highlight=).]

Public News Service, Khrrck

We are proud to announce that we are now opening our gates to tourists and visitors from other nations. Six major airlines now have regular flights to Khrrck City, and several human hotels have already set up shop.

As of this moment, Khrrck City is the only place currently open to tourists. However, we hope to widen the range of locales open to outsiders shortly.

At the moment, the most popular spots to visit in Khrrck City seem to be these three:

The local Mages' Guild branch.
The Central Cavern.
Ss'tek's VR center, which can be found on the west side of the Central Cavern.

We hope you have a good time in Khrrck City.

[OOC: Just fly into the airport, on a airliner or private plane. (Or teleport in, if you're a mage... or fly in on your own wings, if you're a dragon... or land in a spacecraft... whatever.)

If it's a private plane/spacecraft/etc, assume all necessary clearances have been given and just come in for a landing. When you've arrived at the airport, I'll see to guiding you around and describing the airport, etc.]

Temme Air's first 'commercial' (there is no profit in Temme) plane lands. Carlise Jati steps off. She's only 15, and looking for someone to take her seriously. She is excited about politics, even when everyone in her country is apathetic. No one really knows her or cares. She's also hoping to find true love. She checks into a hotel.

Carlise is not known for having the best coordination. She accidentally bumps into Mike.

"I'm sorry. So sorry. I didn't mean to. . ." She's tongue-tied. She's never been articulate when in a one-on-one situation.

Although she's a bit stunned (she's never been hugged before,) she whispers in his ear, "Carlise. Carlise Jati."

A rumbling bass voice resonated across the tarmac. "FREEZE!"

A silvery blur slammed into the ground and blurred impossibly fast across the tarmac towards the errant parachutist.

The blur slammed to a stop and resolved itself into a silver dragon, who could have passed as a Chinese dragon if it weren't for the membranous wings folded against his thirty-foot-long, snake-like body.
"What the hell are you doing? Parachuting onto the tarmac like that? You just barely escaped being shot. You'd better explain yourself, or you're going to find teleported into a swamp before you can say 'What?'."

Carlise was frightened. She looked at him with big, blue eyes. "What are we going to do?" she asked Mike.

bump

Carlise smiled. This Mike guy seemed really nice. She asked him, "So, where are you going?"

[OOC: Sheesh. If you guys keep going on like this, I'm going to consider kicking you from the topic.]

The silver dragon snorted. "That might be true, kid, but I'm kinda dubious. Just a moment. DRACOM!"
A black box, embellished with a silver clock and mounted on the dragon's wide leather collar clicked and spoke.
"Yes?"
"Get me Tk'akr." said the silver dragon, keeping his eyes on the parachutist. "Tell her we've got a fool who parachuted into the airport."
The box clicked again, and spoke in a different voice. "Another parachutist, Romduran? Why don't you just chuck him into the swamps and be done with it?"
Romduran sighed. "Because we're accepting visitors now, and, believe it or not, this fool is a visitor. Can you come over here? You've got all the security gear."
The box chuckled. "Will do."
"Thanks. DRACOM off." The box clicked again. "Okay. You just stay here until Tk'akr turns up. I've got other things to deal with. Stand back while I slice."

Romduran flickered like a badly-adjusted TV screen, starting slow and going faster-
-flicker-
-flicker-
-flickerflickerflickerblur-

A silvery blur leapt, impossibly fast, into the sky, and streaked off towards a incoming airliner.

***********************************************************************

Khrrck City doesn't look like much from the air.

Less than a square mile of vertical ductwork and sheds, inside a barren circle of reddish bluffs in the center of a dune sea; that's all you'll see from above. Outside the circle, a long concrete runway stretches out into the desert. The runway attendants fight a constant battle with the enroaching sands.

But take a look at the bluffs themselves...

Each of the five main faces of the circling bluffs is studded with archways and portals. Traffic moves constantly in and out; trucks and hovercraft setting out across the trackless desert. Even fighter jets catapult themselves out of a especially large archway at intervals, heading out to patrol Khrrck's borders.

And underneath these bluffs and dunes is a city.

Khrrck City extends for miles underneath the desert. Foundries and farms; housing and hangars. Almost everything is under there, and all you can see of it from above is the occasional steel vent belching smoke out the side of a dune.

Nobody's been fool enough to invade the place. Khrrck City isn't just a city; it's a fortress. It's the industrial, military, and political center of Khrrck, all at once. Attack the place and you'll encounter SAM batteries, strategically-placed anti-tank guns, foot-thick steel doors, and the Foundry Special.

Most of it has never seen action. But it's all in working condition. Khrrck City is never defenseless.

But Khrrck City is more factory than fortress. The clang and grind of heavy machinery is audible nearly everywhere in the tunnels, accompanied by the occasional thud of mining explosives. Khrrck City turns out weapons. Steel in hundred-ton lots. And the Wyrms' specialty; exotic vehicles.

Of course, that's not to say there's not plenty of opportunity to amuse yourself...

The Central Cavern of Khrrck City is almost a mile long. It's part street market, part park, part perpetual circus. Wyrms go there to sell, to buy, to rest, to show off, and to watch. But mostly to have fun.

There's always some kind of event going on. It can be anything from a duration flaming contest, to a student mage trying to make a few Shards with illusions, to a FPS contest.

The last such contest was held last October by Ss'tek Halfjaw. The game was a RBVRFPS by the name of Skyfire, there were more than eight hundred participants in the initial melee, and the winner was a Augmented Wyrm by the name of Mareka Carbonwing, alias Colddrake.

Mareka's a frequent sight around the Cavern; ever since his experiences in the Aurora Prima system, he's come home to Khrrck and now hangs out at the Cavern, challenging all comers to Skyfire battles. He wins more often than not, but is persistently crushed by Scree, the only person who can match his augmented reaction times.

Well, I say 'person'. Scree's a dragon. There's a number of them around Khrrck City, and sometimes they visit the Cavern...

***********************************************************************

The Khrrck City terminal is small. The only humans in sight are a couple of harried-looking clerks and an enthusiastic young man in blue jeans and a worn brown coat. A few Wyrms are visible as well, hauling pallets of cargo towards the freight exits.

"Anyone want to take a tour?" yelled the young man. "Three-hour tour of the Central Cavern, starting with an hour at Ss'tek's VR center. He's giving out free VR game time! And I happen to know that both Scree and Mareka are there. Not something you can miss. And if you want to stay somewhere, just stop there! You can leave the tour at any time."

"Khrrck, miss? You're in luck. Elara's just stopped by to refuel. She'll be leaving in fifteen minutes, and I can get you a seat. Just a moment." The ticket man shuffled through a drawer and pulled out a ticket. "One-way ticket to Khrrck. Seat B." She passed the ticket across, along with the card. "Elara runs odd-job flights. This one's pretty empty. Just you and some bloke named Ramakeman. Strange name if I ever heard one. Head over to gate six, it opens right onto the tarmac. You can't miss Elara. She's the twin-engine turboprop with the red stripe. Next!"

*************************************************************

Ramakeman lay back in his seat. "Why aren't we moving, Elara? I thought we were done refueling."
Elara's voice resonated back from the cockpit. "We've got some bloody cargo to load up, and a passenger."
Ramakeman sighed and unbuckled his seat belt. "I suppose you want me to help load?"
"You got that bloody right. Three tons of bloody electronics that's got to be handled with bloody care. I hate cargo flights. Plays hell with evasive maneuvers."

Ramakeman slid the door open and paused. "This is a commercial flight. You won't need to go evasive. Besides, weren't you the one who survived a pair of SAMs over Fort Ironscale with twenty tons of Augmented mercs in your bay?"
"Bloody right. And I lost a wingtip to the bloody Ironscales. They had-"
"Spare me the details, please." Ramakeman dropped out of the door and walked around the little twin-engine transport towards the truck with the cargo.

Elara sighed behind him. "Bloody rude, that kid is. I suppose he can't help it, considering what he is, but it would be nice if he bloody tried."

*************************************************************

"Hold it!"
A brilliant, blood-red dragon slammed to the tarmac next to Mike. It was wearing a leather harness, festooned with unidentifiable bits of equipment.
"Customs inspection. Any firearms, knives, or blunt instruments?"

The red dragon snorted as Mike kept walking. "Fool. I said hold it."

The red dragon lashed out with its tail, hooking Mike around the waist and yanking him over between its foreclaws.

The red dragon lowered its head level with Mike's and hissed through jaws big enough to take his head off with one bite. "You stay here until I'm done with you. Got that?"

*************************************************************
Ramakeman shoved the last crate into place in the transport's cargo bay and straightened.

Ramakeman was rather unremarkable. He was of average height, had an average face, and in general was unusually average. It's not often you see a truly average person. He wore a pair of blue jeans, a battered brown jacket, and a pair of hiking boots.

Ramakeman held out his hand. "Hello. I'm Ramakeman. I assume you're the passenger?"

((I'm assuming this is after the Aurora Prima war.))

A bloody crimson cruiser landed on the tarmac of the Khrrck City airport, vertical ion drives whirring near silently. Perfectly concealed panels stored numerous heavy weaponry under layers of exotic armor. Maybe, just maybe, it would spark a memory deep within Mareka. The ramp lowered itself, exposing a dark interior. A tall, amazingly slim figure stepped out, in a dress uniform of a fine fabric that was an unnervingly dead gray. The Captain walked with a strict air, his gleaming steel hand clicking impatiently. This figure made it's way to the Central Cavern at a brisk pace. He overhead passively that Mareka was at the VR arena. He turned in that direction, neural implants already dissecting the map of the city and plotting the fastest path.

"Where the f*** did we send him!?"
"Dunno," the senior magus stated, shrugging.
"What!? Dunno!?"
"Yep," the senior magus pulled out a pipe. "He'll be fine . . . " he looked at the newly-arrived object. "Now, what shall we do with you?" he asked, bemused.

****

According to the laws of thermodynamics, the net amount of energy/matter in the universe had to remain constant. Thus, in order to teleport an object to a place, you had to teleport another object of similar mass out of that place. This was something the Magi'i of The Tower had not yet perfected.

****

Something heavy slammed into the tarmak, appearing seemingly out of thin air a hundred meters above ground only to fall back to earth.

Most humans would have died from the fall. Ash was not like most humans. He was a golem -- a metaphysical construct whose body had been lost. Few opted for this path by choice -- the process was too painful and the benefits were too few. Ash did not get a choice -- death was not an option, even in Weyr.

Ash groaned. The bastards had miscalculated the mass, again. Slowly, the young mage got up, brushed the dust off his azure utility suit. The eighteen-year-old mage was of average height, unremarkable in most aspects save for the long blue hair that he kept in a short braid.

Ash noted the red dragon nearby. This was interesting . . .

----------------------------------
OOC: You cannot tell that Ash has non-biological body parts unless you're either a very good spellcaster, or are able to perform a detailed scan of his body. In that case, you'd find that the right arm and both legs are artificial, along with various augmented internal organs.

Carlise was frightened. Very frightened. The dragon would kill Mike. So far, she had been ignored.

The red dragon blinked as something slammed into the tarmac nearby, and swore virulently in Draconic.

It stopped and muttered out of the corner of its mouth. "I'll have to finish this quick. Hold still." A wave of blue light washed out of the dragon and over Mike. "No crystalbombs, malign spells... you're OK. Here, take this." The dragon tossed Mike's weapons and ammunition back at him. "Fat lot of good those'll do you."

The red dragon strode off towards Ash, muttering under its breath. "This has not been a good day..."

Carlise turned to Mike. "About that drink. . ."

"Greetings," Ash inclined his head for a moment. It tended to pass for a polite gesture in most places. "I'm alchemist Ash of Weyr. Where exactly is this?" he asked. His chest felt sore from the impact, even though the reinforced skeleton had absorbed most of the force.

The Captain's eyes flickered towards the blur that slammed into the tarmac, but spent no more than a few seconds on the creature that arose from the small crater. He stored away Ash's bioelectrical frequency and his various features in neurally augmented memory banks, and continued his walk.

---

Before long, his steps had led him to the VR arena he had heard about. His eyes scanned the crowd assembled for the one he knew as Mareka.

Ramakeman nodded, dropped out of the cargo hatch onto the tarmac, and started off towards the passenger hatch. "Yep. Come on and get on board. Elara's impatient."

The aircraft spoke unexpectedly. "You got that bloody right, you bloody sh-" Ramakeman kicked the aircraft, who finished, smoothly. "Shrike."
"Since when was I a shrike?"

"Anytime you like, and you know it."
Ramakeman shook his head. "Wrong. Shrikes are low-mass." With that, he grabbed a handhold and hauled himself up and through the passenger hatch.

**********************************************************

The red dragon tilted its head quizzically. "Weyr, Weyr." it said, apparently testing the word out. "Never heard of the place. This is Khrrck City, in Khrrck. I'm Tk'akr. You OK? That was some fall you took."

Tk'akr turned her head back towards Mike and yelled. "Try the Central Cavern. Ask Keman for directions. He's the tour guide."

**********************************************************

A silver-scaled Wyrm strode up beside the man with a whir of hydraulics.

The Wyrm's entire left side had apparently been lost in some horrendous accident, and replaced with machinery. His left side was a tangle of struts and hydraulics. The left side of his head and lower jaw, including the eye, had been sheared off as well, and replaced with sheet metal and a camera.

The Wyrm looked up at the Captain. "I'm Ss'tek Halfjaw. You here to meet someone, perform an experiment, or to play around?"

The red dragon tilted its head quizzically. "Weyr, Weyr." it said, apparently testing the word out. "Never heard of the place. This is Khrrck City, in Khrrck. I'm Tk'akr. You OK? That was some fall you took."


"I'm fine," Ash grinned for a moment. "This skeleton can take over a hundred thousand newtons." With that, the alchemist drove his right arm into the concrete of the tarmac.

The arm gave off the screech of overloaded mithril-steel. A dent appeared in the concrete, with a web of cracks shooting out in all directions. Ash placed his left hand onto the ground, so that both hands touched the space around the dent. With a flash of blue-azure light and a crackle of static energy, the cracks disappeared, along with the dent.

Ash could feel a slight grinding sound as he streightened. He'd have to find a mechanic to take a look at the arm.

"So . . . what can I do here?" Ash asked.

The Captain grinned over at this new arrival. 'More machinery. Interesting.'

"I am looking for someone." The Captain said calmly. "I wish to locate a Wyrm known as Mareka."

Tk'akr winced at the noise Ash's arm made. "Your arm OK? That sounded horrible. As for what you can do here... I don't know. Armaka knows the most about what needs doing. I'll ask her to come over. DRACOM!"

A black box on Tk'akr's harness clicked, and she muttered under her breath at it. "Armaka, I've got a kid over here who just TP'd in. Says he's an alchemist. Could you come over? DRACOM off."

***************************************************

Ss'tek smiled. "You're in luck. Mareka's around. In fact, he just challenged me, Pheonix, and Scree to a game. You're lucky you didn't arrive a few minutes later. Follow me."

With a a hiss of hydraulics, Ss'tek took off, weaving through the crowd.

Grrrrrr. I am -NOT- a kid. Ash fumed silently. "The arm's fine," he shrugged. For now.

"Interesting." The sullen-faced Captain remarked bleakly, befor following the other Wyrm without so much as a sound.

'He's just as daring on the ground as he is in the air.' He mused.

Tk'akr shrugged. "Fine. Armaka should be here any moment now-"

Tk'akr jumped as the air behind her split open with a earsplitting bang. "Romduran! Don't you be-"

A huge white dragon dropped vertically through the hole and slammed to the tarmac with a resounding boom.

Tk'akr stuttered to a stop like a broken tape player. "-playing... around... with..."

"Portals?" finished the white dragon, smoothly. "I was right next to him, and, naturally, I asked him to help me get here quicker." The white dragon slid sinuously around Tk'akr, its scales glittering with blue and silver highlights, and peered at Ash. "That was some fall you took."

Tk'akr grinned sheepishly. Well, theoretically she was sheepish. It's very hard for a dragon to look anything other than powerful.

"Armaka, this is Ash. Ash, this is Armaka'karema. She's a ambassador, though she's helping with the airport work at the moment."
Tk'akr grinned wider, exposing a array of teeth that would have put a knife factory to shame. "We dragons make very effective ambassadors."

***************************************************

Ss'tek stopped in front of a pair of wide doors. After a moment, they hissed open, and Ss'tek stepped through into the large cavern beyond.

At first glance, there were two dragons in the room.

On second glance, the differences became apparent.

One of the occupants was a golden dragon. A very small one; only about ten feet long.

The other occupant was Mareka.

Mareka's changed since the Aurora Prima war. He's swapped his exshell for a powered exoskeleton. By far the most striking difference, however, is the wings bolted to the back of his exskel; a fifteen-foot span of grey nanofiber and ultralightweight struts. Each of his legs has a hexagonal bar of crystal, capped with gold-inlaid steel, fastened alongside the exskel struts.

Ss'tek nodded at the Captain. "This is Mareka. Scree's the dragon."

Mareka turned his head and peered at the Captain. "Do I know you?"

The Captain made a low whistle at the impressive additions to Mareka, but instead it came out as a low, sinister growl.

He grinned with a hint of malice. "Yes, I believe you do. I also believe you're the one who ruined my kill record. Those wings for when you get blown out of your fighter?"

Ss'tek blinked. "Waitamoment. I brought you in here, if you start a fight you're going to regret it."

Mareka shook his head. "I don't think he's planning to." He turned to the Captain. "No, actually. It's a complicated story. I ended up with these wings because linking directly with my fighter seriously messed up my reflexes. I kept trying to use wings I didn't have."

Mareka spread his wings, servos whining softly. "So I got some."

"Nice portal," Cyril commented. "I'm quite sure you're very effective as an ambassador. I'm only here as a tourist, really; and to see if you've been messing around with N-Space. Considering that there isn't much death and destruction going on, I'm guessing you're not."

The Tower wanted to make sure that no-one else repeated the experiments with N-Space that destroyed much of Weyr. The nearly-unlimited space N-Space provided made it attractive, but the side effects also opened up a gateway for nasties that seemed to come out of someone's darkest nightmares.

The Captain brushed off Ss'tek's protest with a nonchalant wave of his hand.

"I'm honorable enough and intelligent enough to know not to attack an Augmented in Khrrck, thank you." He remarked dryly. "That's an interesting story, and an interesting end to our little escapade back in Aurora. Don't suppose you ever figured out everything behind the Omniclan, hm?"

The uniformed man grinned again secretively.

Mareka shook his head. "I was too busy trying to stay alive. That was a hectic episode."

******************************************

Armaka blinked. "N-Space? Never heard of N-Space. You want to know about the portals, you ask Romduran. He's the only one who can pull them off. It's actually a secondary talent of his. His primary talent is timeslicing, which I have my doubts about." She shrugged. "Nothing bad has happened yet, though, so I wouldn't worry."

Bump?

((Sorry, been busy. Yay look I'm back.))

"Indeed it was. In any case, we have decided this is the time to fully and truely expose ourselves. You see, what is known as the Omniclan is, in reality, a collective swarm. That is why our ships are so coordinated, our assaults so precise. There is no lack of communication, unlike in an...unrefined lifeform." The Captain revealed, bowing his head slightly. "We thought it best to come first to the one lifeform that evaded us."

[OOC: Don't worry about that. I've got stuff to deal with too. Unfortunately, will not be able to post due to RL (dinner), but will try tomorrow.]

Mareka blinked. "Hive mind? Just how- No, I won't ask. Squad links don't hold a candle to that. It's a wonder we survived."

The golden dragon's attention snapped from a wallscreen to the Captain. "Swarm? Did you say swarm? If you're anything like the Swarm..." The little dragon hinged her jaw half-open, revealing a array of needle teeth.

The gray suited Captain stared at this exotic dragon for a moment. "We are not familiar with this..."Swarm." But doing harm to me would hardly do you any good."

A small smirk tugged at his lips.

The dragon crouched, tensing her muscles. "You don't look very-"

Mareka's voice blared from his exskel speakers. "Scree, cut it. There's no reason to act this way. Plus, you don't know what he's armed with."
"I know bloody well what I'm armed with, and I doubt he can match it."

Ss'tek shouldered his way between Scree and the Captain. "Now, calm down. Scree, are you in high gear?"

Scree nodded, then locked her attention back on the Captain.
Ss'tek shouldered her again. "Snap out of it, Scree. You know you can't think straight in high gear."

The little golden dragon shuddered and slumped. "Ah, shkak."
Ss'tek sighed. "And I suppose you've got agression hormones to burn off. You really need to control yourself. Head out for a moment while I talk with the Captain."

Scree walked out slowly through the doors, tail dragging on the concrete floor.

"Then . . . where can I find this Romduran?" Ash asked.

"I'll call him. DRACOM!"
At Armaka's command, the box around her neck hissed into life. "Yes?"
"Put me through to Romduran."
"Gotcha."
The box crackled for a second, than another voice spoke. This one was deep, though the details were blurred by the bad transmission quality. "Yes?"
"Can you come over here? I've got someone who wants to talk to you."
"On my way."

The air split open. Again.

****************************************

A silvery blur leaped through the portal and started to resolve itself as the portal closed.

blurflickerflickerflicker-
-flicker-
-flicker-
-still.

The silver dragon grinned at Ash. "You wanted to see me?"

“Yes, I believe we made a bet some time ago whether or not you dragons would ever be able to make portals. Guess I owe . . . Wow, I don't remember." Ash grinned. He might have looked 20 or so, except that he was not -- 2500 years and counting, give or take a few centuries. "Anyways, I owe you something because you mastered portals. A drink, perhaps?" he offered.

Romduran blinked. "I think you must be confusing me with someone else. As far as I know, I'm the only one of my kind in existence. At least, in this universe. It's a long story."

He looked Ash up and down consideringly. "Why don't we go and figure this out?"

Romduran grinned, suddenly. "I'll buy you a drink, too."

"Possibly," Art shrugged. "It all becomes a blur after the first hundred years. I know I made a bet with a dragon about portals . . . Where shall we go to?"