Invasion! Oh wait, they're friendly... most of them anyway

[Swix]

((Since this is described as 'the perfect place for sci-fi or space RP's, this belongs here))

At Blackstar:

Above the planet, the abandoned station and above the five moons of Blackstar there was a blue explosion of sorts. It did not affect anything, nor was it particularly dangerous or noticable unless you happened to be watching the skies at that point in time, or were an AI in said space station. It only lasted for a few seconds, then it was gone.

In Consortium neutral space:

At the same time, within the depths of outer space and possibly even in a different dimension a second, simultaneous loud explosion would have been heard-if outer space could carry such a thing as sound to the multitude of hearing organs the aliens on the station near it had that is. It would also have been followed by a string of gravelly sounding native curses if the pilot of the ship that had caused it had had the com unit set to outbound broadcasts. Fortunately for the grey skinned, purple eyed Reniilian it was not.

"Alright Lerillin" came a female voice over the com channel, that of the Tezcan responsible for the station he was next to "that's the last time this week. Leinnrrad says he should have enough data to make it work next time". Nrenth was not exactly the owner of the place, nobody had owned the station for over a millennium-or so he'd heard from other members of the serpentine race, but she may as well be. She kept the Tezca built structure running smoothly all 'day', only leaving her post during the hours of articial night on the place.

"Yes ma'am" Lerillin sent back, before setting the ship directly on course to the airlock it had originally launched from. Lerillin was the best test pilot the Reniilians had, so like any member of a young species eager to prove itself to the older, more established aliens he'd been quick to volunteer his services for the prototype he was currently in. He'd been even quicker to jump on the fastest transport to the Consortium station once he'd been accepted. Now though, he wasn't so sure it was a good idea. He hadn't had a clue exactly what it was the E-Maginian engineer was trying to do, except that it was supposed to be some new form of transportation. The ship itself wasn't much better either, it was neither machine, animal or vegetable but a mixture of all three. The thing had been grown rather than built, courtesy of the Tiermutian, Krkrln, Kinntrra and Reniilian races working together. Yet it somehow still managed to incorporate several fully mechanical parts, including the E-Maginians new transportation device and engine. The Oktaluns and T'Larans had had a hand in it as well, their respective weaponry and 'hard' shields coupled with it's natural slow healing capabilities made it one of the toughest little ships ever built. Of course, the Tezca had yet to contribute anything to the prototype except funds so far, but apparently it wasn't ready yet. Whatever it was.

Lerillin brought the ship to the docking clamps before relinquishing control of the thing, rustling his organic rock thread-wings before he stood up. He was sure it would cause them all nothing but trouble.

One week later, at Blackstar:

A large blue Warp Portal began to grow slowly in the sky, becoming bigger and bigger until it got to the point that a gigantic city-ship could easily fit through it without any problems.

What came through though was something relatively small, a ship that whilst it was large enough to hold a full crew currently only held two organic beings. One was Lerillin, the Reniilian test pilot, and the other was a Kinntrra by the name of Vulo. She was their equivalent to Lerillin, one of the better pilots and head of a group called the KS, so they had sent her along with him when the E-Maginian engineer Leinnrrad had been insistent it would work. And it had, much to Lerillins shock and Vulos expectations. There was just one problem though:

"The Portal won't shut down" the Kinntrra said as she gathered and read the readings the AI on board was bringing up for her "but there doesn't seem to be any reason for it"

"Your E-Maginian friend must have made some sort of mistake" Lerillin said as he too examined the same readings, but out of the corner of his pupilless eyes. He was piloting the ship manually at this point in time after all.

"We are not friends, we are colleagues. The same as you and I" Vulo countered, but without a hint of hostility or friendliness. Unreadable and surprising, as their reputation said they should be.

"Erayna" Lerillin said out loud, summoning the Tezcans contribution, the experimental, sentient AI that had been installed on the ship. She preferred to be called by a name rather than her number, and so soon after a holographic image appeared on the console in front of the Reniilian "where are we?"

((This has gone on long enough for an intro I think. Enjoy and have fun, this follows on from the Consortium story in the Amphitheatre ))

[Coolpikaaa]

Jack had resorted to indexing the entire database on board the CSS out of boredom.
And that was A LOT of files.

It also didn't help that new things kept happening. Like right now for instance.

Far off in the space from the damaged station was a blue explosion. Jack took pictures using whatever camera wasn't damaged, filed it and "threw" it onto his to-do list.Half pf his program was slowed by the damage to the station,and he was using what remained to index, so it was safe to say he thought nothing of it.

---
1 week Later
---
Jack was having a crisis.
A set of pictures taken a week ago(supposedly by him) had eventually come to his attention.They depicted a blue explosion in space, and he couldn't find anywhere to put that under...

So doing what ever a normal pushed to the edge by loneliness AI would do, he opened a new folder, named it "Random blue explosions in space", and transfered them in.

Pleased with another crisis solved, he turned once more back to his work.Only one file remained on his pile, an alert.

"LARGE WARP DISCREPANCY FOUND.
UNIDENTIFIED SPACE-CRAFT FOUND
ACTION?"

"Guests!" The AI shouted through the stations intercom.He quickly opened a channel to the new ship and called out,
"Hello oh great friends!"

-coolpikaaa

[Swix]

"I do not know" Erayna responded to Lerillins question unhelpfully. The hologram of her on the console shrugged the shoulders of it's strange 'body' as it tilted it's head to consider some new information. Whilst the AI had been made by the Tezca, the hologram she used to show herself was entirely different from anything anyone had seen before. It was like she had cherry picked parts she liked from some of the races and mixed them all up together. She had no legs, instead she 'rested' on a long, serpentine tail. She also had a single pair of arms and a pair of wings that were an exact copy of the Tiermutians. Her head too was like a Tiermutians, including the shoulder length hair growing out of her holographic head. Her skin on the other hand was similar to a Reniilians, but it had been coloured lightly purple. Her eyes were Reniilian too, pupilless and dark red.

"There are dozens of species all mixed together on the closest planet to us, with at least three on one of the five orbiting moons" Vulo reported, though the data gathering was of course helped exponentially by Erayna, who was currently working on several tasks at once. Of course, that didn't stop the com channels from working perfectly, and Jacks voice soon rang over their ears. It caused Lerillins beaky mouth to drop open and so he missed the chance to send anything back. Vulo on the other hand was immediately on 'the ball', as humans would say, and had soon opened a channel back.

"Hello friend" Vulo sent back, the winged mammalian was incredibly calm considering they neither knew where they were or what it was they were talking to "perhaps you could help us, we are a little lost. We haven't been to this part of the galaxy before. Where are we, and who might we be speaking to?"

"The message is being broadcast by another AI on the damaged space station close to this vessel" Erayna replied to the Kinntrras question even though it was not directed at her "I am transmitting gathered data back to the Consortium via the Portal"

[Coolpikaaa]

"Hello friend perhaps you could help us, we are a little lost. We haven't been to this part of the galaxy before. Where are we, and who might we be speaking to?"

Jack paused a moment then sent back.

"I am Jack, AI of The CSS. I'm sure you could find more information if you were to board the station here..."

-coolpikaaa

[Swix]

"Lerillin" Vulo asked the Reniilian, although she did turn to speak to him "do you think you can do it?"

"Do what?" the Reniilian asked testily, three weeks and the thing still wasn't working properly. Why hadn't Leinnrrad told them this might happen? From what he'd gathered the E-Maginian was usually really good at guessing just how bad some of his inventions would backfire-or in this case, constant-fire.

"Land on the station, of course" the female Kinntrra replied, again with no hint of untowards malice or unearned friendship. It wasn't that the Kinntrra were an unemotional race, quite the opposite in fact. But Vulo felt this situation called for neither with the Reniilian.

"Land on an apparently abandoned space station in an unknown area of space with the most advanced ship in the Consortiums fleet on the invite of an over-friendly AI? Of course" Lerillin answered as he began to steer the ship towards the derelict station "I'm not guaranteeing a smooth flight though"

"I am a flier too" Vulo reminded him, her head flicking towards the creature that was more closely related to a rock than to her with some sharpness. Maybe Lerillin had finally succeeded in hitting a nerve "just as good as yourself. I am aware of the risks"

Vulo glanced briefly at the hologram of Erayna, who had now gone silent as she concentrated both on her tasks and her own speculation before sending communications back to the stations AI "Jack of the CSS" she said "we are coming in to board the station, my readings say the atmosphere within is capable of sustaining us. We can do this without properly docking, but that would involve damaging your station more. If you can open a bay for our ship, we would appreciate it"

Erayna had more than just her tasks on her mind, she was aware of another AI! Nor was it of the same origin as her, it was completely alien. It probably goes without saying the young Articial Intelligence was very excited.

"Hi" she sent to Jack, through a completely different channel than the two 'organics' and with some enthusiasm "I'm Erayna, AI of the protoship. I've never met another AI before. Nice to meet you!"

[Coolpikaaa]

Jack opened the hatch to the docking bay with ease.There was a rattle as several loose objects were sucked into the void of space.


"Guests!" The AI yelled through the intercom, flooding several halls with precious air again.
The hydroponics bay doors slowly creaked open as a few crashed up drones flew in and picked as much fruit as possible.

Living things had to eat right?

-coolpikaaa

[Kazumaru]

Meanwhile, in KAIN:

Sentinel stood on the roof of the saloon, a passive expression on his face. Which wasn't unusual, given that half of his face was a mass of clockwork and the other was an unmoving mask.

He watched the ground below and around him shift by his will, changing from the previous endless desert into an endless ocean, punctuated only by the island the saloon sat on.

He hopped off of the roof as the saloon began to change, shrinking down to one storey and widening out. The roof replaced itself with thatch, and the walls disappeared, leaving only the occasional support. Inside, the chairs and legless tables remained mostly the same, and the dart board stayed in its previous position on the wall, failing to react to the lack of said wall.

Inside the shack sat Melissa and Greg, who barely reacted to the change in scenery.

"Sentinel!" Greg shouted.

"What do you want, mingebag?" Sentinel responded.

"Have you seen Jack in the last month?"

"Nope. Jackieboy's connection cut out and he just didn't reconnect." Sentinel said, reaching up and appearing to move the sun with his hand, taking it down near the horizon.

[Swix]

((Yay, someone else came in ))

"Ah-ha! Excellent" Lerillin said, noting the opening of the bay doors and making the protoship move towards it as quickly as possible without endangering them or the damaged station. The ship was alive, in a weird sort of way, and he didn't want it to get mad at him. Although... didn't it need a brain to get mad at him? He was pretty sure it didn't have one, so didn't that mean... Erayna was it's brain? What a creepy thought.

'Why am I thinking about this? Lerillin thought, snapping himself out of it in order to steer the ship manually in to the docking bay whilst the AI was busy gathering and transferring data, and Vulo took a small portion of the ships power to find out more about the station before they set foot on it.

"Lerillin, don't go outside just yet" Vulo warned the Reniilian after their ship had come to a halt in the docking bay "there's no gravity outside, they don't appeaer to have artificial gravity that this ship does"

"That's not a problem" Lerillin answered with what to his species was a puzzled look "Reniilians haven't mastered that yet either, I'm used to zero G. Besides, this place was spinning. There's bound to be gravity in the outer levels"

"Correct" Vulo answered, standing up from the odd seat she had been occupying up until now "now let us see what this station looks like from the inside. Erayna!" "Yes, Vulo" the AI answered, her holograms lips moving in sync with her words "don't let anyone on here after we've gone, unless it's us, okay? We don't want to lose you or the ship" "I won't" the AI answered, a little disappointed at being left by herself.

The two living beings exited the ship, one of rock and one of flesh, the strangely organic door closing behind them. Whilst Lerillin had to float and 'push' himself with his thread-wings, Vulo simply walked across as normal. The benefits of having suckers on the soles of your feet.

[Coolpikaaa]

Jack noticed the new arrivals but was slightly more interested by the other AI.He opened another channel to the ship, and sent out a mesage.

"Hi, are you bound to your ship?"

-coolpikaaa

[Swix]

Erayna might possibly have bounced about the ship excitedly at finally getting a response out of the other AI, but there was nothing around that she could use to do that with. Instead her hologram disappeared in what to anyone on board would have looked like a bunch of pinkish purple sparks, as she no longer needed it to show herself to anyone.

"No, not exactly" she answered Jack, her own excitement was quite clear "I can move to other places so long as I keep a link to it, my main core is in there. Why, can you move from your station?"

((Bah-my creativity dried up ))

[Coolpikaaa]

"Yes, I can. The station has links with many virtual places."

Jack briefly wondered how the rest of his "family" was doing in KAIN.He hadn't visited in a while...

"Er.."Jack paused for a nanosecond. "Could...Maybe if you wanted...to transfer into the station?" Jack stopped once again. "Only if you wanted to really..."

-coolpikaaa

[Swix]

Erayna paused herself, transfer into the station? Would the Consortium on the other side notice if she did that? No, only if she stopped transferring data, and that was simple enough for her to handle. Besides, this place was interesting and new to her, and there was another AI here. Another of her 'kind', she knew that there she was the only one, the first one, but not here.

"Errr... Okay, sure" she sent back, after a longer pause than Jacks "hey, I could even visit you after the ship has to go. Do you have any archives for the planet below us, or your crew? Or where your crew is? We're on a data gathering mission"

[Coolpikaaa]

"I sadly no longer have any crew...."

Jack then though if he really should give these "aliens" any data on the planet.They really seemed nice...

He instead went with a pre-made welcome package for any out of system beings.With one quick thought it was sent to the ship.Then something she said donned on him.

"Sorry...Did you say you could come back and visit? How is that possible?"

-coolpikaaa

[Swix]

Erayna gladly recieved the 'welcome package' and sent the data through the portal, back to the Tezca station.

"Surely you see that portal?" Erayna asked, rhetorically "this ship and I made it. We can come back even if it disappears, and I will have to leave when they leave. But we don't know why it won't close"

Of course, a different galaxy entirely brought different enemies, and what appeared to look like a ripple in space came out from the portal. A cloaked ship, with an unknown alien passenger had managed to get through the Tezca Stations defences... or perhaps it hadn't. Erayna couldn't tell, because her transmissions and those that were supposed to be coming in had suddenly stopped. They were being blocked.

"Jack" Erayna said to the other AI, along with information on the Muzvus species, the Consortiums collective enemy "if you have any defences you might want to power them up now. I think we have bad company"

[Coolpikaaa]

"Bad company?"

Jack checked his sensors. Just plain space out there....

...But not wanting to mis-trust his new guests he powered on defensive systems anyway. In the ships decay however, only one or two small cutting lasers fully started.

Just the strain of activating the program flickered the lights aboard the station.

"Uh-oh." Jack said across the open channel to the other AI. With a quick thought he sent her a run down of the ships active defences. It showed a bunch of "not operating" red lights and very few else.

-coolpikaaa