sibling-neighbor-comrade

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

//KINGFISHER

Ah hell, forgot I hadn't answered this.

Calling it an H/A battleship is...technically true. Though I admit, it doesn't paint the most accurate picture.

The ship was originally a Dreadnaught, but now it belongs to the pirate crew I was flying with at the time. Not entirely sure how they got it in the first place. (You know pirates - every person you ask gives you a different story.) It'd been stolen by a low-ranking Armory officer right before I hitched a ride with them, and I just helped 'em steal it back.

Anyway, the captain and her crew handled most of the maneuvers to get us close. I don't think I could recount many of the details since I was inside the boarding vessel for all of it. Once inside the ship, my job was fairly simple. Mechs got us past the worst of the opposition, and my team gave me cover while I did my thing.

Now, I'm not much of a hacker. But I am excellent at breaking shit. I had access to the schematics ahead of time (it being the pirates' ship and all), and I'd pinpointed key systems to cripple the ship from the inside. A fork bomb is just one line of code, but it can keep an NHP busy rebooting every computer system you touch. Electrical fires are pretty easy to set up, too, and they're great at sending people running where you want them too. As long as I have someone watching my back, I can cause some mighty-sized chaos with just a bit of effort. The crew took care of the rest.

I did actually get a bounty on my head for this, though - at least for a little while. When I started working with my current team again, Squad Lead pulled some strings. Had it lifted as part of our contract. I'm not sure what he did, but I've said before that he's important enough to have a bodyguard, so. Either he or Bodyguard said something to somebody they knew. Had to promise not to pull this kind of shit again - not against the Armory, anyway.

So, yeah! Sorry for making it sound more exciting than it actually was. As for the kind of Dreadnaught, it's been so many decades, I'm not sure if anyone remembers. It's been repaired and upgraded and modified so many times that it's a bit of a battleship-of-thesus situation anyway. It's, uh. Old.

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

//KINGFISHER

I'm a pirate who successfully hit an H/A battleship, if that counts

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

<Do you want to be a legend? No. Nobody wants that. What they want is adoration. Glory. But not to be a legend. The legend's story is already over. So here's to eternity>

The message contains goblin liturgicode

//KINGFISHER

Nice try sweetheart, but my mum taught me better than to accept weird code that shows up in my inbox.

Now I'll just...hand this over to the ship's NHP to take care of.

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

//KINGFISHER

My mom told me a legend growing up - allegedly an old humanity one - where the hero said, "Earth is the cradle of humanity, but one cannot live in a cradle forever."

I don't know if it's true, but I always liked it.

I gotta ask- why is it called “Cradle?”

The sentimental meaning is obvious, yes, but usually systems are identified by their stars. Alpha Centauri, Sirius, etc. Cradle’s star is Sol. The name is “first” enough(Sol means “Sun” if I remember right), which is how I would describe the feeling “Cradle” gives me, so that fits more than enough. So why do we call it Cradle and not the name of the star of the system?

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

//KINGFISHER

hey can I have one of those granola bars

Okay Lancers I'm testing a new blink technology that allows people to send food over the omninet

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

//KINGFISHER

Oh Diemos I was talking to squad lead and referred to members of my pirate family as my cousins and from ACROSS THE ROOM saw bodyguard raise her eyebrows as she overheard.

COUSINS. IMPROPER NOUN. NO "THE" IN FRONT OF THEM JUST COUSINS REGULAR COUSINS I HAVE NO AFFILIATION WITH GG_UNCLE PUT YOUR EYEBROWS AWAY.

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

//KINGFISHER

I 'spose it doesn't make sense to anyone who grew up on a planet that somebody would miss a little glass bubble on an asteroid.

But I do.

I miss home.

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

//KINGFISHER

Oh dw this was specifically set up for me to hide pirate shit from the NHP of the ship I'm on. I had my cousin step me through the encryption he does for the rest of my family and teach me how to replicate it. Obviously it won't be as good as his because, well. I'm not an NHP like him. But! It should be good enough to keep Casey's little H/A eyes off me.

Trust me I'm a professional.

//KINGFISHER

Hell yeah finally figured out this whole encryption thing now I can send people messages about crime

Someone talk to me about illegal shit

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

//KINGFISHER

Hell yeah finally figured out this whole encryption thing now I can send people messages about crime

Someone talk to me about illegal shit

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

//KINGFISHER

Been seeing the buzz about those newly-discovered FSLC pattern groups and I can't help but notice they're all named after birds.

Fly true, little freedom fighters. Fly for all of us.

Don't ever touch the ground.

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

//KINGFISHER

Ok I actually can't do it anymore.

Freak teammate and gooseboy were roughhousing at breakfast (like they usually do) and when gooseboy told him to cut it out, he looked at me to wait for me to say it too (like I used to at school). But I didn't. So then he just wilted like a flower and quietly let go of gooseboy's leg.

I gotta ask him to start with the horror movie shit again because acting like a kicked puppy is just getting pathetic.

//KINGFISHER

Life's a lot more peaceful since my Freak Teammate stopped jumpscaring me in every hallway.

I know it's because I ran away from him when I blew my cover, and he doesn't wanna spook me again, but every once in a while I catch them doing freak shit when they think I'm not around.

Like today, for instance. Walked into the ship's lounge to see Freak Teammate with their shoulder fully dislocated so they could reach under the couch to grab the cat.

I walked out of the lounge.

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

//KINGFISHER

Gooseboy asked if I had any experience breaking out of holding cells (it was relevant to the conversation), and I told him my friends and I used to sneak aboard the ships docked at our station as kids, and it couldn't be that much different. He reacted with skepticism, then incredulity, then asked if my "tutors had no interest in keeping us busy".

I think I'm just gonna start making shit up about the Rim now. Anyone have some really funny lies they want me to tell a ktb noble?

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

Hey, are you alright? You've said your team knows you're a pirate, but the tags on your posts make it sound like you're trying to get messages out of a prison cell. Do you need help?

Ok, so- the situation's like this:

After signing on with the crew, my family - you know, the pirates - sent me somewhere to get formal training. Yes, we could get frames and licenses the traditional way (🏴‍☠️), but cap'n had some strings she could pull to get me there. And if she's going to have one of her crew strap into a walking death machine, might as well make sure they had a bit of education.

(Won't bother saying where. I'm not giving out names that have records attached to 'em, you know how it is.)

Went to school. Lied my ass off about the pirate thing and even tricked some folks into being my friends. Once we all graduated, we went our separate ways and I was never supposed to see them again.

Except. We kept running into each other.

First time I thought they were following me, so I panicked and blew my cover. I grabbed a ride with another crew and ran off before they could ask me to stay again. I'd planned to hitchhike my way back to the Rim, but I only got a month and a few stepping stones down the line before crashing into the same fools again.

This second time around was less...fraught. I wasn't worried about trying to keep my cover and not hurt people's feelings while keeping bodyguard's gun off my back. (Although this time, I did punch squad lead for saying that my stakes were lower than his. But his bodyguard didn't even shoot me about it so I think she agrees that it was a bullshit thing to say.)

We teamed up again since we were solving the same problem anyway. At the end of it, they offered me a ride to the next port so I could hop another ride, and by that point cap'n realized I could actually be of help if I stayed with the team. Due to...the assorted nonsense of everyone on this ship, I can gain access to things regular pirates can't, much less all the way in the Long Rim.

They know why I'm here. They all agreed to let me stay, even knowing why. I'm on something of a short leash, but I'd rather they be honest with me and give me restrictions than pretend everything's the same as it were in school.

So no, I'm not in danger. Things are...tense, but fine. Some people wish things were a little less tense, but you can't force something just 'cause you want it. All I gotta do now is stop firing shotgun blasts into my own feet. And hopefully, squad lead'll stop trying to rush that "fire-forged team-as-a-family" fantasy of his, too.

With any luck, we won't even kill each other.

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

//KINGFISHER

Life's a lot more peaceful since my Freak Teammate stopped jumpscaring me in every hallway.

I know it's because I ran away from him when I blew my cover, and he doesn't wanna spook me again, but every once in a while I catch them doing freak shit when they think I'm not around.

Like today, for instance. Walked into the ship's lounge to see Freak Teammate with their shoulder fully dislocated so they could reach under the couch to grab the cat.

I walked out of the lounge.

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

//KINGFISHER

My teammate's Manticore exploded a scarab once, if that counts.

Weren't even in combat, it just vaporized the damn thing when we dropped it in the cockpit.

Hey, Omninet. Most of you are pilots, I'm sure there are some good stories out there. I'm bored on indefinite involuntary shore leave and I need something to keep me sane while I wait for a job.

What's the weirdest thing that's ever happened to you?

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

OOC: I gotta break character for a minute to share this interaction from my game. Kingfisher would never volunteer this information herself, but it touched on this idea with the current batch of facsimile clones.

(context: we encountered one of the John Harrisons in the running for the Harrison IV title, and were surprised to find a 13yo girl eject from the cockpit.)

LOVE this passage from open hand by miguel lopez (from a collection of short stories set in the lancer universe) which implies that at least a couple of Harrison II's facsimilie clones turned out to be trans women. the purview needs #MoreTransDirectorGenerals.

also love that this passage means that harrison III (the perspective character of this story) respects his sisters' transitions but has still left them to die. very Armory type of move lmao

[sibling-neighbor-comrade]

//KINGFISHER

Bastions of support, huh?

...I think I know why he said it like that, then.

Now that I think of it, the greatest downside to having few other Karrakin friends on here is that I am now enraptured by the question of what Passion holds everyone's Solar Bonds, because while I feel I can guess for some of you it feels disrespectful to do so and besides. That is not the same as knowing.