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The Eye of the Needle (where Fantasy and Sci-fi collide)

The bridge

Wodan picked one hell of a time to come online. A proximity alarm pinged twice around the bridge as the Jotunheim’s radar picked up six locked-on missiles. Everyone leapt into action.

“Evasive action, NOW!” Zey shouted, diving towards her seat. Bosko immediately went to full speed ahead on the main engines and yanked the control yoke. The Jotunheim’s beetle-like shape exploded forward and pulled up towards the dawn sky, but it was too late. The missiles were moving at 1,200 metres per second, and there was no way the hulking spacecraft could avoid them all. The first missile went straight towards the bulbous shuttle bay on the side.

The shuttle bay

Ezra threw the spasming spider droid onto the shuttle bay floor, gritting his teeth from the pain. He quickly looked down and dipped his fingers into a rip in the undercoat covering his right arm. His fingers came back red with blood - the robot had cut him.

He looked back up at Eva as she came over to grab the spider. He crouched down and picked his assault rifle quickly back up, then stalked towards her.

“No more games. Open this door or I’ll-”

The deck shifted dramatically under their feet and the engines shook the deck under their feet. Everything seemed to move at once - an unsecured box smashed into the soldier’s legs and he stumbled into Eva. Darnell shouted, staggered and fell back hard into a row of jump seats. The airlock door opened, and the sound and sight of screaming civilians could be heard in the service corridor, then they closed again.

Then a massive explosion ripped through the bay. The ramp fell slightly open, and a section of the hull in the corner buckled and burst. Flames gushed in, whipped up by the wind. A maelstrom of shrapnel made a sound like tinkling glass as it impacted surfaces. One of the large straps securing the shuttle snapped as a siren blared.

---

The second missile fizzed past the ship and exploded in front of the bridge as Bosko violently levelled out of its upwards ascent and turned it to the right. A long, thin pleasure craft veered out of the way to avoid crashing into the Jo, and moved straight into the path of the third and fourth missile.

The last two projectiles soared straight into the engine shielding, and the whole aft crackled with bright blue energy. The kinetic barrier forced the missiles to explode early - a savage shockwave buffeted the hull and shook the insides.

Engineering

Zhao strapped in, her face illuminated by glowing in the light of various displays crowded around her.

“Power spike! Someone talk to me!”

“It's the FTL drive ma’am, it's jumping all on its own!” Varen shot back. Vigdis would see dangerous fluctuations in her console’s readings.

“Kill it, now!” Zhao commanded.

“It's not responding!”

The noise was unbearable. The shields were screeching, and now the FTL’s whine had rapidly risen to a crescendo.

“Engineering to Bridge, emergency jump imminent” Zhao yelled into her comms piece.

Vuuuuuuuuuummmmmmm FLASH

The sky was dark, and full of stars over Kanth-Amerek. The only sounds one could hear in the wilderness was the rustle of foliage and call of animals. These calls turned into frantic screeching as a thunderous boom rolled over the land and echoed off the far hills of the Ascendency. The sky flashed, like with lightning, and a dull mauve scar seared into the atmosphere. A bright ball of flame emerged, and hurtled towards the ground.

The Bridge

Zey had only just made it to her seat and strapped in before the panicked call from engineering. Her eyes had involuntarily closed against the bright flash, and now gouts of flame erupted from the shield cabling below the Bridge cockpit windows. The sound of missiles had totally gone, and the engines were eerily quiet, more of a sooradic judder than a continuous sound.

“Where are we? Somebody give me a sitrep right now. Wodan? Welcome aboard - reboot our sensory array.” Zey ordered, staring at the curved bank of screens that folded out of the wall to surround the Captain’s chair. All of her external data sources were making zero sense.

The Eye of the Needle (where Fantasy and Sci-fi collide)

@PerfectThought you are now accepted! Welcome

The Eye of the Needle (where Fantasy and Sci-fi collide)

@PerfectThought thanks for writing up your character

I've left some questions and feedback for you kncdiscord. Let me know if you want me to compose it here.

The Eye of the Needle (where Fantasy and Sci-fi collide)

@Starlance yeah, Elite and I were just thinking that if the ship's AI controlled servile droids in stock on the ship, that would be ok! I've amended my first answer.

The Eye of the Needle (where Fantasy and Sci-fi collide)

@PerfectThought

Hey, thanks very much! We are still accepting new characters, yes.

Heavily augmented Humans are permissible; Earth and her colonies have no unified rules on that front. You could have specialised brain functions, limbs, sensory equipment and more. It would be relatively expensive, so tour character would need to have a reason for their gear.

AI of a sort also exists, but not the fully sentient, independent kind you might be thinking of. AI is controlled more tightly by Humans who fear anything which could end up being a more perfect version of them. A perfect AI is also very expensive to create and host, so you wouldn't necessarily have mobile versions, especially not hanging around at Spaceports.

In the context of this roleplay, I think the most plausible AI character you could create would be the ship we're riding in itself! You could present as a hologram on the Bridge and control servile droids that do a lot of the work in the service areas. You could potentially leave the ship and move around as long as the signal reaches.

The Eye of the Needle (where Fantasy and Sci-fi collide)

Hangar 147

The smoke grenade was gradually dying out, revealing a dozen black-clad troops moving into the hangar. Ezra’s team had fanned out behind engineering consoles, spare parts and cargo created near the open end the Jotunheim was slowly flying through. The attackers shot up at the spacecraft’s bulbous engine cowlings before taking cover when the mercenaries returned fire.

Levi ducked behind a small mobile crane, flicked a spent mag out of his AR and clicked a fresh one in. “Looks like they aren’t stopping! Get ready to bug out.” He called over comms, icy wind ripping at his armour.

“Ezra, come in brother, over.” …Static. Then a piercing buzz overrode all other sound in the hangar. Levi gritted his teeth and looked towards the sound. The ship was halfway outside, manoeuvring jets suspending its massive bulk off the floor. The thick wire that ringed its hull on two dozen steel brackets was…shimmering and crackling with blue light. A sound like submarine cable being stretched taut rippled through their skulls, jangling every nerve.

Like a baby bird leaving its nest for the final time, the Jotunheim exited Hangar 147 into the fjords of Norway.

---

The Jo’s shuttle bay

Ezra barely registered the sound of a taser behind him before his muscle memory kicked in. He spun around and swung his rifle at the spider. Its gangly forelegs clung to his gun and back legs scrabbled for a purchase against his chest. Its electric probe glanced off his forearm plate as they staggered around together. Ezra dropped his main weapon and held the robot off with one hand but the spider just scrambled up onto his shoulders and lunged for him again. Though heavy, It wasn’t designed for combat, and struggled to bring its zapper to bear.

In one movement, he drew his sidearm, pressed it against the spider’s underbelly and began firing, sending sharp raps echoing around the shuttle bay.

Darnell had been trying to communicate with the face on the other side of the airlock who he thought was the Captain when they turned away. Upon hearing gunshots, he instantly turned and saw what was happening. He held out his arms in a pacifying gesture.

“Guys! We’re on the same SIDE!”

He moved quickly to Eva and spoke urgently to her.

“I need to talk to the Captain. Tamerlane ran the data from your last test through a different program. If the shields are on and being impacted, and the engines and FTL drive are online, we’re all going to die!”

The sickening sound of the shields coming online simmered up around the engine noises from outside. Darnell cried out involuntarily in despair and grabbed at the slight blonde woman.

“You do get it, right? I don’t want to die! Now get your Captain to open this door right now!”

---

The Bridge

“Dialling them in now, sir.” Bosko confirmed from the Pilot’s chair at the front of the bridge. Floating one hand, he overlaid both potential routes on a 3d model of the region projected to the right of his control yoke. The Jotunheim was primarily controlled from consoles, but there were some ergonomic manual options too, which Jankovic made good use of.

The doors whooshed open and Zey stalked in on the balls of her feet. The bridge was intentionally darkened to allow her crew to focus on the various consoles and readouts. Light strips outlined walkways between workstations.

“Captain on bridge.” Anselm announced, only looking up from their screen for a moment to acknowledge her. Anselm was the Comms officer, a tall and muscular Danish woman with great facial bone structure, piercing grey eyes and light yellow hair pulled back into a severe ponytail.

“Talk to me. What's it like outside?” Zey ordered, striding to the front and looking out of the wide cockpit window. As she passed by Mallory, she grabbed the ludicrous hat off her XO’s head and threw it into a corner.

“Not good.” Bosko grunted, easing the Jotunheim forward and building the speed up.

The sun was peeking over the horizon at the fjord, and by its light one could see two dozen spacecraft attempting to escape. A giant fire had erupted across the mountain range ahead of them from a crashed ship, and some other vessels were shooting at each other in confusion. The ATC came through as an unintelligible warble.

“Full ahead all aux jets, stay low until we get out of here.” Zey ordered.

“Aye, ma’am.” Bosko increased the power and the change in thrust could immediately be felt throughout the ship. The Jotunheim started to skim rapidly above the black waves of the fjord, building to a speed of roughly a hundred miles per hour.

“Anselm, tell me you’ve got hold of Tamerlane.”

“We’re still jammed, Captain. The shuttle bay stowaways are asking to talk to you though.”

“I’m a little busy. Tell everyone to hold onto something.”

“Aye aye.” Anselm pressed her earbud to activate ship-wide comms.

“Passengers, strap yourselves in for a bumpy ride. We are attempting to exit the fjords.”

---

The concourse

The people dressed as Norwegian military had neutralised the spaceport’s meagre security, and were close to crippling the ATC. Now, their quarry had finally emerged from hiding. Its FTL drive, their prize, gave off a unique energy signature that they could trace from miles away.

Together, teams smashed windows on the concourse and wheeled large armament boxes into position. Clicking open the catches, they flipped the boxes open to reveal brand new, man portable surface-to-air guided missile launchers. Spotters located the Jotunheim while others prepared to fire a salvo. Finally, against a backdrop of chaos over the water, they fired a half-dozen rockets that exploded from their tubes to spiral towards the target.

Greetings, stranger!

Welcome to the Guild, @Phantom Caliber! I love post-apocalyptic settings - that says a little something about me doesn't it?

[daredabble has joined the game]

Welcome to the Guild, @daredabble! Any particular sort of Horror and/or Fantasy?