Viola Chen: Intergalactic Pen Pal

From: Remy Knox (Public Terminal PTS-1109) New Detroit, Five Sisters Subsector
To: Miss Viola Chen 279 Melchior, Sol Subsector
Relay: In-system xboat for standard delivery

Dear Viola,
I haven’t written in a while. I know when we set up this correspondence ring all those ages ago, we agreed to be punctual and regular about sending these muddled thoughts. (It was Junior Grade Level in Primary School, right? Sometimes I can hear you faintly echo the answers across the grand dark reaches; They’re memories lost like tears in the rain and all that sentimental fluffy vent lint. And the echoes I hear are just the dark recesses of my mind.) Well, this time, I have reasoning for this offense, so if you’ll forgive me, I’ll put on my barrister’s wig and begin. I have a defense that will, beyond any reasonable doubt, clear me of wrong doing; and at the end you will see this situation is not my fault. Wait, that’s not entirely true. I’ve some personal fault in this but not enough for me to shoulder all the blame. And before I sever my foot with a laser spanner, I’ll go ahead and begin. (I’m sorry for shifting from past to the present tense there. I think I’ll be doing a lot of that during the course of this transmission.)

And you’re probably wondering why this message is being sent from a New Detroit public terminal and not Iderati, the capital planet of the subsector and the last shining point in civilized space. Don’t worry. I’ll be getting to that.

To really begin, we’ll have to backtrack to some information I know you’re already aware of. (Yes. Giving obvious hackneyed information drives me spare and goes against my personal beliefs. But to properly deliver my defense, I feel that even a small amount of background information is necessary to prove my innocence or near-innocence in this case. Right. Enough stalling.) As you know, I’ve been an assistant professor of engineering and mechanical design at Iderati’s premier university for ten going on many years. My ambition in life has always been improving and designing space ships in every sense of the sentence fragment. Perhaps for the private sector or maybe the Imperial navy.

Wait. Why did I just say that? I would design Imperial ships but it would have to be on my terms. Sure, the Imperial fleet has a wide variety of ships. Some are good and some are relics that really belong in a museum. Okay, a really big museum, preferably in space. And sure, what young kid doesn’t dream of graduating with top honors only to have the navy elites break down his door with promises of money and glory? It happened to me just about every single year. It happened so often, I could even recall the recruiter’s names after a while.
But just because it’s everykid’s dream doesn’t mean it’s mine. When I got to the end of my first degree, I didn’t feel like it was enough, so I went back and got another one. And another. And one more. After my third or fourth degree, I think the faculty just decided I would stay around forever, and so I was offered a professorship, which I took, and that’s what I’ve been doing ever since. And though I do appreciate being on the fringe of the knowledge avant guarde, we both know that I wanted to get on board some random piece interstellar-ravaged beauty and make something of her. Sure, a life in the navy would mean polished consoles and white engines hot off the drive presses and lens flares reflecting off absolute white surfaces. Just a light show really with yahoos in clean-pressed uniforms standing above their men ordering them to scamper about all decks hurrying like drones.

Yeah. Authority. I have to take a pretty deep breath just to get the bad taste of the word out of my mouth. And besides, I have a hard time accepting an organization built on the idea that he with the bigger spinal mount overruns the native population. But I’ve devoted entire volumes of letters with diatribes about my distaste for the military.

So navy ships were out. What was left? I looked into the scout service. Even a few merchant vessels. Each time I felt nothing out of the ordinary, so I stayed with the university. Being a scholar wasn’t my first choice either, but I got time to get another degree in another aspect of the engineering. It wasn’t my ideal of living but it paid my bills, and I could experiment in the labs with some new project.

And then it all changed in a night on a single bad answer. A Fiday where I could have stayed in my warm hovel, a glass of synthehol in one hand and a Popular Starships magazine in the other. But, no, I accepted an invitation to pub crawl with some students. I think they were celebrating one of their number getting married to a girl or an Aslani dowager. I really don’t care and I don’t care to remember.

And here the details get a little hazy. I’ve reconstructed most of it, but most of that jigsaw fell prey to the bin long ago.

I know we were in the area of the starport because those bars had the most interesting crowds. It was a stupid reason, but I went along and partook of the excess. About 12 bars and many drinks later, I can’t remember much. Everything became a blurred backdrop and I essentially became a nodding head, aware and laughing at every meaningless comment. Then I went somewhere to do something with one or two of them and returned to the starport. I next recall stepping, or stumbling, into something with a breathing device on my face. With my giggles escaping the mask, everything slowed to where I saw, or thought I saw, their faces staring at me from a window far away.

Then came the chill, a frigid feeling like when you overdose on peppermint patties or when you bathe in drive coolant. Cold and nothing is what I experienced then.

And then I found myself freezing on a metallic gourney with a medic flashing his light in my eyes. He asked me some questions: who I was, what year I was in, which Imperium we were in―the standard conscious questions. He checked my reflexes, taking some basic measurements, and then he left. My clothes were folded on the table, cleaned and pressed. Still I looked around to figure out where the hell I was. A medical bay. How did I get there? Was it alcohol poisoning? If that was case, then the doctor had no bedside manner. He left before I could say anything.

So, I got my grubbies on and walked out the door only to discover another long hallway and not a nurse or doctor in sight. I did see a bunch of multi-colored lines and arrows pointing in a direction to “Departure and Arrival,” so I followed those. I felt well enough. No need to stay there any longer.
Only the hallway led to an empty room with a husky blonde sadly stuffed into an incredibly tight business suit sitting behind some kind of reception counter. She gave me a smile that appeared genuine unless you looked really hard and saw it was phony.

“Oh, good morning, Mr. Knox,” she said with the manufactured smile. She spoke about me being the last to wake up and that coming out of freeze had proved more difficult than previously imagined. I just shrugged my shoulders and agreed.

“Are feeling well enough to leave?” she asked. Again I nodded and said sure.

“Good,” she said. She leaned forward looking at my feet. At least I think she was looking at my feet.

“Do you have any luggage? Anything to declare?” she asked.

I said no explaining I came in with just the clothes on my back.

“Oh,” she said forming her mouth in a rather round “O,” which sounded like a clash between bemusement and bewilderment. “You’re one of those.

“So, is your trip for business or pleasure?” she said resuming her forced script.

Now that was a strange thing to ask. Since when do they ask you about business and pleasure in a hospital anyway? I’m usually smart about catching onto things, but in this instance (blame it on the booze) I couldn’t see what it actually meant.

Again I shrugged and said it was for pleasure on the grounds that the pleasurable consumption of alcohol is what got me there to begin with.

“Ah, I see,” she said simply. “Then could I see your papers?” she said holding up a stamp and ink pad from behind the desk where she sat. Hold the phone. Stamps and ink on a tech 12 world? What kind of wonky establishment was this?

“Look lady,” I said. “I don’t have anything like that on me. I’m probably very late for a teaching appointment, so could we just move things along?”

“Don’t have papers? That’s odd. We usually are very thorough about this business, you know. Must have been lost in the transit…well can’t be helped. You’re already here.”

Yes, I agreed, energized with the desire to just get out of here.

“Then, that’s everything I suppose.” She straightened and flexed that plastic grin. “On behalf of Tukera Lines, welcome to New Detroit. We hope you will fly with us again.”

“Lady, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I said. “There’s no city called New Detroit on Aderati. The only place I know of with that name is part of the Five Sister’s colonies.”

And that’s when the truth came up to the surface like so much peat bog muck and gas. My physical condition was not due to alcohol like I originally thought. No, I had been in low-berth stasis on the boat to the astral heart of darkness.

That’s when I flushed all my patience and civility down the tubes. I demanded a refund. Her smile vanished like so much shattered latex, informing me that the trip was one-way and nonrefundable.

Then I demanded a return trip. She explained that could happen with the normal passenger fee of 1,000 cr. I told her to where to shove those imaginary credits. We argued for a while longer until I threatened legal action and stormed out the front door into the street.

“Have a pleasant stay, you elitist shitass,” I heard her shout though the door when I left. “Hope you don’t get murdered in the streets or just starve to death.”

I chose a random direction and walked a while in search of a financial institution to finance my way off this rock. When I did, I walked straight in there. Actually, I didn’t because I walked right into the door. Stunned and shaken I inspected the thing only discover my mistake. It was an old door, the kind you need to push to open and shut. Are you kidding me? What kind of people are there in the universe who don’t have universal biochip recognition tied to automatic opening and closing mechanisms for their doors? I’m pretty sure we as a species evolved beyond those manual doors ages ago.

But shaking my head, I marched into that bank full of determination…only to stand in a lovely line. Twenty minutes later, I spoke to a teller and explained to him my situation, demanding I be given the requisite amount of money to walk right back into that spaceport and return home living the high life and coming up with a reason why I needed a six-month absence from the university.

And then he informed me of my financial status. I had no money in my bank accounts; they were all drained over the weeks after I went on my little pleasure cruise. I can only my guess my “friends” had gotten a hold of my personal information and funded themselves for more drunken sprees. I marched out of that bank wishing each one of those drunken degenerates death by exploding liver damage.

But what was I to do? Stuck on a planet with no money and no way to get back. I needed to think of something and think of something quick. That’s when the idea of writing to you came to mind. I needed to do something that would take my mind off the stress and come up with some kind of plan.


So, now that I’m sitting here in this booth, I think I’ve come up with solution. Sorry, I need toggle the grammar switches back to the present tense again.

I can’t go back to Iderati, but I’m not sure if I really want to. Yes, I’m stuck on planet of primitive tech apes, but I’m in a part of space that is just screaming to be developed―the frontier of the final frontier.

There’s another plus to consider. The Keening shipyards. That lovely jewel is one of the hottest places for shipbuilding in the subsector. It’s a place where a guy of my skills could definitely be put to good use. But getting there requires money and that’s something I don’t have.

No problem though. I’ll just browse the want ads and get a job. It might just be working as a grease monkey fixing liners for the starport here, but it will get me money nevertheless. When I have the credits, I’ll book passage on a liner and then it will be off to the stars, on the way to fulfilling that next part of the unfolding mystery of life.

Yeah, in spite of the anger I felt a while ago, I think I really could make things here work out. Sure I might be light years from home without a credit to my name stuck in the ass end of space, but I can take anything and making it better be it a machine or one of life’s many problems.
And sure there might just be an enforcer knocking the outside of my terminal window telling me my time is up; that I need to move along so the angry space bum can get his turn in the terminal. Yeah, he’s threatening to take me down to the station now. I could leave, but if I persist, he might take me back to the station and let me have a hot meal and stay overnight. That would get me at least one meal. Not that these terminals are anything to shout about. Geez gentlemen, are we civilized or bone-throwing monkeys? the age of air touch/physical keyboard interfaces went with out with the first Imperi…………..

End of Written Transmission

I love it. Adventures of the new space professor hobo.

Adventures of the new space professor hobo.

I can only hope this character does not become the butt of everyone's joke as what happened to the last space bum I tried to play.

Unlikely. Your 10 point disadvantage is just a little front loaded in how it pinches.

Funny to think that by the time your pen pal gets these in Sol you will all have been likely spaced by pirates long since.

you will all have been likely spaced by pirates long since.

Spaced by pirates or become pirates of space? That is the real question we must consider.

Remy Knox wrote:

Adventures of the new space professor hobo.

I can only hope this character does not become the butt of everyone's joke as what happened to the last space bum I tried to play.

It doesn't help your character's reputation when he digs through garbage bins to find thown-away food, or pinch candy from vending machines.

And Mechior? Yeah. Methinks that when any return messages arrive in system we'll all be swimming with the fishes.

It doesn't help your character's reputation when he digs through garbage bins to find thown-away food, or pinch candy from vending machines.

He's just a man, man. A man trying to survive in a harsh urban jungle. He's just like Casey in that regard only his enemies are hunger and cold cruel world.

From: Remy Knox (Public Terminal PTS-8827) New Detroit, Five Sisters Subsector
To: Miss Viola Chen 279 Melchior, Sol Subsector
Relay: In-system xboat for standard delivery

Dear Viola,
I don’t know how I get myself into these things, Chen. I really don’t. One moment you’re living your life as happy as you please. The next you’re tossed into the great galactic garbage heap with next to nothing. Not even a lousy Imperium ID card. Just a few months ago, I wouldn’t have taken a second look at mine as it sat unused in my back pocket. Now it’s practically the greatest asset I can have, save it’s lost somewhere in a space port back on Iderati.

Remember how upbeat I was in my last communication before it got interrupted by the bum and his cop buddy? Forget about that too. Toss that in the bin because I’m not out of trouble. Actually, I think I’ve fallen down a second rabbit after having recovered from falling down the first. But I’m getting to that—I really am.

So, there I was on New Detroit, a tidally locked planet suffering from either excessive day or night and guess which one I landed in? No, go ahead and pick. Did you choose the worst of the two? Hope so.

So, there I was all at work making my mental plans when before I knew it, I wandered into a broken down neighborhood. I took a moment to look around, and that’s when I saw this guy perched like a bird on a railing just looking down at me. We made eye contact. He saw me and I saw him all dressed in fancy dark clothes. And then he just vanished into thin air. I kid you not. One moment he was there, and the next, nothing just like a magician’s exit. I honestly wondered if I was supposed to applaud the spectacle.

Then someone else appeared, a pretty intimidating guy in a duster carrying a shotgun. He scanned the area and saw me. I told him that his friend had gone. He told me to stay put and that he was coming downstairs.

Did I wait for him to come out and turn me into string cheese? No, sir. I ran as fast as I could as long as I could. I may have run right out of that ramshackle shanty town if I weren’t tackled down an alley. They were cops and they had questions about a murder that happened at the place I fled from. I didn’t take kindly to being tackled and so I kept my mouth shut about answering any of their questions. They responded by putting me in a paddy wagon and there I stayed.

A while later, they let this guy in, a real pretty boy dressed in an overcoat (Seriously? Does everyone on this planet need an overcoat?), who introduced himself as Cale Roth, a private investigator working with the police. He started asking me the same questions. Now, you know me, Chen. I’m not the kind to break down immediately, but there was something about this guy. No, it wasn’t his pretty-boy face. I don’t swing that way. No, call it something in his voice, in his mannerisms, but honestly I felt it would be a good idea to open up to him. So I did. It was some kind of unspoken coercion I guess. Hope he’s not a closet psychic or anything.

We got out of the paddy wagon and talked with the cops for a bit. I was to stay close to Mr. Roth and come to the station if I needed to pick out a face from the lineup. We went to Mr. Roth’s car. He tried to start it; the vehicle didn’t respond to him. He tried to turn the motor over again. I hopped out and looked under the hood. The problem was the battery injectors: they had been forcibly removed from the car. I mentioned the word sabotage to Mr. Roth, but he didn’t seem to care much. So, we started hoofing it back to his place where I’d at least get something to warm to eat and drink.
Only we didn’t get there. Instead some sleek limousine cruised right alongside us where it stopped and two giant men stepped out. They said they had business with Mr. Roth. I took that moment to explain I wasn’t with Mr. Roth and got out of there as quick as I could.

There was a diner nearby, so on an empty stomach and pockets, I decided to do a little dumpster diving to see if I could find anything decent. At that point I really didn’t care what I found. That’s when the other guy in the duster and shotgun showed up and quick like a shot I ran. Only I couldn’t shake the guy and he cornered me in an alley. I thought my number was up only he didn’t lay me out. Instead he wanted to know about everything that happened there at the crime scene. He even offered to give me some food in exchange for it. I believed him. Much like Mr. Roth, he exuded something, some feeling from a dark corner of my mind that he could be trusted. So my stomach led the way.

As I ploughed through about four breakfast specials, I told him everything I knew including the tale that got me to this dark slimy mud hole. I found out he was on the run from someone (he didn’t say who), and the murder scene was an address he’d been given to stay ahead of his pursuers. Only, it seemed, his pursuers were playing one step ahead of him.

And then I realized who it was that drank coffee before me. It was Casey Duquette. I kid you not, THE Casey Duquette. You remember, he’s the one caused that ruckus a few years ago over slaughtering the entire population of Saurus. He and his crew were quite the celebrities especially among the Eco heads at the university who thought killing 50,000 people a victory for the planets. Down with man and his killing of the genetically-engineered dinosaur. You know crazy twat like that.

Who would have thought? Me running into a mega-90-day celebrity.

About that time Mr. Roth wandered into our café searching for me and settled at our table. Together we found out that some of the cops on that scene were one the take since one of them had tampered with Mr. Roth’s car. We decided going to the police would mean certain death and that going back to Mr. Roth’s would be a bad idea too. Which left getting a hotel to split between the three of us.

We walked between at least two hotels until Duquette decided we were in the right place. He and Roth squabbled over setting up some equipment and revealing something hidden on a note. I solved their second problem by applying some simple chemicals to them (the wash sink is a chemist’s best friend, I always say) and then we went to sleep for the night.

About four hours afterward, I bolted straight awake with the realization I was hungry. But I was in a hotel in the middle of the night with no money, so I slipped out into the hall and spied a vending machine nearby. Looking at the mechanism, I found it relatively easy to open and hotwire so that it spit out a few chococrispy bars. The machine didn’t much like being tampered with, but I had my meals for the next little while. I ate a bar and it satiated me for a while. I gave one to Duquette; he took it and didn’t think to ask how I got a hold of them. Or maybe he didn’t need to.

So, when morning came (I say morning ‘cause the clock numbers read 8:00 a.m. The skies outside though were still blacker than a poorly maintained motivator bypass junction), Mr. Roth said he needed to check things at his office. He was gone for a few hours and returned looking like had been knocked through a three-story window, which, oddly enough, is exactly what happened to him. He had a little encounter with our disappearing man who also possessed the power to channel lightning through batteries. But we discovered that all his tricks were based on gadgets, so at least they weren’t dealing with a powerful psionisist. Anyway, Roth felt that the linchpin to this whole caper lay in finding the sister of gal whose wife was the head of the Muscatoli Syndicate. And the murder we were involved in was to spark a gang war facilitated by rival merchant factions on New Detroit. Is this sounding like a noir story, yet?

So, we spent a few hours looking for clues in all the wrong places. We went to a house of ill repute searching for information. Duquette and Roth didn’t find much but they did find their way into rooms with ladies of the night. I just sat and read a magazine.

Next we walked over the threshold of a popular night club. Again, I suppose we were looking for clues or information but Duqette and Roth contented themselves by carousing with the owner and a table of Bwaps. I kept to myself and kept drinking water and chocobars to keep the hunger pangs away. All that did was annoy the waiter. As for me, I’m no detective. My only call in life is to design and fix starships, so I stayed put. I did see a few guys wander in from both the club’s exits blocking them. I called that to Duquette’s attention and he said we should get up and leave.

So we did.

And then the shooting started. I stood frozen as both Duqette and Roth dove for cover. And I just stood there like a statue while those toughs filled the air with zinging lead. Fortunately, that only lasted a few moments and I took cover behind the stage. Then I crawled on the stage and saw the mob backstage running to what I could only assume was the stage exit. I reached a safe corner and turned around in time to see Duquette gun down one tough and Roth cut another in two with his laser pistol.

And I ran. I didn’t wait for anything or anyone, least of all those two gun lovers. I hit the street and ran with the fleeing mob. I ran until I ran out of breath. And then I saw a park with a bunch of public terminals not in use. I needed a place to sit down and collect my thoughts and so that’s what brings me writing to you.

So, as you can see, quite a lot has happened to me over the last while. In thinking about what I can do, I’ve come to a conclusion. I need to hide and hide deep. I need to disappear into a group that nobody cares about, like say a group of bums, and hide out at a church mission or something. Perhaps there I can get another ID and begin the process of trying to get out of this nightmare.

What about Casey Duquette and Cale Roth? I don’t know. Maybe they won and maybe they were overwhelmed by the zoot suits with guns. I don’t know and I’m not going back to find out. I’ve found the address to a UCG (Universal Church of God) mission not too far from this park. That’s where I’m headed. I hope to write to you soon.
Take care and pray for the both of us.

Remy

END OF TRANSMISSION……..

The member 'Remy Knox' has done the following action : Dices roll

---

'D6' : 3, 5, 6

My die roll equals...14. I may need to use luck for that if it were an important skill roll.

I am confused. When did this take place? It must have been so long ago that I dont remember it at all.

I am confused. When did this take place? It must have been so long ago that I dont remember it at all.

I know, right? It's so far removed in the past, I think we might need to do a reboot of that first game just get everyone else up to speed.

Hope he’s not a closet psychic or anything.

Haha! Subtle.

Much like Mr. Roth, he exuded something, some feeling from a dark corner of my mind that he could be trusted. It was almost like they were both player characters, and I wasn't allowed to use player knowledge to know that Jon used Casey to kill PC after PC in Eric's previous game.

Much like Mr. Roth, he exuded something, some feeling from a dark corner of my mind that he could be trusted. It was almost like they were both player characters, and I wasn't allowed to use player knowledge to know that Jon used Casey to kill PC after PC in Eric's previous game.

Well, Remy doesn't fully trust Casey or Cale, at least not yet. (Casey and Cale. That name combination nearly sounds like an Australian Saturday morning program about a boy and his bush kangaroo.) He's only know you for a day, and the only reason he's followed you around this far is because of two things...

A. You haven't shot him full of precise laser points or shotgun pellets yet

B. You've given him food

That intuition moment happened only as the balancing point that this guy with the shotgun wasn't going to kill him outright.  Beyond that, he knows that trouble with more guns is following both Casey and Cale like specters of death. Maybe that will give him enough reason to get as far from you as possible.

Nice read there Jake.

Yeah there has been a gap since the first session. We'll do a thorough recap next week when we resume. Dust off those fedoras!

Dust off those fedoras!

My character doesn't have a fedora. He can't afford one neither...

So the Space Bum really is not a space bum after all. He really is an Ideratan professor, and is of such profound knowledge that he can impress a sentient AI with his views on the Jump Six FTL drive.

So the Space Bum really is not a space bum after all. He really is an Ideratan professor, and is of such profound knowledge that he can impress a sentient AI with his views on the Jump Six FTL drive.

More than a Space Bum. That could have been the No.1 slow jazz hit of New Detroit.


But now it's all moot.

For you see...as the party celebrated their win over Lightning Lad, drinking to excess and smoking cigars galore, they failed to ignore a silent figure slip out the room door. No one in the room saw him go.

He left to take his chances at the Universal Church of God provided he could make it there without getting gunned down or picked up by the cops. Then he'd take some odd jobs for a single standard passage ticket, and then he'd leave the planet of New Detroit. Back to Iderati. Back to the comfort of his former university existence.

THE END