Once I had composed myself it was time for planning. The machine spirit helped me calibrate the auspex for weather pattern prediction. The amount of sulfur and other components the volcanos were throwing out were great for my promethium projections but terrible for landing in. Already an ash plume was conjoining with the dust from the Beacon. At best with no continued volcanic activity, I had 2 weeks before the slow weather patterns cleared the skies.
I had a choice to make. It was a two-day run to the ice planet. I would need ice for a lot of different applications. Ignoring my lacking equipment, it made sense. The other choice was a 6 day burn to the L5 Lagrange trailing the gas giant. I could also use the time scan the giant and its myriad moons for materials for future use, but I lacked any mining equipment. I had plenty of raw material for construction so thinking about that would be an effort in futility. The real kicker was the signal. I did not have a visual, so the object was probably small or shielded in some way. I had fed the signal through the cogitator bank and had gotten a non-answer. It was made to transmit signals that we didn’t have the equipment to translate. The Beacons cogitator banks would probably have gotten me a translation and an estimation of the xeno species that made it just from the frequency used. No use crying over what could-be, I needed to choose. So, I planned a path to the signal with Vibrant and had the servitors meet me on deck one. We needed to cover the maw of the vessel if I ever wanted to land, and we had 12 days before we returned.
++ To every problem, the solution lies in applied tech-lore ++
The MIU helpfully pointed out. It wasn’t wrong. As we had removed the extendable ramps, I needed a multi-purpose device. To seal the deck from the worst of reentry and to provide a ramp. We started with the hinges. Already had adamantine hinges for the vectored thrust of the engine as well as the struts to attach to them.
Using the last of the plasteel Gantry we assembled the frame. While the servitors welded it together, I began the delicate maneuver of working on the exterior of the ship while under thrust. Working only light tools to prep for the hinges where the floor of deck 1 meets the reinforced outer shell of the ship I delicately made space for 4 of the adamantine hinges. Assuming we use 8 of the struts we would have space for 2 Leman Russ sized vehicles entering and exiting next to each other. With an adamantine locking mechanism of a disassembled hinge and a void rated actuator for the ship it should remain closed under stress of maneuver in the void. Adding 2 low tech winches fitted with void cable would enable the door to be lowered in gravity relatively easy. But with the adamantine and ceramite would be uncomfortably near the breaking point under anything more than 1g terrestrially. I sighed as it was the best I could do.
Finalizing the work plan and orders took the better part of a day filled with only minor breaks. I had been awake for over 2 standard days and needed rest.
One of the solutions the Tech-Priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus had found to the problem of a tech-priest losing a third of his working lifespan to sleep was the mix of memory and cognition enhancers that everyone got when they were fully inducted. A Mind Impulse Unit takes these effects and multiplies them. I have full access to the noosphere virtual reality when I sleep. I could even get most of my work done in this state that I’d ever need. I really prefer working with my hands though. I have saved all my reading material to go through while I catch up on sleep and I realize I need the extra time. It is honestly holy how much data a senior tech priest can transfer to another MIU when he needs to.
With a quick prayer to the Omnissiah I delve into the meticulously organized information I had received. The Lord Captains logs meant for the Forge Master. Next there was a plan for an optimized efficiency set up for the deployed manufactorums and Iron Womb facility. Also plans on how to sufficiently use the near 100 million people who lived on the target planet for our Questor Mechanicus. With the realization that this might not be as rewarding as I had hoped my next step floored me.
++ The Omnissiah directs our footsteps to the path of knowledge ++
Everything that a new forge needs to begin the process of building a new forge world can be boiled down to the STCs. Although it is an honor for a Tech-Priest to work the auto-forges of a forge world, in which all you need to do is have a copy of the STC supposed to be read by the equipment, all one really needs is the ability to forge the right alloy of metal. Then to shape it on the blessed lathe and machine press utilizing the mechandrites to place circuits and other holy implementations. A STC can be as simple as a pipe wrench or as complex as the mightiest war machines of the Mechanicum.
I had to force myself to breathe as I noticed that the Magos had included a back-up of everything he had to build the Questor Mechanicus. I noticed that while I have many available, like the great manufactorums and genetoriums that make the backbone of a Forge World and all the of transport infrastructure to make sure it can be fed, I do not have access to the more advanced things that would make a Questor Mechanicus. They’re all encrypted so I only have an idea on the bounty. Probably as a security measure, so the Forge Master doesn’t make me embrace eternal service as a servitor for knowing too many things. The knights, and possibly more, are locked. But I have a starting point.
The next section is the starmaps. I open them on impulse and realize I should have known better. Maps whose geometry and directions are based on the non-Euclidean nature of the immeterium has no business being looked at by a non-psyker non-navigator like myself. My sleeping body writhes as my mind is assaulted by what seems to be pure distilled curiosity. Forced out of the noosphere by cascading critical alerts I felt as if the ship beneath my hands was trembling before it stopped, and the alerts ceased.
“Vibrant, what the hell was that?” I ask from the command seat.
++…Unsure ++ Captain auspex sensors confirm warp-adjacent turbulence ++
“Run a full diagnostic on the ship now! Keep the servitors in view.” I fervently wished I had an Omnissian Axe or even a las weapon now. As the minuets turned into an hour the systems of the Vibrant Echo started to ping the all-clear. No Scrap code detected, no cogitator thinking for itself, none of the machine spirits being puppeted by daemonic influence. It was like nothing had happened.
Watching the servitors, all 12 of which had finished their tasks and were doing the basic maintenance of the engine room and reactor. The panel that had fallen was back in place and the safety railing was bent back into shape. Bends and dents making it obvious what had happened but cleaned so the horror wasn’t so fresh.
“Vibrant, what does warp-adjacent mean?”
++ The Phenomena that occurred was comparable to when a Gellar Field loses efficiency in the warp and warp phenomena occur aboard a vessel ++ No comparable events recorded happening in real-space without a psyker nearby exist within my memory bank, hence warp-adjacent ++
Well, that was terrifying. This new galaxy was already showing that the immeterium was powerful in the local area. Especially when a psyco-active object only existing as a digital scan caught the attention of something so powerful it could peer into this dimension merely when a non-psyker looked at it. Immediately I went to work quarantining the scans of maps behind my best encryption work yet. I would need to make an air-gapped cogitator and memory back for this later as it was the best I could do, but I did not have the equipment.
I sigh and go back to the STCs. I needed something to calm down and without a small auto-forge chapel to pray at looking at the holy relics would help.
Turns out, after I was scouring the industrial STCs there is a small auto-forge chapel. It’s connected to a large piece of equipment, an overland freight train, and it requires a lot of components I currently don’t have but I could modify it for use in the Vibrant Echo. The problem with it was the cogitator it required, and I could only make a few good cogitators with the servitors I had on board. I was no Magus Biologis that could skillfully get an entire cogitator bank out of the material in 12 servitors.
As it was, I still had a lot of nervous energy to work off and days left in the journey. I decided to plan what my next steps should be. I would never be able to get a whole Forge World going on my own, but a forge village would go a long way to securing my foothold in this system.
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Sheev Palpatine sat with Janus Greejatus in his comfortable Senate apartment on Coruscant being waited on by the ever-present Sate Pestage. They had been discussing the Chommel Sector and what they could do to curtail the monopoly of Nabooan plasma to the Nemoidians of the Trade Federation. It was a common discussion between them and while Sheev could usually entertain his friend the compartmentalizing of is life meant that if he were to stare out past the Slice and deeper in wildspace Janus might ask questions he wouldn’t answer.
It took 10 minutes and some covert signals to Sate to fake an emergency he needed to take care of so Janus wouldn’t feel slighted by having their time curtailed.
“It was good talking with you my friend, and I agree. King Veruna has allowed many slights to our people to go unchecked. I might have a plan or two when we can get together in the coming weeks.”
“Sheev, my friend, speaking with you is a balm to this poor politician’s soul. I wish you well, and I’ll be back to air more complaints from the Chommel sector to the Senate soon.”
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Sheev kept the pleasant smile on his face until his friend was gone.
“Sate, I’m going to be busy until tomorrow. Make sure My appointments are shifted accordingly.”
“Yes, sir.” Sate said before turning to his dataslate.
Sidious needed to meditate and feel out what happened without letting anyone else know he was scouring the force to learn what had agitated it so. In a meditative pose he sat for hours thinking on what he was feeling. It hadn’t been someone using the force, the shift he had felt came from the force itself. Sidious hesitated, it almost felt like the force was endlessly curious about something. The way the force thrummed with something approaching the excitement a doting uncle feels when he sees a nephew do something particularly clever from over his shoulder.
Sidious dove into the feeling to see if he could gain a glimpse of what caused this. He felt only that whatever had excited the force wasn’t through. There was anticipation of, something. Sheev couldn’t say. Perhaps his master Plagueis would have some awareness of what happening. He sent a message off to his master’s banker alter-ego Hego Damask requesting a meeting.
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Yoda sat in one of the louder Council meetings he had attended recently. Everything had been suggested from merely meditation on what was happening out in wildspace to mounting an expedition of knights and masters to discover what felt so curious in the force. Master Oppo Rancisiss had actually spoken, and recommended recruiting be stepped up. Intuiting that sending knights to uncertain fates now would lead to a dearth of teachers for the student clans. In perhaps 5 years or a decade of training new Jedi to bear the torch of justice for the republic the ones who volunteer for such an expedition could then be sent to learn what had happened.
“No clear answer, we have.” Yoda spoke, ending at least 3 debates on separate plans. “Uncertain of what interests the force, we are. A possible machination, this is.” Looks turned more serious about the room, Masters Windu and Dyas nodding emphatically. “Felt the taint of the dark side, we all have. It clouds our vision. Perhaps, we follow Master Rancisiss’s plan. Never hurt, more younglings have.” He finished to rueful chuckles around the room.
“See if there is a Master who wishes to explore this new phenomenon, there is. Reconvene in a month on this topic, we shall.”
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Sidious and Plagueis sat in comfortable chairs after having been served by Sate. The meeting took place within a few days from the event that had so taken the interest of the force. Sidious sipped his tea while Plagueis removed his breathing mask. They sat, one in contemplation and the other waiting on the first to speak.
“Have you gotten any insight into what occurred in the force Sidious?”
“Master, just what I was able to glean myself. As well as what the jedi decided in their council meeting.” Sidious smirked, “They are jumping at shadows. Worried it is a scheme their “Sith” boogeyman cooked up to attack their order from the shadows. They are planning on stepping up youngling recruitment, which is only going to further alienate them from the outer rim.” He finished, satisfied.
“As for my own findings,” he paused, not having to fake confusion, “only that there was curiosity and excitement in the force. All aspects of it. I’m unsure as to the reason though.”
Plagueis Contemplated, “I sensed much the same as you, Sidious. But I suspect even more muted.”
“What do you mean master?” Sate came back in to refill the two Sith Lords tea.
“What I sensed seemed to have much more to do with technology, and innovation. I’m no stranger to innovation but I have never excelled with utilizing technology. There are myriads to the force and I, as you know, am much more suited to the biological aspects.”
“Perhaps we can also send a scout to divine what happened.” Sidious spoke, “While Maul is not the tool for this, I suggest perhaps finding a findsman since it’s out in wildspace. I can organize such a…”
“No need, you are correct. Someone like a findsman bounty-hunter would be ideal. I’ve got a couple on retainer.” Plagueis interrupted. “I’ll send out word and be in touch. Thank you for the tea, excellent as always, Sidious.” Plagueis finished kindly, replacing the finished cup onto the plate, and replacing his mask.
“Of course, master, I look forward to seeing what they discover.”
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It had been 5 days of void travel that let me get caught up on the various tasks I had around the Vibrant Echo. Even after placing new cowling around the stubby new nose and preforming extensive rites of maintenance on the arvus lighter I still had extra time to occupy myself with the STC’s available to me as well as Magos Ryck’s plans. Most plans were simply untenable, and the rest needed extensive modification. The assumption that getting a manufacturing base going was anything less that an impossible undertaking for me meant that even resource gathering was going to have to take a back seat to my own survival. I currently had no way to manufacture new nutrient wafers for myself. On the off chance I got lucky on the ice world, and it had an ocean underneath with an edible form of life, I would have to waste an unknown amount of my time figuring out automating a retrieval method. Which requires some way to generate power once the devourer was off planet. The lighter could be left as a generator and assume I’ll just be by once I run low on food again. It’s a terrible plan but the only one available to me as I have gotten a much better scan of the moons around the gas giant.
There are a few with carbonaceous deposits but by and large they are just large asteroids whose orbits have been captured. They would be a bounty of many of the metals I need to produce small amounts of both plasteel and ceramite and much larger amounts of structural and tool steel. I was limited on the stronger materials until I got a fully functioning forge together though.
Then there is the fuel issue. I’ve been able to pick up multiple sources I could mix for an ideal Promethium blend for the lighter, but starship fuel is a bit more intense, and I will need to throw a chemical distillery together. Which requires some of each of the carbon deposits, the iron, and the chromium. Since I don’t even have a forge to produce that I may need to throw one of the most expensive chemical distilleries by weight together and use the ceramite and adamantium I have in the hold. If I miniaturize one of the smaller refineries, I have in the STC’s and put it in one of the middle storage rooms I can convert the rooms next to it for low- and high-grade fuel storage. The high to low grade production would be around a 1 to 100 ratio so I’ll need to figure out additional storage options for the lesser fuel quickly. One of the ways to utilize this will be necessary if edible matter isn’t discovered on the ice world. Further refinement of small portions of the low-grade fuel will provide a nutrient past that is as unpleasant as it is sustaining. I would end up with many other volatiles like ethane and methane, but I could simply route them back into the low-grade storage.
The project would use a total of 8 tons of the ceramite and one of the adamantine since I can make that thin without issue. The part that hurts is I will need to use 4 of the servitors and their implants as controls and sensors for the small refinery. I’ll have to check on the ‘spare parts’ room as well. I need to set up a servo skull to control it, but I do not have the equipment to make the gravity impellers for them.
I can’t even take physical fans from an atmospheric drone chassis for the skulls to be able to transit around since the void seal on the new cargo deck hatch isn’t good enough to keep any atmosphere on the decks. It would also get awfully close to tech-heresy to do that sort of mix and matching to the Omnissiah’s holy implements. While I wouldn’t report myself its good for such contemplations to be left aside, lest temptation grow. For now, I plan to leave the two of them half-finished and merely slaved to the chemical distillery when its finished.
++ The eyes of the Omnissiah are always open ++
After that ominous reminder the plans are drawn up and orders given to the servitors on how to prepare the ceramite and to deliver some of the adamantine to my workshop for shaping I left to sit on the command bridge again. The gas giant was visible now, not just over auspex sensors. The signal was much closer and the auspex sensors had finally given me an idea of what we were approaching. A small satellite of some sort broadcasting a repeating signal. The cogitator has had some time to digest it now and its definitely repeating in a language that is nothing like low gothic or the lingua-techis. I almost wish an inquisitor was here to deal with it. I’m sure some xenarite fool from back home would have loved this opportunity.
Approaching the satellite, the first thing I notice is looks fairly new, just defaced with symbols that look strangely similar to the defacing you’d see on the lower levels of hive planets. No obvious connections but I’d probably have to pry it open to look inside for anything I could plug a mechandrite into to analyze the programing architecture. It’s awash with little signals I can feel with the MIU implant but I’m hesitant to connect unknown unreadable signals to my brain. Its small, half the size of the lighter, so we can pop open a side hatch and try to reel it in. I send an order for the servitors to put this at the top of the list and align the ship.
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Aboard the Dusty Crow the atmosphere was jubilant. They might have just pissed off a banking clan frigate, but they had looted a shuttle’s worth of debt payments. 20 tons of valuable metals and 100 thousand credits had everyone excited for when it came time to disperse shares of the loot. They were currently running from Formos into a patch of wildspace their captain had marked years ago as a spot to dump hot cargo and pick up what had been dumped previously. It was more complicated than most pirates got but the crew hadn’t been accosted as anything but smugglers occasionally, so it was working.
“Alright you louts, remember this stuff is going to have to sit for more than a year this time. Even then the Banking clan might track us if we kriff this up so get it out of your systems. We’re gonna leave it all at the dead drop and pick up that shipment of Microdata datapads and the credits we dropped from last year. It might not be as good a haul, but you shitheads will be able to drink away a few months on Tatooine when we get there.”
The captain, a devaronian, said. No matter what he said the crew knew how it worked and the stuff from last year might have been a small haul, but the captain was underselling it. Even with his and the ships cut everyone would get 6-10 thousand credits. The Microdata pocket secretary was a small and valuable piece of equipment, and they had an entire 1ton crate of them. Plus, the 20 thousand credits on hand meant each of the 12 would have another thousand in their pockets by the time they landed.
No matter what the captain said he was lounging in his captain’s chair with some Corellian brandy, and everyone else had something to sip on.
“Capin, why we gotta go to that banthashit planet? Why not Nar’Shadaa or somewhere we can get a real party going?”
One of the human raiders spoke up.
“You kriffin know as good as I do that we’ll be able to argue for a better price from one of those Toydarian bloodhound merchants than we could one of the Hutts. I want some new proton torpedoes and they ain’t cheap.”
“Sure boss, I just…”
The Gozanti-class Cruiser arrived at its destination falling out of hyperspace. The translation was a little more turbulent than the crew were used to, and several made complaints about spilled beer before the R-1 astromech droid that had come with the ship started buzzing in alarm and got the crews attention. When they looked over the sensors, they saw a tell-tale plasma plume emitted by the ship that was running into the system. And no satellite.
“Hey boss, I think that kriffing shitheads got our loot.”