Deserted

Carvings of the Galaxy

Ooh, do I sense some history there, @TheMadAsshatter

Carvings of the Galaxy

I think we should all just start fighting each other until someone walks out with a shotgun and fires it into the ceiling and is going to say "Alright, now that I have your attention..." but instead breeches the hull and we all get sucked out into space. What do you all say?

Carvings of the Galaxy

Okay, I was kind of doing a Popular Mechanics/Science sort of feel.

So basically 3D printing is going to change things radically because you will only need material, a file, and a printer in order make anything you want. Currently there are plans to make 3D printers that print in multiple mediums and use lasers to fuse the particles instead of just plastic. When this happens, you will pay to buy a file and raw materials, and then print it out... custom orders will also be possible to make it however you want. (For example, cell phones with custom hardware, sizes, etc...)

In addition, I was saying that recycling (a reclamant and grain sorter) grinds everything down into microscopic dust particles that are then sorted in accordance to harmonics and then stored for re-purposing in a 3D printer. I was also figuring that 3D printed fabric is super cool and could seriously change the clothing market as well... especially on a microscopic level.

Is it okay to have that sort of thing on the ship and/or the norm?

Carvings of the Galaxy

Now, I could use some clarification, @beyond visions We ARE from a fancy sci-fi technology future, is that correct? I recall hearing things about jetpacks, laser guns, cybernetic arms. Is this the case?

In which case, I've been laying down some technology.

-FREV-R
-3D printed food
-Reclamants with grain sorters
-Self-repairing systems

Stuff like that.

However, I keep hearing that this future is remarkably similar to the world we are in right now.
-malls being the only place to buy things
-an ignorance on repairing ship technology
-"Maybe there is something about how to repair the cryo units in the library"
-printers with paper
-etc...

So, don't take this as a gripe, I'm cool with it either way. However, I could use some clarification so that I don't drag us way off track.

Carvings of the Galaxy

So, are we waiting for something?

Carvings of the Galaxy

Quit your whining, you ninny. I've been running around about 8 to 10 miles a day for weeks now slamming through massive classroom installs pulling 10 hour days, hauling tons of crap around constantly, not to mention my 6 week old baby, and having to tend the house and cook for my poor tired wife, and you don't hear me complaining. Not to mention the constant gunfire and the frequent ninja assassination attempts!

HARDCORE!

Ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha ha! Muhahahahahahahaha!!!! I think I'm losing my mind!

Not to mention the crazy clown constantly laughing and laughing! Make it stop!

Carvings of the Galaxy

Well, that's 3 in Benji's meeting. Let's see if anybody else shows or if they are like. "Dude, I didn't get the memo."

Carvings of the Galaxy

---

Echo Montigawitz

---

Promptly there was produced a seam ripper, and thread by thread was popped. Hems were unrolled carefully. One two three... fifty. Each thread was carefully captured and placed into the reclamant for recycling in the grain sorter. Her uniform collar was gently unfolded, searching intently. There it was. Echo could hardly believe her eyes. All of this cloak and dagger was one thing to hear it discussed, but to actually witness it unfolding was something else entirely. She wondered just how many of the rest of the crew were in on this entire hush-hush information. Maybe all of them were in on it, and they were all being paranoid and stone silent on information that they all already knew.

Carefully, Echo drew out a small filament of graphene silica... nearly transparent, nearly indestructible, and nearly undetectable. This was to be the message in the bottle that the leadership of Project Renaissance was talking about. Information so volatile that they dared not digitize it for security purposes. Final instructions perhaps? An explanation of their situation? Maybe it was simply a farewell.

Echo jumped into her belongings and got to work. All of the components should have been provided. She simply needed to assemble, listen, and then dismantle the custom auditory device. She was about to assemble it when Benji’s request for a team meeting echoed through the ship. Her quarters were prepared for the quiet of the chamber and automatically lowered the volume so that it was not startling.

"Attention, attention, all crew mates please report to the living area... Ha! I feel official, oh wait forgot to turn the mic off."Really? We’re all going to jump at the beck and call of the crazy doctor? Just go along with it.
The components were stashed quickly and without any visible form of disruption to the tidiness of her chambers... as they were perfectly designed. The message was stored properly now that it had been collected. In a moment, nothing was out of place, and someone would be hard pressed to even know that clandestine operations had taken place.

She closed her closet only to notice the laser marks again.

“I’m going to need to replace those..." At first she took a moment to examine it, then in a flash she had removed the 6 screws and held the hatch under an arm. "...or not.”

She snatched up her explosive with her spare hand and proceeded to the common area with a smile on her lips and a spring in her step. Entering the room was only Benji, Tahlia, and Ailbeart Rend. She didn’t seem to notice as she plopped her spoils on the table. She had to do a double-take as she saw the final member of the crew. Her first reaction was shock, then confusion.Oh great! Of course they would allow politics and greed dictate their decisions. After all, what is mankind but the Devil's palankeen barror?
She finally seemed to settle on delight at his presence. She was far too sophisticated to rush him with an outstretched hand. However, her enthusiasm was difficult to conceal since she could not help but take a number of steps to approach him, and her hands seemed a little animated at the vision before her. Finally they settled on clasping in front of her to tether them and hold them steady (as she had been raised to do) and she almost curtsied before him. “Ailbeart Rend? Forgive me, but I must be out of sorts for having missed your presence on board. I must say that it is an honor to have you join us. My father has been thoroughly captivated by your guile and cunning, not to mention your irrefutable successes. I suspected that they would undoubtedly include some sort of leadership for our mission, but I am indeed surprised that they were able to gain the cooperation of a man of your caliber.”You sick minded, $@&s0

Carvings of the Galaxy

Well, I'm posting if nobody else is.

Carvings of the Galaxy

Echo Montegawitz

---

FREV-R (Force Resistance Enhanced Virtual-Reality) had hit the schools with the force of an asteroid impact. It was brand new in Echo’s father’s generation. A training that went beyond words, went beyond sounds, went beyond stereoscopic vision, and jumped straight to muscle memory. While clumsy and more of a novelty in the ritzy schools when it first came out, in a matter of decades FREV-R had grown up. It wasn’t sporadic, lazy, or antisocial any longer. It had matured into reliable, useful, and user-friendly. Not only that but inertia, temperature, and even smell had enhanced the FREV-Rs after the years to make it a full simulation.

However, the actual muscle memory learning that made trades and tech as well as fine arts learned at thousands of the pace of normal, the true game-changer was the content. Several billion sims had been recorded and written for FREV-R specifically for manufacturing, maintenance, and repair.

Couple that with self-repairing and maintaining systems, it took the “nician” out of “Technician.” Gradually titles such as electrician or mechanic evaporated from the industries. Engineers became more of designers than anything, especially with powerful computer programs resolving all of the math and calculations that would take a classical engineer dozens of years to calculate. The only true people that really had to know from the ground up were theoretical inventors (and these sorts of people were neither a reliable, nor accessible.)

So, when Echo accessed the control panel on each of the quarters, it was no surprise to see a lack of an engineer on board. FREV-R (in combination with the crew) was the engineer, preparing them for any task that the self-repairing systems could not provide.

Echo found her quarters easy enough, the keypads were color coded to the individual and showed the registry number that Cryonautics entrusted for all computer and security access. You didn’t need to knock or randomly open doors, it listed the tenant and whether or not there was an occupant in the room or if they set their level to private. The chamber opened with a gasp, as the system awoke again. It was a room that Benji hadn’t been in for the better part of a year... probably because it was intrusive to sit in someone else’s room, and root through someone else’s things while they slept just down the hallway. No dust, and only a little cold. The lights flicked on, and properly entered into Day mode making the false windows display a slightly cloudy, slightly rainy day with a little wind rolling through the system causing the false sense that it was causing faux windows and roofs to shift at the gusts. She waved her hand and the performance shutdown promptly and return to a sterile environment.
I don’t want to be comforted right now
Echo changed her clothes quickly, and suddenly felt a wave of exhaustion roll over her. She plopped onto the bed, glancing around to see that whoever was stowing their belongings really didn’t take note of the feng shui that Echo preferred. Out of curiosity she began looking through what had been provided.
How could I be so blind! I barely packed anything because I wasn’t going to need it. I could have been exposed.
Most of her possessions were not what she brought. Rather, it was provided by her mother and sisters. It was rife with impracticality and upper crust. She wasn’t particularly partial to the formal ware, the personal luxuries, and the knickknacks that had joined her... but then again she wasn’t really all that much into free time since joining the program. There was a card left by her family, which she read and didn’t really say anything more than pride about her. She smiled and placed it in her nightstand.
Even to the very end, they didn’t say anywhere anything about love.
There was little black dress hung predominantly in the closet. A quandary rolled through her mind. Project Renaissance was probably the biggest, most expensive, most high-pressure, and probably the most successful speed date ever connived. There was Benji and Owen, both were tolerable. Andrew and Blake didn’t seem to make the cut and both seemed linger with their eyes upon Echo at meetings and training sessions. Beyond that she had no clue who the third man was.

“Mother,” she grumbled to the past, and promptly stuck the dress to the back of her wardrobe. Now was not the time for romance, without a stable food supply or a stable location nobody had better wind up with a bun in the oven any time soon.

However, upon moving her garments aside, she noticed a few boxes that were disheveled. Furthermore, there was a number of divots out of her closet hatch. Upon closer inspection, she identified them easily as the movies and entertainment loved to show, laser burns. Places where the metal had been heated to the boiling point in moments as they roasted their way through someone. Hurriedly, she opened the rest of her closet shoving out her belongings and rifling through them. She found a device of crude construction well hidden. It looked like a bomb. She grabbed it, which was probably the dumbest thing in the world to do, but she did it anyway. Then, she proceeded to find the nearest diagnostics station in order to assess the device. There was absolute fact that there was a firefight on the ship, and also that someone wanted at least one of the crew (if not all of them) dead.