Pyromania99

The ECS Stellaria - A Sci-fi Fantasy exploration adventure

"I'll 'moth-handle' when I need to." Jess said. As the ship lurched forward, she felt her weight going back. Instinctively, she grabbed onto a small pole for just such an occassion. Her other arm grabbed the Myrkith engineer and held tight. Well, Jess should have expected this much with a Myrkith captain and pilot. She took a look back at Harisa... Well, she prepared Mag-Boots for when they needed to go to the exterior of the ship to repair. "How smart of you." Jess stated to the woman as the ship went into warp and stabilized. She released her hold on the moth and patted him on the head. "Hope you didn't mind a little 'moth-handling' there."

---

In the cockpit, Cherche was just glad she was sitting down. Her entire body was tense from the sudden take-off. Had she been prepared she'd be fine but... Actually, was Engineering fine? The Med-bay? She was about to turn to question the captain when she heard a voice come over comms. "WHAT IN THE ACTUAL HELL!?" The voice exclaimed, angry or irritated. That was definitely Miss Yamada. "Make sure you warn us next time you decide to stress the ship like that!" She continued. Yea, that was definitely angry. "You're damn lucky all the tools were mag-locked down cause it'd b-- Hey!" The voice seemed to be faint... Until another picked up.

"Hey! Yea... Please give us a warning down here next time. Or, you know, take it easy? Inertia is still a hazard even with artificial gravity. We have dangerous tools down here. Fragile ones even. Will be up on deck when warp ends." That was Jess, trying to ease Yamada it seemed. She didn't give the captain time to respond either... Well, there was a bit of time before warp ended.

---

Warp travel shortens the amount of time traveled significantly, and the time to their first destination was only about four hours, compared to the many hundreds of years on thrusters. Cherche had stepped away for a bit. There was little to do as far as pilots go during warp, so that much should be fine. The engineering bay had gotten their things back in order, though that was mostly their not feeling like jelly. She returned to her seat and looked at the estimated arrival time... Five minutes. She tapped on the comms unit set into the dash that called to the whole ship. "Ladies and Gentlemen. We are about to come out of warp, if you'd like to witness this first step in our exploration then please come to the front of the ship."

Whoever showed up on time was lucky to witness the first planet in the ECS Stellaria's history. What came into view was a lush world of green. Eyeballing the one side, it looked like 50% of the world was forest of some kind and the other was water. The planet definitely seemed habitable. There were a couple of massive mountain ranges though. Without a thorough reading yet, Harisa estimated they were likely the size of Mt. Everest back on Terra. In orbit, there were actually two moons circling the planet, one seemed similar to Luna back on Terra and the other looked highly metallic. Like a giant ball of iron got trapped in the planets gravity. There were two points on the planet one might call the north and south poles, though there was a very, very small amount of snow at the very tip tops. The planet seemed a bit hot over all.

"What a beautiful first planet to encounter. I'm excited to get down there and see what's there." Jess said, hopping up and down on her heels.

"I'll just stay and watch the ship." Harisa wanted to make sure she wasn't expected to leave.

The ECS Stellaria - A Sci-fi Fantasy exploration adventure

Jess laughed a bit, "Geez, 'Captain' a little please wouldn't hurt here and there." Jess said as she snaked over to Malia and throw her arms around his. "Now then! How much do you know about our engineering? What's that? Not much?" Jess said, barely giving the moth time to reply. She cleared her throat and began to sing a bit. "Come with me, and you'll be, in a world of human engineering. Take a look, and you'll see, into our imagination!" She sung, rather in tune at least, as she pulled the moth along. Harisa sighed, gave the captain a salute, and walked after the two.

Cherche watched as Erka walked off himself, giving a small glance back as Jessica started singing and walking off with the Myrkith engineer. She felt... Worried, about this trip. Either way, this was the crew. Shaking her head, she chased after Erka, following him to the cockpit.

---

When the Engineers entered the Engineering Bay, Jessica let go of Malia's arm and patted him on the head before checking the stations and bringing up a computer, looking at the status of the ship. "Alright then, unsurprisingly, engine is in tip top shape. Weapons are fine, we should do a few test fires at some debris once we hit some in the vacuum. Shields are working and stealth seems to be working. No real experience with that though. Do you, 'Yamada'?" Jess asked her other human engineer.

"I was present for a few of the tests, but it seemed to work then. I did help install it too so I have an idea on that. It should work." Harisa said, examining their work stations. She double checked to make sure they had all the tools necessary. Power tools, plasma cutter, electric screwdriver and drill... "Well, we have all of our tools. So, I think we're good to go. 'Helmheim' can you go check the lab and workstation? You're the one that's going to use it the most."

"Yea, sure." Jess said, nodding and walking through one of the doors in the back of the room. There were two. One that went to the engine core, and the other that led to the lab and workstations. One to examine and experiment on things they found out in their travels, and the other to work on projects. The lab was as expected, fully stocked with essentials to see the properties of materials and all. The workshop.... Well, that was as to be expected too, but not in a good way. It actually seemed a bit worse than the one at home, though that might just be because this was smaller.

After her look over, Jess clicked on her wrist-mounted computer that luckily had a comms function installed. "Alright, Kiri. Everything looks good down here. Ready when you are." She reported. She cancelled the comm function and looked to Malia. "Alright, shall we explain some of our devices here to you before departure?"

The ECS Stellaria - A Sci-fi Fantasy exploration adventure

"Oh! Yes, yes! Question, question." Jessica asked, raising her hand and hardly giving the captain a moment to answer. "Do we have a first place to check out yet? Or do we need to search for ourselves? How much danger are we expecting? Do you think we're going to have to worry about some weird alien parasite latching onto our brains and taking control of our bodies?"[ Some of her questions were more serious than the others.

Harisa sighed at the dumb questions but asked her own. "How long is it scheduled before we return to Terra for our first full scale report? Supposing everything goes according to schedule of course." She was much more respectful about asking. Cherche meanwhile, stayed silent near Erka.

The ECS Stellaria - A Sci-fi Fantasy exploration adventure

Harisa and Cherche both arrived with their respective parties. Cherche took a spot along the wall with Erka while Harisa stood with her fellow engineer. They arrived before the captain and both would salute her as she entered. When Jess and the Captain entered, Jess would give a small nod to the Captain and walk off to where she saw Harisa... Then she'd notice the Mothraki. She gave a harsh look over and then smile. "Gya! You are adorable!" She said, hugging the moth boy. She knew all about these creatures! "Oh, you make me want to swing for the correct team, you're so cute."

Cherche on the other side of the room just rolled her eyes. "I feel like I must apologize for her on behalf of all of human-kind." The woman said to Erka while the Head Engineer did what she did.

Harisa stepped in though, and lightly pushed the woman away from Malia. "Miss, while I understand the feeling... We are here for a brief. You can do this later. Or better yet, not do it." She stated, looking the woman in the eye.

While at first Jessica looked irritated with that, she resigned. "Yes, yes. You're right." The woman sighed and turned to Kiri. "Alright, 'I apologize for my outburst, Captain. Please proceed.'" Jess added with an obviously rehearsed phrase. She obviously did not have a military background.

The ECS Stellaria - A Sci-fi Fantasy exploration adventure

"Well, just remember that you may know Myrkith tech, but that tech is much more crude than ours. No disrespect, but I imagine you both will agree." Harisa said before turning. "Follow me. I'll take you to your quarters." She set down one hallway. She had helped make it after all.... And she might have made her room a slight bit bigger than designed... Jessica wouldn't notice, she thought. Well, whoever was going to be the Head Engineer. She heard that the Head was going to be a workaholic so that might be true.

Soon enough, they arrived at the crew quarters. Her things were already in hers. "Here you are. You can take the one on the other side of mine here, Mr.Russil. And Mr. Heart...Cheer." Saying the name left a bad taste in her mouth. Human media in the past had a similar idea for the names of elves, though they had not so cringy names like Windrunner or Sunstrider. Heartcheer? Bleh. "Yours will be a bit further down. It's closer to the Medical Bay, so we took the liberty of moving you closer in the case of emergencies." She made sure everyone was fine with their quarters before heading off to the meeting location.

---

"Time for the beginning briefing, huh?" Cherche muttered to herself as she looked to the time on a watch. "Well then, Tearch. Shall we head that way?" She asked, though stood and started heading the way she thought it was. She stopped at the door and watched as it opened quickly, but stayed put. Erka was a joker wasn't he? She turned and offered the Ant man to go first. "It's a custom to let your elders go first." She teased with a small smile. He had some fun little quips to return after all.

---

"Lady's first?" Jess joked a bit, go along with the offer. "I think you're probably more of a lady than I am now." She teased, showing off her arm a little bit. "I thought I was the more feminine one of us before too." Ignoring the teasing now though, she decided to talk about the Myrkith engineer. "Alright. So we need to get the new guy up to snuff. Good to know. Shouldn't be too hard though. Our tech is suppose to be made with ease in mind. Well, I've been learning this stuff for the last two months or so since I focused on energy." The elevator opened as she arrived and she entered.

The ECS Stellaria - A Sci-fi Fantasy exploration adventure

Harisa scoffed, "Uncultured? I did help build the ship after all, so I don't know if I'm the one to be called uncultured." She admitted. While it was true, she didn't come up with the plans. She just put the pieces in place. Still, it was unprofessional to be doing this to him, so she released him. "Around here, Mr. Russil, fashion isn't nearly as important as utility so I hope you will ease up on any worries of a fashion disaster. There will be days when we'll be working on greasy parts and all we're going to be wearing are tank tops and overalls." She said this to gauge the moth's reaction, of course.

When the moth finished replying, she looked to the elf that was present with them. "Anyhow, while Malia and I are here, have you had a chance to check the medical station we've prepared? I'd suggest before launch checking it and making sure the machinery works while we have the resources of the government available." She wanted them all to have the best trip possible. Faulty medical machinery was the worst too. Could mean the difference between life and death.

---

"Most of the time." Cherche copied. With that over, she wasn't sure what else to say to her any comrade so she just sat at her chair and looked at the controls. She tapped a few buttons and brought up a couple of diagnostics and noticed something. "Oh, we even have a Virtual Hologram Room installed. I hadn't heard about that." She muttered to herself. The rooms were useful, allowing one to see just about anything they wanted, so long as they could program it (which wasn't exceptionally hard) or they could use one of the pre-programmed ones. There was even a shoot-out one to practice gunplay and was likely why it was installed.

---

"Ahh, well, Dad died not long after you left and you know I don't really get along well with mom after the divorce, so I've got nothing keeping me tied to Terra." Jess stated, only sound a little somber. Her mood lightened slightly as she looked up towards the captain. "Well, either way I'm here now with the person I know best. Well, alien I know best. Hope we make a small little family here." Jess stated laughing at herself a bit. "Oh, I heard you Myrkith were bringing an engineer. Is it safe to assume s/he is an Antathlon?"

The ECS Stellaria - A Sci-fi Fantasy exploration adventure

"Of course. Never too safe. That said though, we have one other safety tool I'm not sure how a Myrkith would respond. Ever hear of a Stealth Device? Camouflages your ship so it's both invisible to the naked eye and detection systems. We have that." She says with a smirk. "Changes the frequency of the shields so they're not so strong, but that should be fine. When we get to our first expedition, I'll show you how it works."

---

"Down cute bugsy." Harisa said, hopping up and grabbing Malia around the midsection, pulling the moth-boy close and moved her arms closer up. "Calm down, girl... Well, I guess boy. It's rude to pester around people like that." She patted the moth's head. "Easy, easy."

---

"Hey don't mind me. I've seen you get dressed before." Jess said, giggling a bit. "And naked. You know, what constitutes as naked for you." She took a seat in one of the few chairs in the captain's quarters and just watched. "So, what've you been doing for the last couple of years exactly? Find a lover yet? Well, probably not considering this expedition." She teased. She examined her arm a bit and started to wonder about if it was a good idea after all. After the couple of seconds she looked at it, her vision went back to the captain.

The ECS Stellaria - A Sci-fi Fantasy exploration adventure

"Yes, well, we can modify it if needed. The reason we run two is because we believe it removes the strain on the pilot if one is the real pilot and the second takes care of many of the other things. I can run diagnostics and other such things from here. Besides, is it not easier to work when you don't have to worry about the silly numbers of energy capacity and redirection of said energy? In a dangerous situation two minds are better than one." Cherche just wanted to make her point across. Then she stood up and removed her two pistols. "And I'm a little extra security detail just in case." She added with a smile, replacing her weapons.

She took a seat again and began to look up diagnostics on the ship, to ensure everything was fine. She'd have to redirect some power. The engine was a prototype of a slightly more advanced one more suited to long distance travel and escaping atmospheres. "Luckily, this ship was built to escape atmospheres and enter. We just need to remember to have shields up when we drop into a planet. We don't want to burn up on entry." It was mostly musing to herself, though there was a bit she wanted Erka to understand.

---

"Malia Russil. Understood." Harisa looked fairly guilty. Felt it too. "As an apology, let me take you to the crew quarters. Ahh, not about the you being cute part but the grabbing your fluffy fluff. I have a bit of a self-control issue sometimes. Makes me wonder why I got recruited into the military sometimes." She made her way past the moth cutie but then they were stopped by an elf. The last bit of the crew involved it seemed. She listened to the man. Hell, that name sounded so fake. "Heartcheer". So odd.

"Wonderful... Umm, my name is Harisa Yamada. Engineering in charge of ship repairs among other things." She informed the man. She then looked to the moth. "Thinking about it now though. I believe I heard from someone who doesn't shut up that your subspecies has no real sexually dimorphic features. Does that make you male or female, if I may ask." She tried to be polite now.

---

"Not allowed?" How annoying. Military protocol seemed annoying. Good thing she came on as a civilian contract. "Well, at least you can get away with your beloved soda. I'll have to remember to keep those stocked for you." She teased. Then she relaxed a bit. "Little anxious about this whole leaving Terra ordeal. Can't say I've really left for the unknown fringes of space before." She gave a small uncomfortable giggle before moving closer to the captain. "I'll show you something fun though. I've had some cybernetics spliced into my nerves. I got a couple of tools I can use like this."

She pulled up her jacket to her elbow. Dead center on the top side of her forearm showed a circular disk shape with a small divot in the center. There seemed to be small lights going up her arm too. Some extended to her fingers as well. "Now prototype material I decided to test on myself. Works for the most part, though the odd electrical shock with cause my entire arm to spaz out for a couple of seconds." She allowed the captain to mess with her arm if she wanted a better look at the tech, but would pull away if she didn't seem interested.

The ECS Stellaria - A Sci-fi Fantasy exploration adventure

Cherche smiled a bit. "Monkey, huh? Heh. Well, fair enough." She accepted. She had just called him an ant after all. She looked at the secondary control panel. "Well, let's see here. It's a lot of new things for me as well. Some things are the same, things I'm sure anyone with extended experience in the Myrkith Naval Service would still have a tough time with. I'm sure you didn't have to deal with this, but you seem like you can learn quick."

The woman tapped on a couple of buttons and sat down in the chair of what would become her station. "As you know, we've developed energy weapons, correct? Well, we can do a couple of things with the ship's core. We have the ability to allocate power from one system to another. For example, if we're in a fight and get attacked from the rear, we can allocate shields from the front of the ship to the rear. Likewise, if we need to focus on destroying something, we can focus the energy on the weapons. Don't worry though, we still have ballistic weapons your people prefer." Cherche seemed intent on making sure Erka had an idea about what was going on.

---

Harisa was busy working around the Engineering Bay. The ship's core was completely stable. Definitely stable. Everything else seemed to be mostly in order. All the electrical sockets they'd need... Some cleaning supplies, chemicals... This was good. Good, good, good. She need to grab the last bit of boxes from outside. The door was open and... What was that? A person? Looked rather fashionable. Curious, she made her way over to the entrant. "Pardon me, you're... Wait, a moth? Oh. I think you... Actually, do you belong here?" She asked, curiously. Her eyes rushed to the moth fluff though. "Though... I can't really resist... I'm sorry."

The woman's hand moved out and brushed against the moth fluff gingerly before the taking a better feel. "I've never felt anything so soft. Become my fluffy plush toy." She added, wanting to push her face into the soft fluff. She then kind of realized what she was doing and pulled back. "Oh! Umm, sorry. I didn't... That is, uh, welcome to Engineering. Did you need to go somewhere else? I can't think of where a moth would go on here."

---

Jess was happy enough to be remembered. "It's not breaking and entering if there's nothing to break. You left it unlocked. I thought you learned by now." She added, smiling at her old friend. "You know, if you want to drink don't let me stop you. Makes it easier to take advant-- Errrr... Get away with stuff." She teased. Rank meant little to her. Despite her being the Head Engineer, she was also the only human that was non-military. All the Myrkith were, though she was not exactly sure about the elves that were suppose to join them. "How's the captain life? Survived the Elf planet I see." She teased again.

She looked at the wrist fastened device she had and noticed, "I believe there are some elven guests. Some nice little toys. You can do a lot with these things. Think you should talk to the pointy ears cause they're just standing there." Unfortunately for Jess, she only had view on the hallways and Engineering Lab. Private Quarters were off limits for... Personal reasons.

The ECS Stellaria - A Sci-fi Fantasy exploration adventure

"Great googaly moogaly! Today's the day Harisa!" Jess said, wheeling forward on her Wheelie Shoes while holding on to a couple of boxes with important tools and some other things.... Not so important things. "Alright, kiddo!" She asked her fellow engineer.

Harisa seemed a little... Concerned with how her superior was acting... But at least it was better than people that were way too serious. "Yes... Well, I did help put the ship together... Ma'am?" The girl said, looking over the Stellaria. "We've taken her for a couple of test runs but we'll have to see what it's like on the actual run." She looked over the ship with pride before speaking again. "Well, I can guarantee this ship is very worthy of 'flying'."

"Of course! Only the best for this expedition!" Jess said, looking at her shipmate. "Let's get our stuff on. I need to go talk to the captain... And I think our pilot doesn't like our shenanigans." She added, taking a peak back at the second pilot who just about gave her a somewhat dismissive look.

"Yes. I think you need to take this more seriously than you are, for our engineering lead." The pilot, Cherche, said, walking forward through the hatch and into the ship, eventually making it into the bridge and setting her eyes on the other pilot. "You are the other pilot then? An... Ant, then? Interesting. My name is Cherche Kendrick.
Would you want to take care of the sub-systems? Or the main piloting position? I've plenty of experience dealing with the sub-systems."

---

"What a prude." Jess said, watching as the woman prudishly walked onto the ship. "What gives her the idea I'm not taking this seriously?" She asked, wheeling her way onto the ship. Of course, the woman's words didn't really imprint well on her as she set her belongings down in front of the lab door. "If you can get set up, I need to go talk to the Captain. I have a little Comms system in... That box on top. Earpiece. Put it on, I got some for everyone."

"Sure thing. Send me a message if I need to talk to the captain." Harisa said with a nod.

With a smile, Jess made it over to the elevator to take her up. She didn't even care to ask for the captain's permission. With a smile, she pressed the button for the elevator and waited for it to come down. With a whistle she waited until the elevator came down and wheeled on in. There were a couple of buttons... "There! Captain's Quarters." It was a small wait up to the Captain's Quarters and she exited looking for a certain beetle girl. "Hey there beetle girl! Long time no see!"