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Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)


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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

"Very well Aya. I shall pass this along and inform Ellisia. We will be making our return journey to Peltas shortly." Ayla replies. Once the communication was over, Ayla would indeed begin the process of navigating back to peltas, before calling a meeting with the Knights aboard.

(Just a tiny post keeping things brief to get me in motion. I'll make the real post in the other thread soon.)
 

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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

Draven paused for a moment before replying.

"Pray that it isn't a replicator ship, although ... I've never seen one this massive before. Scanning the interior ..."

There was a pause, and when Draven spoke next, he seemed a bit hesitant.

"I'm reading 130,000 or so bio-signs, but they are erratic. They don't even appear to be of the same species from reading to reading, it's as if that ship is being run by over a hundred different species working together. Beyond that, I'm having a difficult time penetrating their hull to get better readings. They're broadcasting a message on all frequencies, tapping in now."


A moment later, a voice, or rather what sounded like tens of thousands of voices speaking as one filled the audio channel, and what was said definitely wasn't a nice thing.


"We are the Borg. You will be assimilated. Resistance is futile."

A half moment later, the communication cut off, and the massive cube moved in closer to the nomad ships. In moments, the nomads, probably taking exception to the 'invasion', began firing weapons at the cube ship, which took light damage to it's hull. In response, the cube fired off some sort of projectile that slammed into the lead nomad ship, then two more. Draven stared at his console in disbelief.

"Nomad shields are gone. The cube is ... cutting into their hull."


A beam of some sorts had locked onto the unshielded ship, holding it in place, while a second beam, like a cutting laser, was literally cutting out a piece of the hull. Draven continued to watch this, not noticing something else was going on.


Alberik, likely able to multi-task far better than any organic being could ever hope to, might catch another sensor reading, and a disturbing one at that. The damaged areas of the Borg vessel, which moments ago had looked pretty damaged, appeared to be moving. In only a few moments, the damage appeared to be reversing, as if the cube were regenerating it's 'wounds'.
"The cube ship is repairing itself, almost like a biological system, but much faster. I suspect nanotechnology. I believe it likely that the 'assimilation' they mention is quite literal." Albert responded, simultaneously going through records both of his own and the alverans. He also began probing the collected knowledge of the Asgardians, looking to see what kind of protections they had designed into the construct he now inhabited agains intrusions from the replicators. "The replicators are the closest we have seen to this kind of technology, but seems to vary in several points."
 
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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

If Draven could have blinked in his true form, he definitely would have been.

"If this is nanotechnology, then it's even more advanced than that which the replicators had. Their ships didn't self heal, not at that rate anyway."

He stopped as something caught his eye, and when he spoke next there was complete disbelief in his voice.

"The remaining Nomad ships are returning fire ... and doing nothing to the cube. It's as if they've already adapted their shielding to the Nomad weapons, and are immune to them. Wait, I'm detecting six of the 'Borg' life signs on board the crippled Nomad ship. Looks like they're boarding them and ... some of the life signs that I'm assuming are Nomads are beginning to wildly fluctuate. Something is definitely going on over there."


Meanwhile, Alberik found that the suits were designed to be impervious to the acid the replicators used to break down materials, and to be highly resistant to being pierced by their nanites. Still, from the readings they were getting, it was safe to say this was a whole new ballgame in terms of nanite tech. Given the sheer size of the cube though, it was safe to say a single ship was not going to bring this behemoth down, at least not quickly.
 

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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

"I suggest we avoid conflict here, and have our escape already planned should we be spotted. I'm plotting a jump to the badlands of new York system. The nebula there should impede scanners nearly as well as here, and as a core system, we should be able to glean much more information." Alberik explained, fingers tapping away at the controls. It crossed his mind that his input speed was much lower in this form, and set a side task to begin engineering a direct interface he could connect to, for their own ships.

"New York might be a little crowded, but the badlands are probably the best place to hide of any core systems." Ariana agreed, listening to Draven's description of what the cube was doing to the nomads.
 
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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

Draven nodded in agreement. Watching what this cube was doing, and how easily it was doing it, he had no intention of trying to fight that thing.

"I don't think they can detect us, as long as we remain cloaked. But it's a good idea to have an escape plan in mind anyway. I've no intention of trying to tangle with that thing, or staying anywhere near it if it spots us."

He paused as his sensors began spitting out new information, blinking several times at the screens.


"The Nomad bio signatures have ... become something more like those inside the cube. I think you were right about literal assimilation, they're being forced to become the same as these other Borg. I'm detecting irregularities in the Nomad ships as well, as if they're also being converted in some way. Power levels have increased three hundred percent, and some portions of their hulls are getting thicker, more armored. One of the other Nomad ships is sending out some kind of signal, perhaps to bring more of their own here."
 

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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

"I would say they wouldn't fall for that, but I'm not sure how their signals between each other in space work. In person or ship to ship beside each other, no chance." Ariana said. "Actually, this is a bit of an opportunity. How close do you think we can get to the nomad ships and stay undetected?"
 
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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

Draven thought for a moment before responding.

"Assuming we don't run into anything, or one of the ships doesn't miraculously fire a shot in our general direction, I'd say we could get almost close enough to tether connect ships if we needed to. Why, what do you have in mind?"
 

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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

"I want to get close enough to hear their minds. I know what they felt like last I was here, so I got a basis of comparison to go off of, and maybe I'll learn what the signal was as a side benefit." She explained, shrugging.

"You sure? It wasn't exactly the most comfortable experience for you, I recall." Alberik asked, sounding worried. The woman gave a nod, looking a bit troubled, but keeping silent.
 
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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

Draven paused for a moment before shrugging.

"Alright, just be careful. We know nothing about these Borg, it's possible they'll be able to sense your presence, if you can even connect to the nomads that have been ... converted."


He began moving them into position, finally reaching a point where he said, "alright, that's close enough. Don't want that ship to move suddenly and accidentally ram us."
 

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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

"It's not so much reaching out and making a connection, as it is just listening. Most things broadcast their thoughts, some more than others. The air is filled with it sometimes, can be hard to tune out." She explained, leaning back against the wall and closing her eyes. The nomad's thoughts were alien, but she had learned to pick out emotions, images on occasion. More stable thoughts, when they were in human hosts and co-opting brain power.
 
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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

At first she'd have trouble finding much of anything TO connect to. Finally she managed to 'connect' with a single nomad on board one of the ships just now falling under attack. It's mind was a chaotic mess, panic mostly controlling it. She could make out that the transmission was a warning regarding the Borg, and that they had worked out these creatures were some kind of nanite enchanced cybernetic life forms with organic parts. This was replaced by the sudden vivid image of what had to be a Borg in her vision, or it's vision more precisely. The Borg was a cybernetic creature, having one arm replaced with what looked like a multi-use tool or weapon, and one eye replaced with some sort of implant.

Said Borg wrestled with, and overpowered the nomad, and Ariana could 'feel' a sharp pain as some form of tubules pierced the skin of her 'host'. In seconds she could feel mechanical implants moving through the body of the nomad, see them erupting through the skin. It had to be incredibly painful, yet she was able to block most of that pain out. Then suddenly, the voices of the nomads were replaced with the sounds of billions of voices, all speaking at once. She couldn't truly make out what was being said, but she might have the distinct impression that for the moment, she was tapped into some kind of hive mind. A few moments later however, the connection was broken, and couldn't be re-established.
 

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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

The woman leaned back against a bulkhead, closing her eyes as she opened her mind, starting to listen. She hesitated to do this in most places, but out here in the depthsbof space, there was few other beings, far from emough to overwhelm and 'deafen' her. Draven's thoughts immediately sang out to her, him being so close. His surface thoughts were inconsequential, guarded, which made sense given how the psychic had just explained how she listened. So she set about ignoring his mental voice, drifting her attention further out, towards the ship under attack.

What she discovered was quite disturbing. She could only hear a single nomad out of the half dozen a ship of that size must be crewed by, panic filling it's mind as it broadcast a warning to its compatriots elsewhere. She had just enough time to remark to herself that this wasn't some lone band of her foe when it's emotions jumped upwards further, drawing her deeper in. She could see through its eyes as it wrestled with the cybernetic Borg, losing quickly and being injected. The pain that followed was enough to make her gasp physically, but she pushed through it, hearing a glimpse of some sort of hive mind, billions strong, and then she was kicked out of the vision, visibly rocked by the suddenness of it, throwing a hand out to catch the wall, steadying herself.

"That's quite enough, get us out of here." She said in a worried tone, saving explanations for when they were safely away.
 
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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

As she had lurched towards the wall when the connection broke, Draven had moved quickly to reach out and help steady her. At her words, and the look in her eyes that she was alright, he turned swiftly and entered a random bunch of coordinates, engaging the hyper-drive. In short order they had made the jump, Draven monitoring one of the panels for several minutes, keeping a hand up to let Ariana know he was busy. Finally he lowered it, and explained.


"I wanted to monitor the space behind us, just to be certain they hadn't detected us and didn't decide to follow. It would appear we were not detected even with the hyper-space jump. Now, please. What the hell happened?"
 

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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

The woman waved Draven off quickly enough, letting him plot their course out of the system while she calmed herself, shaking the last of the vision out of her head.

"Sometimes, if an emotion is strong enough, it... draws me in, I guess is the best way to describe it. Never happened with a nomad before, but there's a first for everything. I saw through its eyes." She explained, pausing to let that sink in a moment.

"Those Borg seem to be altered humanoids, machines grafted onto them. The signal was a warning to other nomad's, before one of the Borg injected it with something. I guess they must be some sort of networked intelligence, I caught a glimpse of a torrent of other voices, other minds, before I got cut off."
 
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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

Draven frowned, his misty features not really suited for that.

"A sort of hive mind then? That would give them a hell of a processing advantage over us then to say the least. It also might explain why they were able to regenerate their ship so damn fast too. If that's the case, it's a good thing we did leave when we did. Chances are if that nomad you were linked with has been absorbed into some kind of hive mind, then whatever he knew, the Borg now know. We need to warn the alliance and as many planets as we can about them then, who knows if that's their only ship out there."
 

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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

I doubt the living brains have too much to do with the overall process. The way I was kicked out, it felt like a death. Not really sure how much they use of the brains thoughts and memories. That much technology, not really sure why they'd need bodies at all." She said, shrugging. "Where'd you put us? If we can get close enough to the core systems, I should be able to broadcast a warning from my ship, if here still using the same systems."
 
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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

Draven nodded.

"Just point me in the right direction. I set a course for as far away from that cube as possible, but we can alter course at any time. Right now we're leaving the system."

He paused for a moment, then added, "you do realize though that they may be able to track your transmission and might come towards us though right?"
 

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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

"It's a point-to-point system, very little bleed out." Al explained, moving back to the controls himself. "I'll bring us to the badlands, as we discussed. Ariana, you should go prep the ship."

"Yeah, makes sense." She answered, headed down in that direction.

((Figured I'd let Draven decide which one to stick around with, hehe.))
 
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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

((He's not leaving his ship lmao.))


"Very well. Good luck then. I'll keep an active lock on you and be ready to act if it seems like there might be trouble."


Draven seemed content to allow Al to handle the flight path, particularly since, as he had pointed out earlier, they knew this region better than he did. Nevertheless, he kept busy with other consoles, inputting information. A quick glimpse here and there might give the impression he was running simulations, and not all for the same thing.
 

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Re: Milky Way Galaxy (Space Itself)

((Eh, could have chatted in the bay or something.))

Alberik worked in silence, plotting their course and setting off. He spared some attention to peek in on what Draven was doing. Simulations, looked like.

Ariana found her way to the bay easily enough, hopping into her ship and starting to fire up its systems, hands flying with the ease of someone long practiced.

When they entered realspace again, Draven noted they were in a purple nebula of some sort, dark and thick. Visual range was almost nothing, proven when the android deftly maneuvered them around a sharply angled asteroid that seemed to come out of nowhere before coming to a stop. Sensors weren't much better either, with reduced range and sensor echoes pinging frequently.

"You're in the clear. Launch when ready." He broadcast down to her. "Got it, launching now."

Leaving the bay, Ariana's smaller ship had no trouble missing the asteroids hidden in the nebula, making her way towards the dim glow of the system's star.

((Gotta find some time to chat before I can post much more than that.))
 
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