Bay 12 Games Forum

That is because I can be derpy at times, and forget to put things inside my head onto digital paper. My bad. By all means, continue to poke holes where important.]

***

You consider Our options for some time. In the end, it boils down to a choice - do You sacrifice a few of Us in the future in exchange for technology now, or sacrifice resources for Us now? You briefly consider only getting the most valuable parts, but when it comes down to it, it is better to do one thing well than two things poorly. Unable to decide, You shoot a rock, then flip it in the air. You consider the burned side to represent the ship and the clean side the food. The rock lands with the burned side up, and You decide that you currently have enough Eggs to replace Our losses.

You administer a dose of Royal Jelly to the Repair Drone, focusing on its legs, eyes, and antennae. The procedure works well - guided by Your mind and will, the Repair Drone shifts and grows to form true-hands, longer and more delicate antennae, and becomes considerably more durable and flexible.  You order all of Us to scour the ship, with the exception of a security patrol.

Engineering produces the best results, with Spare Parts for just about everything aboard the ship, and quite a large amount of Wiring, Diagnostic Computers, a single Molecular Fabrication Device, and a Munition Fabrication Device. The most important find in the Sector, however, is a large Battery and schematics for smaller-scale batteries.  Unfortunately, the Missiles aboard are far too weathered and broken to be of use. You disarm them anyway to be safe, and salvage a single working Kinetic Energy warhead.

Med/Sci is a complete mess. You find a few Dead Flowers of Life, various decomposed Larvae, the leg of a Biped Test Subject and a box containing 10 Units of Synthetic Food. Upon closer inspection, you find that all but 3 units have spoiled. You call for a break to feed Us, and distribute the food among Yourself, the Nurse, and ten of the Drones. The Warriors consume all but two dead Flowers of Life.

Operations provides you with several Telemetry Computers, Display Panels, lots of Wiring, and a single Targeting Computer, as well as various Spare Computer Parts.

Nothing of value is to be found in the Cargo. Perhaps yesterday, there would have been, but right now, there is nothing but scrap.

You retrieve a set of Replacement Parts for the Fusion Reactor from Propulsion, and a small amount of Ice left over. Lastly, you strip the Hull and Superstructure completely down to nothing, gaining several sets of Construction Materials, Armor Plating, and lots and lots of Scrap Plastic, Scrap Metal, and some Thermal Insulation.

Your Flying Warrior senses an incoming Flying Mechanical Spy Drone of Biped origin, and climbs to the top of its flight ceiling as your Warriors sit completely still under the cover of the Ship. You are well aware that given enough time, the MSD will detect Us one way or the other, and decide to solve the problem. As the drone circles the ship, You possess our Flying Warrior and fire a quick Pulse Burst at the MSD; the first two shots send it into an uncontrolled spiral to the ground, and the third misses for obvious reasons. It shatters on the ground below, and Our warriors collect it for study.

***
[OOC Note: You have NO IDEA this is happening.]

"What the HELL was that?"

"Micrometeor came down and hit it. Shit happens. Better get on the paperwork, the Chief will have your ass if you don't."

"What about the ship?"

"Write it off as a loss. I will answer for it. It's too far away to get anything but scrap metal. God only knows we don't need it."

"...Your neck, not mine. Sir."

***

You assume that We have, at the very least, aroused suspicion. You wait for several minutes, but when no explosions come forth from the sky, You are reasonably certain that We were not detected. You are fortunate in that you have an hour before Nightfall, and spend the rest of the time improving the Agricultural Earthworks before retreating underground for the night.


[You are:
1 Queen Alien (Almost Full)
1 Level 3 Nurse Drone (Halfway Full)
2 Level 2 Navigation Drones (Hungry)
1 Level 1 Repair Drone (Full)
19 Basic Drones (9 are Hungry)
1 Flying Warrior (Hungry)
4 Basic Warriors (Hungry)
14 Drone Larvae
1 Small Fertile Flying Spy Drone Larvae, Generation 0
70 Eggs
22 Drone Eggs
7 Soldier Eggs
1 Flying Soldier Egg
10 Flowers of Life (1 Queen's Flower, 7 Maturing Flowers, 3 Stunted Flowers)


You own:
A Bunch of Spare Parts: (Computer, Mechanical, Fusion Reactor, Weaponry)
A Fully Charged Battery
Battery Schematics
Point Defense Laser / Smelter
A Lot of Damaged to Intact Metal Plating
Many Computer Parts / Wiring
2 Diagnostic Computers
Molecular Fabrication Device
Munition Fabrication Device
A Kinetic Energy Penetration Warhead
2 Telemetry Computers
A Targeting Computer
Display Panels
19 Dormant Flowers
Relevant Tools
A Light Expirimental Defensive Pulse Cannon
A Queen-Sized Light Energy Machine Gun
A Soldier-Sized Light Energy Blaster
3 Soldier-Sized Light Pulse Blaster
3 Dead Biped Test Subjects + 1 Leg
3 Dead Flowers of Life
A Sensory Array
Imperfect Glass
Earthen Insulation Materials
Glass Insulation Materials
Functional Greenhouse Glass
Ship Thermal Insulation
Iron
Water
Carbon
Nitrogen
Calcium
Phosphorus
Scrap Metal
Scrap Plastic
A Broken Biped Mechanical Scout

Your Nest:
Queen's Chamber with A Flower Pit
Flower Chamber with Nine Flowers of Life / Laboratory
Fusion Reactor Chamber
Defensive Earthworks
A Partially Constructed Agricultural Earthworks
A Heating Tunnel]

Quote

The Synthetic Food is simply a chemical compound that closely mirrors the composition of elements in the Flowers of Life, used in combination with certain bacteria present on yourselves and the terraformed planet to create basic nutrition

.

Yup, breaking the laws of thermodynamics.

Fusion reactor. >___>

It can be done without it by Yourself or a sufficiently advanced Nurse in a biological manner, but it's going to result in a net loss of energy for the creator.

You feel that we are called the Kai, and proceed to produce insulation materials for half of the night. You consider raiding the ship again, but it is still bitterly, bitterly cold. The tunnel is dug further and further until the first Drone cooks to death; You decide that a sufficient depth has been reached, and feel a very slight increase in warmth. Given enough time, sufficient heat should be achieved - You feel that the immediate risk of freezing to death is over.

We do not find ice.

It is still cold.

In the meantime, Our drones insulate the Flower Chamber, and re-locate the Laboratory to the Flower Chamber. You and Us work on the design for a point defense system using a mostly-broken-down point defense for blueprints and such. After spending the remaining half of the night in designing it, We produce an Experimental Light Pulse Cannon. It is rather jury-rigged, but the test-fire bores a solid hole through the rock that heats up the Hive further

With the remaining time left before dawn, you create three Light Pulse Blasters. They are inferior to Your own Light Energy Machine Gun, but superior to the single Light Energy Blaster in rate of fire. You equip our Soldiers and spend the remaining hour or two of dark in the Flower Chamber, thinking thoughts of growth and unity.

Morning comes.

You once again notice that We are hungry. Your own Queen's Flowers produce two units of Food, and you harvest a single dose of Royal Jelly. Out of the nine live plants, seven thicken and grow their second Flower; two remain stunted in their growth. Naturally, Our Nurse and Queen are fed first, but that still leaves Our Warriors one further food cycle before death. The Drones can still survive for two food cycles.

Once again:

- You may cannibalize the Ship. The weather and cold is causing damage to the Ship; you suspect that it will be entirely scrap in two more days unless a storm comes. 1 day.
- You may lay eggs and experiment upon the Larvae. 1/2 day.
- You may examine the dead Biped Test Subjects. 1/2 day.
- You can travel to the Curious Structure and spend the night there. 1 day.
- You can create Synthetic Food from the Elemental Reserve. 1/2 day
- You can invent something. 1/2 day
- You can have Us develop the Agricultural Earthworks further. 1/2 day.
- You may develop the Defensive Earthworks. 3/4 day.
- You may insulate the Nest. 1/2 day.
- You can experiment with the Flowers of Life. The Queen's Flower will produce Pollen Fuel within the day. 1/2 day.
- Something else?

You may use the Royal Jelly to:
- Upgrade the Level 0 Repair Drone
- Begin to create a Royal Larvae
- Experiment upon Your genetic code - 1/2 day
- Assist the growth of the Flying Spy Drone

[You are:
1 Queen Alien
1 Level 3 Nurse Drone
2 Level 2 Navigation Drones
1 Level 0 Repair Drone
19 Basic Drones
1 Flying Warrior
4 Basic Warriors
14 Drone Larvae
1 Small Fertile Flying Spy Drone Larvae, Generation 0
72 Eggs
20 Drone Eggs
7 Soldier Eggs
1 Flying Soldier Egg
10 Flowers of Life
1 Unit of Royal Jelly

You own:
A Bunch of Spare Parts
Point Defense Laser / Smelter
A Lot of Damaged to Intact Metal Plating
Many Computer Parts / Wiring
19 Dormant Flowers
Relevant Tools
A Light Defensive Pulse Cannon
A Queen-Sized Light Energy Machine Gun
A Soldier-Sized Light Energy Blaster
3 Soldier-Sized Light Pulse Blaster
3 Dead Biped Test Subjects
11 Dead Flowers of Life
A Sensory Array
Imperfect Glass
Earthen Insulation Materials
Glass Insulation Materials
Functional Greenhouse Glass
Iron
Water
Carbon
Nitrogen
Calcium
Phosphorus


Your Nest:
Queen's Chamber with A Flower Pit
Flower Chamber with Nine Flowers of Life / Laboratory
Fusion Reactor Chamber
Defensive Earthworks
A Partially Constructed Agricultural Earthworks
A Heating Tunnel]

You proceed to work upon Your reactor. While many of the details are simply a matter of repair, replace, and adjust, there's also a few parts that require complete replacement. One particular drone seems rather well-suited to the task of making very small repairs, and You designate it as a Level 0 Repair Drone. You and the drones further tinker with the reactor until, finally, the machine feels right.

In the meantime, the Warriors, who are beginning to slow down from the cold and lack of energy, begin assembling an above-ground earthworks for flowers.

You examine Our supply of reclaimed elements present in the Nurse. The process generated  water, carbon, nitrogen, calcium, phosphorus, and small amounts of various other trace elements. There is more sodium and lithium than You would have expected, and trace amounts of fluorine, but beyond that, everything is as expected. After filling the tank with a pound of water, and giving all of the Flowers a healthy watering (and a healthy dose of elements with them), You connect the final wires and activate Our reactor. It works!

Your success pleases You, and You quickly order drones to assemble a lab while We begin making the point defense into a smelter. While Repair Drone is helpful, it is clear that Our talent is limited by Our intellect. You note the potential of the application of Royal Jelly, but You currently lack it. You send Our drones to dig a borehole for ventilation purposes, although You choose to reserve a quarter to assist in the production of Agricultural Earthworks, while the remaining five Drones (counting Repair Drone) assist you in the smelting of iron. We succeed yet again, creating not only a sizable quantity of Iron, but silica and other materials.

Your concept tests for materials proves to be successful. Knowing that heat is critical to Our survival, We set out to create the materials for insulation, and come up with some terra cotta bricks, two failed attempts at "greenhouse" glass, and some insulating concrete. It is not yet enough to cover the entire Hive, but it is a start. You sense night coming again.

You consider examining the Ship, but decide against it. Too cold. In the meantime, You have a perfectly good Lab, and it will not take the entire night to produce or insulate the Flower Chamber.  You consider creating batteries - You could likely create some form of weaponry, device, or tool before morning comes, although You are open to suggestions.

[You are:
1 Queen Alien
1 Level 3 Nurse Drone
2 Level 2 Navigation Drones
1 Level 0 Repair Drone
19 Basic Drones
1 Flying Warrior
4 Basic Warriors
15 Drone Larvae
1 Small Fertile Flying Spy Drone Larvae, Generation 0
83 Eggs
14 Drone Eggs
3 Soldier Eggs
10 Flowers of Life

You own:
A Bunch of Spare Parts
Point Defense Laser / Smelter
A Lot of Damaged to Intact Metal Plating
Many Computer Parts / Wiring
19 Dormant Flowers
Relevant Tools
A Queen-Sized Light Energy Machine Gun
A Soldier-Sized Light Energy Blaster
3 Dead Biped Test Subjects
11 Dead Flowers of Life
A Sensory Array
Imperfect Glass
Iron
Water
Carbon
Nitrogen
Calcium
Phosphorus


Your Nest:
Queen's Chamber with A Flower Pit
Flower Chamber with Nine Flowers of Life
Fusion Reactor Chamber
Laboratory
Defensive Earthworks
A Partially Constructed Agricultural Earthworks
A Mostly Dug Heating Tunnel]

The night passes.

Come morning, You discover that out of the twenty Flowers of Life We have planted, nine survived. Yours, of course, is a bit bigger and produces another Flower; the rest are simply struggling for life. Several larvae have developed into Drones. A few eggs have matured enough to produce Warriors.

Your Warriors take up a patrol route around the nest, aside from the wounded Flying Warrior. The Nurse should have it healed by mid-day, if We are lucky. The Navigation Drones have created a basic "map" of the surrounding area using stored memories from the over-fly, planetary maps, and instinct. About three-quarters of the day to the northwest is some sort of hexagonal building. It appears to have bipeds in it, but not Bipeds. Possibly robots?

[You are:
1 Queen Alien
1 Level 3 Nurse Drone
2 Level 2 Navigation Drones
20 Basic Drones
1 Flying Warrior
4 Basic Warriors
15 Drone Larvae
1 Small Fertile Flying Spy Drone Larvae, Generation 0
88 Eggs
10 Drone Eggs
2 Soldier Eggs
10 Flowers of Life


You own:
A Partially Damaged Reactor
A Bunch of Spare Parts
Point Defense Laser
A Lot of Damaged to Intact Metal Plating
Many Computer Parts / Wiring
19 Dormant Flowers
Relevant Tools
A Queen-Sized Light Energy Machine Gun
A Soldier-Sized Light Energy Blaster
Dead Biped Test Subjects
11 Dead Flowers of Life
A Sensory Array

Your Nest:
A Queen's Chamber with A Flower Pit
A Flower Chamber with Nine Flowers of Life
Constructed Earthworks]

You own the rifle, yes. You simply cannot shoot it outside of Light Armor due to massive, massive energy requirements.

You look around for opticks and some war harnesses. The best of either you can find is expensive enough to prevent you from buying one or the other. The optics you are looking at have an infrared option and 30x zoom as opposed to 20x; the warharness is a sticky patch of nanites applied to the back of the armor that keep weapons attached and easily deploy-able, as opposed to your current nylon/plas physical harness.

This is very rough here, and may or may not be retconned into making sense, but: drones are about the size of medium dogs, and grow or shrink when they are adapted to a new purpose. Warriors are roughly the size of horses, although the flying ones are half that size. The Nurse drone is about the size of an average SUV, while you are about two feet longer and more slender.

You are considerably stronger than humans, and could withstand small-caliber gunfire for quite some time, but your carapace is not invulnerable.

60 C / 140 F, -50 C / -58 F roughly. You could MAYBE survive the exposure terraformed Mars cold for half the night if you ate enough and kept moving.

As of right now, You are not versed in genetics enough to do so immediately. Given enough time and conscious effort, You should be able to do so within two or three generations with proper experimentation. You file this information away inside Your mind, and instruct the Nurse to feed one larvae three-quarters as much regurgitated food to limit its growth, as well as to feed it only enough Royal Jelly as needed to be fertile.

You finish planting your first Flower, and feel a gentle hunger inside your mind that soon fades as the Flower rapidly grows and blooms. It is not particularly large, but the stalk is particularly thick, marking a good root system.

You are:
1 Queen Alien
1 Level 3 Nurse Drone
2 Level 2 Navigation Drones
17 Basic Drones
1 Flying Warrior
4 Basic Warriors
19 Drone Larvae
1 Small Fertile Flying Spy Drone Larvae, Generation 0
95 Eggs
5 Drone Eggs
1 Flower of Life

You own:
A Partially Damaged Reactor
A Bunch of Spare Parts
Point Defense Laser
A Lot of Damaged to Intact Metal Plating
Many Computer Parts / Wiring
39 Dormant Flowers
Relevant Tools
A Queen-Sized Light Energy Machine Gun
A Soldier-Sized Light Energy Blaster
Dead Biped Test Subjects
A Sensory Array

Your Nest:
A Queen's Chamber with A Flower Pit
Partially-Constructed Earthworks]