Nova Chasers (A space Western role-play)

After hearing the man's analysis, Nirakaleania replies,

"No, I have no more inquiries. Once again, you have my gratitude." Although she was as expressionless as ever, Nirakaleania gave the man a tone of earnest sincerity.

She then looks upward, toward the ceiling. She relaxes her entire body. Her senses heighten, and she exercises the connection mental between her mind, her body, and the Gilgamesh System within her body. In doing so, she would gradually recover faster, as the stronger synchronization between her autonomous nervous system and the autonomous cybernetic system of the Gilgamesh Implant would synergistic effects on each other. Such an ability would only be acquired from such extensive cognitive training for so many years. She listens to the voices that resonated throughout the ship. The voices were cheery, happy, and carefree.

She then realizes that, in these moments, she had never felt such a sense of tranquility and peace in her heart like she did now.

Her focus does not waver, and her expression does not change in the slightest... but, in her heart, she was smiling.

After already getting a bowl and was about to return to the briefing room, Clover noticed that Rick had entered the kitchen. As he was getting a bowl of chili, Rick complimented on the food and asked who made it.

"Hmm, I think that woman named Teal made the chili."After taking a spoonful, Clover continued, "She seems to make some good food. Do you want to eat in the briefing room for a bit or eat here? Oh, and just to be sure, where will I be sleeping?" While waiting for an answer from Rick, Clover continued eating his chili.

Harris was a bit curious, the woman seemed relaxed but readings show her body working at near full capacity. Harris sat down and observed, it was indeed something astounding. Harris did not take this anomaly into account, he began running estimationss in his head.

Her body is working at full capacity yet her expression is that of total tranquility, her mental activity as well. It's. . It's working at more than three times the capacity a regular human could ever accomplish. . . What exactly is this woman. Oh how I'd like to out.

Harris got up, leaving the bag of chicken on a table nearby, and left the room. Before he left he turned to Nira, still relaxed and composed on the operating table, "I might have miscalculated in my estimations, you probably will be able to stand in less than an hour. I'll leave this food for you. Don't eat it straight away though, you should probably wait a while longer." Harris left the med-bay, contemplating on the anomalous activity he had just witnessed. He made his way to the meeting room and sat down, still thinking.

I arrived at the meeting room, taking the seat that I was in earlier. I started to eat my chili, criticizing it in my mind, needs fresher meat. Best that I could have done with the ingredients on the ship I suppose., I lost my train of thought when a girl entered with a bowl of chili for herself. I smiled at her and she sat down next to me, "Oh, you must be Teal." I nodded as I swallowed a mouthful.

"Yes and you must be Mia. I heard that we are bunking together, right?"

I was sincerely happy about that, being around girls gave me a sense of security. I was used to it and it felt like home to be sharing rooms, "I'm really glad that we have another girl on this ship. Talk about a sausage fest."

I laughed a bit, then looked at Mia and smiled, "Welcome to the Infinity."

Clover and Richard entered the room with bowls of chili as well. Richard looked as happy as ever and he started to eat, "You seem to be enjoying the food, Richard."

I laughed as I pointed to his mouth, where the was a mess of food. I was very glad that everyone was enjoying the food.

I grin like a madman when I hear him describe this grenade sized bomb, taking it and straping it to my grenade belt.

“yea yea, fine fine, but if you get shot before you can slice someone its on your head.”

As he leaves a put the last of the rifles back together, when im done I stretch and
yawn, leaving the cargobay looking for the captian, taping my headset as I walk down the hallway.

“oi, dick got any timeframe till we reach our target? I could use some rack, speaking of wich, ya still haven’t told me were my quarters are. And one last thing, do you know were avery is? I still need to bribe him for some booze.”

I enter the briefing room just as im done sending the message and I see dick and a few others in there, teal, the tech kid, clover and… mia? I think her name was.

“there you are any-“ I pause when I notice he ahs his headset off.

“well that was a pointless message then, just wondering were, if anywhere I could get some sleep, and how long I have to finish making some demo charges, with the shells that i now know you don’t need anymore I could make some nasty ones, and I was hoping you could point me twards Avery, still need to bribe him for some drink.” I say yawning as I sit down across from him.

"Hmm, let's go the meeting room to eat. I think the others might be there too, so we can discuss and eat at the same time."

With that, Rick and Clover took their respective bowls to the meeting room, where they found Teal and Mia already chatting and chowing down.

"Teal, amazing chili! We need to get some proper ingredients, though, so it can taste even better. But anyway, now that a lot of us are here, I think we can start clearing up any questions on who's bunking where."

As he and Clover sat down, Alistar soon came in, spouting some nonsense that Rick somehow understood.

"Well...let's face it, Al. Not a lot of us here really like you, so as punishment, you sleep in the cargo hold. Hey, at least you're beside guns. Also, we're taking a little extra time here before we head to the Atlantica. So yeah, you'll have a little more time. And Avery usually stays in the cockpit. Good luck, though."

He turned his attention back to the others.

"Where were we? Right, bunking..."

I stand back from the teleporter again, and sigh.

"This is going to take a while. I hope we won't have to go into action too soon."

I start working on the device again, trying everything. I change out the older parts with newer, reconnect the circuitry, rework the mainframe of the chip-set, everything. It takes a little while, with the occasional cursing and throwing of a tool, but it finally gets done. I take my last apple from my stash and place it on the teleporter. I go to the consul for the teleporter, and set the coords for the Meeting Room. I turn on the teleporter, set the power output a little lower than the last tries, and hit the button.

The apple does nothing.

"Why di-", I cut off as the apple explodes sending mush everywhere.

"Great. Perfect. I've taken three steps back. Why can't I figure this out.", I say as I wipe up the mush.

All of a sudden, I realize what I was missing. I run to the med-bay. As I get there, I slow down, catching my breathe for a little bit. I walk into the room and I go over to one of the cupboards that line the back wall of the med-bay. I still notice that woman laying on the table, looking like she was asleep, but she still had her eyes open. I ignore that fact and I set about looking for the aperture I need.

"Ya, bunking. I was told by Harris that I'd bunk with either him or Bohr. Just want to be sure on where us new recruits will be sleeping." After finishing his bowl of chili, Clover pulled out a few napkins from his backpack and cleaned off any leftover chili on his face. Afterwards, he handed a few to Rick and pulled out his hacking tablet to make adjustments to it. Before he started with adjusting though, he said to Teal, "Thanks for the chili Teal. Haven't had something that good in a while. Hope you'll cook again after we get more ingredients."

Before Harris knew it, everybody had come back into the med-bay, chatting with each other about who's sleeping where. I can't concentrate in an environment like this Harris got up and left the meeting room, he didn't think anybody had even noticed he was there anyway. As he left, he heard a muffled explosion and, as a reaction, he quickly drew out his M6. that came from the engine room, whats going on in there? as Harris began to make his way to the engine room, he saw Bohr dash right into the med-bay. Harris was curious so he went inside and noticed he was rummaging through one of the cupboards.

Harris loudly cleared his throat to get his attention, "You need something?"

As Harris spoke to me, I pulled out a very peculiar looking item.

"Yes. I need what's in this. A very special element that will make the teleporter work perfectly."

After I answer Harris, I run back to the Engine Room. I quickly take apart the item and extract the material I needed. The element of tritium. The third isotope of hydrogen. I go about setting it in the teleporter and quickly reconfigure everything. This is getting interesting.

"That should do it.", I say, exhausted. I look around for something organic. I don't see anything, so I decide to use myself. I sigh.

"For the betterment of science, huh.", I say as I shrug.

I set the coords for the med-bay and set the teleporter to a timer to activate. I step onto the pad and stand there for a bit.

"5 seconds to initiation.", the computer says.

All of a sudden, everything starts to shimmer and glitter. Everything turns white, but only for an instant. And as soon as all the white appeared, it went, and I was standing in the med-bay.

I look around, and look at myself. I look fine and feel fine. And I see Harris standing there with a surprised look on his face. I walk over to him and clap his shoulders.

"It works. It bloody freaking works!", I say with a tear in my eyes.

"Yes, and you must be Mia. I heard that we are bunking together, right?" Teal asks Mia.

Mia looks at her. "Well I'm not certain of that yet, but I don't mind at all sharing a room with you. The chilli is cooked wonderfully though, thanks." She says to her while eating. So far, she has been the only female onboard that Mia has seen, and that fact comforted her to know. Captain Richards and the boy named Clover walks into the room, eating their bowls of chilli, and shortly afterwards, Alistar also walks in. Richards says a few things about the food and to Alistar. After Mia was about to finish her chilli, Richards turns to everyone and says "Where were we? Right, bunking..."

"Ya, bunking. I was told by Harris that I'd bunk with either him or Bohr. Just want to be sure on where us new recruits will be sleeping." Clover replies.

"Yes, and I'll also want to make sure of where I'm sleeping too. So far it seems that I'm rooming with Teal though." Mia says to Richard as she finishes her bowl.

Bohr left the room, taking a sample of tritium. Harris sighed, "People can't just ask?" Harris shrugged and looked through the cupboard, checking if there was anything left missing.

After checking and making sure that the tritium was all Bohr had taken, Harris turned around and was surprised to see Bohr warp in. Bohr walked over to Harris, tears of joy in his eyes and rejoicing the success of his machine. Harris was a bit worried, "well, that's good and all, Professor, but can I do a small check on you? Just to make sure." Harris took his scanner from the desk and waved it around Bohr before bringing it back to read the results. Harris was both surprised and relieved in the results."Well, seems this is indeed something to rejoice about. You don't seem to have any permanent damage, internally and externally. Although, during transportation, it temporarily jumbles up you nervous system, making you lose your sense of feel for a bit, although that would mean you can't feel any pain either. It's literally as if you had taken a dose of painkillers during warp." Harris put back down the scanner and slapped Bohr on the shoulder, "Good job."

As Harris said, I didn't feel anything when he slapped my shoulder. But it didn't matter. That was a good thing.

"I-I see what you mean. That must be the reason why I feel so happy and funny at the same time. Anyways, I have to go tell Richard this good news!", I say as I run out the door.

I run to the meeting room, where I last saw the Captain, and I go in. I see him sitting around the table with the other people of the crew, minus Avery.

"Well, I guess it's easier this way to to everyone at once. But I got the teleporter to work. And this one makes no sound, so we can secretly invade that ship if we wanted to.", I say as I try to catch my breathe. That painkiller side-effect was nasty.

Rick had heard all of the comments presented by the people in the room, and thought a little bit before answering.

"Hmmm...OK, here's the thing. Kestral-class ships, like the Infinity, are made to hold 10 to 12 people. However, it's still a little small, so yeah, some bunking would 'normally' be required. Fortunately..."

Rick took another sip of the chili, slowly taking his time with it.

"Oh maaaaan, that is good chili. Like I was saying...fortunately, some of our members have opted not to use an actual double-room, which the quarters are. Bohr stays in the engine room, Harris in the med-bay, Ave never leaves the cockpit, and now, Al is confined to the cargo hold. We have about 6 mid-size rooms for 2 people each on the ship, and Teal and I are the only one occupying any. So, your choice on where you want to be now."

Suddenly, Bohr walked in and exclaimed hurriedly how he managed to get the teleporter working.

"Hm? Cool. Well, we don't have too worry too much about manually docking and having them expect us. Of course, is all of this safe? And why are you so jittery?"

Bohr had gone off to tell everyone else the good news and Harris was left with nothing to do. . . Again. He scratched his head and walked around in circles before deciding to head out and explore the ship further. As Harris left the med-bay, he could hear the commotion inside the meeting room."They must be having fun, unfortunately, I'm not that interested right now."

Harris walked the opposite way of the meeting room, towards the cargo hold. "With all these weapon specialists joining the crew, my interest in firearms is starting to rekindle." Harris used to be fascinated in weaponry back when he was in the military, "ah yes, I love how damaging a seven-six-two mil round can do to human flesh." More specifically, he was fascinated in how damaging certain weapons could do.

Harris walked into the cargo hold and saw a bunch of internal components from several weapons on the table as well as labelled ammunition and magazines. Harris gave a smirk as he walked to the table, "fantastic, I see an FN FAL, uses a seven-six-two by five-one mil NATO round. . . Quite amazing how we still use the weapons of our ancestors, shows how amazing their technology was back then." Harris reached for the FAL until he averted his eyes to a moore better prize. "Oh ho, this is amazing," Harris grabbed a compact rifle with a folding skeleton stock and built in suppresssor, "the Soviet VSS Vintorez, using a nine by three-nine mil round, it's compact but still effective as a sniper. Just like the ones back on my home planet. . . " Harris suddenly became quite sad when he mentioned hiss home plantet, ". . . I wonder how they're holding up back there. . . "

Harris shook his head a bit before taking the VSS and a couple of magazines, "I'll head back to the med-bay and configure some caustic ammunition for this rifle." Harris had a big grin on his face as he left the cargo bay and entered the med-bay, "Although i'm not all that good with the larger style firearms like rifles and LMGs, the compact-ness of the rifle will make it quite easier to handle for me." Harris sat down at his desk, a tray of tools and materials on it and began working, he finally had something to work on while he waited.

Clover thought for a while before he answered, "Choice huh? Hmm, well I guess I'll bunk with Rick if that's ok." Then, Bohr entered the meeting room all excited and saying he finally got his teleporter to work. In all of the excitement going on, Clover decided to head off to the kitchen to wash up his bowl, seeing that he already finished his food.

On his way to the kitchen, he noticed Harris walking towards the med-bay with a Soviet sniper rifle.

Hmm, haven't seen one of those in a long time. Maybe I'll pay a visit to the cargo bay as well later.

Once in the kitchen, he quickly washed his bowl placed it back into the cupboards. He then went to peek in the med-bay to see how things were with that woman he saw earlier. Something about her fascinated him.

"Wait...so six rooms in the ship, right? And four currently free ones?" Mia pauses for a minute. "You know what, i'll take one of em' free rooms." Mia gleefully says to Richards. Mia wouldn't have minded bunking with Teal, but there were more than enough empty rooms in the ship to take from, for now. Mia stays at the table, playing with her tableware, whirling her spoon inside the empty bowl. She turns to Teal, and asks, "You're really good at cooking, how'd you learn to cook like this?"

I smiled at everyone's satisfaction, "Thanks everyone. Oh yeah, Richard, I'll make a list of things for the groceries."

I finished my bowl of chili and started to daydream. It wasn't too evident that I was zoned out completely but if you payed enough attention, which no one was at the moment, you can tell something was off. With daydreaming, the constant guard on my memories that were pushed back into a volt, was falling down. Suddenly, the memories of earlier was flooding in, as well as the vivid memories of death. My face grew dim as they over flooded my mind and drained me of my life. It would still be hard to notice unless you were paying close attention.

My state of mind was beginning to shatter as the memories overwhelmed me. My ghost-like state was broken as Bohr ran into the room. It felt like I was being sucked back into reality as all the memories went back into the volt, I have to watch out where I have those nervous break downs..., I thought to my self as I heard Mia talk to me, "You're really good at cooking, how'd you learn to cook like this?"

I smiled at her comment, "Well in my old home, we lived with a lot of people. I was the youngest, about 10. I wasn't able to do the jobs they were doing yet and no one had time to cook. I taught my self how to cook food for them and I've been cooking ever since."

"I'm so jittery because of the little side-effect. It's like taking a good amount of pain killers. I don't feel a thing and my emotions are running rampant. So far, it's all good. All I would need to do is increase the power a little and the side-effects shouldn't be present.", I state. "Hey, um, Teal.... Can I speak with you privately?"

An hour, the man had said.

Those words rang in Nira's mind, as she continued to concentrate on her meditation. As she continued, several personnel had come and went. Without her focus wavering, she could listen to their activities as well as perceive any malice they held. Nira's recovery processes was impeccable, even among like her. She routinely used her Gilgamesh System to provide analysis of her body's condition.

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Nira then contracts her muscles, one by one; she flexes her arms, clenches her hands, stretched and contracted her legs, and continues to stretch out every muscle she could. Right now, she felt she would be able to walk soon, but anything more strenuous than running should be avoided until her wounds completely heal.

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Nonetheless, the rate that she was recovering was attributed to the man's efforts earlier. She was earnestly grateful, and she silently thanks him. Right now, she could sense the presence of someone in the room.

She could not see directly, but she could sense one man—

—No, two.

Nira was alarmed. She had no idea where this second presence came from. She calms herself, as the new entity held no malice, but she was curious about what she felt. Turning her head, she could see another man yelling joyously, and then the who had helped her earlier had begun speaking with the elated man.

"Teleportation...?" She thought, questioningly.

As she listened to the mens' conversation, she could infer that it was definitely use of a teleportation device. A soundless one, at that. If not for her extrasensory perceptions, such a device would be incredibly fearsome.

But, those days are done for her anyway, she thought to herself.

The Gilgamesh System was very demanding in its maintenance, as it consumed a large portion of her body's resources for its upkeep as well as maintaining its energy output. The function of forcibly increasing her metabolism would be ineffectual without consuming any nourishment. She steps off the medical table, and walks over to where the man earlier had left something. He had said it was "chicken", but she was unfamiliar with that term. Observing it, it would appear to be meat, which was much needed for her right now. In many situations, she would sometimes be required to function for long periods of time on miserly amounts of nourishment, so she had developed a habit of being economical. She began eating the food, consuming as much as she could; she left only skewers. Although as such, she did not ignore courtesy and propriety; she had took one of the chairs and sat in an elegant position, and ate with etiquette as to not be unsightly.

The meat was a bit cold to her. It was no significant issue for her, however. She was much used to worse circumstances. She looks around the room for a disposal of some sort, but cannot recognize one, and she did not want to make assumptions. She silently apologizes for her manners. Nira returns the chair to where she found it, and lies down on the medical table again, continuing to rest her body.