Goonhub
12-04-2015, 06:44 PM
LLJK RP 5: NSS DESTINY
STARRING:
ErikHanson as Clark Clarkson
SAAesculus as Thet Raytor
Voliun as Karla Crowne
Hephasto as Osiris Jones
Disclaimer - Only two events in this story were the result of administrator action: Gannets fixing the portal which had bugged out and authorizing the solving itself. All other events were entirely and completely player-driven, and completely replicable by anyone determined enough. It's a fun thing to do, and we totally encourage you to try it! Feel free to join us on #sol at irc.synirc.net to hang out and talk about the riddles and puzzles goonstation has to offer.
5th of December, 2053.
It started with a protest. Scribblings of SINNERS. Claims of God being dead, luddite and blasphemer thrown about.A fundamentalist chaplain against the sinners of the research department, a champion of Space God with one goal - shutting down the department, and preventing extradimensional beasts from invading the Destiny, all noble causes. A madman research director, who had already destroyed several stations for science.
And then Thet Raytor turned away from the main doors into research and walked past telescience, and was waved in by fellow scientist Clark Clarkson. As it turned out, he was not there by coincidence: He wanted to solve the solarium!
NanoTrasen research logs spoke of the 'solarium', the vessel lost to space within the Sol system over a decade ago, the vessel which, inevitably drove mad all who attempted to solve whatever riddles it had in store. So, of course, he would be the first.
But, of course, they were the elite top-notch nerds of the galaxy, the best of the best, and if they wanted to do it it would be done. And so a plan was hatched, a plan to piss off the chaplain, collect a set of keys and unlock the very forces of evil she wanted to prevent upon the station, solely in the interests of pissing off a mad priest.
They both tuned their headsets into a secret frequency, and went their own ways, Clarkson promptly ran into the pod bay and enlisted the help of a crewmember to build a small, but sturdy miniputt and Raytor calibrating telescience and sending himself to explore areas he suspected would contain clues to the riddle.
During all this, Clarkson was busy as well, busy, in two words, exploring space. In his spacepod, he managed to visit quite a few interesting places to retrieve a few important items - A spaceship stuck in a time-space disturbance with a rather old fellow and a key in his pocket, a key in a greater domestic space beehive-ship, and a rather peculiar egg, an egg with KALI MA engraved on it.
The advance through the biodome was almost instantanenous, stopped only when reality itself frowned at how fast it was going. A portal had failed to materialize, and instead opened up inside a tree trunk. But he already knew the solution: Space-time was grumpy.
A portal stuck in a tree, a clear indicator that space-time itself wanted nothing to do with Thet Raytor. And instead he descended down the elevator to grab not only the silver key or the old book, returning only after the portalhad its break and smoked a weed and allowed Thet to transit through.
The other side was intriguing yet repulsive, with blood-red carpet and monochrome grey walls clearly marking the owners and operators of whereever he ended up: A syndicate manufacturing satellite for the mysterious project IRIDIUM!
A small craft with mostly automated production facilities, It seemed almost entirely deserted, and became entirely so when Raytor took care of its last inhabitants - old, malfunctioning security droids. While few contents were noteworthy, there were several of great concern: Blueprints for new lines of Syndicate assault drones.
Clarkson was still busy retrieving the last few items he promised to pick up, after a few short messages back and forth, our elite nerds decided it would be quicker if Clarkson made some snacks for the automaton, and grabbed a few other items that would help solving the riddle, whilst Thet was still busy allowing for a tree to have a break to smoke weed and returning back to the station to attend to a head of staff meeting.
Promptly after entering botany clark was greeted by a grumpy botanist which wanted him to leave! Clark being the guy he is, he told the fellow spaceman to calm down, because he clearly had permission to be here under standard law sections 48 subheading 2B, just ask one of the heads.
After a quick conversation, and communication they found out that they had most of the items they required to to continue, but there was only one thing which could possibly provide enough power for the dreaded solarium's effects: The key, the heart of the IRIDIUM drone. And, just from a cursory glance at the blueprints from the factory, it was going to be the toughest battle yet.
they required at least 100.000 credits to buy some overly expensive pod armor to fight the IRIDIUM battledrone, or rather, battleship! Our elite nerds weighed their options: Robbing the ship's bank computer would be the easiest and fastest, surely, but would it be even possible to do? Pooling their resources to purchase hundreds of lottery tickets would surely take far too long, and there was always the chance that no tickets would win.
So both Thet Raytor and Clark Clarkson put their life savings on their ID cards, and played slots until they dropped, or they had the money, whichever came first. While Thet quickly turned his meagre 5500 credits into 25000, there was a problem: Corrupt security officer Osiris Jones was on patrol at his favorite gambling den, which just so happened to be the one Thet was playing at.
Which, of course, was a problem: Officer Jones was blocking the way, and Research Director Raytor wasn't giving up any of his money. So he gambled once more, put it all on the port-a-sci: The incredible teleporting closet. Just as Osiris was ready to take out his stun baton, Thet vanished into the locker and disappeared: The gambit worked.
But they were still short seventy thousand credits. Fortunately, Clarkson being a lucky fellow, it only took a few quick tries until Clarkson managed to get the jackpot of 100.000 credits, which was more than enough to get him the armor they needed to construct two space pods to battle the IRIDIUM drone!
After a few quick checks, they knew they were ready, their space pods ready for action, and action it was when the IRIDIUM drone's presence made itself known when it teleported towards the relay satellite, ready to face its challengers.
Unfortunately, the Syndicate had massively underestimated the value of engineering: The satellite itself blocked the drone from moving in all but one direction. And that one direction just so happened to have two angry, deadly spacepods staring down the doomed drone.
After celebrating a quick victory over the IRIDIUM battledrone, they both jumped into the port-a-sci, and promptly teleported back to a slightly charred research wing, after which Thet yelled the correct coordinates towards Clark, and after a few mashes of the SEND button, they knew they had managed to land back home - back at the Solarium when they were greeted by the clockwork ticks and tocks of the Automaton. After a few nods they both dumped their keys and items on the ground, and started to hand over their items to the now twitching and rotating Automaton, at last, they handed him a book, after which it froze.
And then it was done, they managed to solve the riddle, the puzzle, after all, despite countless roadblocks they managed to do it! They had defeated the machine, the Automaton, the Solarium, destroyed the Syndicate Y-class battledrone, and the universe itself was at their hands.
Thet and Clarkson both yelled of their victory over the station's common radio, and taunted the Chaplain for the last time - They at last had had their victory, and destiny was rightfully theirs.
And then the NSS Destiny flew into a sun. Or was it the sun that flew into its Destiny?
STAY TUNED FOR PART TWO.
STARRING:
ErikHanson as Clark Clarkson
SAAesculus as Thet Raytor
Voliun as Karla Crowne
Hephasto as Osiris Jones
Disclaimer - Only two events in this story were the result of administrator action: Gannets fixing the portal which had bugged out and authorizing the solving itself. All other events were entirely and completely player-driven, and completely replicable by anyone determined enough. It's a fun thing to do, and we totally encourage you to try it! Feel free to join us on #sol at irc.synirc.net to hang out and talk about the riddles and puzzles goonstation has to offer.
5th of December, 2053.
It started with a protest. Scribblings of SINNERS. Claims of God being dead, luddite and blasphemer thrown about.A fundamentalist chaplain against the sinners of the research department, a champion of Space God with one goal - shutting down the department, and preventing extradimensional beasts from invading the Destiny, all noble causes. A madman research director, who had already destroyed several stations for science.
And then Thet Raytor turned away from the main doors into research and walked past telescience, and was waved in by fellow scientist Clark Clarkson. As it turned out, he was not there by coincidence: He wanted to solve the solarium!
NanoTrasen research logs spoke of the 'solarium', the vessel lost to space within the Sol system over a decade ago, the vessel which, inevitably drove mad all who attempted to solve whatever riddles it had in store. So, of course, he would be the first.
But, of course, they were the elite top-notch nerds of the galaxy, the best of the best, and if they wanted to do it it would be done. And so a plan was hatched, a plan to piss off the chaplain, collect a set of keys and unlock the very forces of evil she wanted to prevent upon the station, solely in the interests of pissing off a mad priest.
They both tuned their headsets into a secret frequency, and went their own ways, Clarkson promptly ran into the pod bay and enlisted the help of a crewmember to build a small, but sturdy miniputt and Raytor calibrating telescience and sending himself to explore areas he suspected would contain clues to the riddle.
During all this, Clarkson was busy as well, busy, in two words, exploring space. In his spacepod, he managed to visit quite a few interesting places to retrieve a few important items - A spaceship stuck in a time-space disturbance with a rather old fellow and a key in his pocket, a key in a greater domestic space beehive-ship, and a rather peculiar egg, an egg with KALI MA engraved on it.
The advance through the biodome was almost instantanenous, stopped only when reality itself frowned at how fast it was going. A portal had failed to materialize, and instead opened up inside a tree trunk. But he already knew the solution: Space-time was grumpy.
A portal stuck in a tree, a clear indicator that space-time itself wanted nothing to do with Thet Raytor. And instead he descended down the elevator to grab not only the silver key or the old book, returning only after the portalhad its break and smoked a weed and allowed Thet to transit through.
The other side was intriguing yet repulsive, with blood-red carpet and monochrome grey walls clearly marking the owners and operators of whereever he ended up: A syndicate manufacturing satellite for the mysterious project IRIDIUM!
A small craft with mostly automated production facilities, It seemed almost entirely deserted, and became entirely so when Raytor took care of its last inhabitants - old, malfunctioning security droids. While few contents were noteworthy, there were several of great concern: Blueprints for new lines of Syndicate assault drones.
Clarkson was still busy retrieving the last few items he promised to pick up, after a few short messages back and forth, our elite nerds decided it would be quicker if Clarkson made some snacks for the automaton, and grabbed a few other items that would help solving the riddle, whilst Thet was still busy allowing for a tree to have a break to smoke weed and returning back to the station to attend to a head of staff meeting.
Promptly after entering botany clark was greeted by a grumpy botanist which wanted him to leave! Clark being the guy he is, he told the fellow spaceman to calm down, because he clearly had permission to be here under standard law sections 48 subheading 2B, just ask one of the heads.
After a quick conversation, and communication they found out that they had most of the items they required to to continue, but there was only one thing which could possibly provide enough power for the dreaded solarium's effects: The key, the heart of the IRIDIUM drone. And, just from a cursory glance at the blueprints from the factory, it was going to be the toughest battle yet.
they required at least 100.000 credits to buy some overly expensive pod armor to fight the IRIDIUM battledrone, or rather, battleship! Our elite nerds weighed their options: Robbing the ship's bank computer would be the easiest and fastest, surely, but would it be even possible to do? Pooling their resources to purchase hundreds of lottery tickets would surely take far too long, and there was always the chance that no tickets would win.
So both Thet Raytor and Clark Clarkson put their life savings on their ID cards, and played slots until they dropped, or they had the money, whichever came first. While Thet quickly turned his meagre 5500 credits into 25000, there was a problem: Corrupt security officer Osiris Jones was on patrol at his favorite gambling den, which just so happened to be the one Thet was playing at.
Which, of course, was a problem: Officer Jones was blocking the way, and Research Director Raytor wasn't giving up any of his money. So he gambled once more, put it all on the port-a-sci: The incredible teleporting closet. Just as Osiris was ready to take out his stun baton, Thet vanished into the locker and disappeared: The gambit worked.
But they were still short seventy thousand credits. Fortunately, Clarkson being a lucky fellow, it only took a few quick tries until Clarkson managed to get the jackpot of 100.000 credits, which was more than enough to get him the armor they needed to construct two space pods to battle the IRIDIUM drone!
After a few quick checks, they knew they were ready, their space pods ready for action, and action it was when the IRIDIUM drone's presence made itself known when it teleported towards the relay satellite, ready to face its challengers.
Unfortunately, the Syndicate had massively underestimated the value of engineering: The satellite itself blocked the drone from moving in all but one direction. And that one direction just so happened to have two angry, deadly spacepods staring down the doomed drone.
After celebrating a quick victory over the IRIDIUM battledrone, they both jumped into the port-a-sci, and promptly teleported back to a slightly charred research wing, after which Thet yelled the correct coordinates towards Clark, and after a few mashes of the SEND button, they knew they had managed to land back home - back at the Solarium when they were greeted by the clockwork ticks and tocks of the Automaton. After a few nods they both dumped their keys and items on the ground, and started to hand over their items to the now twitching and rotating Automaton, at last, they handed him a book, after which it froze.
And then it was done, they managed to solve the riddle, the puzzle, after all, despite countless roadblocks they managed to do it! They had defeated the machine, the Automaton, the Solarium, destroyed the Syndicate Y-class battledrone, and the universe itself was at their hands.
Thet and Clarkson both yelled of their victory over the station's common radio, and taunted the Chaplain for the last time - They at last had had their victory, and destiny was rightfully theirs.
And then the NSS Destiny flew into a sun. Or was it the sun that flew into its Destiny?
STAY TUNED FOR PART TWO.