Red Agenda: Neon City

[Schwuldubist]

Neon City
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Nearly 800 years ago a new city was founded in the Oriob-Cygnus Arm. The city plans were extravagant from the beginning. They wanted to build a large commercial cit with advertisements built on every building. As the plans expanded, people began living in the top floors while the bottom floors were filled with shops. Buildings began going up in matters of weeks, ancient times square was spread across an entire city lights flashing, giving it the name Neon city. The city grew larger offering all forms of entertainment, film, music, symphonies, along with many illicit actives of enjoyment as well. However, the rise of entertainment made the rise of crime as well, many people began living outside the city and only working as crime rates increased just as quickly.

As crime increase the city was losing popularity and as an entertainment and advertising center of the solar system losing popularity meant loosing billions of credits for millions of people. Justicar's began appearing, independent vigilantes beginning to lower crime. As they lowered crime they began to bond together form a sort of gang extorting companies. In response taxes increased to pay for more police and security. The power hungry cops began to become dirty also extorting companies. While clean cops did their best, but the combined power of dirty cops and justicars overwhelmed.

Now the city has began to clean the dirty cops, the Justicars are beginning to be disassembled but this has only come help from other cities and worlds sending military units forcing nearly a millitary lockdown causing curfews and illegal activities punished severely.

[Schwuldubist]

Iraja
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Iraja woke up again in his apartment above a liquor store. He stopped the alarm without touching his clock. His apartment was the one place he used his power to do everything that he could, which was incredibly little. He sat up with a big yawn. He had no plan yet ago, his last attempt to obtain a shuttle resulted in a scam where he lost most of his money. He had already quit his job and now had to find another one, or some other way to make a lot of money. He got dressed quickly, opening doors with just raising his hand and waving it lethargically. He stepped out onto the street opening up his pda. Job listings were thousands deep but the city was huge and most of these jobs were in shady neighborhoods and horrible pay. It took hours to find a job only to have thirty other people competing for one job.

[Revelator]

800 years ago...


[Captain! hull breaches in sections 2,5, and 7] the ships computer told her urgently.

"Seal it off!" she yelled. The ship shuttered as more missiles made it past. The arc-field was barely there anymore, the power systems had been pushed too far and fried. V was doing his best, but he couldn't keep up.

She gritted her teeth, Cavalier Eternal had taken out many of the AI drone ships, but then the humans had shown up. They wanted her dead just as badly as the AIs. It was an awful situation. She was stuck between two enemy fleets, both fighting each other, and both wanting her dead.

There was a squeel of beeps and robot chatter of the intercom. She replied over her comsystem, "Get out of there V, you can't do anything else from in there. Can you get two the cannon to reload it?"

More beeps and noise. "Alright, Alright. Try and get back to the bridge then. I could use you here."

She heard the acknowledgement and clicked off her system. Fortunately, the servitors in the weapons tunnels had gotten the missile racks almost completely reloaded. The fleets were both converging on her position. She had to force herself not to hold her breath. She had once chance to do this.

[Schwuldubist]

Iraja
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Iraja found a job nearby, it was in some food place, he didn't recognize the name, but the locationw asn't too far from his home, and in the older part of the city. He knew that a bunch of people were probably already there for the job as unemplyment was still a problem in the city. But if he got the job at least he could save money and walk to work. He headed toward the adress closing his pda and pocketing it. An advertisment for ships was on a nearby neon sign, he recognized the ship he had try to by in a scam, and shook his head. If only he could warn other people not to fall for the same scam.

[Revelator]

800 years ago...


She kept her ships engines idling while she waited for the fleets to close. She was playing 'dead' or at least trying to make them think she was too damaged to do much of anything. Her ship was angling down, as though she was going to try and slip under the human fleet and use the planet to slingshot her ship to the outer system to make repairs. She didn't have to try to hard to pull it off either. Her ship WAS badly damaged.

Ships from both fleets broke off and made and intercept course for her ship. The two fleets engaged above, while the groups coming after her began taking potshots at each other. There were eleven AI ships and fourteen human ships coming after her. Five of the ships were at least as big as hers; three AI ships and two human ships.

Finally they were in range of almost all her weapons. The arc-field was down, which was bad. All she had were her point defense turrets on top, and half of those were gone, "Alright, we're going to do a turnover so we can put our internal launcher into sprintmode. We'll flush the external racks first, give two seconds after, start sprint mode, then fire all broadside weapons. Leave point defense turrets to handle enemy missiles," the Captain told the ship's computer.

The ships computer beeped once at her for acknowledgement. V just got to the bridge, he looked a little scorched, but took a seat one of the gunnery seats. He'd man point defense, as his reaction time was incredible, "Get ready V. Alright, countdown to turnover... 3...2...1...NOW!"

The ship flipped over, suddenly pointing towards the enemy ships, though it's momentum continued to carry it further away. Nearly two hundred missiles flushed from the external rack and orientated themselves and began streaking towards both groups of ships, which were almost flying right on top of each other now. Cavalier Eternal began taking hits. The cannon housing was closed, though it took enough energy weapon hits to make the Captain worry about the cannon itself. The sprint mode missiles were already on their way, racing out past the flushed missiles. Two second before the missiles hit, some started popping as the enemy ships point defense went to work. V at his station was knocking down most of the missiles coming their way. Some got through. All the broadside cannons fired, striking the ships almost the exact same instant their missiles hit. The two groups turned into a boiling inferno. Ships popped and imploded. When the wreckage cleared, there were still seven ships left. They had done great, but then their shields failed completely. More hull breaches were being reported.

[We need to make an emergency landing. There's a city we can fly into, with all the wreckage and ships falling, we might be able to hide amidst it] The computer told her.

"Alright, take us in hot, keep those guns firing V. This will only work if we survive long enough to make a landing," she ordered. The broadsides continued firing. They were out of missiles now though, and relying on turrets.

[Schwuldubist]

Iraja
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Iraja left the interview site knowing he didn't get the job. He heard that another applicant knew somebody who worked there, and he had lived in Neon city long enough to know how it went. He repeated the process of opening his PDA, glancing at the jobs. There was a high paying job, still open surprisingly. Sadly, Iraja read the descriptionSewer cleaner. The sewers have been backing up in certain areas of the city, and they need to be cleaned out by hand. The robots and the automated systems can't keep up. Hazmat suits and tools will be provided. No previous experience or skill needed.

Iraja looked at his other choices. They all seemed equally as bad, but this one seemed closest to him and would let him go to more interviews in one day. He sighed, sucking up his pride to think about his future as he walked to the nearby water treatment plant.

[Revelator]

800 Years Ago...


V was doing his best at the gunnery seat, but there were still too many missiles coming in. All their counter-missiles had been fired off already, and they didn't have time reload any of the counter-missile batteries. Quite a few were still getting through.

Then they hit atmosphere, the missiles went all sorts of different directions. There were six ships on their tail still, drives and computers straining to cope with flying in atmosphere. The two larger frigates were still there as well. They had almost completely forgotten each other and were focused on the Cavalier.

One corvette exploded from the strain. It burst into pieces that began falling along the same course the ship had been taking.

[Captain! There's a subsystem access way coming on my sensor sweep. I've used my astrometrics to map out some of the subsystem. I'm going to fire the guns and blow a hole for us to go into. There's a cavernous room we can fit the ship in. I don't want to risk destroying the entry way and preventing us from getting out. We'll be able to at some point though, that opening was made for industrial excavators. We'll fit] the computer chimed at her.

"As long as we aren't burying ourselves alive I don't care what you do," she yelled over the klaxons wailing, "Turn those sirens off. It's bad enough without bursting my eardrums," she added. The sirens went quiet quickly.

The ship's broadside turrets towards the front began firing straight ahead, blowing a hole that began collapsing. The ship began braking. The ship clipped the edge of the hole, causing it cave in more behind it, a building falling in behind it. The city was mostly abandoned, so hopefully no one was inside, the captain idly thought. Though they were effectively closed in to one half of the cavern now. Fortunately it was the side that lead to the exit. The ship began powering down it's engines and settling. The captain blew out the breath she had been holding. V was sitting frozen at the gunnery console.

[Schwuldubist]

Iraja
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Iraja entered the building, finally glad to see and interview that wasn't packed with interviewees. He sat down with about three other people, all probably as desperate as him to find a job. The first person went in, and took about five minutes. The second person went in and took about ten minutes. It was finally Iraja's turn he walked into the room, one person was sitting there behind a desk, and Iraja sat across from him

"So, Iraja..." He started looking at Iraja's electronic Resume "It appears you have a history of jobs that only last about a year"

"Yeah, I've been trying to save up to buy a ship to leave neon city."

"Wouldn't that be nice to leave, but I have a family here." The interviewer stopped, and looked at the clock. "Aw crap. Now I'm late for family dinner, you got the job. I have to get out of here. I'll send the details on your pda" He said, standing up and more or less shoving Iraja out the door. Iraja, of course, was stunned at the strageness of how he got the job, thank goodness for family dinners.

[Revelator]

800 Years Ago...
Alecta and V


V finally moved from the gunnery station and began asking her if she was alright in his computer speak. Captain Alecta nodded then shook her head.

[Captain, we're going to have company here soon] the ships computer informed her, injecting an urgent note into it's tone.

"We'll go out and meet them. Get the armor out, I'm going to the armory and I want it ready to put on. V, wait for me by the airlock door," Captain Alecta ordered.

V agreed and headed out to grab his own weapons. The ships computer acknowledged.

With that Alecta began making her way to the armory. She had to pause here and there. She was pretty sure something was broken, or ruptured somewhere inside her. That probably had something to do with the rough landing. Nothing to be done about it now though, other than take out the AI war droids, or humans. Or both. Once that was done she could try and get some medical attention.

Once she finally made it to the armory, the servitor there had the armor laid out for her. She began slowly putting it on, wincing every so often.

[Captain, your injured. Stay aboard the ship. Allow myself and V to take care of the attacking forces] the ships computer told her.

"No, no... you really think your automated turrets and V can hold them all off. I'm not going to send V out alone. I'm hurt, yes. Can we do anything about it right now? No. If we don't stop them outside they'll come in. If I'm going to die here I want to take as many of them as possible first," she told the computer. "Thanks for the offer though. We had a good run didn't we?" she asked rhetorically as he grabbed her rifle. She fit a couple extra hand guns on as well.

The computer was quiet for a moment before replying, [Yes, captain. We did. I don't want it to end here. Come to the mainframe room before you go, please] the computer asked her.

Alecta was somewhat surprised to here the request. She didn't know what she could do there, or what would the computer wanted her to go there for. However she decided to go, the computer deserved it from her, "Alright, I'm heading there now," she agreed as she began what seemed like a journey to the other side of the world.

[Schwuldubist]

Iraja
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Iraja disguised his excitement for his job, as he didn't want to annoy the people around him. Still he could celebrate now and spend the last of his money. He went to a nearby restaurant ordering anything he felt like, which was some exotic dish that he couldn't even pronounce. He was going to hate his job, but at least he was making enough money that he could put some away to buy a spaceship, or at least try to again. He had had enough of neon city.