The presentation

Beau leans back in his chair, arms folded across his chest, waiting to see where all this is going.
When the suit has his little temper tantrum, he looks annoyed, leans over to Teo and says "asshole" in a not quite whisper.

"If she disappeared because she poked the wrong person because of the crash, that was awfully fast of her. I only fell out of orbit yesterday." Pilgrim thinks aloud, not looking to honk off the fellow. "I do indeed want to have a look at some of her work later. I'll certainly make sure to take Mr. Gantz' thoughts into account when I can review her UNN material."

She probably interviewed this choom, thinks Pilgrim. What are the odds I'll find she did some kind of embarassing expose' on Gantz over there. What he seems to be trying to gloss over is that if she disappeared in relation to the crash this fast, she knew someone that was likely involved and went to ground. But there's not enough data in that set. There's any number of reasons she'd do that. Riley has a reason he brought her up. If only to see who'd jump when he said frog. What might he know that he's not saying here? Maybe something he can say in an email later. I'll want to contact him on that.

Gantz’s stare falls upon one of the representatives from RUST, and if he had lasers for eyes it looks like the man would be dead.

The ComStar Precentor turns her head to the Adept at their table and say aloud, “It been nearly a month since you came crashing down in a fiery blaze, but I agree, she either crossed the wrong people or she’s still doing some intel gathering, either way it’s suspicious.”

Adopt Riley nods, “Right. Mr. Gantz we all know you and Miss Petrov have bad blood, and most people in this room know she’s prone to dig up dirt no one wants known. But the timing is suspicious. And if there are no other comments or questions, we’ll move along to the the next portion of this presentation.”

At that moment one of the gmar elders speaks up, “I am elder Zachariah, and our council had decided, that we must speak to the brother shown in the pictures here. He is known to me, and to others in Gelassenheit. We all know that off-worlders or those outside of our community convert to the faith. But it was upon seeing these pictures that we wish to state that we do not believe he is one of the faith. The weapons he carries would never be allowed, and if the rumors we’ve heard about him are true, he is know to deal in illicit trade, while working in the warehouse district in the trade center. “

Beau stares right back at Gantz, intimidatingly.

(Needed a 10+ for that. Rolled: 2, 2, & 4. 6 doesn't make it.)

When elder Zachariah speaks up, he listens respectfully. When he finishes, Beau nods his head in agreement.

"A turn of phrase, Precentor.  I'm sure by now you'll have found I'm full of them.  Full of something anyway, cry your pardon.  Please go ahead, Adept Riley." says Pilgrim, self-effacingly.  She sits back feeling pleased.  She got what she wanted from the exchange.  That's right, Pill.  Let Mr. Grumpyface over there feel like the young-un by the Precentor is still wet behind her ears.  And pretend that you meant to do that.  It may still come in useful if he underestimates you.

She hears the Elder Zachariah renounce to the whole room that Laser-Pistol Pete the faker-quaker was no son of his flock. Pilgrim kind of wished he'd done that afterward. If the fellow's cover wasn't blown before, it surely was now. If anyone here had anything to do with the guy, he'd go to ground fast as soon as word got out he was a person of interest. If working with someone here, word was already to him most likely via covert comm if they had access to stuff like that. It would have been nice if the Elder had renounced the guy privately to us after the meet. But if wishes were dropships we'd all get to ride.

“Right so moving on.” Say Adept Riley.

At his utterance the holo changes to a planetary map.



It flickers, fades out then returns. Upon seeing the image Riley sighs audibly, “Sorry folks, but this will have to do. Apparently the amalgamation of multiple images is too much for this old machine.” He frowns.

“So what we have here is the best image we could get from the records of old weather and military satellites of Urilon. We, meaning HyperGee, Relic, the scavenger reclamation projects, and the gmar communities, are located on the western continent, in the more central larger mass.” He points towards a light green area near a large organs blob.

“What we need is to get to this larger continent.” He then points to the larger mass to the East. “There we hope to find… well anything. That can help that is. We know there was once a large star port that also possessed a conventional airport as well, but it was more than likely destroyed during the war. But we know there were manufacturing plants, smaller aerospace hubs, corporate, military and ComStar facilities, etc, something had to survive. There may even be other people left on the planet. Having limited resources has kept us from venturing, and since the wars radiation storms and other inclement weather, and just plain survival have kept us from doing much more than just that.”

He coughs then shuffles his feet a bit, “Right, so we’ve been doing well for a few decades, things are moving ahead, then we have a huge setback, no offense to our gmar brothers, but some of us would like to see us have more contact with other worlds. So we had already begun the process of preparing for expeditions to the other continents.”

He looks around the room, “So how do we get there?” Pausing a moment he waits till he’s relatively certain no one has anything to say, “I can see you’re all asking yourself the same thing.”

A picture of a large cargo plane and some VTOLs appear in the holo-projection. “Well we have a cargo plane and some VTOLs, but even with Tyzorg running our refinery we barely have enough fuel for short flight, and definitely not for a return flight.”

The picture changes to blimps, balloons, a dropship, all of which are immediately X’d out. “We have very limited options. We could fly a recon crew and parachute them in, but how would we get them back?”

A picture of a boat becomes visible in the hologram. “One thing we did think was by boat. We have some small boats, but those weren’t sea worthy, but thanks to a small Scavenger tribe, the Six Six Sixties, we have and have been restoring an old nuclear powered battleship. The restore isn’t large enough to power a dropship, otherwise we’d have just taken it for use in ConStars other drop ship whose reactor no longer is operational. But the ship will get us across the ocean and can stay till there is something found or well nothing is found at all.”

“Any questions or comments?”

Beau gives Grant a puzzled frown.

He leans over and whispers quietly "Once again, what the hell's going on here? Back at my place you said this was supposed to be some kind of negotiations about those jack boot thugs making amends for what they did. We get here and first they give us this dog and pony show about the crash and some gmar guy who may or may not be a pirate. And now this song and dance about some wild ass expedition."

Then, louder and with obvious frustration, he says "Somebody's yanking our chain here, and I don't like it one little bit!"

Beau wrote:Beau gives Grant a puzzled frown.

He leans over and whispers quietly "Once again, what the hell's going on here? Back at my place you said this was supposed to be some kind of negotiations about those jack boot thugs making amends for what they did. We get here and first they give us this dog and pony show about the crash and some gmar guy who may or may not be a pirate. And now this song and dance about some wild ass expedition."

Then, louder and with obvious frustration, he says "Somebody's yanking our chain here, and I don't like it one little bit!"

Grant, looks over at you, his brow furrowed and a look of annoyance upon his face, then whispers, “I think you’re right.”

The main representative of the scavenger tribe RUST stands up and loudly states, “What in the hells does this all have to do with making sure my men that were unjustly imprisoned and making recompense for the other tribes who’s people were killed by the UPDF’s heavy handed actions?”

The adept’s face drops a bit, as the rooms becomes filled with rumbles, mutter, and jeers, from different factions present.

One of the representatives from the Scavenger’s Guild yells, “Yes, just what does this have to do with negotiating for better working conditions and making amends for those the bastards in the UPDF killed!”
He then throws a cup at the table where the Defense force representatives are sitting, which in turn turns the muttering and rumbling into yelling and screaming.

After a few minutes of this, a loud “SHUT THE HELLS UP! YOU PETTY SIMPLE
MINDED BUFFOONS, JUST SHUT THE HELL UP!” Comes from the middle of the room, and everyone’s eyes are upon the Precentor of the local ComStar standing there clenching her fists, and looking quite irate. “Sir the hells down. Shut up and listen. I fear Adept Riley has been far less direct i I anticipated he would be.” She says a little more quietly.

As she sits back down, “Let’s put it bluntly. We’re fucked. Seriously fucked. You all fighting is making it worse. We’re largely cut off from the rest of the galaxy, we have limited resources, this planet is ducked from two wars that left its steaming pile of shit…” she stresses the word shit, hard, “… and while I’m sure the gmar would be fine without ever having contact from off planet, some of of us, very much like modern conveniences.” She turns to the gmar delegation, “No offense Elders, you way of life is respected and even admired.”

Precentor Misra, looks to be about to say something as the doors to meeting hall open, and a group of four enter. One is a man looking to be in his late forties, or early fifties, another is a young woman in the acolytes clothes of ComStar, and a another dressed in Military garb of the UPDF, and yet another ComStar acolyte that is quickly approaching the Precentor.

Oho!  So that's that other project they've been working on. Thinks Pilgrim about the Battleship.  Just the thing for heading into what might be a hot section of the planet.  A nice mobile base of operations that would necessarily have its own radiation hardening.  Or at least, Geiger counters.  She'd need to re-consult the maps she had and see what kind of rads are still buzzing about in the air, or how dirty the bombs were.  

If there was functional star league tech out there, would there have been large scale air scrubbers from the initial colonization?  If so, would they even be in working order after their hot little war?  I'll have to read up on that too if they have the reference material regarding what the initial colony and spaceports were like.  But a Battleship... I might could get some of that beast's armament running again if it's offline.

Seeing the Precentor take bloody charge of the situation, Pilgrim raises her estimation of the woman up several hundred notches.  She'd stand up and cheer were it appropriate.  But Pilgrim's just another Star chick at this meeting.  Not her place.  But she'll do that later in her quarters.  I will certainly buy the woman a drink for that.  Fuck to the yeah!

When the new quartet of people enter, she has time to think, Oh what fresh fuckery is this now?  Seeing the acolyte closing on the Precentor, she shifts her seat, opening a way to assist if whatever happens here turns ugly.  Not that an acolyte would dream of any of THAT kind of fuckery, but part of me still doesn't trust any of this.  

With an angry look on his face, Beau starts to stand and make a rejoinder when the new folks arrive. He remains seated, looks hard at the new arrivals, then at at Grant, and says "bloody hell, what the fuck is it now?"

OOC: I assume the "man in his forties or fifties" is me?

"Good to meet you, everyone", Malachi says. "From the looks on your faces, I guess you're all wondering what fuckery this is... I don't know either, but I've just accepted the job. Malachi Rupp's the name. Free Trader, pilot, navigator, a few other things sometimes. At your service."

All eyes are on the man speaking, as the acolyte speaks with the Precentor.

Grant and Gantz both stand and simultaneously say, “What the hell is this?!” Then they both lock eyes with one another, a small look of disgust crosses their faces, followed by Precentor Misra shooting rhem both a lion of absolute disdain and annoyance.

“Right” she says in a voice that barely hides the seething rage building inside her. “Everyone. Sit. Down. Shut. Up.” She takes a couple of deep breaths. “Will you continue Adept Riley?”

The Tyzorg representative Mr. Gantz stands up in huff, “I demand to know who this is that has interrupted this proceeding!” His assistants slowly stand, taking defensive positions.”

Precentor Misra stands sharply, “Mr. Gantz, sir you’re ass down and tell your goons to do the same or I will have you all removed.” She puts extra emphasis upon the word “will,” enough that it comes across as a promise, not a threat.

Mr Gantz sits down looking like a scolded puppy.

Adept Riley looks confused, “So… where were we?”

Beau mutters to himself a bit about "being the damned voice of reason here", takes a deep breath, and then flops his hand up while standing.

"Beg pardon, Adept, but it might be helpful if we clear up some thangs. We was brought here under the understanding that this was to be a negotiation about what them there ja..."

Beau stops short, closes his eyes, and bites back the rest of that comment before continuing.

"Errr... the recent 'unpleasantness' between us and the UPDF. This here presentation's touched on some mighty important sounding stuff, what but it ain't at all clear how it's all connected. Could y'all maybe connect all the dots here for us? I understand that this expedition is important, but what's it gotta do with that 'gmar' fella what's arrived on the drop ship and what's it all gotta do with us?"

Adept Riley, looks over at Beau, “To be frank, Mr. Oliver, the connection is that these issues affect us all, that fighting between factions will ruin us, and that the only way to rebuild trust is to work together.”

He straightens his posture and takes on a very stiff demeanor, “Currently I am laying out the reasons WHY we should all work together. Followed by a plan of action of HOW we can work together. Amends come from the outcomes of WHAT we all do to address these issues. And to be incredibly honest this plan of action was already decided, the people chosen for the mission, and the timeline set, before we even sat down. If you want to really know more then ask Mr. Mayar about what role he’s playing in this and what he volunteered you and Mr. Brandt for.”

Grant looks a bit stunned by this being said aloud, and the stunned silence that fills the room, you swear you can hear multiple people’s blood pressure rise.

One of which is the Precentor of ComStar, who rises abruptly, “Meeting is adjourned for the day.” She says angrily, “Adept Riley. My. Office. Now!” Then she storms out of the room, right hand clenched into a fist.

Adept Riley then, slinks out of the room, looking as though he knows he messed up, and might be in a lot of trouble.

Most of the smaller factions representatives look bewildered, While Mr Gantz from Tyzorg Corproation looks absolutely amused.

The UPDF representatives hurry out of the room.

Beau looks at Grant, cocks an eye, and says, in a cool and low but rather brittle tone of voice "Explain." As he does so, he rests his hand on his hip, ready to slide it towards his lower back if needed.

Malachi looks around at the others. Looking especially at Beau, whose hand is ready to slide toward his lower back if needed, Malachi puts his right hand in his coat pocket, just in case. "It's good to know I'm not the only one who's armed here. But if we're just here to start a fight with each other, I'd rather go home. Supposing we figure out what's up instead?"

Grant stares holes through Beau, “Now I’d be very careful what you choose to do next.” As other men from RUST, all seem to take a more tense posture, “how did you think we got you and Teo out? We have to give a little to get a little. So we volunteered for a joint mission, that will benefit us all.”

The Tyzorg Representative bursts out laughing, “You can’t trust anyone these days.” He slaps the table three times, and his men and few others that were apparently outside of the meeting room walking in, looking very serious. “I mean, everyone didn’t know about this venture, but of course, some people are more available than others.” He chuckles to himself. “I think I’ll take my leave.” He says, standing slowly, keeping his eyes on everyone in the room, then he slowly backs out of the room, his men following him.

The scavengers guild representatives look dumbfounded, then focus their attention upon Grant and the men from RUST, and glower at him. As do some of the other factions.

It doesn’t take long after Mr Gantz, of the Tyzorg Corporation, makes his exit, that Grant puts both of his hand flat on the table, “Sit down Beau. Let’s talk.”

Just as he says that the young officer with the UPDF staggers back in, looking quite green.

Beau looks at this Rupp character as he speaks, clearly wondering exactly who the fuck this guy is.

When Grant speaks next, Beau turns back to him, clearly not happy.

However, his great wrath is spent on Grantz. As he leaves, Beau spits on the ground and quietly but savagely utters expletives mostly questioning the legitimacy of Grantz's birth status.

When Grant suggests he sit. he tenses, then relaxes slightly, crosses his arms across his chest, and sits.

He starts to say something when the young UPDF officer staggers in.

He lookas at the officer and sotto voce says "Oh, for fucks sake! What now?"

Malachi sits down too, relaxing but not totally letting down his guard. Being looked at with a "who the hell is this guy" look is nothing new to him, and he shares Beau's apparent confusion about what's going on. So he decides the best way to find out is to be quiet and listen for now.

With the precept gone in a huff, and more power to her, Pilgrim quietly gets up from where she was at the end of the table she'd been at and comes over to join everyone there with a friendly, "I'll sit.  No one minds, I'm sure."  She looks in the direction of where Gantz exited the proceedings.  "At least now that the bad air has sucked itself out of the room."

She takes a seat amongst the grumpy confused menfolk.  Was she grumpy?  She checked all her internal boards and found them green.  Good enough then, Pill.  She thought to herself.  Perhaps we're just glad to be headed in a direction.  Whether the folk in here had planned on going or not.

"I'm Ms. Mortimer.  But most just call me Pilgrim.  Pleased to meetcha." she says as the greenish youngster enters.  Arching an eyebrow and calling over her immediate group's shoulders at him, "You look like my transport fell on your house.  Care to give us a sitrep?"

There are many whispered conversations taking place in the room, and the gmar elders stand up, “We shall take out leave for the day englische.” And the solemnly walk out of the meeting hall.

The UPDF officer still absolutely green to the gills, says something in Dutch, or German, or maybe the hybrid language of the gmar, but it is hard to hear. As the Elders walk by one of the claps the officer upon the shoulder with a sad look in his eye.

Grant’s poker face seems to have returned, no longer a look of astonishment, nor the grin and bear it expression visible upon his countenance. “You and Teo are valued members of RUST, that’s why I made the deal I did. I’m not looking to use you or personally gain, I want RUST and the Tribes to be in a better palace.

The Scavengers Guild representative, shouts, “Then why haven’t you ever join the guild or aided the guild when labor disputes have arisen?”

Grant makes a dismissive wave, and continues, “I’m sorry that you learned of this deal the way you did, and I should have told you, but what we all gain was going to be based upon what you two find and negotiate for in my stead.”

So of the other tribes murmur, discontent with the way the conversation is going.

As Grant is about the speak again, a woman addressing the group as Ms. Mortimer sits down at the table, then directs a comment towards the UPDF officers, who looks to be about to vomit any moment now.

OOC: as ex-gmar, I guess I'd understand what the UPDF officer said to them? What did he say?

Malachi addresses the ill-looking young officer quietly. "Rough night, huh?" After quickly explaining his tried-and-true (from long experience) hangover remedy recipe, he asks, "do you have any more clue than I do what's going on here? Doesn't seem like a very well-organized meeting. No introductions yet... who is everybody?"

Malachi Rupp wrote:OOC: as ex-gmar, I guess I'd understand  what the UPDF officer said to them? What did he say?

Make me a listen check, he’s still by the doorway and he’s speaking in a hoarse whisper.

As the boy doesn't immediately answer beyond something in Dutch she didn't quite get, she leans back in her chair and surreptitiously checks her stunner for a quick draw if necessary. The preceptor might have her pilloried for it if she had to drop someone in neutral space, but lets her paranoia stretch out for a closer examination of the Up-diff kid, as she's coming to think of the faction. (Going active with perception checks on this kid. I can imagine a lot.)