The location of the meeting is an uncommon one. It is not a planet, randomly within a territory of a foreign power or amiss amidst the cosmos. It is not simply the nothingness between stars often used to bury or hide things away from the eyes. it is instead a prominent phenomena, as prominent as it is problematic, it situates itself within close proximity to the Hollow Reach.
Backdropped by the lightears-long plumes of purplish matter and towering pillars of unknown origin, the vessels of those called upon fight against the severe FTL disturbances of the area until reaching a point of relative calmery, and from amidst the various cosmical winds that the area emits, the signature of a singular vessel can be made out, an old MISE wartime vessel, the DWV-1.
@Fawx
Raasha, keen on making quick appearances, makes himself appear within a large room deep within the enormous ship. An arrangement of chairs set around an oval table with a display within it, at the end sits a lizardman with grayed features, presumably elohim given the characteristic mechanical left hand, surrounding him the soft impression that any psychic gives out, his of modest strength.
Despite the sudden appearance and introduction, the lizardman moves very little. He frowns for a second, not indicating displeasure but in a manner of acknowledgement, before he starts:
“Raasha, The Ambassador’s protégé, I see.
I will say to others that will soon be here, that their allegiance matters little. After all, there are only those that help you, and those that don’t.
But you are an exception.
That book you inherited, it was not always his. Before, it belonged to the MISE, to them.
Your knowledge may not be so esoteric to some, though, given your presence, you must already be aware of that.
Well, make yourself comfortable.”
The vessels that came close were met with docking instructions from the enormous Wartime Vessel, escorted to the meeting place by what seems to be a skeleton crew of mostly Musavians, with the occasional opportunity to peer into an inner hall of the vessel where robots work on some kind of unknown weapon or device, including several drones from Damadafu’s Respite.
Bandula, in particular, had no troubles navigating the large vessel that was once her home. Quickly navigating through the cyclopean interior she found passage towards the meeting room, where they used to debrief operations for raids towards Capitol and other operations of the likes. She found her way to the meeting room, where a slightly older Elohim sat at the end explaining something to what appeared to be Raasha, an unexpected but somewhat welcome presence.
Quickly after, the others were escorted to the room for the debriefing.
—-----------------
They are all met by the visage of Elohim, by this point a figure of almost mythos, leader of revolutionary movements, escaped psychic project, founder of a nation and ender of another, a lizardman of average body for a healthy adult, though his age is far beyond that.
He eyes the collection of people within the room, pleased to see Bandula within the group. The presence of Alsinans also brought happiness to him, apparently they had military equipment, meaning that the cause that he carried had acquired sympathizers in high roles.
And then, obvious soldiers from the GBE, the crude psychic signatures gave away their origin, their presence was appreciated nonetheless.
Finally, the two slime people from the singular incident at the corner of the galaxy, the large signature that it emanated brought many to look over, the knowledge of this event was what made Elohim know that Raasha inherited the book in the first place. There’s little to no chance they’d sympathize with the enemy.
“It seems everyone is here.
Some of you were called in specific, others may have intercepted the message, your allegiance matters little to me as long as you are on my side, there are issues beyond the scope of geopolitics.
There is a reason I have gathered such an eclectic bunch here today. I suppose I should properly explain everything to those here.”
The holographic displays come to life, emanating imagery from the central table. It follows what Elohim talks about.
“I am Elohim. Some of you may know me as the leader of the Revolutionary Front, some as the forefather of the Democratic Systems , but before that, I was science - an experiment.
How does a nation so big, not plagued by the erosion of logistics, core to the economy of the galaxy, fall so quickly and without culprit? If you’re like me, then you may know that these kinds of catastrophes are rarely without a culprit.
The only one that could have defeated the MISE at their height, well, evidently, it’s themselves. But it wasn’t the three-sided combat that the galaxy participated in. There was a fourth side, a catalyst to all of that blood and war. The schism was orchestrated, and ever since the nodes exploded and war raged amongst my kin, I’ve been trying to find the culprits.”
The image flashes to that of the Musavi system, it zooms fast Damadafu to the capital planet, into the deep underwater, revealing an enormous lattice of a hidden facility, corridors and rooms sprawling as far as the projection can cast.
“That was until I remembered where I came from. Like many others, I couldn’t enter the Musavi system after it was besieged. But when the defenses suddenly fell, I rushed in and managed to infiltrate the facility that once created me, a large and sub-oceanic facility far away from the eyes of the public, operating since before the MISE called itself that.
I met the same imagery that others did, death riddled the place. But I managed to extract what was left of their database, and since then I’ve been decoding the information and pairing it with what I already had.”
The projector flashes again and showcases now another lizardman, one similar to Elohim but of older features.
“Observe, the culprit - My father, or rather, creator. The genetic imprint matches up enough for that to be true, or so the data says. From what I paired, he had been in power from before the MISE’s creation, and until the demise, operating as one of the heads of the Ministries.
He is not the only one, it seems.
At least 3 others seem to have held similar roles, the link between them is that they formed the Board of Directors from Galactic Lihr and Mhertz. They all seem to have had complete clearance for the IPD systems, and could operate with almost complete freedom within the MISE. The coincidences ares far too consistent for it to be a fluke.
In the days of the Second Blackout, several administrator orders were issued throughout the systems, thousands of instances of information being hidden about maintenance for the nodes, and several fleet movements that distanced from the norm that we had known for the past few years. Only this group could have moved so much of the MISE at once.
But why?”
The projector flashes again towards the image of a large sector of the galaxy. It then zooms in, past systems and clouds into a particularly uninteresting section of space, amiss within a nebula, a star system.
“Within the golden ages of the MISE, past the destruction that the Deltas caused, we built much. One of the most well-known projects was called the “Great Future” project, I am sure everyone is keen with the vessel in question.
However, it seems that the Great Future was only the tip of the iceberg, one of the final measures of a much larger project named “Vault”, one that dwarfs the construction of the vessel.
Details are sparse, but it was a secretive bid, a combination project between GL&M and the MISE, which only the top brass knew about. A series of megastructures built to advance the technology and legacy of the MISE unto eternity, divided into several locations.
I only managed to find the coordinates and details of one such location. A green planet orbiting an inconsequential star, lost amidst a nebula in a zone of particular danger, though never in danger itself. The project details the location as an enormous data storage area, though it seems completely disconnected from the IPD itself.
Defragmenting data from Wartime vessels and few remainders obtained within Musavi, we also came to know that the area is extremely secure, utilizing several hardkill measures tailored to eliminate anyone that its systems don’t recognize. These systems are similar to the ones used in Musavi, or rather, Musavi’s were experimental designs in these.
Thankfully for us, I am within said database. I fear, in fact, I may be the only one left within it, after the scrubbing of the main IPD nodes, those systems likely only recognise The Board, and being tied to one of them, automatic defenses do not target me or my proximity. We tested this theory before calling you here. Me and Red made landfall within the planet in proximity to one of the entrances of the facility, before our progress was halted by other defenses within land, smarter ones that targeted me nonetheless.”
Elohim exhales and takes a big sip of water, having talked for so long.
“That is why you are here. We will infiltrate the facility and extract more information from the Vault programme, this knowledge will guide our next steps. But I cannot do this alone. There is a clear danger of death, as we do not know the full extent of the defenses within the planet. But without knowledge, we can do little but chase the destruction that the Great Future threads across the galaxy.
Well that was a lot.
Any questions? We will move out as soon as we can, you may leave your vessels here if you want.”
