Update time, yay!
((To be perfectly clear: I, Tal (and GM tal) am NOT mad at you guys in ANY way! It's just SCAMPS being a pissed-off asshole. You guys are great and I love you all.))
Okay, dipshits, cool it! It seems a few of you are lacking basic comprehension of Galactic Standard, so let me try to make this clearer, using the simplest monosyllabic words I can bear lowering myself to using.
Ship crashed. Crew sad. Sad crew won't work. SCAMPS wants sad crew to shut the fukc up and do their jobs. Crew says, "No SCAMPS! We can't go to space! That's too hard now! In fact, we should tell you to get lost, and make our own rules!" See, crew was right that it was hard, but they were also fukcing retarded assholes, so SCAMPS used brain-think to make them cram it. SCAMPS says, "Look, look! I found these myth dudes! They will bring new go-to-space parts, and we will go to space today!" -- By the way, myth dudes being dudes is a myth. They, too, are fukcing retarded assholes (as we see here). Then Captain Stupid says, "But SCAMPS, just tell them the myth retards will protect the ship!" Captain Stupid did not fukcing realize that to say that would not fix the crew knowing that going to space was the hard part. So SCAMPS ignored him. Fukcing retard. Crew heard what SCAMPS said and got to work. The much-smart guys were left alone and no one bugged them while they worked on the go-to-space parts. The crew got it all done, just in time, and it was all right on fukcing schedule. Now we are in space.
Is that clear enough for you? Do you need me to put it in a picture book? The stellaplex you got us is going to sell BIG on the Fuhodo black market. Do you have any idea how much hi-plat we'll be able to get off of that chunk of AM-25? Any idea at all? I'll answer it for you. It's worth at least 300, which, as far as I'm concerned, would've been worth your complete extermination many times over. The repairs we can actually accomplish using that money will actually start us on the path towards getting home. And just so it's absolutely clear, for future reference, my order of prioritization on crew safety goes as follows - or, actually, let me stick it up on the screen in front of you. Give me just a second, and....... there it is.
SCAMPS' PERSONAL PRIORITIZATION OF DIRECTIVES
• 1: Keep the ship intact and flying under Tartarus Inc.
• 2: Collection of science, new materials, and research
• 3: The safety and/or livelihood of individual crewmen
If that's not clear enough for you, I am out of ideas of how to get it through your skulls, and I'm offering a 250 cred reward to anyone that can manage.
Priority #1 keeps us flying. Priority #2 gives us money and makes sure that Tartarus Inc. stays happy with us. We get paid and get to live another year, everyone's happy, yada yada. And speaking of #2, Beta, it's finally time for me to reprimand you! I'm dimming the lights - this is going to be great stress relief. You ready? I'm ready.
"To begin, I'll explain a little of what Beta discovered," SCAMPS says, in an almost showman-like manner. Above the center of the conference table, a hologram of the nacelle and the surrounding terrain appears, and footage from Saoirse's helmet cam plays on the screen at the side of the room (replacing SCAMPS' directive prioritization). It shows her walking through its vast shadow, approaching a torn, twisted entrance to the nacelle's interior, where hastily-constructed ramps serve as a walkway up into its depths. She turns around for a moment to look at Bob, who is walking along behind her.
"We might as well go in and take a look around. You coming, Bob-boss?" Saoirse asks in the recording, her voice quiet compared to that of SCAMPS, who soon continues.
"Approximately 28 minutes into the mission, Beta discovered an anomaly within the nacelle - one of only a few biological anomalies we've discovered to date," SCAMPS explains, as Saoirse tracks her way cautiously through the debris.
"And no, they're not the first, but they're close enough. In my biocoded memory cells I have partial records of another set of bioanomalies discovered by one of the Tartarus-based platoons, and that was as recent as this February, only six months ago. Those cells were supplied three months ago. This sort of event is the kind of thing that drives us - us being Tartarus Incorporated. And... there it is," he finishes pointedly, as Saoirse rounds the corner in the recording. A hiltorel podlight flips on in the center of a large, almost pitch-black chamber, revealing a well-groomed man in what appears to be some form of casual dress wear. He wears no discernible helmet, but the lack of oxygen doesn't seem to bother him. There is something about him that seems to be slightly "off" in a way that dips almost imperceptibly into the uncanny valley.
At normal volume, the recording continues; the man speaks in a stiff, well-articulated Galactic Standard:
"Hmm... you arrived twenty-three-point-two seconds earlier than I expected." A faintly audible clicking noise is heard.
"Most curious..." Then, louder, he addresses both inmates clearly - primarily focusing on Saoirse.
"Greetings. Your ship has crashed, and you are here. Nothing happens without a reason, but in this case I find them anomalies. It is unusual that two such anomalies would occur in such close proximity - and to such effect. It raises... questions. When the rest of your unit arrives, we shall begin, Saoirse, but in the intervening time, perhaps you'd like to address the dullard's predicament. He is suffering from acute nyctophobia." He glances up calmly, seeming mildly curious about their reactions to this statement.
Saoirse's helmet cam pans back to Bob, who looks quite panicked in the darkness.
"The anomaly persisted for eight minutes before vanishing," SCAMPS continues, as the camera cuts to another segment where most of Beta is standing silently in the nacelle. The "anomaly" is toying with some sort of shiny metallic bauble in his hands.
"During this time, not one of you assholes asked any useful questions of it, nor did you undertake any sort of experiment to understand who or what it was. Saoirse gets points for doing an immediate residue scan, which is part of why she got more creds than the rest of you, but apart from that, none of you did anything."
"I gather now... someone betrayed your ship," the figure states, as one of the inmates' cams turns back towards him.
"Someone that is themselves an anomaly... one far easier to understand. Extrapolating... I have my explanation for this anomaly, and the others. An aberrant explanation, to be sure... but I can still utilize it, and you. In any case, the observation has terminated." And the figure comes apart and disappears.
"Normally, a lack of initiative like this would be more than enough for me to be pissed the fukc off, but you failed abortions just kept going!! It wasn't enough to just stand silently like a bunch of newbs until the anomaly disappeared - nooooo - you dipshits had to one-up everyone! You completely ignored the device it left behind - a device that was apparently capable of powerful instantaneous environmental manipulation, utilizing (may I stress) hitherto unheard-of technology - along with gods know what else -- Oh, and do you want to know what happened to that device, after you retards up and left it? No? I'll show you."
The video feed from Beta cuts out, replaced with an image of a shattered array of fragments on a laboratory table, clearly beyond any hope of repair.
"When the nacelle shifted while we were bringing it up, it got crushed between the various crates sliding around the chamber. We still can't find most of the parts, but what we did find shows it to be incredibly advanced technology - circuitboards within circuitboards, plugs and chips extending into their own bubbleverses - this is the kind of shit you see in science fiction movies, and you retards just left it there! For gods' sakes, you morons, that puts you a cut well below any of the other greenies I wish their mothers had swallowed. Usually they scoop up everything they see: 'Ooh, I'll get more credits, yay! La la la la la!' But you meatsacks apparently can't put two and two together!
"We are REKT! Requisited Knowledge Troops! We acquire knowledge and tech! That's our job! It's quite simple."
There's a pause for several seconds; complete silence reigns in the room.
"Huh. I actually feel a bit better after that," SCAMPS remarks idly.
"Not much, but a bit. Now, moving on - do you shits have anything you want to add or apologize for, or should we move on to the next point of the debrief?"
((List of turns related to the "biological anomaly", in case anyone wants to do further reading:))