Frozen Soul, and other works: April 2018

Monday, April 30, 2018

Chapter 96 - Assault on Booty Bay

(Main Control Room, Booty Bay, The Badlands)

The recent failed raid on the Black Star Shipyards was the talk of the station. It had been a huge raid, with over twenty ships! The fact that the raid failed, with only twelve ships returning (and the Mercer’s Folly was apparently not worth repairing after the beating she’d taken), was causing rumors to fly that some of the ‘subordinate’ captains might stage a mutiny and challenge ‘Temptation’ to her title of Pirate Queen. In the week since the raiders returned, two captains had already made a play, and their bodies were strung up just outside the airlock, so everyone could see what happened to traitors.

Of course, the Black Star ships were also being talked about. Those weren’t like any civvie ships they’d seen, even with merc groups. After all, who the hell decides to put a fucking battleship gun on a ship barely large enough to hold it, and then sends swarms of the things at people? And the whole part where they’d been able to respond to the attack so quickly… the whole point of the raid had been to attack after they’d had a few hours in dock, so that the ships would be on skeleton crews after a long voyage.

“Cap’n Temptation’s gonna have her hands full with the Wynmaer Brothers. They’ve been looking for a chance to take ‘er down since the Cap’n stomped Ivran’s berries when she took over.”

“Well, five of the ships lost belonged to the Wynmaer clan. They only got, what, three ships left? And the others, they were all Pagellas. Arbane was leading their ships himself, since he was wanting a chance to grab one of those stealth ships for himself. They’re no threat to her, now.”

“True that. But Sarkas and Fenrora just got back onto the station. Either one of them has as many ships as Temptation. They get it in their heads to start working together…”

“Bah! That’ll never happen. Those two hate eachother, ever since—”

Alarms cut short the discussion, as the pirates raced to figure out what was going on. Not being particularly well trained, and not having heard this particular alarm before, it took a moment before one of them realized what was going on.

“Shit, that’s the invasion alarm! You, go wake Cap’n Temptation! We’ve got trouble!”

They could only see two of the ships at the moment. One was an Imperial Corvette, and the other was an Imperial Carrier. But the IFF loudly announced that they were the BSN Jubilee and the BSN Dykhaniye Smerti.

There were twelve installations in the Badlands, not counting Booty Bay. Ten of those decided to take this moment to explode into a multitude of tiny pieces of shrapnel and debris. The two survivors were the stations belonging to the Rose Dragon clan and the Crystal Fang Syndicate, both crime families based out of Dimiya. Both crime families had warned the Pirate Queen that she was better off not picking a fight with the Black Stars. Temptation hadn’t listened, and had instead worked to get some support and trade favors with the other groups in the system.

“What the bloody hell is going on?” ‘Temptation’ Savant herself strode into the room like an angry hurricane, her eyes going to the screens as she spoke.

“Cap’n, we’re only reading two ships, but most of the other bases in the system went and blew up! Never seen the like before!”

“Cap’n! Tarpits just went active!”

Temptation scowled. “Raise shields! We’re under attack, you idiots!” Her mood did not get any better when the extent of her problems became clear. In addition to the two ships that had not bothered hiding when they came out of warp, more ships were now dropping their cloaks…

“By all the stars…”

“There’s so many of them!”

“Stop your lollygagging, you stupid fucks! How many ships are we facing? And get all the boys to their ships. Anything that can fight, I want it manned and ready, now!” The crew started jumping as Temptation barked orders, but in her mind, there was just a single thought running through her head. What in the infinite abyss have I stepped in?

“Shit, they’re launching fighters!”

“Well launch our own!” Temptation shook her head. If the computer was counting right, there were eight bloody squadrons of fighters out there… no, make that seven of fighters, and one the computer thought were probably bombers. When her two squadrons of fighters launched, she got a good appreciation of just how truly fucked they were. Especially when the enemy fighters mowed through hers like they were a blowtorch through tissue paper.

By now, the pirate ships were starting to come online, and move into a rough battle line. Almost thirty pirate ships, against what was clearly over fifty enemies. The reality of it sunk in to the pirate captain. This was the entire Black Star fleet. Only the superdreadnought they were refitting wasn’t present. But why go to so much trouble when they had the weapons to blow them away in an instant, like they’d done to all the other stations in the system?

The bombers struck first, two missiles speeding across the space between them and the Wolf’s Fang. Only two missiles, but merciful god, what missiles! The first actually crashed the Fang’s shields, and god knew what kind of damage it had done to the systems on her baby. The second… Well, the Wolf’s Fang would never fly again. The rear half of the ship was simply GONE. She’d be surprised if the ship had anything except battery power right now, given the way it started spinning slowly in space.

Then the two ‘fleets’ were in range of eachother. It was not a battle. The only word that could describe it was ‘massacre’, but even that didn’t seem to fit, as the Black Star ships went out of their way to try and disable the pirates, rather than destroying them outright.

They want prisoners. Oh hell, most of his people are slaves.

Then she saw one ship in particular on the screen, as it made a high speed pass of one of the pirate frigates, turrets blasting away at the larger ship. Once it passed the frigate, the pilot managed to flip the ship on its axis, in a maneuver that had to have put the crew under some serious Gs, even with dampeners, and unloaded particle cannons directly into the frigate’s engines, taking them out of the fight. Sensors told her it was the BSS Starlight Raven. That bastard was here himself!

Seeing her chance, she pointed out the Starlight Raven in the tactical plot. “All guns, all ships, fire on that freighter! That’s the fucking owner’s ship, and he has to be on board her! Take that ship out, and we still have a chance of living through this!”

That provided the men with some motivation. Nothing like the prospect of imminent death to make them shut up and do their jobs. Unfortunately, it seemed that the damn ‘armed freighter’ that was practically a smuggler’s dream was better than her gunners, who soon had other things to occupy their time.

“Captain! We got that big ship moving in, past the other ships!”

Looking at the screens again, she cursed. That was a fucking marine assault ship! “Pass the word, boys, we’re about to have company. Prepare to repel boarders!”

At that moment, several blasts from the little gunboats struck the station’s shields. Thirty-two battleship cannons striking the shields, one after another. No pirate base’s shields could take that kind of punishment for long. Soon, the shields began coming down, and ion cannons began playing hell with station systems.

Temptation was screaming into her commlink to the engineer. “Keep power to the guns, whatever you do! I don’t care if you have to turn off life support! We’ll either be able to turn it back on or will be dead long before we run out of air!”

(BSN Thunderfury, approaching Booty Bay)

“Captain Am’Rica, the gunboats have taken down the shields, and the cruisers and Assassins should have the station disabled momentarily, while the Ravens are mopping up the last of the pirate ships. Ship-board tactical teams will be doing ship-to-ship searches for prisoners and spoils, so I want you to focus on getting the Marines to that station.”

The Ihm female’s tail moved excitedly at the prospect of assaulting a pirate outpost. No one liked pirates, after all. It wasn’t quite as good as being able to shoot the Imperials, but it was still a chance she didn’t want to pass up. “Understood, Commodore. We are targeting the enemy weapon systems with more forceful methods than ion cannons. I expect to start landing the Marines in ten minutes.”

“Very good, Captain. Just take care not to destroy too much of the station. We’re here to take prisoners and spoils in return for the attack on our people. The other stations in the system were simply a message about the consequences of collusion with Black Star’s enemies. The fact that there were several bounties we just cashed in is a bonus. I want that station intact, so we can loot it, and hopefully parade the bitch who ordered the attack across Dimiya as an example of why attacking us is a horrible idea.”

“It will be done, Commodore.”

“Major, are your people ready?”

“You’re asking if a group of Marines are ready to kick some pirate ass? The answer is ‘Always’, sir!”

“Hah! Good enough. Remember, use stunners unless there’s no alternative. I leave authority for lethal force to your discretion. But I’d like to have prisoners to add to our workforce, even if they don’t have any skills we can use. The coming expedition is going to need some people to do mining work and other unpleasant jobs, after all.”

“Can do, Commodore. The prospect of putting these assholes to work at something suitably terrible will take the edge off not shooting to kill, if only a little. Reports we’ve been getting say this is the same group of pirates that’s been causing all kinds of trouble across this sector.”

“Yeah, our Assassins have taken out several of their ships when the Ravens decide to play bait. Took them almost a year before they learned that one of our Ravens had a good chance of having an Assassin nearby. A few others learned that the Ravens aren’t exactly toothless, either. Piracy’s been up all across the Confederation after Jagloth, as you can expect. That many refugees… well, desperate people tend to be either easy targets, or easy recruits. Either way, pirates take advantage. We take the so-called Pirate Queen, though, and that will take the wind out of their sails, for a while.”

“Fair enough. What are our rules of engagement on prisoners and surrender? These are pirates, and no doubt they expect to be spaced, but they’re cowards at heart, so there will be some who want to surrender.”

“Accept surrender when it is offered. Anyone who gets stunned gets collared, so we don’t have to worry about them. Anyone who surrenders can avoid the collar, so long as they behave. Let them know that, once this is over, they will have the option of accepting a collar, or being turned over to the Confeds for trial. Any slaves you encounter are to be treated well, but assume that they’re going to be brainwashed to be loyal to their captors, if they don’t have Stepfords on. When in doubt, stun them. We can sort out who is who later on.”

Major Khan nodded. “That won’t set right with some of the troops. I’ll let them know the score, but stunning slaves of pirates for convenience is a crap gig.”

“Getting killed because the person you were trying to save goes crazy when their captors tell them to kill you so they have a chance to escape is worse. And if any of those pirates are really nasty, they’ll use human shields or suicide bombers. Best to just stun everything that isn’t in Black Star uniforms, just to be sure.”

“Understood. We’ll get the job done.”

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Be sure to read my published works!

Frozen Soul series (Sci-Fi Supervillain story):
Frozen Soul https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071R125QT
Tales of the Void Traveler https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06ZZ52G37

Rules-Free VRMMO Life (Dark Fantasy GameLit):
Volume 1 - Tutorial https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071VPRNDB
Omnibus 1 - Volumes 1-4 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0774T354X

Into the Black (Sci-Fi GameLit):
Book I - Game Start https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071LT5WGL
Omnibus I - Books 1-4 https://www.amazon.com/dp/B077X2KR7Y

City of Champions Online (Superhero GameLit):
Issue I - Origin Stories https://www.amazon.com/dp/B075SHXQS1

Lewd Dungeon (Dungeon Core GameLit):
Book 1 - Welcome to the Apocalypse https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07BB34DHF

The Kalipshae Affair (A First Contact Short Story): https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0739V6R6T

Wednesday, April 25, 2018

Chapter 95 - Tracking the Rats

(Aboard Destroyer Wolf’s Fang, approaching pirate base Booty Bay)

Captain Loraine Savant was not pleased. The self-styled Pirate Queen of this sector had lost several ships to this Black Star fleet since they’d started showing up, always in sneak attacks where they lured her (admittedly dumber) captains into attacking a bait ship and then pounced. It was common knowledge in the whole sector that they’d been the ones who had caused all those sudden victories in the Terran Empire just now.

She would have loved to attack and plunder that shipyard of theirs while their fleet was out of the way, but there was just no way for them to get the Confederate Navy out of the way. Civilian ships used to hitting from surprise was one thing, but actual navy? Few pirates risked those odds. So she had waited, having some of her people watching the yards to see if there was any opportunity to attack.

Finally, when the ships came back, the Navy left them to their own devices. Savant had made a study of the shipyard defenses. The superdreadnought was being renovated into something new, so it wasn’t a threat. The carrier and the little corvette taken from the Imperials might be a bit of a threat, but training up crews for one of those things took time, time the bastard owner hadn’t had, since they’d been busy with the war. And all those ships that just came back went immediately into holding orbits or docking, probably letting their crews go on shore leave. Those little patrol boat things were unknowns, but what kind of weapons could they possibly keep on those things? No way it was big enough to hold the slug throwers the ships were famous for.

Basically, there had been no better time to attack than right then. While they’re all celebrating and drunk, she planned to go in, grab the ships she could, blow the rest, and escape. A couple bribes and the tarpits had ensured that the Navy response would be slow, and her ships would get ‘chased off’ after that. It was a decent plan, until it all went wrong.

Now she was in her quarters on the Wolf’s Fang, pouring over the tactical data. The patrol boats had been fitted with what the sensor readings were saying was basically a battleship’s gun, running the length of ship. Oh sure, it was just one gun, and not the twelve or so a superdreadnought would turn into a broadside, but when you added in the missiles and other weapons, it was more punch than any patrol boat should have.

Actually, it was way more punch than ANY civvie ship should have. Sure, she knew the corvettes had those big railguns, but who puts a battleship weapon on a ship barely big enough to hold it? What kind of madman designs ships like that, where you literally have to point little ships directly at their target to try and hit? And how does any company get away with building dozens of the things? Where did they hide them? Her people had only counted six of the little boats, so were had the others been hiding? And how come none of her people had told her they had these weapons?

Well, that last part was easy enough to answer, at least. The Owner of Black Star was pretty notorious for doing everything ‘in house’. Most of the company were slaves he snapped up after Jagloth, or in other dealings. Some were Nomads he probably had some hidden connection to. And the others were usually vouched for by someone on the inside. Made getting a spy on the inside to get details on their ships hard.

Hacking their systems was damn near impossible, too. Pretty much anything worth getting into was on an internal, standalone network. And hacking the ‘public’ nets was a pain as well. The stuff her hackers could get into didn’t have much info, just some PR stuff and areas where people could talk about orders and contracts. That led to a private server that was isolated from their main servers, so you couldn’t worm your way in that way. The only other servers they found that could be accessed from the outside were hidden by hind some heavy encryption. Her hackers swore that it was at least military grade, and probably had at least a couple layers to it, with different types of encryption.

The public announcements to the Company and dependents they could get into, which is why they knew that the Owner and a good portion of their tactical teams would be on the planet, away from the fleet. The same announcements also said that the fleet would be getting shore leave, after the long job they’d been on. That should have meant that the ships were all on skeleton crews, their men too drunk to do anything, certainly too drunk to react so quickly! Hell, if she’d promised her crews leave after all that time fighting, it would be half a day or more to round them all up, if she even found them. And most merchant ships weren’t much better!

It just wasn’t fair!

Savant sighed. At least the ships they lost were mostly the converted freighters and some of the more rowdy crews, who were basically fodder anyways. When she got the spy’s report, she’d taken every ship available at the time, but the most of the pirate ‘fleet’, including all of the best ships (except the Fang, of course), were still away, out raiding. Now their best shot for taking out that bastard who had been screwing with their operations since Jagloth was gone, and with it, their best shot at getting those stealth ships. They’d have to figure out something new.

At least most of the dead came from the Pagella clan. They’d been getting uppity with her in recent months. This raid basically reduced them to a third-tier outfit, while not costing Savant too many of her own. She’d need to replace the fighters and the pilots, but that wouldn’t be too hard. The Pagellas, however, were down to two ships, and most of their clan would be quiet now, or someone would take it into their heads that wiping them out would get the pirate queen’s favor. Especially if she ‘accidentally’ put the rumor out there herself. Yeah, she could spin this raid as an attempt on an old enemy, while making sure any blowback happened mostly to her enemies.

(BSN Breath of Hades)

Captain Dasyra Enlen was proud of her ship. The Breath of Hades was the second of the Black Star Navy’s two cruisers, alongside her sister the Shinokage. Now that they had more hulls in the fleet, they’d started dividing into Groups. Her Hades was the flagship of Second Group. First Group, of course, was led by Shinokage, and included most of the ships involved in the Imperial Civil War. Of the warships that went to that, only Thunderfury was outside First Group, being on its own so it could attach wherever the Black Star Marines were needed.

Second Group was designated the ‘home defense’ group, but that mainly meant that they went on jobs in and around Dimiya, where they could be recalled quickly if need be. In addition to Breath of Hades, there were her four Assassins (Lyudmila Pavlichenko, Dragunov, Vendetta, and Black Mesa), ten gunboats, and the pocket carriers Providence and Destiny. That was in addition to the static defenses the shipyards and residential stations had in place. Between the yards and the carriers, she could also field three squadrons of Thunderbirds, one of Raptors, and one of Dragons.

Well, she could when she was on station. At the moment, there was just her ship, as they’d been ordered to quietly follow the pirate scum that had tried to attack their home, and find out where they lived so that the Master could personally explain to them why they should never have done such a thing. The fact that the pirates were surprised by the extra ships defending the stations said that the practice of lying in stealth whenever possible had paid off, since even if the Navy knew they were there, the pirates were clueless as to their strength. Hell, the gunboats alone could probably have taken out everything but the fighters, though they would have taken losses. Being able to bring the lesson home to the pirates was almost worth being ordered to keep quiet during the battle and simply let the pirates fly away. Almost.

The ship had performed brilliantly. Using the latest generation stealth systems, as well as the special hull material and null-paint like all other Black Star ships, the pirates had a better chance of detecting light from the center of a black hole than they did of spotting her ship unless she went and flashed her engines at them. They had followed the pirate ships into warp as soon as the last one had cleared the tarpit, minimizing the chance that one of the pirates would detect the energy of their jump.

For the last week, they had followed the pirates, until they reached this system. Technically called the Chathor system, it was uninhabited, officially. The system was a collection of gas giants and asteroid fields. Sometime in the distant past, the rocky planets in this system had all broken apart, and had formed several large asteroid fields. The system was too remote and too much of a navigational hazard to support mining efforts, so it was left uninhabited.

Unofficially, the system was known as the Badlands, and had long been a pirate and smuggler haven. So long as the pirates operated within certain limits, the Confederates had decided that it was not worth the cost to go hunting through the briar patch for rabbits. It wasn’t just pirates, of course. There were smugglers, crime syndicates, people fleeing prosecution, and more. The various asteroid habitats in this ‘uninhabited’ system turned into fiefdoms, but ones with connections that made a full-scale cleansing of the system impossible. The few times it had almost gotten to that point, the locals usually ended up turning on the one bringing the heat down on all of them, and the problem soon resolved itself.

Breath of Hades was following the ragtag flotilla to a large asteroid, roughly twice the size of Ceres in Sol, which had been hollowed out and turned into a shipyard and pirate haven. The pirates were not too trusting of their neighbors, but that was normal for these kinds of places. Dasyra could see minefields, weapon platforms, and a small group of patrol boats flitting around the asteroid base. From intercepted communications, they found that the base was called Booty Bay, as it had apparently been used by pirates for a long time now.

Looking up from the tactical readouts, she said, “Launch probes. Standard set of eight, box formation. Have them set up above and below the ecliptic, so we can launch tarpits and keep the rats from scurrying away. Comms, lock on to that beacon the Yakuza station is using for FTL comms, and let the Master know we’ve tracked the rats, full encryption. Send a second message to the yaks, and quietly let them know that what is coming is not aimed their way, unless they intervene. No sense getting additional players involved. Their ships are weak, but one can’t underestimate them. After all our ships are weak compared to those Imperial ships, and we all know how that turned out.”

Turning back to look at the tactical screen, she considered, and then said, “Launch another probe, full stealth. Try and get it as close as possible without being detected. Let’s see what kind of sensor readings we can get off them. Their comms leak like crazy, so have our people work on intel gathering and quietly subverting the systems if they can, without alerting the enemy to our presence. I want as much data as possible about that station and its layout ready for the Master when he arrives. Let us show him what the Breath of Hades can do.”

Friday, April 20, 2018

Chapter 94 - Future Plans

Paxisys’s eyes narrowed. “An expedition, you say? I had not figured you for the explorer type.”

I simply shrugged, and said, “Well, there’s an interesting story here. You see, back when Jagloth was still fighting the Legion, my crew was hired to do a job. We needed to get into a secure vault on one of the stations, and make sure the contents got safely delivered to someone in the system for safekeeping, so that they wouldn’t get caught in the crossfire when things finally came to a head. While we were in the vault, we looked around for anything else that might prove interesting. In a section belonging to the planetary governor, we found what you might call the governor’s retirement plan.”

Paxisys went from mildly uncomfortable, since he was the one who paid for that first job, to interested. “Hmm. Always knew that the Governor was planning something. His finances said that he’d been gathering personal funds for something big.”

I nodded. “Oh, it was big. Unfortunately, the Legion got him, so all that work went to waste. But the… retirement plan itself is still there, waiting for someone to take a chance on it. Since I’m fairly well off and have a booming business, I decided that with the whole civil war thing over, now would be a great time to take that chance. Well, it will still be a little while. The refit of my new ships isn’t done yet.”

Zumrora leaned forward again. “Yes, we’ve been watching that fleet of yours. Two new pocket carriers, thirty-two of the little craft you’re calling gunboats, six ‘armed freighters’ like your Starlight Raven, four more Assassins, another Cruiser, and those Imperial ships you brought in, on top of the fleet you already had. You do realize you are building a bigger fleet than some small planets, right?”

“Sure, sure. And I can understand how that would make people nervous. But I’m about to be splitting my forces again. In addition to security contracts within the Confederation, I need to secure the Black Star properties to prevent people from getting stupid ideas about attacking me and mine, and then there’s the expedition. Don’t know what we’ll be finding, so it is better to have enough force to deal with any problems we find. Plus, the Nightforge will be able to establish a manufacturing base once we’re where we’re going. I’ll be buying a few mining vessels, to help speed things along.”

Paxisys squinted his eyes. “It sounds almost like you’re planning on starting a new colony.”

I shrugged nonchalantly. “Well, I don’t know WHAT I’ll find, exactly, when I get where I’m going, but any survivors of the Juan Ponce de Leon might just need some help getting on their feet again.”

Zumrora looked confused, “What ship is that? I haven’t heard that name before.”

“Don’t figure you would have. It was one of the old Drake-class colony/explorer vessels Earth sent out before they got knowledge of FTL drives. Exploring the stars at sublight speeds, knowing that if they were wrong about their projected system having a world that could support them, they’d probably all die. And more than one of the colony ships went missing, to be sure. The Ponce was one of the ones that was missing.”

“WAS missing?”

I winked at Paxisys. “See, let’s just say that the Governor got his hands on one of the data recorders from the Juan Ponce de Leon, and was sure he could find the ship. Now I have the recorder, and my people have a good idea of where the ship might be.”

“And why are you telling us all this? I mean, it would be simple enough to keep that kind of information to yourself, and you aren’t exactly known for being forthcoming without some reason for it.”

“Well, for one thing, I didn’t want nosy intelligence types poking around my property any more than they already are, thinking I’m up to something nefarious. It just gets annoying finding them and sending them back. Especially since the last one had a certain prototype from that vault we were hired to raid back on Jagloth. Oh, don’t worry, Paxisys, I’m letting this one slide, especially since it made for a good test of the defensive measures we developed against that item. But if it happens again, then I can’t promise that the agent won’t find themselves dead, or collared.”

“Ah-hah. It would seem that one of my associates will need to be reprimanded. I am surprised, though that you were able to come up with a defense for something you shouldn’t have known about?”

I simply shrugged. “You hired us to get the goods. You never said anything about not looking at the goods, and while copying information for resale or blackmail is not something I would care to do, keeping a copy for my own research and to protect my people is perfectly fine in my book. You’ll note that this is the first time we’ve talked about this since then, and only because your people forced me to act.”

Zumrora cleared his throat, clearly trying to draw attention away from Paxisys. “You said that was one reason for sharing the information with us. What were your other reasons?”

“Lets just say that I’m making advanced preparations, in case things pan out the way I think they will. The potential profits of this run are on the ‘own a small planet’ level, which means that some damn fool is going to try and take it from me, so I want to make sure your services know that I’m going to shoot first, ask questions later if people start trying to get handsy with things that don’t belong to them.”

“However, if you don’t try and stab me in the back again, then I might give you right of first refusal on any sales that come about from what I find. At the very least, there will be the map data, since I plan on taking my ships into Unknown Space.”

THAT got their attention, and I had a feeling that the conversation would have gone in very interesting directions, except that Raven interrupted us at that moment. “I’m sorry, Captain, but you have to see this!” She turned on a viewscreen, showing a CNN anchor looking rushed.

“This is a CNN Breaking News update from our headquarters on Dimiya. A fleet of pirate ships has just entered the Dimiya system, and is on course for the Black Star Shipyards in orbit of Isil, Dimiya’s moon. While it is unknown what has provoked the pirates into launching this raid, it is suspected that the reports of the Black Star Navy being involved in several pirate-hunting expeditions, as well as their being used in the recent Imperial Civil War, has made the pirates believe that there is wealth for the taking.”

I growled, “Turn that off, Raven, and get me a tactical read of the situation.”

The news report blanked out, and was replaced with a tactical display of the space around the Black Star Yards. Blue dots represented Black Star ships, while a cluster of red was advancing on them. We watched for several minutes as the ships began advancing on the shipyards. I was pleased to see that my Navy wasn’t a bunch of idiots, as even without my order, the ships were moving into a defensive position. “Tactical report.”

“When we arrived back in the system the Confederate Navy pulled back the ships which had been guarding the Yards. Since they were replaced by the Black Star ships, this was not viewed as an issue. If I had to guess, I would say that these pirates likely have had the Yards under observation for some time, but were unwilling to chance dealing with the Confederate Navy. They are probably expecting the ships to be on skeleton crews, with most of their people sent ashore for leave.”

“In other words, they wanted to hit us when they thought we were weak, and either disable or capture our ships?”

“Most likely, Captain. They have deployed tarpits to keep Confederation Navy from interfering. Sensor images of the ship we believe to be the lead of the enemy force indicates that it is the Wolf’s Fang. It is supposed to be under the command of a Captain Loraine ‘Temptation’ Savant. Captain Valkian of the Savage Rose was her cousin, it seems.”

“The Savage Rose? Wasn’t that the pirate ship we towed into Dimiya after the dumbasses tried a tarpit trap on us?”

“Yes sir. Valkian was captured and sold as a slave at the local markets, though I do not know who his current owner is. I calculate a 75% chance that this attack is one of opportunity, and a chance for the pirate to get revenge for what happened to her cousin. There is also a 12% chance that she intends to take hostages to force the return of her cousin to her.”

“How many ships are we looking at? And what types?”

“The Wolf’s Fang is classified as a Destroyer. I believe it is a decommissioned Confederate Thavank-class destroyer from before the last war. Emissions are a 67% match to the Hactha, which was reported decommissioned and sent to the breakers. Margin of error in the emissions profile could be due to shoddy maintenance and replacing older components with newer ones. In addition, there are twenty-one other attacking ships, mostly corvettes or converted freighters, but I am detecting two frigates in the mix. Wolf’s Fang is currently hanging back, likely to direct the battle.”

She paused, and then said, “Fighter launch! We now have fighters launching. Three squadrons total, designate fuglies. One each from the destroyer and two pocket carriers.”

“Deploy our own tarpits, don’t let them just cut and run. Launch all Raptors and Thunderbirds, have the Dragons on standby. Fighters are to take out the enemy fighters first, and prevent them from making attack runs. All gunboats are to concentrate on the lighter craft. Assassins and Shinokage are to target the frigates.”

“Captain, the Breath of Hades is asking for orders.”

“Inform Captain Enlen that she is to maintain stealth, and to track the Wolf’s Fang back to their base if the ship tries to run. I wish to find out where this foolish woman has been hiding, and personally explain to her why she should never have done something so stupid as attacking my people.”

“Captain Enlen confirms. She will track the enemy destroyer.”

“Weapons analysis on the enemy ships?”

“Primarily missiles and energy weapons. Strength is consistent with last generation models. If they had caught us in a low readiness state, or if the rumors going around about how our ships are weak when not striking from stealth were true, they could possibly have been able to force a landing on one or more of our ships. Against normal civilians, they would easily have been able to accomplish whatever their goals were and escape before Confederate Navy ships could intervene, assuming they weren’t paid off in advance.”

Zumrora sputtered, “Then navy would never—!”

I shook my head as I cut him off. “Unless they thought they could do it without being caught. I’m willing to assume that you two didn’t know anything about this, but that doesn’t mean that nobody in the Confederate government wasn’t aware beforehand, or that there aren’t corrupt officials who would be willing to ‘slow’ a response in return for hard currency.” Zumrora shut up, ceding the point.

Looking back to the tactical display, I noticed something, and began to smile. “The tarpit spooked the pirates. They’re trying to turn about and flee, but they’re too far into the faux gravity well. They’ll never make it out before the fighters and gunboats get to them.”

Indeed, the pirates had only just started their turns when they got into weapons range of the Black Star ships. The fighters were completely wiped out, as they were lesser craft flown by worse pilots and were fewer in number than my Raptors and Thunderbirds. The gunboats began tearing through the corvettes and converted freighters, their main guns which belonged on a battleship being far too much for the little ships to take. In a convincing rout, only twelve of the twenty-two ships made it out of the tarpit and were able to jump to safety, the Wolf’s Fang running fast as she could ahead of the pack.

Looking back to the two spooks, I said, “Now, what were we discussing?”

Tuesday, April 17, 2018

Chapter 93 - Return to Dimiya

(BSN Shinokage, Dimiya System)

I was standing on the bridge of the Shinokage when the Black Star Navy emerged from warp in the Dimiya system. It had been a relaxing couple weeks since the end of the battle for Earth. I’d stuck around long enough to get a couple laurels and other such things from the Empress, and then gathered my ships to head back to Confederate space. I’d been away from my businesses for long enough already. Didn’t want any greedy government types thinking I was gone for good and getting grabby urges.

I had to admit that I looked like an adventurer or old-time pirate returning to port after a successful voyage, dressed in my ‘casual’ armor, with Widowmaker on my right side (the blade had improved quite a bit from my level gains), the Energy Blade clipped to my belt, just above the custom weapon I got from being a Destroyer of Worlds on the left.

Hope’s End
Type	Heavy Pistol	Rank	Unique – Scaling
Damage	150 – 200	Damage Type	Piercing
A high quality pistol, designed to be used by someone who has high levels of Psy power, but also wants something for more physical means of conflict resolution. Psycharged II – Can charge a shot with up to 1000 PP. Psycharged shots do 1% extra damage for every 10 PP charged. Ignore 1% Energy Defense for every 10 PP charged. Charge up to 100 PP per second. Willbreaker – Reduce target’s Resistance to Mental Psy by 5% for each shot. Duration: 1 min. Chaos Shot – Cost 200 PP. Target has 10% chance to act normally, 10% chance to attack shooter, 30% chance to attack nearest creature, 10% chance to flee in a random direction, 10% chance to attack nearest ally, 25% chance to do nothing, and 5% chance to attack themselves. Reroll every 5 seconds. Duration 1 minute. Cannot be affected for 1 hour after duration ends. 10 Shot clips. 200 PP to charge. Scaling – This is a scaling item. Item improves with character level. Gains abilities every 10 character levels. Eternal Soulbound – This item is eternally soulbound to you. It cannot be stolen, traded, or lost.

Widowmaker
Type	Dagger	Rank	Unique – Scaling
Damage	80 – 100	Damage Type	Piercing/Slashing
This dagger is made of a rare Gycep Blood Crystal. When bonded with a wielder by tasting their blood with an infusion of their Psy, the dagger allows the wielder to channel their Psy through the dagger, causing it to grow in power as they do. Blood Daggers are each unique, and can carry unusual powers. The wielder does not choose what powers the dagger develops, but the way they use the dagger may influence the dagger’s development. +20 STR, +20 DEX, +20 CHA Bladeshimmer – 100 PP. This Weapon ignores all armor and defense for 5 seconds. Silent Death – Sneak Attacks cause the victim to be Silenced for 5 seconds. Mindkiller – 500 PP. This weapon damages target’s INT and WIS (split evenly between the two) for 5 seconds. Damage recovers at 1 point per second. Attribute reduced to 0 knocks the target unconscious for 1 hour, and reduces their resistance to the user’s Mental Psy by 30% permanently. Techslayer – 100 PP. Attacks permanently brick target machine or component, requiring it to be replaced. Does not affect living creatures. 5 second duration. Scaling – This is a scaling item. Item improves with character level. Gains abilities every 10 character levels. Soulbound – This item is soulbound to you. It cannot be stolen, traded, or lost while you live. If you die, there is a 10% chance the item will lose its binding may be looted from you.

Looking over at Aurae, I said, “Captain, contact the Thunderfury and Wisteria. The teams who are awarded ‘special’ shore leave will load up in their shuttles and accompany the Starlight Raven to Thelorious Spaceport. Pass the word around the fleet that when the ships dock in the Black Star yards, all crews will be able to rotate through shore leave as scheduled by their Captains. All crew and assault team members have three drink credits at the bars in the Black Star compound.”

That got smiles from everyone on the bridge. “As you wish, Master.”

(Delirium Nightclub, Thelorious, Dimiya)

It wasn’t my idea to give some of the troops a night on the town, but since their commanders had promised it, and the troops delivered quality results, I decided to go with it. Which is why Team Catspaw from the Wisteria was here, joined with Major Khan and the squad that found what everyone was calling Greenway. They’d both been promised a night on the town by yours truly, so here I was, giving it to them. Didn’t mean I wasn’t going to have a bit of fun, though.

I’d rented out one of the VIP areas in Delirium for the Black Star Company for the night. It cost a pretty penny, but it was a lot cheaper than just giving a company credit card to a bunch of fighters on shore leave. Since everyone had arrived, and was settled down with their first drinks, I whistled, to get everyone’s attention.

“All right, Ladies, Gentlemen, and Marines.” That got a laugh from people, for obvious reasons. “You are all here because your team leaders decided that they were going to reward you with one hell of a good time, and then stick me with the check. Well, you guys did kick ass work on your missions, and you’re all still here to talk about it, so I’m willing to shell out some credits to see just how drunk a bunch of Marines and operators can get.” There was a LOT of cheering at that.

I raised my hands to get people to quiet down. “But because I’m not made of money, we’ve got ground rules! Rule One: this VIP box? Open bar, for everyone in it. But drinks served in here, don’t leave the box. You want to go impress a girl with your tales of thrilling heroics out on the dance floor, you best be willing to pay up. Rule Two: each of you may bring one, and I mean ONE person into the box. So if you meet a cutie and she has a friend that wants to tag along, you best find someone to be your wingman! Rule Three: you get drinks as a unit. If one man orders a drink, EVERYONE in your unit that is in the box gets a drink, and a new round doesn’t come until everyone’s dry. Marines and Catspaws are two different units. Rule Four: as penance for their sins, the unit COs get to stay in the box for the night, and babysit you clowns. So they’ll be drinking with you all night long. Rule Five: if either unit drinks their CO into unconsciousness, the members of that unit who are still conscious will get a ticket allowing them a free ride at Saslin!” There were a few VERY enthusiastic cheers, at that, “Which, as some of you already seem to know, is one of Thelorious’s premier spots for ‘paid companionship’. The use of sober-up injections is not permitted, but the wager does apply to all the members of the unit who are conscious and in the building, whether or not they are in the box when the CO checks out.”

The two COs glared at me in mock anger, since I’d just given both teams a HUGE loophole, and everyone knew it. Looking the two men in the face, I said, loud enough for everyone to hear, “If you don’t like it, then maybe you’ll learn a thing or two about not spending other people’s money, hmm?” More laughs as the COs took their medicine, and I continued. “Rule Six: I am not bailing anyone out at three in the fucking morning. You people get in trouble, you call a buddy to bail you out, or you sit there until I wake up at a decent time of afternoon and come to get you. Understood?” I paused and then said, “Of course, if a Black Star is in trouble and another Black Star sees it, I expect you all to do the right thing and help them out. I know you people won’t let me down on this, because every one of you are Black Stars, and we’ve gone to the highest level, kicked ass, and now the whole galaxy is speaking our names. Am I right?”

There were massive cheers, as I expected. Smiling ear to ear, I drained the mug of ale I was holding, and said, “Well, what are you slobs waiting for? I see two very sober COs here that have a date with hangovers tomorrow, so you people best see about introducing them! Get to it!” And with a laugh, I left the two crews to their celebrations.

(Private VIP Box in Delirium)

I sat down at the table across from the two men who had been waiting on me. Once again, Alok Paxisys and Maeral Zumrora greeted me, though this time they were out of uniform in an attempt to ‘blend in’ as ‘common businessmen’. Paxisys managed just fine, but Zumrora clearly showed that he was a better analyst and manager than field operative, because he still reeked of spook. But here in the private (and very secure) VIP room, it wouldn’t matter too much. The room had already been swept for bugs three times, and the soundproofing was good enough that I couldn’t even here the Black Stars partying in the box next door.

Smiling at the two men, I waved as Carissa brought drinks for everyone. “Gentlemen, I am pleased to see you two once again. A lot has happened since the last time we met, hasn’t it?”

Paxisys sipped his drink, and nodded. “Indeed. When we asked you to perform a few raids behind enemy lines, we had no idea that your ships would prove so instrumental in turning the tides of battle. Reports from our sources in the Empire have been causing more than a few people to have sleepless nights here, as you can imagine.”

I shrugged. “It is a situational advantage at best. Shinokage and the Assassin-class corvettes are well-suited to the niche they fall in. Think of them as the naval equivalent of a sharpshooter with a big gun. They are hardly all powerful. So, were you coming to me to talk about a purchase for the Confederate Navy, or did you have concerns?”

Paxisys cleared his throat. “Well, while the capabilities of a full corvette are impractical for our needs, the things you’ve been able to pull off have gotten some interest in certain circles for a few discrete armed courier vessels that could be used for resupply missions in the field, for instance. The Navy might have other ideas. Maeral?”

“Well, I can’t deny that there are several admirals who are begging for a squadron of stealth corvettes or cruisers to command, but the budget for new ship construction has yet to be finalized. There are many more officers, who are pulling their hair out looking for a way to defend against ships like yours.”

I nodded. “Ah, of course. I don’t doubt that there are researchers working feverishly to deal with that problem, in every faction. My own people have been working on that idea, as well, you know.”

“Any, ah, signs of success?”

“Well, first let me put your mind at ease regarding everyone’s nightmare scenario, some idiot using one of these things for orbital bombardment. There is a lot of math behind it, but essentially the projectile suffers a catastrophic failure when it hits the upper atmosphere, because it is simply going too fast, and the physics are against it. There is an explosion, with a lot of energy lost to heat and the explosion, so consider it like a high-altitude nuclear detonation, without all the pesky radiation. You wouldn’t want to be in a ship within the blast radius, but people on the ground should be fine, for a world like Dimiya. Now, if you were targeting a mountaintop installation, or something on an airless world, that changes. But your people probably already told you all of this.”

“So lets move on to ships and orbitals. To be honest, the best defense for any ship is to be somewhere else, which is why the Assassin-class works best as a first-strike weapon. Otherwise, you need at least battlecruiser strength shields to have a prayer of surviving a shot. Orbitals can’t move, and I can imagine the reasons you might not want them to have battleship shields. The physics just aren’t good for shrugging off an impact with that much energy behind it.”

Zumrora sighed. “That is what the scientists have been telling us. That weapon of yours is a frightening thing, Captain Mollen.”

“Well, since I’m a great guy, I’ll give you a piece of advice. Instead of trying to stop a shot from an Assassin, try to deflect it instead. There once was a blue-water navy ship on Terra, back before humans achieved space flight, called the Merrimack. Instead of blocking the cannons of enemy ships, it had a low hull, and everything above the water was angled to deflect the cannonballs. While I doubt a cruiser’s armor could ever be angled enough to survive a hit from the Shadowdancer and still be effective as a warship, it may be possible to angle the shields, though with current emitter setups we’ve found that it leaves you more vulnerable to energy weapons from oblique angles.”

Paxisys leaned forward. “Giving information away, Mollen? That’s not like you.”

“Well, I figure a bit of help will encourage a budget that has room for a squadron or two of Assassins for the Confederate Navy. And I also have a bit of an expedition I’m putting together…”

Thursday, April 12, 2018

Chapter 92 - Rite of Luwreni

Since comparative religion wasn’t exactly a topic for public places like the medlab, we changed locations to Captain Inatumal’s quarters. As we walked, I did my best to keep my concentration on my form, to keep it from getting out of control. Who would have guessed that increasing my ability to shapeshift would have had a downside? Still, I could see skill XP start rolling in, which meant that working to control the unstable flesh was basically helping me increase my shapeshifting skill.

Anyways, once we were all in the captain’s suite, I looked over at the twins, and said, “All right, what is this Rite of Luwreni?”

Aurae sighed, and said, “As we said, Mimdros is the Divine of War and Fertility, the Defender of the People and Conqueror of their Foes. As you might have guessed, many of His teachings have to do with War, the division of Spoils, and so on. Among those is the Rite of Luwreni, named after his consort in the religious texts.”

Nimue nodded. “You see, when Mimdros would return from war, he would celebrate his victory with his consorts, and encouraged his followers to do the same. As the god of Fertility, he would… ensure that the next generation was as strong and numerous as the last.”

I nodded slowly. “I think I’m beginning to get the picture. And I am going to guess that this is not just symbolic, something that is carried out to completion as thoroughly as possible.” The twins were blushing heavily at this point, clearly pretty embarrassed at having basically just propositioned me for a threesome with them. “I understand why a slave would traditionally seek out their Master for this, but why would you seek out your Commander?”

Aurae shuffled her feet, and said, “Because, if the seed takes, then the blood of one who is victorious in battle would make for a stronger addition to the People than that of one who has never known victory. It is supposed to be a good sign if a Communionist is with child following the Rite of Luwreni.”

“I see. Out of curiosity, what happens when the ‘Master’ or ‘Commander’ is a woman, or when the Commander and Subordinate are the same gender?” I wasn’t lying when I said I was curious, since it would be interesting to see how far this rabbit hole went.

Nimue looked glad to be talking about anything other than asking me to bang her and her sister. “Oh, that is simple enough. If the Commander is a woman and the subordinate is male, they might still perform the Rite, though the dominant party shifts. If they are the same gender, then if they have no consort, they may find one of their peers who was in battle instead, or, if all else fails, they might find one amongst the population that they protected or conquered to perform the rite with. But first they must have approached and been denied by better candidates. Amongst Communionists, it is an honor to participate in the Rite.”

Makes sense, I guess. Most religions that aren’t insanely repressed have traditions like that. “So, are there certain forms to follow, or ceremony to do?”

Aurae shook her head, though she was trying to look me in the eye, instead of looking at the parts of my body that were moving outside my control. “There is some preparation on the part of the Communionist’s part, but we already went through that, while we were waiting for you to… return. Now all you need to do is ‘conquer’ us.”

I nodded once. “I see. And you both wish to do this with me?”

The two knelfi women looked at eachother, and then nodded. Nimue responded, “Yes, Master. The truth of your ‘heritage’ is… off-putting, but you have been good to us, and could have taken us any time you wished. After leading us into battle, this is only right, even if the sight of your flesh doing those… things is disconcerting.”

Well, I wasn’t going to get a better offer than that. Stepping forward, I cut off anything further Nimue was going to say by sealing her lips with mine. She was surprised, at first, but then relaxed into my arm. Without thinking about it, I reached out for Aurae, to draw her into the embrace as well, and I heard a small shriek of surprise, causing me to break the kiss, only to see that my arm had become a tentacle, and had wrapped the captain around her waist, bringing her to us. Guess I lost control for a bit there.

Of course, I’d be lying if I said I’d never dreamed of being the tentacle monster in a hentai before, because let’s face it, any guy who has watched hentai has probably thought that, at some point or another. So instead of fighting it, I went the other way, and dove in, letting flesh become more fluidic, as more tentacles grew from my body, and began stripping the twin sisters. Turned out they were indeed perfectly identical, except that Nimue had shorter hair. They even tasted almost the same.

The women tried to get away, but by then I had tossed both of them to the bed, with smaller tentacles binding their wrists together behind their backs, and others forcing their legs apart, spreading them open for my viewing pleasure. I slipped a tentacle into their mouths, both to reduce the sound they made, and to get a bit of lubrication going. Small, thin tentacles snaked about their bodies, gently squeezing their breasts and stimulating their nipples, while another concentrated on repeatedly flicking the little button between their legs, causing screams to become moans.

I hit them both with Mindread, so I knew just where to aim for ‘critical hits’, when to speed up or go slower, when to go hard and when to be gentle, constantly changing the rhythm of the ‘battle’ in ways I hadn’t even considered before. Eventually, though, things came to a head, and I found myself once more in my ‘normal’ form, though still dealing with the occasional ‘writhing’, and two very satisfied Knelfi women lying on either side of me in the captain’s bed. Now that I was out of ‘combat’, I decided to check the notifications I had been getting.

Seduction has improved to 40/100.

+15 CHA

Mental Psy Mastery has improved to 40/100

+10 WIS

Shapeshift has improved to 40/100.

+5 CON, +5 CHA

Skill Evolution! You have reached level 40 of the skill Shapeshift. A branching skill path is available to you, which will evolve the skill into a new form. This evolution is a specialization of the skill. You can still use other aspects of the skill, but areas within your specialization gain a +5 rank bonus to their attempts, and earn skill XP 25% faster. You can unlock a second evolution at level 80 of the skill.
Perfect Shapeshifting	The shapeshifter has learned perfect control, allowing them to easily shift their internal structure to mimic other creatures, to the point where they can confuse biometric scanners.
Wild Shapeshifting	The opposite of perfect shapeshifting, Wild Shapeshifting allows the user to more freely change their body to whatever form is most efficient for the situation at hand, even if that means more tentacles.
Adaptive Shifting	The user passively shapeshifts their body to react to incoming hazards, allowing them to exist indefinitely in a variety of hostile situations, including hard vacuum, and makes them immune to most toxins or diseases.

Skill Evolution! You have reached level 40 of the skill Seduction. A branching skill path is available to you, which will evolve the skill into a new form. This evolution is a specialization of the skill. You can still use other aspects of the skill, but areas within your specialization gain a +5 rank bonus to their attempts, and earn skill XP 25% faster. You can unlock a second evolution at level 80 of the skill.
Smooth Talker	The quintessential smooth talker, who can simply say a few words and have willing partners running after them, and convince them to ‘try new things’.
Magic Touch	Less concerned with the ‘hunt’, and more focused on ensuring that the ‘prey’ they catch always leaves satisfied, the person with the magic touch knows what to do in order to ensure ‘repeat customers’.
Charismatic	Some people walk into a room, and all eyes turn to them with thoughts of lust. This is a passive effect that increases the interest of those around you.

Skill Evolution! You have reached level 40 of the skill Mental Psy Mastery. A branching skill path is available to you, which will evolve the skill into a new form. This evolution is a specialization of the skill. You can still use other aspects of the skill, but areas within your specialization gain a +5 rank bonus to their attempts, and earn skill XP 25% faster. You can unlock a second evolution at level 80 of the skill.
Mindreader	One of the most basic uses of Mental Psy, but perhaps the most subtle. It also has the most potential rewards, but sometimes ignorance truly is bliss.
Dominator	An advanced use of Mental Psy, the ability to control and compel the minds of other beings to do what you wish is a very powerful ability, but one that can spark distrust in those who know about it.
Sensor	One of the basic uses of Mental Psy, and perhaps the most utilitarian. Being able to detect danger or ill intent in advance is an incalculable boon on the battlefield.

The skill boosts were nice, but the skill evolution thing was something he was not expecting. But then, other than hardcore grinders, how many people would be up to 40 on one of their skills, when you had to live the world? And how many of them would tell people? That would be giving away some critical info that could help your enemies, after all.

Now, I had three choices for each skill, and on the face of it, each evolution looked to be pretty interesting. The Dominator evolution of Mental Psy Mastery, for instance, would play well with my Charm and Alter Memory abilities, as well as the Mindbreaker, allowing me to more easily play an ‘offensive’ Mental Psy user. But was that what I really wanted to do? I already wasn’t really comfortable with using Mindbreaker except as a last resort. On the other hand, Mindread was the Mental ability I used most often, and boosting that would allow me to be more effective at the ‘subtle’ manipulations… Yeah, Mindreader was the choice to make.

Skill Evolved.

Mental Psy Mastery is now Mental Psy Mastery (Mindreader).

You gain the Telepathy power.

Psy Powers
Mental	Telepathy – Allows two-way mental communication between targets, sharing surface thoughts with all recipients. Can affect up to three targets simultaneously. Only works on living creatures. Requires concentration. 8 PP per second per target. Range 10 meters. Improves with use. Rank 1/10 (0%)

A new power, huh? Lucky! Well, what would Seduction get me? I thought about Smooth Talker, but decided that wasn’t really what I needed. I already had a harem, after all, and any help I could get keeping them all satisfied was definitely welcome. But something about the Charismatic option appealed to me. Being able to walk into a room and just have all eyes on me would be useful for any number of possible tricks, whatever form I took. But in the end, I took the advice of a senior chief who was my superior back when I was in the Navy, “If your woman ain’t happy, ain’t NOBODY happy!”

Skill Evolved

Seduction is now Seduction (Magic Touch).

You gain Touch of Ecstasy power.

Psy Powers
Energy	Touch of Ecstasy – Converts PP into low level electricity, stimulating target’s pleasure centers, giving them an instant climax. Cooldown 1 minute. Costs 20 PP. May improve with use. Rank 1/10 (0%)

That just left Shapeshifting. Adaptive was pretty cool, if I was a solo player, but being the leader of what was quickly becoming my own faction, I couldn’t just go off on my own. Also, that was a good way to get myself shot, or worse, and I wanted to keep the number of people who saw my whole Corporeal Instability thing to a minimum. The same with Wild Shapeshifting. I’d just experienced what a lot of fun going full on crazy with the shifting would be, but was that really what I wanted to base my playstyle around? Perfect Shapeshifting, though… yeah, I could definitely use that.

Skill Evolved

Shapeshift is now Shapeshift (Perfect Shapeshifting).

You gain Scan Biometrics power.

Psy Powers
Physical	Scan Biometrics – Scan the touched creature’s biometric profile. Only works on living creatures. Scan takes 10 seconds, and requires physical contact for duration. At current rank, able to scan fingerprints, facial structure. Rank 1/10 (0%)

I would have continued playing around, but I felt the twins moving next to me, and decided that it was time for round two…