Saturday, June 22, 2013

GOAL: XIX Sized Claim

Well, it took a bit and one lucky level 7 amp to do, but I finally did it. I hit a level XIX claim, which is the last of the teen sizes, which puts all sizes XXI and under in my repertoire. It will take me a bit to mine up, but it is all joy as I had been hoping for this one for quite a while. This just leaves one more pre-tower size to find, and that is the XXII, after that I'll only be pining after XXIV and higher. Perhaps if I'm lucky and buy the right amp I'll find those too, but for now I'll just be overjoyed to have reached this milestone of completing the teens.

Luckily this was iron, so it came up pretty quickly.


Thursday, March 7, 2013

Rebuilding the Ruins

The once flourishing city was in ruins now, it was hard to see it this way. I had watched it being built, it had gone up so quickly and the residents had learned so much in such a short time. I couldn't hide the sorrow I felt seeing the place the way it was, I knew I had helped build it and in the end I had also helped to destroy it. Though one thing was strange about it, the ruins didn't look like they had been destroyed in war, but rather by time. I knew it hadn't taken much time for the Klatvix to catch up with me, or rather us, it was still a hard thing to grasp just how many lives ended up back in that one location and were now a part of me. I knew about reincarnation, but this was different. I didn't have fragments of past lives coming through as others claimed to have, I had full lives filled with sorrow, joy, and love. So many experiences, and yet despite them this life was the one I cherished the most. Something about recovering a life I had lost made it very dear to me. There were still others to recover, and perhaps one of them would be better, but for now I wanted to revel in my return to this one.

We spent weeks wandering and talking about the things I'd seen, what happened and how we thought it could have been possible. I found many fragments of the former society that lived here, but no signs of what fate befell them. Most of the time we stayed above ground, but once in awhile I would show them something I had built below. They were impressed at seeing the objects, knowing that even though I had done it before I had done it better this time. I had gone from primitive technology to fully featured and improved technology in a matter of weeks. They didn't ask me too many questions about what I had gone through, mostly just letting me decide which parts I wanted to share. Eventually I had gone through the story of the life on this planet and was hesitant to talk about some of the others right away, but knew soon I would have to start discussing it, Ambri and Nira would both be able to help me figure out what to do next. However, I felt that before I told them any of the stories that there was some work to be done here.

I was still hesitant to touch the technology below, instead we spent some time rebuilding the city that once stood above. I remembered it all vividly and we used the same methods to build it as they had used then, though we had the advantage of very refined technology to speed it up. Most of the materials we needed were still on site, it was like nothing had been moved or touched, the residents had just disappeared. When we got to the area that I'd never seen before we stopped, I spent some time looking at it but had no idea what they had done here. From what I could tell though, it had been important, so important that it appeared many of them had been involved. I hoped that perhaps it had been a ship that they would then have used to escape from the Klatvix, though I doubted they had developed their technology that far that fast. It was strange how little information I had from the moment I had entered the cube until the Klatvix had retrieved it once more. They had wasted little time once they had it again in putting it in a location that I couldn't readily escape. In fact, they had activated all the bits and pieces that locked it down until Nasero had figured out how to open it, though he wasn't aware yet that his part was key in my escape, I would let him know eventually, but I wanted to wait and do that when we visited him next.

When we had finished rebuilding the city, save the part that I had no idea what it should look like, I had the machines return to the surface and reprogrammed them to maintain and care for the structures. Though we would stay here for awhile yet I wanted to ensure everything would be cared for during our stay so that I could finally share with them what I had truly been through.

Wednesday, February 13, 2013

GOAL: Level 30 Prospector

Finally, after much PED turnover I finally achieved level 30 in prospector. The other mining skills are not too far behind so I'll have them all there eventually. But I was very excited yesterday morning to go on some runs to finish that last <2 after="" and="" finally="" for="" get="" had="" happy="" hitting="" hooray="" i="" in="" make="" me.="" mineral="" my="" new="" now="" p="" point="" points="" see="" sense="" serendipity="" skills="" some="" that="" them="" these="" to="" two="" unlocks="" useful="" very="" was="">

Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Thankfulness

The thing was huge, but I knew I had to take it out. Arks of hot, thick, red liquid flew as I slashed at this creature with my horribly damaged dagger. Why did I take this thing? He said it could be good again given some care, but right now it wasn't helping much. The creature fought back with its talons, landing some blows here and there. I hadn't had time to put on some armor when this thing showed up and as I felt the pain of it ripping my flesh I wished I had some seconds to prepare. A few quick evasive maneuvers put me in the right position though, and throwing my entire weight into it I managed to sever the head from this hideous creature. It's body flopped around for a bit and as I had a chance to look at it I realized it really did look like a berycled, though a bit uglier. The feathers just seemed out of place on it and the neck just too long. It's body was huge, far too big to be natural. Curious of what it was, I used my scanner to figure out what kind of creature this was. The screen displayed it's name: a turkey, from planet Earth. How it got here, I had no idea, but the screen also mentioned that it was a very tasty thing to eat and my stomach told me to waste no time and cook that sucker up! I started a fire and soon the smell of it cooking made my mouth water, I couldn't wait to try this thing.

Once it was done cooking I ripped some flesh from the beast and pulled it towards my mouth. Saliva flowed freely as I anticipated the first taste and as it finally reached my tongue... I woke up. It was a dream! My curiosity had brought me all the information about Thanksgiving, a holiday of abundance celebrated back on Earth. I tried desperately to think of what it would have tasted like, but even the fabricated smells left my waking senses and I was left with just one thing to remember from it all; my stomach growling and the pains of hunger. As I prepared to leave the comfort of my apartment I mentally thought about what I was thankful for. The home I had here, the living I made, no matter how meager it was at times, and the fact that I lived on a planet as beautiful as this one is. Yeah, I was hungry most of the time, but at least I still had life within me and work to look forward to doing. Perhaps today I would find the big one and be able to get a few pieces of furniture, though I was still thankful to just have a place to call my own, a giant step forward from what a lot of colonists had these days. I hoped others would take some time to remember to be thankful for what they had, even if we don't formally celebrate the holiday here, there were plenty of others who had lost so much to get us here and still so many more who sacrificed much to allow us to stay.

Thursday, September 20, 2012

I am NOT lunch!

I've just been having an amazing week so far. Most of my runs have finally been turning up something useful and I have been able to get some of my tools back in shape, hopefully soon I'll be able to do more but I'm doing my best to go slow and take my time, when I rush I tend to lose more than I want to. Anyway, yesterday was no different from the last few days, I head out and shortly find myself getting a claim large enough to make me excited. But what was different yesterday was where I was mining was full of atrax and armax and later a few other things, but the atrax and the armax seemed to be very hungry or pissed off because I had to run away from a few of them that decided I looked threatening or like a good meal. Luckily my Sleipnir gets me out of a bad situation pretty well, otherwise I would have been spending a good portion of my time trying to get them far enough from my claims to not come after me again. After the first few good claims were up I moved beyond their territory, freeing me to go about my business in relative peace, though I was extra caution for the rest of my runs. Lucky for me, beyond their range was some better mining. So in the end all I have to say to these blasted creatures is, "I am not lunch! But thank you for pointing me in the right direction."

Monday, September 17, 2012

Gone Fishing

The other day I did something a little different. Recently I followed the people who took me in and taught me how to survive here to a new society. Since then I have been slowly learning who the other people are, which is difficult when you spend most of your time out on your own looking for resources. But as I was listening to them talk from their remote location I decided I wanted to see their activities first hand. So, using my hover pod I took a trip from Fort Cayuze out to the middle of nowhere in the water where they were hunting Leviathan. I've seen these fish before, but it never ceases to amaze me at how big they actually are. I'm surprised anyone can fight them as they should just be able to gobble them down in one swift motion. However, the fish seem to be unaware of that and instead try to kill you before thinking about eating you. Luckily the revive system keeps them from actually making a meal of us, or else I'd think they'd stop fighting and just swallow us whole as they might actually like our taste. Anyway, I watched them kill a few and thought, that looks like fun, but I opted to continue my normal activities and went off to a land area filled with those giant spiders that live on this planet. The run went poorly and I thought again about joining the hunt. Since my runs had been so bad lately I decided that would be a good idea and went back to Fort Cayuze to prepare.

Now, handling a weapon of any type is rare for me, especially guns. Plus, with a limited budget, I couldn't afford much. So with my little Kiwio and some ammo I found my soc mates again and started shooting with them. My pathetic gun didn't do much, but every little bit helps I'm told, so when we (them mostly) killed the big fish we were shooting at and activated the processing function of our handhelds I was pleasantly surprised that I got a small share of the fish. Those around me were quite excited, so I figured we must have gotten a much fatter one than they had been getting before. They equaled out the oils that were extracted from this behemoth really quick, giving me a little extra for my pathetic effort and then we continued on. It didn't take me long to see that the first fish had been quite good compared to the normal ones, but we got at least one more good one before it was time to head in. It was definitely a bit different fishing in this way, but it was quite enjoyable and I got to relieve some loneliness for a change. I'm back to my normal task of mining now, but I'm thinking some more fishing trips with the guys will be in my future.

The New Rig

There are just so many robot conflicts that have happened over the years on Calypso. Some areas you just avoid because of the robot activity, at least I do. Without proper weapons and armor against them I have to make sure I don't encounter them while I mine up the resources we need to continue the fight. One area in particular was burnt up by the robots, which is a shame. The black burning scar that once had other life living on it was pretty nice, if you could avoid the wildlife. I mined that area a few times, but once it had been destroyed I stopped going. It was the fear of getting shot down by the robots, which I know isn't a huge deal with the revival system in place, but it still hurts like you wouldn't believe. Recently, however, it came to my attention that the robots in the area had been wiped out and in their place we found a nice reserve of oil, much like the one in the middle of the desert, though not quite as rich. They placed a pump on this one as well and if you're lucky enough to be there at the right time you might find a few barrels that didn't get sent to the right place. These barrels can sure help in getting through some rough times. The only problem with the arrival of the new rig is that they no longer patrol the area to keep you safe. It seems they know they can't stop the conflict and so they don't even try. So when there you are competing with others to get what little you can and some of them won't hesitate to shoot you down, knowing full well it isn't murder if you're going to revive again shortly after they take you out. So the new rig isn't much different than the old except in that the new one drops so much less than the old that less people will spend a lot of time there defending it, so I have a much better chance of getting a few drops once in awhile when I need them.