And yes, Bogdan and Feeniks volunteered for these parts in the story. Thank you both of you! Feeniks will appear in future parts of this (as will I hopefully) if I get at least somewhat good responses to this.

Bogdan Redbeard looked at his rusty old controls. He couldn't believe this was the ship that Corvus was giving him. They said they knew what they were doing, but then again, they probably wouldn't give a shit if he died. His screen started blinking, so he pushed it. Touchscreen technology had been out of style since before anyone could remember, but this ship still used it. The message popped up as a hologram in front of his eyes:
**Pirate Babk Rako* Yarr! Drop yer cargo or be shot!
Since the ship Bogdan was driving came from a time before maneuvering was really thought of that much, so he decided this would be a pretty good time to drop The Addict.
"The Addict" was the nickname for a new bomb recently designed by Corvus to be deadly, cheap, and invisible. And it was wired up to a big red button. How could it be any better?
He pressed it, and a small, chicken-egg sized pellet dropped out of the ship and flew towards the pirate Vulture. Bogdan rotated the camera around just in time to see a giant energy sphere coming from the pirate ship. Strange, he thought, it's still there. Barely outrunning the shock wave-like thing, whatever it was, he jumped to D14. The pirate Vulture just sat there like no one was inside.
A biological weapon? thought Bogdan. Would even Corvus do that? It made sense though. How else would such a destructive (according to Corvus) weapons be so small? Flying into the dock, he thought of something else. If this could travel through space like he saw... he may have just started an interstellar plague.

Hedgehogs4Me, meet Freedombird: http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/7/15133

Don't be like Freedombird, Mmmkay? Before you write another word of this one, think very carefully.

Thanks.

Okay, now I'm just confused. As far as I can tell, Freedombird just got good comments on his. So what am I supposed to think about?

EDIT: oh, now I see. He insulted you or something.

Lecter's just asking you to make sure that your writing has a coherent plot, at least decent grammar, and perhaps a semblance of character development.

But it sounds cool so far. See if you can work in LeberMac somewhere where he saves the day with a crate of tequila. ;)

Heh, okay. A crate of Tequila, got it =P

yeah and make sure you reference all the cool characters. choose from this list and you wont miss.

as far as lecter is concerned, his pomposity is inherent to his nature. his bitchy tone is his way to feel sorry for himself for years of neglect and lovelessness, which have pushed him to the brinks of humanity (aka, law school). his only intent is to help you come up with more writing which he can later read in order to cling to humanity. it's such a desperate case that even moderators on here totally ignore any decency rules when his posts are concerned and let him do pretty much what he wants for so long as he keeps his two accounts running.

so, hang in there and keep writing. nothing keeps you from editing when you done but better plan ahead. read up on past rp posts as guides and format of what's usual around here. plan out your story with long term goals, mid-term plots and short term action. make yourself a background for each characters and give them out as the story require, but not all of it. use it as a guide: "what would he do or say?".

Leber, at least, got the point. If this could travel through space like he saw... he may have just started an interstellar plague. Seriously... you can see that my concern is a reasonable one.

uc, as usual, tries to show off what he's learned from the psych degree that he got for sending in 12 cracker jack box-tops. Fact-check, however: I'm no longer in law school; it's just one account for now; and the Moderaters routinely alter or delete my posts to help keep them VO forums kosher. You're a dishonest piece of shit if you think you can misrepresent your disagreement with their interpretation of the EULA as actually being their selectively ignoring it where I'm concerned, for whatever reason you're implying.

[edit]Oh, my bad. Those cracker jack's prizes all look alike to me.[/edit]

it wasn't a psych degree, you moran. it's a divination ring.

edit:

moran. i know it's moron. it's called irony and is a wink at that well-known photo.

edit-2:
edit: nope. it was a pro-war rally.

Moron-you moran-is the word you seek.

[edit]LOL Sorry... I'd never seen that one. Wow. Do you have the context for it? It seems so bad as to have been staged... but probably not.[/edit]

Alright, here's part 2, don't stray too off-topic with your comments guys! I'll add a bit more of Feeniks, me, and possibly Leber in the story once Bogdan is pretty much taken out of the picture.

"Mr. Feeniks, do you have word from our shipping guy about when he's due to arrive?"
"No Sir, but a ship is entering he sector now."
The man pushed Feeniks off his chair and looked at the screen. "What is it? Cmon, what is it?"
A name appeared next to the blip on the station radar. "Bogdan Redbeard, Corvus Grasshopper mkII"
"Is it him boss?"
"It's him. ready the dock."
The station opened a hatch, and out came an arm-like object. It turned sideways, then shrunk down to something much like a dock, but deeper and slightly rounder. The Grasshopper, not being able to maneuver nearly enough, skidded in. The arm closed around it and sucked it into the station.
Bogdan couldn't move, the docking procedure had caused a rather "convenient" malfunction causing a small hole in the side of the ship and the front view screen to come crashing in on him. He managed to turn his head just in time to see a hand reaching in with a syringe. He could only guess what was in it.
When he woke up, he was in some sort of a children's playroom with others. They were all playing with toys. He recognized a few of them: a Rubik's Cube, an electric trains set, a slide whistle. He went and picked something that looked like a double-ended slingshot. He placed it on his head, and for some reason was significantly amused. He tried balancing something else on his head. He started laughing. He had no clue what was so funny, but something certainly was. He started laughing so hard that what was on his head fell off. He didn't care though, he was having too much fun.
Just outside the room, several Corvus scientists looked at a large screen that was transmitting the image from inside the room. "You think we gave him too much?" One of them asked the others.
"Nah," another one replied, "He was pretty strong-willed from the beginning, I figured making the dose a little higher was a reasonable thing to do."
"You think it'll work?" one of the other ones asked.
"I have no doubt, I was the one who designed it."
"I sure hope you're right, or the boss is going to be pretty man, and you know what he's like when he's mad."
"Why do you think I'm missing an eye in the first place?"
Back inside the room, Bogdan decided to look around at what some of the others were doing. One of them was doing a headstand against a wall.
"Hey, how do you do that?" he asked.
"I dunno," the guy responded, trying to shrug his shoulders.
Bogdan tried, but couldn't get up, probably because he wasn't really thinking about trying to do a headstand, but more about how much fun he was having.
A door opened, and a tall man walked through with a briefcase. He opened it to reveal that it was full of syringes with that same chemical that was injected into Bogdan. "Alright guys, time for your shot!" No one did anything, so he tried again. "Come on, it'll be fun!"
All the people in the room formed a line in front of him. The man injected each of them with whatever was in the syringe, occasionally having to go back for more. Once he was done, they were all smiling like lunatics.
A woman walked into the room with an electronic clipboard and a pencil behind her ear. "Could Babk Rako please come with me please?"
The man who Bogdan recognized as the pirate who he bombed earlier ran towards the door, grinning from ear to ear. Bogdan would've been puzzled by his presence there, but was too happy to notice.

Oh Dear was exploring the outer reaches of the known galaxy. Well, not really, he had just fallen asleep at the controls and was now who-knows-where. Noticing that he was holding the turbo the whole time, he let go of it. He rotated his camera around. He didn't recognize this part of space. He couldn't have moved very far in only an hour or two though, he thought to himself. He then looked at his other hand, which was holding down the "activate" button. It seemed that he had found a new wormhole accidentally while sleeping. That can't go too well into the history books.
Then he realized something: He may of run into an ion storm, or a small nebula, or something like that that had redirected his course. It would be nearly impossible to retrace his steps. He hoped he hadn't gone too far, or there would be no way home.

Lector, you can't stage a mullet like that one.

Nice one, Waffles...

Not bad, Panis. You're getting better as you go.

WOO minipost =D

LeberMac tried to kick over a garbage can, but nowadays they were attached to the ground, and he just hurt his foot. Cursing, he took another drink of whatever was in the bottle he was holding. He couldn't remember where he got it or what it was, but whatever it was, it tasted great and did some pretty dazzling things to his brain. He shook the bottle, and decided it had nothing left in it. He attempted to throw it into the garbage can, but threw it in the exact opposite direction.
He thought for a moment. Gosh, what planet was he on, he thought, and which system? Not that it mattered to him at all, but it was good to know which planet one was on so one could find the whereabouts of somewhere to get more of anything alcoholic. He bent down and licked the concrete. Nope, nothing alcoholic on this road. His tongue started to bleed, but he couldn't feel it through all the moonshine. Salty, he thought. Salty blood.
That wasn't what he was looking for though, so he kept going. Suddenly he had a brilliant idea having to do with making an inter-galactic jump drive, but promptly threw it out of his mind. He had to think of how to get more booze, not brilliant ideas involving quantum physics. What use was quantum physics anyways, besides to invent stuff that wasn't nearly as good as old-fashioned home brew.
He stumbled down the street and entered a random building. A woman screamed. Nope, not that one. He tried another. an energy pulse whizzed past his ear, burning off most of his hair. Nope, not that one either. Finally, he found the bar. Immediately upon entering, everyone else left. Leber didn't care, in fact, he was thrilled, as they all left their drinks on the table. He picked up six tall glasses full of unidentified liquid at the same time, drank them all at once, and passed out on the table.

Feeniks groaned. Dumb desk job. He didn't groan too loudly, or he figured he's go with some of the others to be experimented on. He typed into his holographic keyboard, and an alarm sounded. Feeniks pulled his hands away from the keyboard. He was almost certain that wasn't him. Whoever it was, they would get beaten to death by nerve stimulator. He heard it was the absolute most painful way to die, so he tried to act inconspicuous. He looked around. No one was getting a death device pinned around their necks, so this must be real. Either that or they hadn't found out who did it yet. He knew that if it was real and no one did anything, the lot of them would get killed, or so the bosses claimed. He decided to risk it try to trace the hostile. His fingers flying, he got to work. A radar image appeared on the holo-screen:

My god, he thought, these are hostiles. They may have been green on the radar, but he knew Corvus policy. All real friendlies appeared as hostiles so to avoid trickery. He sent for on of the employers to come to his desk by station chat. Almost immediately, four or five of them were huddles around his desk. He pointed out the radar image on the holo-screen, and surprisingly was given the order not to fire, instead to enter some obscure code into the computer matrix.
With a shudder, the station opened multiple hatches, and something similar to a shockwave erupted from it. Inside the station, everything went eerily still. No fire came from the attacking ships, and the hatches closed. Feeniks got the word to send all the hostile ships this message:
Come on in, it'll be FUN

LeberMac rolled around on the floor after passing out, and relished his role in this story so far.

A year (in the story) has passed since the last story update. (hint: this is RP, not actual VO)

NOTE: DAMN, I just thought of an awesome way to end this, but it would require the destruction of every planet, making the devs have to go into a lot of trouble to change every map =P. I guess I'll have to come up with another ending that makes Earth, jump sling technology, and the new wormhole obsolete. Ooo, I just thought of one. You'll have to wait and see though!

Oh Dear pressed the activate button. Nothing happened, as usual. He replicated another small meal, if you could call it that, using a system he had invented. He started to accelerate to collect space dust for fuel. Once he had enough, he pressed the activate button again. Nothing happened.
Everyone back in the known universe had no doubt either forgotten about him or thought he was dead. Well, that's if the known universe existed anymore. Who knows nowadays, right?

LeberMac drank another bottle of who-knows-what. There were quite a few of them since the wave took over.
"The wave" was Leber's name for whatever made the people on this planet disappear. Well, that was his theory, but he didn't know that they disappeared, since he would pass out before the wave ever came close enough to do anything. But when he woke up, most of the townspeople would vanish. Good thing they left their drinks behind.
He had seen the wave though, it was all bright and sparkly, coloured blue with a touch of red. Or perhaps the red was blood in his eyes from his busted capillaries (another well-known side effect to drinking as much as Leber did). It didn't matter much to him, though. In fact, how much better could it get? A pretty, sparkly thing that came down and provided more drinks for him. Still, pretty creepy.

Oh Dear pressed the activate button again. To his surprise, a wormhole opened. He was sure it was his imagination, though, because he had tried thousands of times before, and one never opened. Then he realized: he wasn't on a direct intercept course with the opening, which meant two things, at least. The first was that that wasn't a wormhole. If it were, he would've opened it himself just then. However, if he wasn't opening it himself...
Something was coming through.
And there it was, clear as day, a ship. No configuration that Oh Dear recognized though. It was almost like a Centurion, but longer and slightly taller and wider, almost like... a space shuttle. One of those old myths, back from 20th- and 21st-century Sol I. Maybe some alien race was experimenting with jump drive? Some early test-jump from an Earth craft causing severe spacial and temporal fluctuation? It hailed him.
*UESS Fate* Do you need assistance?
UESS? United Earth Star Ship? Nah. Ukari Ethical Stellar Service? Hmmph, probably.
*UESS Fate* Unidentified vessel, please respond or we will be forced to open fire.
He decided it would be best to respond.
UESS Fate-> Who are you?
*UESS Fate* This is the United Earth Star Ship Fate. Please identify yourself.
UESS Fate-> Is this some kind of joke?
*UESS Fate* This is not a joke. Please identify yourself.
He decided it would be best to play this one safe.
UESS Fate-> This is Oh Dear. Where I come from, some believe Terra I is a myth.
*UESS Fate* Please state your real name and your exact location.
Hmmph, robot at the controls. Should've known.
UESS Fate-> Panis Onar, originally from Serco Prime, undoubtedly known to you as Terra II.
*UESS Fate* Please lead us to your home planet.
UESS Fate-> I, err, umm, accidentally went through an uncharted wormhole and lost its location. I'm as lost as your are.
*UESS Fate* We are not lost. We were searching for the location of Sol II, as we have for the past eleven years, according to orders directly sent directly from Earth. State the galactic coordinates and we will transport our ship, as well as your ship if you wish, there.
Oh Dear couldn't believe what he was seeing. An intergalactic jump drive? He hoped they would let him take it apart.
UESS Fate-> I've learned it in school as 128-∆ßΩ-6, that may be off by a little though, I wasn't exactly taking advanced stellar cartography.
*UESS Fate* Stand by
Before he knew it, a jump portal had opened, sucking him and the Earth ship in. Next thing he knew, he saw a great ball of light, then he was in Sol II.
UESS Fate-> ...wow
*UESS Fate* You have just experienced the sling jump drive. I am not authorized to tell you the exact specifics, but it allows our ship to travel anywhere in the universe.
Oh Dear scanned their ship until he found the info he was looking for.

Leber looked for another bottle, but couldn't find one. He looked for a person to wait by until the wave came again, but there were none of those either. Finally, he came found a mediocre solution: a ship. It had a great personality too, it fit him. He stepped in, and a holo-screen flashed in front of him. He first put his hand through it and waved it around to see the pretty colours ripple, then attempted reading it, letter by letter.
"W-E-L-C-O-M-E, welcome," he said out loud, If anyone had heard him, they would've heard a sound very similar to the sound of a drunk man groaning (as that's actually what it was), but to Leber, he was being extremely clever. He moved on to the next word.
"I-N-T-O, into," he moaned. That was an easy word. He looked at the next one.
"T-H-E, the," he groaned. These words were getting easier and easier!
"G-R-A-S-S-H-O-P-P-E-R, gash-cropping?" That one didn't make any sense, so he passed out onto the control panel. The holo-screen changed to display:
"Course set to: SERCO PRIME. Engaging Auto-Pilot"

Just because no one seems to comment on this, or even know of its existence, I'll provide another story update! And no, this ISN'T absolute bullshit!

*UESS Fate* We have detected mechanical intervention the brain waves of the majority of the people in this system. Is this out of the ordinary for your people?
UESS Fate-> Nah, we have bio-mechanical implants
UESS Fate-> Wait, did you say brain?
*UESS Fate* We mean what we have sent you.
UESS Fate-> Care to tell me what sort of intervention?
[100] <Sedina V Hold> Corvus now has control of all systems in the known universe. New announcement: serving us is fun!
UESS Fate-> ...oh
*UESS Fate* Please define: Corvus
UESS Fate-> They're sort of the black market in grey space, along with Xang Xi and a few others. Corvus is known as the most extreme, though.
*UESS Fate* And they command your known universe?
UESS Fate-> Not last I've heard. Something tells me this has to do with your readings about the brain waves
*UESS Fate* Possibly a type of nanite or retrovirus of some kind?
UESS Fate-> Hey, don't ask me, I'm not the expert!
*UESS Fate* Was there any sign of a plague or disease of any kind spreading before you originally left? Or any sort of rumours of experimental genetic research?
UESS Fate-> Not that I've heard of. Nanite then?
*UESS Fate* Most likely, otherwise it would be unlikely that it could travel so fast through space. Set your hull plating to send a scrambling energy pulse at a modulating frequency all around your ship at all times.
UESS Fate-> Already on it. I assume your deflector shields can short-circuit any nanites that may decide to hitch a ride?
*UESS Fate* That's the plan. In the meantime, we must find a way to research into this without anyone knowing.
UESS Fate-> Maybe go and tell one of the infected people that telling us about this will be fun? Chances are, they'll know, since the nanites must have some sort of information transfer between them so they can work together so well.
*UESS Fate* Don't ask us, we aren't the experts.

Feeniks was angry beyond belief. He knew the awful effect of the nanite and how to defeat it, but all transmissions out of the system were filtered. So much, in fact, that there may as well be a machine doing the work. Not that he'd admit that, or they'd infect him with the nanite and replace him with a machine.
The more he thought about it, though, the better the nanite sounded. It was said to provide almost absolute happiness to a person, but have the side effect of making them much more willing to do what they were told, in the promise that they will be provided even more happiness than they already have. Of course, to the people at Corvus, the side effect was what their goal was. All they had to do was fit it with a jump drive, and off it went to do their bidding.
Then he realized something. A normal jump drive couldn't get it around the universe so quickly. They hada taken over Dau, Itan, and Sol II first, and it got to each of the locations in a matter of seconds.
Not that he believed in all the propaganda that Corvus was in alliance with aliens or anything, but this was pretty strange indeed.

Okay, finally, another short update, but you've gotta comment if you want to see more. Seriously. That's unless I get seriously bored and decide to write another part, of course =P

Oh Dear was thinking about how to get to one of the people effected when a ship jumped into the sector.
UESS Fate-> I'm picking up a ship on my radar at 3 o' clock and slightly above my position, approaching the station at approximately 100 m/s
*UESS Fate* Please identify it.
UESS Fate-> Person inside is "LeberMac", he's a member of a nationalist guild against this n
ation. He's harmless though, he's always drunk.
*UESS Fate* The Serco Dominion or Corvus?
UESS Fate-> Serco. He's a member of the Itani race. Basically, they were continuing the war that took place on Earth ever so long ago.
*UESS Fate-> Until Corvus stepped in, so chances are this is a routine delivery mission from one Corvus station to another.
UESS Fate-> Do you detect any brain wave intervention?
*UESS Fate* It's hard to tell, the ship is emitting high levels of radiation. We aren't picking up on any, though. Do you recognize the configuration?
UESS Fate-> Nope, looks older than the currect generation of ships being deployed. Could be a sort of holographic mask, though.
*UESS Fate* Engaging cloak.
UESS Fate-> Wait, what?

LeberMac woke up just in time to dock at the station. He got up out of his ship and went to look for some booze. Wondering through the grav-tunnels, he not-so-silently wished for something alcoholic to show up on the other side.
"Doo doo doo, doop diddly-doo, driiiink... Boo-biddy-doo booze, a beverage..." he sang, not following any particular tune. Emerging on the other side, he stood up and walked around the kitchen.
Wait, he thought, walking? Must be sobering up! He shivered in fear of not having anything alcoholic in his bloodstream, then continued on.
A man was twirling around in circles in front of him, so he figured that the man was at least slightly intoxicated. "Hey you, where's the drink?"
"Drink? OOOOOOOOHHHHH, you must mean alcohol. Hehehehe, you're funny. Having fun today?"
"WHERE'S THE DRINK?!"
"Hehehehe, over there, should be in the cooler."
As Leber ran for the cooler, he heard the weird man shout, "Have fun, man!"

Feenik's console started beeping. He turned down the sound level and typed a few keywords into the virtual keyboard. The name of the sender popped up on the screen: CLASSIFIED INFORMATION
That couldn't be right though, there wouldn't be any reason that a name would be beyond his security clearance, unless they changed the privileges.
That couldn't be right either, there would've been a station-wide announcement if the privileges had been changed. Also, only his console had beeped, no one else's. He quickly looked around, then opened the transmission channel without telling one of the employers, an action that would get him killed if he told anyone. The message read:

don’t maKe Children Cry. cHildren cry and ask hard QuestionS when you VoiCe sadness. Zoos are the Best places, nOt Much bad Zones. Videos of dry ZOnes the desert are like zoos. we have them, COME and have fun!
- feeniks of sedina v hold
ps. tales of sol page 155, figure 6 also makes people happy.

At first he looked at and thought, WTF?! Then he realized that either someone out there wanted to have fun with some random transmission to one of the most top-secret places in the known universe, or someone was trying to get a point across. Writing down all the capital letters, he got this:

KCCHQSVCZBOMZVDZO

Okay... that didn't help much. Then he noticed the "ps." note. Looking up page 155 in the copy of "The Tales of Sol" he always kept around, he saw that figure 6 was a picture of an old piece of paper that was said to be from Sol I that said:

Mr. Jock, TV quiz PhD, bags few lynx.

Okay, a perfect pangram. Then it all fit together in his mind. translating the letters using the pangram and the alphabet in the reverse of the way that it would have been coded in the first place, he came up with this:

FEENIKSHELPDALHOLD

Immediately recognizing his name, he separated it from the rest.

FEENIKS HELPDALHOLD

Then he realized that it must be "Feeniks help Dal Hold", "Dal Hold" meaning "Daltas Hold", or the Xang Xi station at Sedina L2. He quickly thought of an excuse to go there and left.

/me pins a shiny FB Medal of Mediocrity onto this thread, in solemn honor of its last two posts

whatsa happen Panis? Gave up on writing?

We can only hope so, Shadoen.