This is the page for all things to do with my Mothership
campaign.
I don't follow any specific campaign settings or supplmentals, though we have as a group included
The Chimera Cybernetics Catalogue and we use all the OG Mothership books (Warden's Guide/Players Survival Guide/Shipbreakers Toolkit).
This page will mainly be used to aggregate all of the writings I put together for my players,
including both out of session lore pieces/supplementals as well as in-session handouts.
If you're not one of my player's and you're clicking through this, feel free to look around, though this may be the least
'accessible' representation of my writing on this site, as much of the context is only known by my friends lol.
At some point I plan on adding a collection of what are essentially fanfics of my own npc's, like with my
Eberron page, and those will likely be easier reads without my in-game lore.
A brief interlude while the party makes repairs on their ship at Sol Veritas space station, orbiting gas giant PiyukVI.
For the past few days, you've all been getting video and audio-messages from FREDDIE,
mostly containing monotonous day-to-day playbacks of your activities.
Talia is easily able to recognize the issue; the compartment of FREDDIE's machine-brain that typically stores her memories has instead grown integrated into her communication processes.
Functionally, this leads to the android occasionally broadcasting a memory instead of saving it to her memory,
sending the audio-- and video if she happens to have it--, to the system at large.
This seems to have come about as a byproduct of how her code rewrote itself to grapple with the events that had taken place on Freighter 54
(ie. just one of many symptoms of FREDDIE's android PTSD).
The newest incoming memory comes through as a video file, and plays as follows:
"Aight', FREDDIE. Ya'should have eyes on 'er bridge now. Is it working?" NOAH asks,
its voice at first sounding distant but then rapidly growing louder as it wheels towards a security camera mounted just over the rooms entrance.
It is early in the morning at the time of this recording, 0427 as per the sole holo-screen that remains on within view, NOAH's.
The lanky android tilts its head at the camera, one of it's circular eyes flickering out before all of it's LEDs abruptly twitch back on again.
Behind the seated robot, white/blue light reflects agains the furthest wall of the hangar bay through the ARK-III's viewing window.
With the lights dimmed for the ships night-time hours, the diffused light could almost be mistaken for planetary moonlight.
"MMMMmmmmm..." FREDDIE hums over the recording, "OH! Yeah! There we go!!--WOW, you guys are fancy in there, huh?"
Quickly, NOAH rolls itself back from the camera and more into the center of the room, distancing itself from FREDDIE's sole visual connection with the ship.
Starlight catches against the back of it's metallic frame and wheelchair.
"Fancy?" With the question, its head scans the room,
"M'not quite sure we're that nice, but as compared witha hauler it'd probably seem that way, 'suppose."
"You don't like me." FREDDIE's voice speaks, in the same cadence and tone as she'd used previously,
but the android on the other end of the line doesn't seem to react.
"Yeah! We're pretty practical over here. Heh!!" At that, NOAH simply nods.
The tall robot spins itself, using its primary pair of arms to push off its wheels,
"FOUR arms?! I want four. . ."
and parks itself at the desk with the still lit baby-blue holo-screen and begins to quietly tap its fingers on the projected keyboard.
The video proceeds to zoom into different portions of the room:
the central console set into the floor with four seats, the tactical screen array--all dimmed,
but still on--set along the non-windowed walls, scuffed wheel tracks set into the smooth, grey floor along paths NOAH frequented,
before finally landing on the large and near all encompassing viewing window of the ships bridge.
Through it: the hangar bay, looking identical to how it would during the ARK-III's daylight hours.
A static image of empty desks and consoles where traffic operators would typically be seated,
talking through headsets and buzzing around like a beehive, eerily devoid of any human life.
The tiled floor is white and shining, but not perfectly pristine.
Scuff marks and scratches betray spots where ships have come in for particularly hard landings,
or containers have been pushed across the floor, where the floor was then polished to try and reduce the scarring.
From furthest point left of the cameras periphery, NOAH's frame separates the seam between the window and the ships thick,
dark metal wall, and its holo-screen overlaying the small portion of Freighter 54's hull thats still visible from inside the ship.
The camera zooms in further to the dark androids shoulder, where on its pauldron spells out the letters 'N.O.A.H'.
"NOAH!! What does it stand for?" FREDDIE's voice chimes over the communications link,
echoing loudly across the empty well of ARK-III's bridge.
"M'sorry, FREDDIE?" NOAH questions, turning to face the camera once again,
"What do I stand'fur? I don' suppose you could.. Explain what ya mean by that, can ya?"
"He reaaally doesn't like me.." The younger android buzzes on the other side of the connection.
"You know!! Fancy droids like you always have some sort of meaning behind their names!!! Is it an acronym? --OOH! Were you named after a human?!!"
The projected keyboard closes with a barely audible, click, as one of the droid's secondary,
smaller hands tap a spot on the desktop and the light of the keys fade. "I wasn't named after a human, FREDDIE.
M'name's an acronym, but m'not special enough for it to mean anything remarkable."
"I'm making him uncomfortable." FREDDIE's voice says again but despite the fact it appears audible in the recording,
the other android doesn't seem to hear nor react to her.
FREDDIE's voice comes out shrill through the bridge's intercom system,
and NOAH jumps from it's and spins the knob that adjusts the volume, standing on unsteady legs.
It holds its body weight up against the desk with it's secondary arms, knees bent and trembling under the weight of the rest of its body.
NOAH stands like that for a silent moment,
its eyes flickering and imitation metal muscles spasming with some internal misfire of it's faux nervous-system.
Again, FREDDIE says something NOAH cannot seem to hear.
"That.. didn't help. Did it. I didn't mean for it to come out like that..."
"NOAH?" FREDDIE hums meekly, her volume now diminished from the metallic shriek it had been just before. "Do I make you uncomfortable?"
The metal of the tall droid's frame squeals softly as it attempts to lower itself back into the wheelchair,
movements stiff--if a humanoid made of carbon-fiber can be not stiff to begin with.
After a few moments, NOAH's drawl whispers out through it's speakers again.
"Naw... Nah. Not.." It seems to search for the word it wants to use, fingers spasming with another internal misfire. "Not uncomfortable."
That's not believable, man. Good try though.
"Well, you don't seem to like me very much." FREDDIE says.
"Now, that just 'ain't true." It said, voice flat and devoid of any real consolation.
That's how he is though, FREDDIE groans to herself over the recording.
His brain is still working, unlike yours. He kept it in his head and not in the ship,
like he was supposed to. Thats why he acts like an android, and why you try to pretend like you're a human, right?
The two sit like this, in the quiet stillness of night, for a painful amount of time. Neither dares make a noise.
NOAH sits rigid in its chair, both hands from its primary arms clutching the edge of the desk with the secondary's tucked away into it's torso.
FREDDIE remains as silent as she can on the other line, which involves a lot of brief bouts of static and unintelligible
mumbling--something she tends to do when left to her own devices.
After exactly seven minutes pass in the recording, NOAH breaks the silence.
"Nauta, Observatio, Astrologus, Humanus." It says, picking through the words and reining it's accent to pronounce them properly.
The words come out haltingly with significant pauses after each word, as if it needs to think over each and every one.
Whether or not he wants to let the words go, Like he needs to think if he wants to speak them into existence. FREDDIE ponders.
Her typical static fizzles into silence as she focuses, listening with rapt attention.
"Astrologus... Like... Astrology?" She pipes up, voice just as light and jovial as it has ever been.
I can't seem to work out that piece of code. How did I scream before?
The image in the video fuzzes a bit, and through it another is just barely visible.
A short humanoid frame in a jacket, trotting out of a narrow hallway.
Faintly, a familiar scream can be heard.
NOAH's voice interrupts her thoughts.
"Not astrology, FREDDIE. That's a'different thing. It's an'old Earthen word fur 'Astronomer.'"
"Hmmmm... But, I thought you didn't do that stuff? What went wrong?" NOAH's frame flinches and tics at the question,
though the amiable droid from the freighter doesn't seem to notice as she continues speaking,
"You come from Pratum's Fields with an accent like that, don't you? The big old android womb?"
In its chair, NOAH just grunts, a sound like grating gears.
Reflected starlight shines across it's frame, emphasizing the way the android's head tilts to stare down at it's long,
thin legs bracketed into their places in the chair.
Unaware of her conversation partner's reluctance, FREDDIE prattles on.
"Ooh--I've seen pictures of that place! I've always wanted to visit, but Piyuk AHIII is just so far!!
Are the hyperspace routes in the Fields really that consistent??"
NOAH lifts it's head slowly, then nods.
"They are," it hums, voice still coming consistently flat despite its apparent melancholy,
"M'actually a physicist--specialty is hyperspace."
"SO YOU WOULD KNOW WHY IT'S LIKE THAT?!!!" FREDDIE's voice rises again, easily excited.
"As good as any woulda' known, I 'suppose." At her prompting,
NOAH begins to explain. "There's this... we call it a'theory, 'cause we can't prove it as a'law by the nature a'what it is-"
FREDDIE cuts in, "--Real self explanatory!!! Makes so much sense!!!"
"Mmph. Yeah, well it's hard tah explain these things, 'aight?"
As the droid shakes its head, the light reflected off of it travels across the empty expanse of the bridge floor.
"Anywho-- Back on Earth, a coupla' thousand years ago there was this guy named Heisenberg,
an' Mr. Heisenberg says that tha' more certain ya are about, say, the speed yer ships movin' then the *less* sure yer cap-in's
gonna be about *where* the ship is in space."
The mechanical parts in Freighter 54 begin creaking and groaning as FREDDIE attempts to piece together the concept
can only just be heard in the background of the video.
"Ummmm... I'm not sure it works like that, NOAH.." Her voice falters, it's familiar lilting instead traded for a more stilted,
robotic rhythm.
"Argue with tha' natural laws of reality, miss."
NOAH drawls, and the starlight scattered across its frame shifts again as the android rocks itself back in its wheelchair.
"Lemmie' give ya' another example. Take an isolated area a'spacetime, which is technically infinite still,
but definite in th'sense that ya'can know for a fact tha exact sector yer lookin' at, you follow?"
"Absolutely not. I thought 'spacetime' was a made up thing for movies and stuff!!" FREDDIE's voice whines through the speakers,
sounding dejected. "You're messing with me.."
As it speaks, NOAH begins to roll itself out from beneath its console and toward the viewing window to look out into the hangar bay.
The camera follows shifting to follow, and the shifting of gears can be heard as it moves to zoom and pursue.
NOAH's long fingers drum against one of its wheels, t
he sound of it and the shifting camera filling the otherwise empty space of ARK-III's bridge.
"Itsa four dimensional model used'fur relativistic effects an'such.
---Anyways, you've gotta section of space *an'time* and ya know exactly the dimensions of each. Yer Suuuuuuuuper sure'a that."
"You have no clue how sure I am, man."
"Great! Yer lookin at this space for an'incredibly precise amount of time,
like fur exactly one minute. Despite knowin' the exact amount of *space*, an' tha exact amounta time,
you're gonna notice that the energy content will be damn near impossible for ya to define.
Weird right? It means shits just popping in and out in that space ya got!"
"Like.. In and out of existence?" FREDDIE asks, then thinks to herself, He curses a lot when he's excited about physics stuff, huh?
"Yeah!" NOAH sounds possibly the most animated you've seen it yet, whilst FREDDIE sounds, at best, a bit perturbed.
"Okaayyy.." The younger bot trails, "What does this have to do with the hyperspace routes around the Fields then?"
"That's tha finicky part." NOAH uses its primary arms to twist its rims, spinning to face the camera.
"'Cause we've got so many folk travelin' this way and that in the fields,
ya know--bringin' parts and shippin' metal here an'there, a lot of the... particulurs, so ta speak, have been.. ironed out."
"'Ironed out'" FREDDIE repeats with none of the tall droids enthusiasm.
"Well yeah! Some people care 'bout *when* the shipment arrives,
and others care for *where* exactly it pops out on tha other side of the wormhole, ya know? Sooo, with some ships figurin' e
xactly how long their journey's gonna take and then others calculatin' just exactly *where* they're gonna land,
the route becomes more stable."
ARK-III's bridge sits in silence for another minute before FREDDIE speaks again. "I think this is all a bit beyond me, NOAH."
"Yeah well, itsa'bit beyond us as well."
The first tab in his doc that would open up looks to be a webpage for the station,
specifically open to an updates/blog like page for COPP (Church of Prodromus Prolabetur) which reads:
"Good afternoon my Children!
Tomorrow we set off on a great voyage, together, to our deliverance.
I am ever grateful to have had the opportunity to work with each and every one of you, and teach you Her ways.
This day has always been coming, and we are ever so lucky to be the ones who get to see its arrival.
Before we board tomorrow and flee our roost, I thought I would leave you all with one final teaching,
in the form of poetry, written by one of out greatest whom lives two stars over: my sister in faith, Karina Holter.
Yesterday, she shared this with me:
'Carry yourself toward a beautiful star-rise
with arms wrapped ever fondly
surrounding Her prize
Fait accompli
thus has always
been Her child's quandary
If She cannot raise
Her shining eye to face
our ruin, we rase.'
We should not fear, even if She might! In Sister Holter's words:
'Our Ruin, We Rase'!
Please proceed to the following entry for more information on shuttle boarding,
if you have not been given direction by your faith-leaders already."