FTL: Wings of the Federation

by Appy

Chapter 4 - Flashback

Derpy, Carrot and Dinky were at the United Equestrian Spaceport, on a rather forgotten, out-of-the-way colony on the outskirts of Equestrian space. They had just gotten back from a routine patrol of the system several hours ago. Ever since the first conflict with the Rebels, both the Society of the Silver Moon and the Shining Liberators of the Sun had sent large increases in ships to defensive positions around Equestrian space. Their ship, the Lunar Wrath, was undergoing some minor repairs, having run into a couple of stray asteroids during their patrol.

Now, this was fairly unusual. Not impossible, but unusual. They wrote it off, just wanting to get back for off time. They had been doing the same patrol route for the past several months, and nothing ever happened. The routine had dulled their senses, and they more often than not, they were simply going through the motions. It was good pay, and the job was —at the time— blindingly simple.

They were on their way out of the station to explore the colony when a PA speaker buzzed to life, a mare's voice announcing, "Will the captain and crew of the vessel 'Lunar Wrath' please report to your ship, immediately."

"Huh," Derpy pondered, "I wonder what all that's about. We should probably go see." Carrot Top shrugged while Dinky nodded in response. Derpy sighed, and led the way back to their ship. Entering the hangar where the Wrath was docked greeted them with a sight that was out of the ordinary.

A grid of red lasers were scouring the hull of their ship centimeter-by-centimeter. Ponies armored and armed in standard Federation gear stood to the side, weapons at the ready. A tall and lanky purple Pegasus stallion turned to face the three of them as they approached. On his head he wore a hat which bore the symbol of the Society of the Silver Moon, along with four stars. Derpy, Carrot and Dinky saluted. Derpy spoke first, "General McHoover, sir! I never would have expected to see you out on the Fringes. What are you doing here?"

"Your job, apparently," he said gruffly.

"Sir?" she replied, confused.

"Come," he said simply as he walked to a corner of the hangar where several more ponies and one pony-like colony of nanobots, an Engi, were investigating what looked like a hunk of metal no larger than a basketball. Derpy gingerly stepped around a pool of blood in her path, saying nothing. The General got the Engi's attention, and lead it apart from the ponies working on the ball of scrap on the workbench. The General asked the Engi, "So what's the verdict on it?"

The Engi's blue glowing eyes flickered, the mechanical equivalent of a blink. The Engi said in its inflectionless voice, "It is as feared, General. Probability of Rebellion origin: 100%."

"What is of Rebellion origin?" Derpy asked.

"The stealth probe that had burrowed its way into your ship's hull. It spontaneously activated while repair crews were working on your ship; one crew member was shot before security took out the drone. Where were you patrolling?" the General asked.

Derpy looked taken aback by this. She said, "The asteroid field orbiting the gas giant at the edge of the system," she said. "We felt several vibrations in the ship but merely assumed them to be stray asteroids."

The General nodded, saying more to himself than them, "Yes, I suppose a large enough asteroid would be an excellent outpost in foreign territory, provided the settlement be given proper shielding. We can't just let this go, we need to act."

"Probability of Rebel suspicion upon detecting investigatory fleets reads at 97%," the Engi added.

"Thank you, captain obvious. I don't know where we'd be without your helpful input," the General replied sarcastically.

The Engi blinked, saying nothing. The General sighed, asking the Engi, "OK then, mister robot, what—"

"We are neither 'mister' nor 'robot.' We are a colony. This specific colony is referred to by the designation 'Notch'."

Through his now-grinding teeth, the General asked, "OK, Notch, what course of action would you suggest we take at this particular moment?"

"Wait until this vessel's next regularly scheduled patrol of the area, then investigate with the vessel in question. Rebel suspicion levels from this course of action are estimated at 17%, plus or minus 2.476."

The General pondered this before responding, "That does seem like the best choice. Captain," he turned to Derpy, "when is your next patrol?"

"Thirty six local hours, sir."

"Good enough. When you pass the asteroid field, I want you to perform a full scan of the area. Report anything on our encrypted channels, immediately."

"Yes, General," Derpy saluted again.

____________

They were approaching the asteroid field. Derpy could see it up ahead, endlessly drifting, caught in the pull of the large gas giant they encircled. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary, but looks could be deceiving, Derpy thought. She announced over the intercom to Dinky and Carrot, "We're approaching the field now. Stay alert. Carrot, start the scanning process."

"Yes, Captain." Carrot Top initiated the scan of the asteroid field, carefully watching the readouts. Several hours passed with no traces; this slow and tedious process would have been much faster if they had higher functioning sensors. High quality sensors such as those are not standard issue for most Federation ships, and though they could purchase them, it seemed entirely unnecessary. Then, a small ghost of a blip appeared on the radar. It could have been nothing more than a large rock, but asteroids didn't tend to give off electromagnetic signatures, as this one seemed to. Carrot Top paused the scan, saying to Derpy over the intercom, "Captain, I think I found something."

"Report."

"Got a small blip. Barely anything, really, but it's got some EM signatures to it. Could be a listening outpost."

"Log the location and scan the rest of the field. There could be more," Derpy replied.

"Understood," Carrot said as she resumed the scan.

Another couple of hours of uninterrupted scanning revealed no more traces. Carrot Top spoke up, with a sigh of relief, "Finally finished. Only that one reading I mentioned before, Captain. Nothing else came up."

"Good," Derpy replied. "Send the location back to the colony. Remember to use the encrypted channel the General mentioned."

Carrot did just that. "Message sent, Captain," she said.

Over the intercom, Dinky yawned loudly before saying, "Now that we're done staring at rocks, can we go? I'm getting really really bored. This took about five times longer than our usual route."

"Hush up, Dinky," Derpy said, good-humoredly, "we're leaving. Then we can all take a nice break and let the Society deal with this little problem. Carrot, queue up the FTL jump back to the colony. Let's get out of here."

"Ready for jump, Cap."

____________

The streaks of light slowed and eventually stopped. What the three of them saw as they exited FTL speed sent chills down their spines. Numerous ships marked with the Rebel emblem were orbiting the planet. Several of the larger cruisers were firing ship-to-ground projectiles on some of the larger settlements, while smaller Rebel ships battled it out with the scant few vessels on orbital defense.

Looking out the view port of her station in the weapons system, Dinky noted professionally, "We're so boned." She called her mother over the intercom, "Uh, Mom? I think maybe we should leave. Like, now."

"No. We need to help with the evacuation," Derpy replied.

"Evacuation, my flank! That place is lost. Look at it," Dinky pointed out.

"It looks like the colony we usually dock at hasn't been hit yet. We can still get some civilians." Derpy flicked a few switches, while checking several instrument panels. Looking out the window, she made sure their path to the planet was open. Dinky spoke up, "Look at all the Rebels around the place. We'll get torn to shreds before we make it halfway to the mesosphere!"

Derpy ignored Dinky, mumbling, "Need to time this just right..."

"Time what right? Mom?" The ship was filled with a familiar whirring noise. Carrot Top asked, "Captain, are you doing what I think you're doing?"

"Yep."

"You realize this is against at least seventeen regulations, Captain?"

"Yep."

"Have any doubts about this?" Carrot asked.

"Of course," Derpy affirmed. "And you?"

"Obviously," Carrot responded. It finally dawned on Dinky what her mother was about to do. She asked, "Please tell me you're not. We'll shoot straight into the planet!"

"Brace yourself, Dinky. Faster Than Light jump in three... two... one." Derpy triggered the FTL before immediately shutting it off. Not only were FTL jumps without a guidance beacon dangerous, but the distance they were jumping was far too short to make it even remotely safe to consider.

A loud explosion reverberated throughout the ship as the Lunar Wrath shot through the atmosphere of the planet like a bullet through sheet metal. Their shields were instantly overloaded, and one of their laser weapons tore off the ship. Derpy pulled up hard, trying to level the ship with the ground that was suddenly not ten meters from the view ports of the ship.

Derpy reacted on pure instinct as they rapidly approached the settlement, sharply turning left, right, and left again to avoid oncoming buildings. They flew through the streets at a blazing speed, hovering about three meters above the carriages and cowering ponies below. Derpy weaved her way through the streets, until she reached a long, straight path between the buildings. Derpy directed the ship down this path as she pulled it up above street level. She circled overhead several times, losing momentum. When the ship had finally slowed enough, Derpy pulled around the settlement and hastily docked in an empty bay, of which there were a lot.

The levitation beams, registering a ship now docked, locked the Wrath into place. A bridge automatically extended and connected to the Wrath's airlock. Already, there were pleas to be let in and a hammering of hooves on the door. Derpy hastily called Carrot and Dinky over the intercom, saying, "Meet in the lockers. We're going to need the riot gear."

____________

Geared up in bullet proof, laser resistant, well padded armor, and armed with pepper spray and riot shields, Derpy, Carrot and Dinky stood by the airlock door as the pleas and hammering continued. Dinky shook her head, asking no one in particular, "So, now what?"

Carrot shrugged. "Hey, wasn't my idea."

Derpy walked between Carrot and Dinky, and approached the door. She knocked loudly on it three times before shouting, "Everypony shut the hay up, or nopony gets in. That is an order!" The cries on the other side eventually ceased to a murmuring, while the banging stopped. Derpy nodded, surprised that it actually worked. She continued, "Before I let anyone in, has anypony seen General McHoover? Tall purple Pegasus, Society of the Silver Moon hat with four stars on it? This is official Federation business."

A stallion's voice spoke up, "I—I was one of the ones examining the Rebel probe your ship had lodged in it, in the hangar. The last I saw, the General was attempting to contact Equis for reinforcements. I don't think it went well."

"I didn't see any other ships docked in any of the bays. What happened?" Derpy asked.

"A lot of ponies just up and ran at the first sign of the Rebellion, either with their ship or somepony else's. The General's ship was stolen," the stallion replied.

"Go find the General, now. Nopony gets in until I hear him."

A fading clatter of hooves marked the exit of the stallion Derpy was talking to. Several minutes had gone by with nothing but nervous murmuring on the other side of the airlock. Finally, numerous rushing pairs of hooves approached. Derpy, Carrot and Dinky heard the General making his way to the airlock, shouting, "Get out of the way, you blasted sheep! This is a vital military matter." Three quick knocks sounded on the other side of the airlock. They heard the General ask, "Captain, are you in there?"

"Yes, General," Derpy replied.

"How in Tartarus did you pass that Rebel blockade over the planet?" the General asked.

"FTL jumped, sir," Derpy answered.

"FTL jumped a distance that short past a fleet of Rebels invading a backwater planet like this? That takes balls, Captain. Or maybe stupidity. Whichever it was, you did a damn good job so far, let's see if it keeps up." The General turned around, addressing the ponies on his side of the airlock. "I want all of you idiots to back at least ten meters away. This airlock is going to open, and only me, my six soldiers, and these two others with me are going inside. Anyone who tries to rush gets shot." A frightened mutter emanated from the crowd, before a number of slow moving hooves backed away. The General said, "Good," the General said. "Captain, you may open the airlock."

"Yes, General." Derpy keyed a few buttons of a panel on the right wall, and the airlock hissed open. A seething crowd of at least forty ponies were crammed in the narrow corridor that lead to and from the spaceport. Several looked as though they were considering running, but thought better of it. The General, six armed and armored soldiers, the stallion Derpy talked to before and the Engi they talked to the previous day entered the airlock.

"Close it, Captain," The General ordered. Derpy did just that.

"Captain," the General spoke, turning to Derpy, "Yours is the last ship in this city, and we have a job to do. I hacked into the Rebel's communications, and found the ship of theirs that is leading this assault. We are going to board it, and find whatever information we can regarding the Rebellion and its plans. Harassment and assaults on supply ships are one thing, but a full-scale invasion force like this is entirely different. We need to find out what they're up to. Think you and your crew are up for the challenge?"

"We'll do whatever you need from us, General," Derpy said. Dinky nodded. Carrot stood with a stoic face that would make major league poker players jealous. This seemed to satisfy the General. He asked, "How do you plan on getting out of here, Captain? The same way you came in?"

"Yes, sir."

"I'll trust you not to ram into any of the Rebel ships in our way, though at the very least that would take one of them out with us," the General noted.

"I don't plan on dying anytime soon, General," Derpy responded. The General laughed, saying, "I like your style, Captain. Take us up."

"Yes, sir!" Derpy saluted. Dinky and Carrot followed suit.

____________

One FTL jump past a deadly blockade of enemy ships later, and all of them were in their positions. The six soldiers were waiting outside the airlock for deployment, Derpy and the General were on the bridge, with Derpy piloting the still undetected Lunar Wrath towards the largest vessel in the Rebel fleet. This, the General had said, was the ship that was in command of the invasion. Carrot was in charge of the shields, and Dinky the weapons, while the Engi was drawn to the engine room like a moth to fire. Finally, the stallion from before, whose name was Hitscan, reported readouts from the sensors.

Those who were not already outfitted for combat, that being the General and Hitscan, supplied themselves from the Wrath's armory. The Engi elected to follow unarmed, despite the General's protests. Hitscan looked as though he were about to soil himself, but did his best to keep his cool.

As the General and Hitscan, now outfitted, returned to the bridge, Derpy asked the General, "Where should board, sir?"

"The airlock," the General replied, as he fussed with a fetlock-mounted computer on his foreleg.

"But, sir," Derpy asked, "wouldn't it be sealed?"

The General tapped the computer on his leg once more with finality, before saying, "Not anymore. Pull us beside them and connect the airlocks."

Derpy gently guided the Wrath alongside the Rebel ship, surprised that they had yet to be discovered. She maneuvered the Wrath and connected her airlock to the Rebel ship's, creating an airtight passage between the two vessels.

"Grab your gear and call your crew, tell them to do the same. We're boarding that ship," The General said.

"Uh, no offense, General," Derpy protested. "I am a pilot, not a combatant. I'm more in tuned for avoiding Partymis missiles with the Wrath than dodging blaster fire."

"Like it or not, Captain, you and your crew are coming with us. We're short-staffed enough as it is. I assume you've all passed basic training?" The General asked.

"Of course, General. We all have. But—"

"Then you have more than enough combat experience. You will be borrowing the sidearms of my men, for I noticed that your ship is quite poorly equipped, with no actual weapons to speak of," The General commented.

"Sir, if—"

"Never mind for now, it is too late to remedy that. Call your crew and tell them to meet at the airlock." With that, the General entered the airlock, not looking back at Derpy.

Derpy stared at the door the General exited through. She was not happy with his forcing her inexperienced crew into a full-frontal assault like this. To be honest, she was more than a little scared, and not just for her own well being. The General was not only forcing her into this deadly situation, but her daughter as well, not to mention her fillyhood friend.

Derpy sighed, and pushed these fears as far back in her mind as possible. She was not about to refuse a direct order, especially considering what was at stake. Derpy triggered the intercom to transmit to the weapons and shield control rooms,"Dinky, Carrot, meet in the airlock. Dinky, grab a few riot shields on your way. We've just been volunteered to join the boarding party."

Author's Note:

At long last, the elusive Chapter 4 is finally completed! Sorry it took so long. Hope you enjoy it! But at least I can count to three, unlike some video game company heads I can think of...

Don't think the next chapter will take even half as long as this one did. It's already typed up and sent to the ever-wonderful TimeBaby for his magical editorial eyes to pry apart my silly mistakes. Expect it sometime soon.

And as a side note, I commissioned a cover from a close friend of mine! He showed me the progress, and I like it so far. Can't wait to show you guys, too. And thanks for telling me why you don't like the story, guy-who-thumbed-down.

Comments

[SkyStream]

time for a review!!

I love sci-fi stories and as such, I kind of am strict when it comes to those stories.... I also know FTL... and as such, elements from FTL itself won't be over-analyzed.....

So first: good use of the FTL universe for the story, although I definitely am unsure about you using pre-existing ponies for the crew and other characters (oh well, at least they're the background ponies). Second, since FTL is a roguelike and you usually get events that kill off your crew and stuff.... I'm expecting NO plot armor (aka the ability of one character to ALWAYS stay alive/wins even when everything is against him/her) which would basically be, a possibility of Derpy, Dinky or Carrot to actually be killed OR critically injured making her unavailable for the remainder of the story (and this is a reason OCs are usually a better choice even though they are harder to create since you got to create them from scratch)

Third, I dislike how Out of Character Derpy is. We know her as a klutz (which has been confirmed with "The last roundup"), so I have difficulties believing she was actually able to perform an orbital entry jump.... which leads to my fourth and fifth points. FTL's Jump Drives more than likely do NOT work how you seem to explain them as well as the drives having LONG recharge times. And fifth, a FTL starship CANNOT drop to atmospheric flight.

Now my reasonings for these.... FTL's jump technology is centered around 2 main pieces: the shipboard FTL engines and the space-based jump beacons. Now, it is safe to assume that in their early exploration age, they used their jump drives without the beacons BUT since beacons seem to be "rally points" that constantly transmit their navigation data in real-time, it would mean that jump drives are extremely hard if not impossible to properly aim and as such jumps would have been to random spots in space. SO, a jump to a planet less than one light-second away would be impossible considering factors like drift and the higher speeds.

And my reasoning for atmospheric flight, the ship would explode upon entering the atmosphere, why? because, FTL's ships are NOT heat-proof and decelerating from light-speed to real-time speed in a high-friction environment would result in the hull plating vaporizing (especially with a large ship) and EVEN if ships wouldn't melt after such a deceleration..... those ships aren't space fighters, they are bulky, slow and generally take a couple minutes to complete their helm order, basically this means that the ship would have crashed way before it reached its "3 meters above everypony's else heads" and stuff. Finally, the last thing that would have destroyed the ship? Its size, a 400+ meters ships is kind of hard to "swerve between buildings" when two skyscrapers can be as much as.... 15ish meters away.

Sorry for long post but basically....
the FTL feel? you got it pretty much covered.
Story: still not sure how it's going to go (besides knowing how FTL goes),
other sci-fi elements: just stop.... a starship is NOT a jet fighter
Score: still unsure how to go with this one

[Appy]

2166831

Thanks for the feedback! Always appreciated. Now, to respond to your points,

You're assuming I'm writing this in a by-the-book manner strictly following FTL lore, which I am not. I'm using FTL as a skeleton, if even that, for me to piece together the actual flesh and blood of the story.

While, yes, FTL is a rougelike, what I do with the characters in my story shouldn't be determined by that factor. That said, I do have plans which I don't want to get into for spoiling late-story elements. Regarding the characters themselves, this has an "Alternate Universe" tag for that reason. I build the characters in my story off the canon/fanon personalities they have been given already, tweaked to my liking for this universe. I use preexisting characters, like Derpy and crew, and creatures to connect with the fanbase more.

Regarding Derpy's klutziness, or lack thereof, I feel that's my decision as an author, entitled to artistic interpretation. The Doctor Whooves radio plays depict Derpy as intelligent and well-rounded. I have yet to give Derpy many chances of being a klutz without completely ruining the mood or scene I've played out, in any case.

Now, on to the jump drives. The working theory I have, and based the story on, is that they only use the beacons to direct ships. The beacons are a safety precaution, to prevent ships entering and exiting FTL speeds from crashing into each other, and to alert any ships of any obstacles in their paths when exiting FTL. And those "long" recharge times? A minute, two at most. The amount of dialogue and events I describe, I feel, would exceed that small time frame, meaning the drive would have had time to charge by then.

The Lunar Wrath is not a large behemoth of a ship. It is small, agile, and easily maneuverable. I picture it maybe just a bit narrower than the distance between two sides of a street. And, that's not mentioning the fact that the "city" they jumped to was small and sparse, not a major settlement, and it did not have buildings packed as tightly together as, say, New York city. As for Derpy's ability to "eyeball" the jump location from orbit and still make it into the city she wanted? Call it luck.

We can also assume ships don't go from zero to FTL in less than a second. I'd imagine there would be a sort of "warm up" period where the ship, while going incredibly fast upon triggering the FTL jump, is not literally in FTL speeds yet. This gives Derpy room to make the jump.

Ships in Mass Effect had atmospheric capabilities, and while that was explained with "Mass effect fields" I can easily do the same, considering the universe, with "magic," or maybe even some sort of magitech. The ship doesn't necessarily have to be enchanted for that to work, it could be a device that uses magic. I haven't gone too far into detail of how advanced they are at this stage, other than to say that they have access to space travel and FTL speeds.

FTL, as I recall, had an event in which your crew pulled the ship down into a planet to investigate a monument of some sort. A nebula encounter. While they didn't puncture the atmosphere by going FTL speeds like Derpy did, that still indicates that they do have the necessary plating and technology to make atmospheric entry and exit with minimal effort. Disregarding the fact that I never said that the Lunar Wrath lacked those, anyway.

Nowhere did I indicate the the Lunar Wrath was "400+" meters wide. I specifically described how it was, in fact, a small ship. More of a civilian transport ship outfitted with military weaponry and shielding than a full-blown military cruiser.

Hope this helps quell any doubts you may have.

[SkyStream]

2167002

ok, I can understand most of your counter-arguments.....
however, my argument about the whole deceleration into orbit still holds. After all, even if Derpy WAS able to eyeball the distance, turning on and off a FTL drive got a lag, even with the best technology, were looking at 0.01-0.1 seconds of lag between the orders during which the drive "spins up" and "spins down", assuming a charge-up delay of Star Trek level where the ship accelerates to light-speed in about 2ish seconds.... it means that the acceleration is of 150,000 km/s, now, a ship needs the same time to decelerate as to accelerate so with an acceleration of 0.1 seconds, you'd travel about 30 thousand kilometers before you drop out of FTL. And sure, as such a ship 30008 km away from a target would probably manage to drop in. but only barely. And you DEFINITELY need to compensate for the potential data lags as well as light lag (although with this last one, it doesn't matter on distances less than 300 thousand kilometers).

And another argument I can try challenging a bit..... in space, no matter how aerodynamic your ship is..... unless it's a space-fighter with a lot of RCS thrusters + its main engines. It's not manoeuverable enough to Barrel Roll, you might be able to dodge the brunt of the shot.... but it will still be a hit just not direct. There's a reason Civilian Cargo ships in sci-fi media are so easy to destroy, they (usually) got no shields and their mass is too big/poorly organized for RCS thrusters to have an effect. And if the Wrath's design IS based off a cargo ship design (which seems to be the case since the Federation was all about PEACE), it should have similar limitations.

oh.... and one more thing about Jump drives.... they DO have large charge times in the realm of hours. FTL just happens to be a SIMULATION where times are accelerated greatly. And when you defeated an enemy in there, the drives would finish charging as no enemy would pop up afterwards leaving your crew with a few hours of peace to charge up the engines.

[Appy]

2167131

I counter your counters with the following:

You're assuming the ship was right above the planet, in orbit. You're not accounting the distance from the jump beacon they entered from to the planet.

You do bring up a valid point here, which led me to develop the idea that the Lunar Wrath was not a bulky cargo ship, but a civilian ship designed for acrobatic space performances. Think the Wonderbolts of spaceships. This would provide it with all the necessary extra thrusters, engine power, and perhaps even improve their FTL recharge time, if the performers ever used it in the same manner Derpy did, but for "death-defying" stunts rather than a short-term jump to a planet.

While civilian cargo ships don't usually have any shielding or weapons of any sort, I did state that the Wrath was retrofit for militant purposes. I'd assume cargo ships such as we're discussing are only traveling between well known locations that are under a constant guard of some sort, and thus, providing ships with presumably expensive shielding would be cost-prohibitive when they would likely not need it. As I said, the Wrath was retrofit for combat, and provided necessary systems like shielding and weapons.

As for FTL, I imagine that all combat does take place in realtime. Assuming you can avoid destruction long enough, your FTL drive does charge up in the time frame I previously described. Even so, it could still boil down to artistic interpretation, if that doesn't satisfy you. It may seem a cheap, unthoughtful, cop-out explanation, but that doesn't make it any less valid.

[SkyStream]

2167197

ok I can "dig" with the concept of the Wrath having been built with way more RCS thrusters which were placed to allow much better control.... oh and I didn't say the Wrath shouldn't be armed or shielded, just that it was BASED on the frame of a civilian ship.

And yes, I did take into account the jump beacon.... I also took into accountsensor efficiency. The normal distance between a beacon and a "point of interest should be about 200-400 thousand kilometers to take into account jump drift. Unless you can have sensor tech that can see 200 000 km away, they wouldn't know that the colony is being attacked and as such wouldn't make a dangerous jump. And if 200 000 km is your "combat range" then I fear for the weapons actually missing 10 times out of 10......

[Appy]

2169231

Heck, if you're still interested in writing an FTL crossover, we might be able to work out something that could cross over my current story and the one you'd write, while making both fit in the same universe. Send me a PM if you wanna talk further about it. In any case, thanks for the interest!

[ManWithThePan]

Authors Note:
At long last, the elusive Chapter 4 is finally completed! Sorry it took so long. Hope you enjoy it! But at least I can count to three, unlike some video game company heads I can think of...
Don't think the next chapter will take even half as long as this one did. It's already typed up and sent to the ever-wonderful TimeBaby for his magical editorial eyes to pry apart my silly mistakes. Expect it sometime soon.
And as a side note, I commissioned a cover from a close friend of mine! He showed me the progress, and I like it so far. Can't wait to show you guys, too. And thanks for telling me why you don't like the story, guy-who-thumbed-down.

First line of Authors Note:
reactionface.info/sites/default/files/images/1310516148484.jpg
Final Line: I agree with that statement. I hate it when people don't explain why they dislike it.