Date: September 1, 2012
Game date: January 10, EY218
Location: Aiscapo system, Daebak
Previous events: not defacing public art at Aiscapo University, finding out more about Hoax
If the Steel Hummingbird is going to be in dock for another ten days there might be time to get some improvements in her before making the trip to Providence. After some discussion it's decided that given the more dangerous situations the ship has been finding itself in lately it's probably best to bulk up a bit on both offence and defence. Some extra protection for the crew, an upgraded cannon, and better sights for the new cannon would fit the bill nicely.
Xao suggests a place in Wonju, Geom Ship Supplies, that caters to shipowners whose craft encounter violence and which has good prices. He also offers Wang Ships' people and space to carry out the installation. With two Grob on board the crew decides that it's better to have Volkova do the work -- it's at a small enough scale that one person could do it -- though the offer of a hangar and tools is gratefully accepted. Jillian calls up to the ship and gets Volkova on the next shuttle down to decide on what parts to buy. Neet has sobered up enough to guard the Grob on his own and they can always hide in the hidden cargo hold if need be.
Bishop is the obvious choice to carry out the negotiations at the store, though he'll need Volkova to tell him what to negotiate for. As a reward Jillian buys the perpetually destitute iLangan a new fedora with a feather in a fashionable men's clothing store (Haber and Dasher) in the Hyndae shopping district while waiting for Volkova to get down to the surface. Malcolm takes his motorcycle to the airport to pick her up; they'll meet up with Bishop and Jillian at the ship store.
Geom Ship Supplies is in the Byolug district, a less upscale and fashionable shopping district than Hyndae but much better for those who choose to negotiate and don't need the shiniest of goods. It's not exactly grubby and dangerous but compared to the rest of the city it certainly feels so. Jillian buys herself a pair of dark, oversized sunglasses at a stall on the street for herself to protect her anonymity to whatever extent possible. Malcolm and Volkova roar up on his motorcycle soon after her purchase and it's down to business.
Bishop and Volkova wander the aisles and browse the catalogues of Geom Ship Supplies. Mindful of time constraints, Volkova picks parts that she can fit into the Steel Hummingbird with a minimum amount of effort and instructs Bishop on where to give and where to hold firm regarding technical parameters. He does his usual masterful job of wheeling and dealing and soon everyone's out on the street with the sort of internal glow that comes with saving almost a third off the regular price of a major purchase.
With relatively little non-shuttle traffic between Osan Station and the surface of the planet Geom Ship Supplies keeps much of its inventory up on Eondeog and the equipment can be delivered to Wang Ships later that day. So it's back onto a shuttle and up to the moon for everyone.
When Volkova rises the next morning she's prepared for a week and a half of hard work to get everything properly installed on the ship. Things would be faster with someone like Olivia to help but she's on shore leave with her beau so why bother her? Jillian wants to help and along the way improve her skill at working on her ship. Who knows how long Volkova will be around for, after all?
As it turns out the work is done in a day: Volkova's blazingly fast and has memorized details about the ship to the point that her choices made in the store fit in with hardly any need for adjustment. Harnesses and padded consoles and a cannon with a higher rate of fire and better targeting system are soon installed.
Over the next week and a half the Steel Hummingbird crew have Neet and Xao over for dinner on several occasions and continue to get to know them a bit better. It turns out Neet passes his time on the station by working as an EVA trainer for "Darkwalkers", an outfit that gives spacewalking certifications, mostly to tourists.
Jillian is also curious about why the Resplendent Dragon considers Shiva to be its home port. It turns out that it's the planet that the crew met on, where the ship is registered, and by chance the entire crew is involved with people on the planet. Bishop is very interested in Xao's girlfriend and asks how hot she is; Xao acidly comments that Bishop would "approve". They've been together for a couple of years and Jillian uses that knowledge to ask how serious this long-distance relationship is... Xao arches an eyebrow and shrugs in a frustratingly vague way.
Later that night Jillian drinks with Volkova and goes on at some length about how she's not interested in Xao at all.
As promised, Hyun Jung Gang calls them a few days after their visit to the Bureau of Xenobiology offices and a reservation is made at a slightly upscale restaurant in Wonju called Kim Jong Deux. Hyun reluctantly agrees to leave her husband at home. Xao can't make it due to a family event -- he seems quite close with his family -- so it's just the Hummingbird gang who take a shuttle down to the city. Malcolm, of course, takes his motorcycle in the shuttle again. Everyone dresses up a bit for the occasion. This comes effortlessly to Bishop but Volkova pulls out all the stops by scrubbing herself clean, putting on a nice outfit and donning a wig that she's somehow managed to get her hands on! The Grob are left to their own devices; if no one's stolen them from the ship yet it's unlikely to happen now and they can, of course, always hide.
The table at Kim Jong Deux is out of the way and no one is especially worried about unwelcome ears. Hyun is told a previously agreed-upon amount of detail regarding the Grob, or would be if Malcolm didn't drink so much before the food showed up and keep dropping blatant hints about knowing more than they're letting on. Bishop manages to get over his dislike of interacting with women that don't meet his standards of hotness and charmingly covers for Malcolm while having the sneaking suspicion that she may not actually be married and may be using it as a social defence. Hyun is quite happy to learn more about the aliens than she already knew. She's pretty knowledgeable and interested about xenobiology but isn't really an expert.
As the conversation and alcohol flow Hyun is asked about the von Däniken platform orbiting Limbaugh that she mentioned in her office. She tells them that Hoax took it over about two years ago and when she provides a more exact date -- it's a sore point for Box, it seems -- the crew realize that the takeover happened within a month of Clegman and Tigd being found after their trip from Vishnu! Hoax sacked many of the researchers on the platform and brought in their own as well as stealing away Nayan Kanth, a xenopsychologist working for Box. So an organization that's supposed to be working on xenotechnology has been taking over biological research stations and poaching xenopsychologist employees from the organization that studies xenobiology. All of this is very interesting and suspicious! There is also yet more confirmation that Hoax is becoming more powerful and imperious over time, but this is nothing new.
After dinner is over everyone makes sure that Hyun gets home (to, presumably, her husband) and then decide to go clubbing on one of their last nights in the system. Bishop's always in the know with these things and suggests Kim Chi's. Jillian calls Xao and asks him if he's interested in coming out with them but he'd rather stay with his family. He does offer the guest rooms at his parents' mansion for the night as long as they call first and are quiet when they get in.
Taxis and motorcycle get them to the club and they find it to be a lounge with a sizeable dancing area and very good live music. Bishop decides to pass on enjoying himself too much to keep an eye on the rest of the gang to make sure that they don't get into trouble. Jillian gets hit on and is traumatized by the experience, limiting her drinking to coffee to keep awake enough to fend off any other unwelcome advances. Malcolm has a decent enough time but spends too much of it drinking. Volkova enjoys herself the most, tearing up the dance floor and barely managing to keep the wig on her head.
By the time they're ready to leave Malcolm is too drunk to ride his motorcycle and it has be left at the club. A taxi takes them to Xao's place and when he lets them in it turns out that his love of stereotypical pirate fashion doesn't just apply to his daytime outfits: his silk bathrobe has upturned cuffs, a skull-and-crossbone motif, an embroidered sword, and a sash that looks like it has a large buckle. He's also wearing a sleep mask that's flipped up over one eye. Malcolm's having difficulty keeping his voice down so Volkova clamps her hand over his mouth to keep him muffled as Xao shows them to the guest rooms. There are only three of them so Malcolm and Volkova share a room.
Everyone gets up late the next morning with the exception of Jillian, who had far too much coffee at Kim Chi's to sleep and now needs lots more to stay awake. They get to meet his family at last! Jillian spends more time than the others with them and hears enough about Xao and his past exploits to work out that he may be hard to read but he's very willing to help those who need it. Not that this makes him more attractive to her, of course. Xao's very tall father (Cheng) and very short mother (Dai) are socially comfortable and take their rough-around-the-edges guests in stride. His brother, Ning, doesn't seem to have much going for him, being short, overweight, unattractive, and argumentative, but makes quite a lot of money breeding salamanders like the purebred Kang, apparently a "Wonju rainbow".
After Xao's family leaves for work for the day the Steel Hummingbird take the opportunity to hang out in the lap of luxury for once. Jillian gets a very conservative swimsuit that covers her tattoo and has a swim in the pool while Volkova wanders the gardens and admires the concept of topiary. Bishop and Malcolm just relax.
Bishop calls Warden Whang several days before they're set to leave and sets up a date for January 18th. She offers to take him out to Dae Namu, the same pricey restaurant that she humiliated him at the last time they had a date. To his relief, she offers to pay as an apology for the way she treated him before. Since his plan is to try to find out about her criminal activities Jillian and Volkova will head down as backup while Malcolm stays on the ship with the Grob.
The next day Jillian decides to check on Sly Fox again and this time she hits paydirt: the Ashoka is in port and there is a new Sly Fox note on the navigation board! On the off chance that it will work she and Malcolm go to Osan Station's most popular pilot bar, Barrel Roll, to find the Ashoka's crew there but have no luck. They decide to check out the Ashoka herself and find her to be a bland cargo freighter, much larger than the Steel Hummingbird. Jillian leaves a note at the Ashoka for Sly Fox stating that she's interested in meeting up and will pay for drinks.
When the 18th comes around Bishop, Jillian, and Volkova head down to Dae Namu. Volkova's cleaned herself up again, is wearing her wig, and makes sure to sit with her back to Whang so as to remain anonymous to her former warden.
To Bishop's relief Whang doesn't seem to want a repeat of their last date. She's dressed very nicely, as before, and is much more friendly than last time. Encouraged, Bishop goes on an all-out charm offensive. During the course of the dinner he's convinced that
she really believes that he faked all the information about aliens in his letters to her in a boyish attempt to impress her. Surprisingly, he's also convinced that she's not running some dirty business out of the prison; if anything suspicious is going on there it's happening without her knowledge.
Whang surprises him by asking if, seeing he's from uBuntu, he knows anything about Dreaming. Relieved that he does, she tells him about a trip that she'd taken to uBuntu when she was younger. She'd gotten separated from her tour group and went missing for several days. With no knowledge of how to fend for herself in uBuntu's arid wastes she should have been dead several times over but was instead found alive and in fine physical shape. What had happened to her over those days is still a mystery to her but she bizarrely came out of her experience with a rudimentary knowledge of electrical engineering and a sporadic ability to tell the future that seems like Dreaming.
Bishop confirms that yes, this does seem like Dreaming, and reveals that he too is a Dreamer and is more than willing to help her develop her potential. She's very grateful for this and Bishop, seizing the opportunity, goes in for the (sexual) kill and finally succeeds at luring Warden Whang into bed. They leave the restaurant very soon thereafter and find a nice hotel that Whang pays for, again to his relief. Back at the restaurant, Jillian and Volkova shrug at each other. Everything seems to be fine, so they finish up their meals and head back to Xao's.
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Bishop's Bedpost Notch Count: 1 (running total: 15)
Jillian's Bedpost Notch Count: ha! ha!
Malcolm's Bedpost Notch Count: 0 (running total: 1)
Volkova's Bedpost Notch Count: 0 (running total: 2)