Redwall Abbey

You all find yourselves pulled away from your daily tasks, dissolved mid-step, and you materialize in the middle of a large black room. Below you is a black mesh floor, thick plates of metal overlapping each other seamlessly. The room is pentagonal, with tall blue swirling lights in each corner. The top point of the pentagon holds a black metal chair, and it faces away from you. Slowly, the chair swivels, and you are greeted by a black fox in a blue-and-black cybernetic uniform.

Hello, welcome to round nine of Overlord's Orders. I will be your Overlord on this flight, and *Ahem* You will obey me without question, failure to do so may result in your being thrown out of an airlock, vaporized, or slowly dissolved by nanites. Moving on!

The rules are as follows.

QuoteThe Rules
We will have an overlord (or overlady), who will be all powerful and control the game.
Everyone else will be a servant of theirs to do his or her bidding, which will be a new assignment at the beginning of each round.
The game begins by the Overlord issuing a task, sending out their servants, and then summoning everyone before them and questioning them about whether they got the thing they wanted.
Any given round may have anywhere from a developing storyline and plot to pure and simple tasking. At times, the gamemaster (Overlord) may deviate from the general pattern and do something different at the end than just another task.

Example Round:
Let’s say the Overlord might have wanted a jeep to use.
Stage 1: Introduction
The Overlord sends out their servants on a task and they return, and the Overlord will question their servants and ask them why they failed to bring them the thing they wanted (which will invariable happen, no one ever succeeds).
Stage 2: Defenses
Players can then blame their failure on some random thing (like maybe an elephant destroying the jeep) or someone else in the game; anything to shrug themselves off from fault.
Everyone can then blame someone, themselves, keep silent, or introduce some sort of new feature that happened while acquiring the item (in this case, a jeep). Eventually, the Overlord will process the information and decide who failed, or might just get tired of the arguing and randomly select someone at random.
Stage 3: Punishment
The person chosen to have failed by the Overlord is then thrown out, vaporized, or something creative, by the Overlord’s orders. The idea is to not be this person, and to survive as long as possible.

Likely, the Overlord will be choosing the best defenses as survivors.

Inter-game rules: The winner of any round is given hostship of the next game. This can tie in with them going from servant to overlord, or it can be original.

General Guidelines:
Free roleplaying, or game spam, is fine. This means having yourself eat a banana, talk about the weather or river dance.

Whenever someone says something, it becomes fact. It is what happened. If someone says an elephant destroyed a jeep, then anyone calling that person a liar is for certain lying; the jeep was destroyed by an elephant. What's up for telling for someone else is, for example, who set the elephant on the jeep.

Godmoding pertaining to persons should be restricted to some extent, just try to keep things with at least a hand in plausibility. Powerplaying is allowed. However, it cannot affect players between tasks. For instance, you cannot have a servants contract a disease and be unable to speak, or even die. You can have them be sick during the task, but you cannot impede them during the Sessions before the Overlord.

Normally, the Gamemaster will have technology restricting servants to a base during the game to prevent physically roleplaying and keep the game focused on its purpose. Overlords can powerplay.
Also, you cannot use an excuse like being brainwashed or cloned during the task. You are you-and you are responsible for what you did wrong.
Remember to keep things civil, stay inside the board rules, keep all hands and legs inside the game until it comes to a complete stop.

Now, in that console over there, you can find logs of the previous rounds. Hah, look at those pathetic little creatures. Trust me, if you fail as badly as they did, the nanites are too kind a fate for you... (In other words- as in, ones that make sense- If you've never played before, you should probably read one of the earlier rounds to get a feel for how the game works.)

Overlords Order's I 1 (http://redwallabbey.com/forum/index.php?topic=722.0)
Overlord's Orders II (http://redwallabbey.com/forum/index.php?topic=888.0)
Overlord's Orders III (http://redwallabbey.com/forum/index.php?topic=948.0)
Overlord's Orders IV (http://redwallabbey.com/forum/index.php?topic=1088.0)
Overlord's Orders V (http://redwallabbey.com/forum/index.php?topic=1246.0)
Overlord's Orders VI (http://redwallabbey.com/forum/index.php?topic=1549.0)
Special Holiday Round 2012 (http://redwallabbey.com/forum/index.php?topic=3022.0)
Overlord's Orders VII (http://redwallabbey.com/forum/index.php?topic=3361.0)
Overlord's Orders VIII (http://redwallabbey.com/forum/index.php?topic=4241.0)

You have all been equipped with small radiowave emitter an reciever implants. You can use these to communicate telepathically with any other implanted creatures nearby. Don't worry, these implants have only shown a limited tendency to explode... Er, as long as you stay away from most types of irradiation. Don't rub your face on the plasma conduits, in other words. Anyway, do not hesitate to ask me any questions you may have, these implants make communication easy, as long as we're all on the ship. (Don't hesitate to PM me questions.)

So, I've got a series of missions lined up for you. Unlike Overlords of days past, I won't send you on petty, arbitrary errands. No, these are at least partially relevant... Far more than that, for you, at least. Remember, the acid nanites don't like you unless I tell them to. I need eight people for these missions, ideally, although if you're all eager or shy, more or less could do, I suppose. Any of you who fail to comply will be transported home immediately, providing the teleporters don't mess up again... Personally, I wouldn't take my chances, but if you're that opposed to serving me, the option is open to you.

Oh, and if you do accept my mission, but you fall asleep on me? Your fate is worse than the fate that's worse than the nanites. I can't stand people who sleep on the job. (Don't go inactive, please! Inactivity is likely to get you disqualified, as it holds up the game for way too long. As much fun as the first rounds were, the later rounds of Overlord's Orders VIII are a good example of this. ;))

1. Cornflower MM
2. Leatho Shellhound
3. James Gryphon
4. Taggerung_Of_Redwall
5. Tam and Martin
6. DanielofRedwall
7.
8.

(Sign-ups now open! Deadline is most likely July 6, more information on the exact time will be posted before then.)

I join!

I'm in!

((Who's CornflowermMM?))

Egg roll reversal, almost... :P

Fixed. Your name is correct, correct name is your.

Thank you.

I'm in.

I'm up for a new game!


Also, there's the updated rules (http://redwallabbey.com/forum/index.php?topic=1549.0) that sort of started at Round VI but ended up only being posted again half the time that I'd recommend editing in to the first post. They're not only clearer but mention a couple new items we encountered through the rounds.  :)

Rules updated, thank you for bringing that to my attention. I had missed some of the smaller details, and mistaken this rule set for the newer one :)

I'm joining!

...Sure, why not. Add me in.

Sign-ups closing tomorrow (July 6) at 6:00 US Central time, or whenever after that I get around to posting. (Don't count on any extra time.)

So sign ups are closed now?

Uhm, yes.

Sign-ups closed!

The round will be starting sometime today.

Goody!

"Very good. Six of you are willing? That is acceptable." The Overlord pressed a button, and the rest of the creatures dissolved. "So. I have a task for you- Simple, just to warm up. Down on deck three is a trunk of a crewman who recently died. You need to go down that lift three floors, and walk until you find a door marked '319.' You'll need to open it, it should be unlocked. Inside, there will be a basic room, standard for all crew, and a chest. I need you to bring me that trunk.

-Six hours later-

Finally. You're ba- What? No trunk? How.. How can you manage to fail at this? And why are you all bruised and bleeding? Explain to me. I'll trigger some nanites to fix you up- Not that you deserve it. I should be using them for their other purpose, by rights.

As nanites buzz around the room, your wounds fade, though the overlord keeps scowling at you.


(Round One begin!)

James Gryphon, or 'Gryph', as he was known, quickly replied, "We immediately set off to the turbolift, led by Taggerung. He pressed the "Call" button and we waited for it to come. We stood there for five whole minutes before it showed up. Apparently the wait was too much for Cornflower; she was hopping around, and when the doors opened she squealed "Me first!", ran into the lift, and closed them again before any of us could react. There weren't any other lifts in sight, so Daniel suggested we take the chain ladder down. However, Leatho's afraid of heights, and it took us a while to coax him to come down after us."

"Anyway, we finally got down to the third deck, and started walking through the corridor to get to where we were going. It was dark, as there had been a power outage. The engineer that was there trying to fix it told us it was because someone hit all the buttons in the turbolift, and it overloaded the system. Tagg said he had a "night vision" optical enhancement and that we should follow him. Well, he has dyslexia. We stumbled around for half an hour until the lights came back on. Once that had happened, Tam easily found the right door and called us over. When we entered the room, we found that it was empty! Daniel used his amazing forensic skills (and a sci-corder) to determine that the chest had recently been vaporized. He said that it had probably been destroyed in the past hour."

"Daniel suggested we search for the saboteur by scanning for their pheromone trail. For some reason, Tam seemed to be against this and knocked him down when he tried to use the bioscanner. Daniel didn't much like that, and hit Tam square on the jaw. They started fighting, and when we tried to break them apart, they hit us too. That's where all of our bruises and blood came from. I don't know how Cornflower could've gotten hurt, though. You'll have to ask her about that."

"I suggested we check the computers to see whether all the cameras and motion detectors picked anything up, but it was in vain. The logs had been erased. By this time, Cornflower had showed up. She said she had a copy of "File Restorer", and that it could bring back the erased files, but when we loaded the data crystal into the computer, it turned out to be a Justin Beaver holoalbum. We were knocked unconscious by the sonic and psionic attack on our brains. When we came to, it was five hours and fifty minutes after we'd first set out. With the trail cold, I said that we should return and inform you as to the reason for the delay and that there was a dangerous spy on the loose, so we spent the last ten minutes rushing to get here. I'm sorry for the long delay, and for our group's complete failure to accomplish this mission."

"Overlord, I feel it is necessary at this juncture to point out a most fascinating detail that has not been disclosed yet. The bioscanner was sentient. Yes, the innocent bioscanner of Daniel was talking up a storm the whole time but everybody thought it was just Daniel blabbering on. The bioscanner was given anonymously as a gift to Daniel to supplement his forensics skills. It was a nice gesture, but the anonymous giver knew what they were doing the whole time and what it was. What evil they had brought to us. What horrifying, incomprehensible evil they had brought into our very midst. Some say even the beavers cower in fear of the thought of one of these bioscanners. They can cause power outages, vaporize almost anything, say almost anything in any tongue or thought. They are the worst of all creatures. They care about nothing, know little, say much and hate all. You see, Daniel's bioscanner is a Mark 6 bioscanner, meaning it had to be produced on one of Earth's seven clones during the Great Beaver Hopping Dance Plague of 2476's third consecutive iteration. What this means is, of course, exceptionally clear to you. Though, for the benefit of a certain few of my fellow servants, I suppose I will have to take the time to explain it further. This plague was triggered by the spreading of a new form of music developed by a musically-inclined beaver. What was this beaver's name? Osyetderafeltighuniamtagerlios. What are the last four letters of his name? Lios. Flop it and you get...soil. Soil is common on many planets. What else is inexplicably on many planets? Turtles. And where do all turtles originate from? Their homeworld. And who is the current Queen of that planet? Bonnie Genie Rig. Re-arrange the letters and you find that an anagram of Bonnie Genie Rig is bioengineering. What is the most bio-engineered crop in this galaxy? Corn. And what is the first part of Cornflower's name? Corn. I believe I have made it abundantly clear who is most responsible for the bioscanner ruining everything."

Mighty Overlord, all that Gryph has claimed we did I will say is all the truth though I feel I must expand more upon why Daniel and I were fighting each other. When Daniel suggested that we use the bioscanner, it was a great idea if it wasn't for the fact that someone had laid a microscopic bomb on the bioscanner which I could tell was going to go off within the hour. How could I tell it had a bomb on it? Well I had brought my vision goggles with me that could zoom in and out and had a microscope in it. I saw the bomb on it and when I told Daniel about it, and he said that he was certain that there was no bomb and that it was completely safe.

Well, me not wanting anyone or anything to blow up, I kept insisting that he should let me take off the bomb but he refused, so I took a swing at him to try and knock him down and reach the bioscanner. Well, I hit him, not hard enough though because he hit me right back. And we went back and forth like that for awhile until everyone tried to stop us. Then, I tried to tell them but they couldn't hear me because Cornflower had come in yelling that she had found a File restorer. I tried swinging at Daniel some more and accidentally hit the others in the process. So I quit fighting and went along with what everyone else was doing hoping to take the bioscanner away from Daniel later. Well, we were knocked unconscious by the psionic attack and when we awoke, the bioscanner was gone. I decided not to worry about it anymore so I went with James back here to report to you.

That is all Overlord.

"Sir Overlord, it is true that when the lift finally came I ran in and shut the doors. But, it is worth noting (At least I think so) that I hit the lift's button's with my elbow, and that is why the doors shut. After I got down, the power was out. I stumbled around for quite some time, and that is why I have so many bruises and why I'm covered in blood. Then power came back on, and I heard the others, and I went over to the door. I heard them talk about the chest being vaporized, and so I went to check and see if there were any camera, or computers. When I found one, I grabbed the crystal that had 'File Restorer' marked on the cover. So, I went back, and went in. Then Tam started trying to punch Daniel some more, and I got hit. When that was resolved, we went along to the cameras and computers, and entered this. I have no idea why it was not properly marked, Overlord. I came back along to make sure that the rest of my teammates did not give me a bad name, sir."

"Might I just add, oh great Overlord, that I had no idea at all that the bioscanner was sentient. In fact, the box it came in specifically outlined on a big sticker on the front that 'this product is in no way sentient and will not cause power outages, vaporize things or even talk", so I was just say surprised as the others when the scanner did just that. In fact, I have half a mind to sue the company for false advertising. Sadly there was no button to turn off the babbling either, so we just had to put up with it. It did its job perfectly otherwise.

And the fact that I did not notice the microscopic bomb has a pretty obvious explanation- it is microscopic, and I don't have fancy microscope goggles like Tam. I just have outstanding forensic skills.

And finally, the reason I was hitting Tam was not in retaliation for hitting me, it was because I noticed he was bugged. And I don't mean he had spy gear on him, he literally had thousands of tiny insects crawling all over him and I was trying to whack them off. Honestly I'm amazed he didn't notice them. I was trying to explain to him why I was hitting him, but he was yelling something back at me (which I now know to be him telling me about the bomb) and so we just ended up yelling over each other. Some of the insects spread to the other group members, so I tried hitting them off them too. Successfully too, might I add, if it weren't for me we would have a serious insect outbreak. So that's the reason for my hitting."

"I think the insects were a "gift" from Leatho. You see, when we were in our assigned room yesternight, I saw them crawling all over him. When I asked him about it, he told us that that being chosen as a host by the bugs was one of the greatest honors a man could have. Apparently they're regarded as nearly sacred animals in his culture, as he said that his people's laws required him to avenge any of them that he saw someone kill.  Anyway, Daniel was out getting our meal, so he wasn't there when Leatho explained about all of that. Tagg, who'd already gone to sleep, had asked us to keep the lights dim, so I guess Daniel didn't have a chance to see any of the critters until today. There wasn't enough room for everyone to have their own bed, so Tam and Leatho shared a bunk, and Leatho's bugs must've taken a liking to Tam."

OOC: Round ends tomorrow!

OOC: Extending time one day, Leatho hasn't posted yet. Giving him one more day to do so. Round ends tomorrow. Carry on.

OOC: *Raises hand* LEatho was at camp all week! He only just returned, I believe.

OOC: Yes, which I'm sure was great fun, however it doesn't mean I can delay the round indefinitely. I might give him one more day if he doesn't post today, but I'd really rather the rounds didn't drag on for too long.

OOC: so sorry, but I'm dead tired right now, can I post tomorrow?

OOC: Sure, that's cool. :)

If I might be so bold, the bugs have special gas in them that can un-vaporize chests. So knowing that they would be helpful for carring out your orders I brought them along. And it seems Tam took them from me when I was sleeping.

So b/c Danile killed these valuable insects we weren't able to get back the chest you wanted.

OOC: Ok so I noticed this as an Observer I would like to comment and perhaps complain and even clarify.

Quote from: James Gryphon on July 08, 2014, 03:09:07 PM
Tagg said he had a "night vision" optical enhancement and that we should follow him. Well, he has dyslexia. We stumbled around for half an hour until the lights came back on.

Now I have dyslexia and that dose not affect my ability to navigate. I perhaps even improves it in a way. I will however give you the benefit of the doubt in this case till I have more evidence other wise and I wot try and vaporize you or throw you out an airlock for the insult. (Really I am not that insulted just wanted to clarify and point that out)     

OOC: Well, the idea was that he had trouble finding the right door number (which was key to this mission). From the little I knew about dyslexia, I thought that it would be as good an explanation as anything else. I should have just said that he had trouble reading the door numbers for some reason and left it at that. If you want me to, I'll change it. It was not my intention to offend anyone suffering from this condition.

One aside, for the players: I'd appreciate it if we could cut down on the OOC talk from here on out. It disrupts the flow of the story. The PM box is for exactly this kind of situation. ;)

The Overlord scowls down at you all, from his smooth, black, metallic throne.

"The chest is of little consequence- The task was merely an errand of my convenience. However, bringing unauthorized life forms aboard a starship is not acceptable. Doing so without alerting the captain is even more so. Allowing them to spread... Well, that's just incompetence. You are dismissed."

The one known as Leatho Shellhound dematerialized promptly, and reappeared on his home planet in exactly the place he was in before, wondering what had just happened.

"So. That's over and done with. I was hoping you'd prove your competence, but it seems you haven't. Ugh, back down to deck three. I've got a crew fixing the power situation down there. Ask them if you can do anything to help, and then do it. No questions asked."

-3 1/2 Hours later-

"Wonderful. So, tell me, how'd you fail so miserably at that? Now we've got decks four and six on a power shortage as well, deck five is failing fast. My repair crews can fix it, but for now, I'd like to determine the one responsible so I may deal with them accordingly."

OOC: Round 2 begins! Good luck!

"The whole thing is very simple. When we got there, the repairmen were trying to fix a circuit when Daniel began screaming about a small panel that had fallen on his foot. Tam and Cornflower tried to tell him he was fine, but he kept going on about his expert investigative skills and said he knew all about what panels can do to feet. That was fine and all, I figured we could do alright with just the four of us helping the repairmen. We were told to go down a deck and activate a wheel responsible for regulating some sort of fluid needed for power. We got there and Daniel decided the fluid had medicinal properties and began applying it to his foot. I tried to stop him, but he broke the pipeline of the stuff and it leaked down into the floor. I had made progress getting the wheel back online. But the broken pipeline fell onto the wheel and locked firmly in place between it and the floor. I tried to move it, but Cornflower and Daniel decided sliding down the inside of the pipe was more fun and made it impossible to get anything done. Daniel then quipped aloud about how we should try and remove the pipeline from the vicinity of the wheel before trying to activate it again. Gryph, meanwhile, had completely disappeared. He was nowhere to be found the whole time. Eventually enough of the fluid leaked out from the broken pipe that power was failing on multiple decks.

"Tagg neglected to tell about half of what all happened, but I guess that's understandable considering that he seemed to be playing 'Spacefighters 3' on his headset the whole time we were down there. To be honest, I'm surprised that he noticed as much as he did. Let me fill you in to what he missed."

"We were told to each activate a wheel, as there were several of them that needed to be re-calibrated. I tried to explain this to Tagg, but he didn't seem to notice that I was even there, and told everyone else to follow him. Then he turned the volume up on his headset. I screamed at the rest of them, trying to get them to understand that there were several wheels, but they didn't, or else couldn't, listen to me. Small wonder, since whatever it was blaring from Tagg's speakers was so loud. I can't believe he hasn't gone deaf with that much noise right next to his ears."

"Anyway, we went to go down the chain ladder. I was the last in line, behind Cornflower. For some reason, she closed and locked the hatch behind her, keeping me from following them. This left me stuck on the third deck. I had to go all the way around the ship to get to another ladder before I could go down."

"Once I finally made it down to the assigned deck, I went around the rest of the deck activating all of the other wheels that they didn't know they were supposed to take care of. That explains my so-called "disappearance". I happened to have studied power regulation wheels when I was younger, as a hobby, so with that experience, I was able to get all of the wheels running very quickly. When I was almost finished turning on the last one, though, all the emergency lighting went out. Now I know that it was because of the damage they were wreaking on your Majesty's property, but at the time I assumed it was a temporary power outage, possibly caused by Daniel's evil bioscanner (which he never bothered to get rid of). I finished the task in the dark, working from muscle memory, and started to try to find my way back up. I didn't try to find my way to the wheel they were headed to because I assumed that nobody could mess up such a simple job as activating a power regulation wheel. Clearly, I grossly overestimated the competence of my fellow servants."

"I got back to the third deck, only to discover that the floor was now covered with three feet of water. All of the other servants, who had gotten back before I did, refused to talk to me, but I found out from the chief engineer that somebody had tried to use the drink machine in the R&R lounge. As anyone who had a rudimentary knowledge of the Mark II Drink Machine would know, the part of the machine that opens the valve that lets out the liquid is entirely mechanical, but the part that determines when it should be closed is electrical. Thus, when there's a power outage, it doesn't close. It's a well-known defect, caused by the superstitions of the drink machine's manufacturers. As no repairman would ever make the mistake of turning the machine on under those circumstances, this mishap must have been caused by one of your other minions."

"After all the water on the ship was dumped into the third deck, the repair work that had been accomplished so far was of course ruined. That would've been bad enough, but the control computer that is supposed to regulate power fluid flow (and prevent failures in the case of a pipeline being broken) was shorted out as well. The repairmen said it would take days to fix. I stuck around, trying my best to both help the repair team and keep my fellow servants from doing any more damage, until I received your summons. I did the best I could, and am in no way responsible for this catastrophe."

OOC:L Oh, I just LOVE how I'm always disappearing or locking people up. Don't you?

BIC: "My Lord, I closed and locked the hatch because I had thought that I saw James ahead of me, and so assumed that I was last in line. I didn't hear James because of the noise blaring from Tagg's speakers, which was also giving me a headache. I did my best to assure Daniel that he was fine when the panel hit his foot, but he did not listen. Then, after he broke the pipe and applied the quite toxic fluid to his foot, I had moved to help Tagg with trying to fix the pipeline. I slipped, however, and slid down the pipe. Daniel following me. I'm guessing that he thought it looked fun."

OOC: Yes, in fact, I do.

"To be clear, these so-called great mechanical skills of Gryph clearly only apply when he is working with devices that are remarkably clear and familiar to him. Perhaps he would like to fill you in on his experience in handling handheld logging terminals? The repairmen gave us each one, but Gryph took them all away except mine, which I defended from him. He claimed he was better with the tech and wanted to look them over, going on about how he was best with working and navigating them. These terminals detailed where to find the wheels, one distinct terminal for each wheel's exact dimensions and location. I protested Gryph swiping them all, but that bioscanner began screaming about threats and wars and stuff like that, so I had to resort to using a headset to block it out. It turns out the ambient theme music of Spacefighters 3   is one of the only sounds that can filter it out effectively. By then, Gryph had managed to break them all, handing them to Tam who promptly threw them into a chute and caused a fire. Gryph was then separated off and was gone with what he apparently now knew of additional wheels. With only mine, we did what we could still do and went to reactivate the wheel we knew existed; or, at least, I did what I could, and exceedingly well I must say so. It is a wonder I managed to prevent that broken section of pipe from penetrating some fail safe and causing substantially more serious problems to your property, Overlord.
"As far as this drink machine, I can't speak of that. I have never laid eyes on it before. I did, however, overhear Daniel going on about how drink machines are very important to detective work since people love to leave and hide all sorts of evidence on them. I think I saw Tam frantically depositing some hardware he found somewhere near the lounge looking all bent out of shape like they had been pulled out of something mechanical, though that may or may not be relevant. You'd have to ask him."

Overlord I do not have much to say about most of what happened but I will say some.

Most of the time I did what the others had told me to do but when Gryph handed me the broken pieces of logging terminal I immediately threw it away from me and the team because I had noticed one of the same bugs Leatho had on him before on the logging terminal. So, me not wanting the bug to get onto the ship and multiply quickly, I threw it where I did, accidentally causing a fire. I didn't mean to start the small fire but wasn't it worth it for the safety of the ship from the takeover of those small microscopic insects? Anyway, I followed the rest with what they did until they started arguing and doing nothing useful. So, I found several pieces of metal lying around at random places hence I figured to do something useful and bend the metal to try to make a frame or a balance for the electric circuits which might have had something happen to them. That is all I believe I need to answer, Mighty Overlord.

"My Overlord, claiming that I "swiped" the terminals is an unfair and misleading attack on my character. You see, when we were first given the handheld logging terminals, I suggested that we should all look at each person's terminal together, so that that way, if something happened to any of us, another servant could finish the job. Cornflower dismissed my logical suggestion by waving her hand and saying "You stupid boy", and the others burst out laughing. Then they all started horsing around. They didn't seem to be taking the assignment seriously at all. I guess Tagg must have looked at his terminal when I wasn't watching him, but when I saw him, he was using it as a back scratcher. Tam was juggling his, and Cornflower kept pressing the keys on her unit's number pad to try to play a song (it sounded pretty terrible). Daniel did look at his terminal, but he was holding it upside down, and he only said that he thought he saw suspicious paw prints on the screen, before taking out his gear and trying (thankfully unsuccessfully) to disassemble it."

"Time was of the essence. The power regulation wheels' locations are of-course top secret, and I noticed that the terminals were special self-destructing models, designed to keep information from getting into the wrong hands later on. They were set to go off five minutes after being activated, which  the repair crew had done when they gave them out to us. I tried to explain this to the other servants, telling them of my expertise with the terminals to back this up, but they just repeated what Cornflower had said, in falsetto voices. I gave up on trying to talk it out and decided to take the terminals by force, so that at least one person would know where each of the wheels were. Cornflower, Tam and Daniel all gave theirs up without much of a fight, saying that it wasn't necessary to read them "since there was only one wheel anyway". I then tried to get Tagg's, but he threatened me with a laser gun(!), so I hoped for the best and let him be."

"I had just enough time to memorize all the information on the terminals when they self-destructed. I asked Tam to take care of the terminal remains by putting them in the hazardous materials chute, where they would be properly disposed of, while I tried to explain to the others there was multiple wheels. Instead, he threw them in the incinerator chute. The trace explosive elements blew up, causing the aforementioned fire."

"Finally, I wanted to mention that it wasn't easy, keeping everybody out of trouble after we all got back up to the third deck. Cornflower in particular insisted on trying to swim through the flooded corridors, and got in the way of the repair team doing this. In fact, every time that the repair team tried to fix something, it seemed that one of your Majesty's other servants was there, getting in the way. The only way I was able to get them to settle down was by telling them there was a "Candyworld" machine, with real candy, in the dining room. That kept them busy until your summons."

"I didn't realize, when I volunteered to serve here, that these other servants would be so childish. This is exactly what I left my planet to try to get away from. If your Majesty wouldn't mind, I would like to be able to work alone in the future."

OOC: This is fun.

Well Overlord, The reason I was juggling my terminal was because of this weird fiery (Is that how you spell it? Fire-y?) feeling on the terminal so I figured if I juggled it, it would cool it down. No harm could come out of juggling it. It turned out though just to be a piece of heated metal that had fallen in my glove.

The other thing I must explain is why I gave up my logging terminal. It is true I said "Since there was only one wheel anyway" but what Gryph didn't say was that he himself had told me earlier to say those same lines. Gryph was hoping that Tagg would give him the terminal since he saw all of us giving ours to him. Gryph is by far the best with all the terminals, and I knew that, but he told me to say what I did so that Tagg might give him the terminal he was holding. I believe that is all.


OOC: Sure is.

OOC: Can I defend myself tomorrow? I'm tired, and I'll have to go soon.

OOC: Yes, you can. The round will most likely end two days from now, you've got time.

"Well, as always, everyone is just leaving out all the facts that prove their lack of innocence, so allow me to fill in some important details here, Your Overlord-ship.

First thing's first, the panel. Yes, a small panel (dropped by Cornflower, might I add) fell on my foot, and funnily enough it actually broke it, so it's a bit of a shame that the rest of this lot didn't do a thing to help despite my polite requests (they just said I would be fine despite my obvious pain). This meant that for the rest of the mission I would be hindered with a broken foot, so not a good start, and I'm not to blame for any of it.

Next is the business with the medicinal fluid. I know for a fact that the fluid itself is not medicinal and will, of course, severely damage the body if it comes in to contact with it, but I also know for a fact after years of investigative work that there is a compound in the fluid that does have medicinal effects. So I retrieved a drop of the fluid from a worker (none of it was from the pipeline) and extracted the compound to apply to my foot so I could carry out your orders effectively. Sadly, Tagg in his attempt to "stop me" from doing so pushed me hard and I let go of the test tube containing the rest of the fluid. The compound I extracted is sadly also the part that keeps it neutralised, so when the fluid came in to contact with the pipeline it dissolved the pipeline and it fell on to the wheel. Again, not my fault, if only Tagg had listened to my explanation before shoving me like he did. Shame, no-one seems to listen these days.

As for sliding down the pipeline, that was an accident, Cornflower tripped me up and took me with her when she went down the pipe. I was walking behind her at the time trying to move the pipe. When I said that we should move the pipe from the vicinity of the wheel, I was commenting on how I was willing to help Tagg in his efforts to move the pipe. I stressed the word SHOULD, as if I was agreeing to him.

Also, I did try and get rid of the bioscanner, but Tam seemed pretty keen on keeping it as a pet and every time I threw it away he retrieved it from the rubbish and tried feeding it milk. Strange.

Next in line for correction was the idea that I apparently turned on the drink machine to assist in my detective skills. While it is true I did say out loud the words Tagg said I did, I followed them up with "however I will not turn this one on as I know the dangers involved in doing so" and I did not turn it on, so I guess Tam is to blame for that.

The reason I laughed at Cornflower saying 'you silly boy' was because earlier today she was experimenting with inceptioning ideas in to people's brains by using phrases. Are you familiar with that kind of idea? Basically there is a way for you to force someone to think of something every time they say a phrase, so when she said 'you silly boy' I was actually thinking of a puppy on a unicycle, and who wouldn't laugh at that?

So this leaves why I was holding the terminal upside down. Well, the terminal was glitching, so it showed everything upside down, so really I was holding it the right way up. I tried telling James about the problem, but he just said "fix it yourself" and threw a bunch of tools at me, so I tried. Really, I would have managed to fix it if it wasn't for him insisting that I handed over the terminal to his 'expert hands'. I never said that there was 'one wheel anyway', I just happened to grunt after Tam said it, so it seemed I was grunting in agreement.

I believe that is all."

OOC: Sorry for late response, just business, and also sorry if none of this makes sense I'm not functioning well today, I'll fix up any errors tomorrow.

"Sir Overlord, yes, I was indeed experimenting with inceptioning ideas in to people's brains by using phrases. Just so I could get back at someone for doing the same thing to me, you understand. Yes, I dropped the panel on Daniel's foot. It was purely accidental - It slipped out of my hands and I could not catch it in time.

As for Daniel's accusation of me slipping him up, how could I trip him when he was behind me? I slipped in the puddle, if you remember.

I kept pressing the keys to my unit's pad to play a song. The result of this sing, however, is to remove any and all brainwashing that we might have had. But I did not get to complete the sing because Tagg pushed me, something that I see he neglected to mention.

All of the others were indeed repeating what I said in high falsetto voices. I believe they were doing it to mock me.  Just so that is cleared up.

I gave up my terminal with out a fight, saying that that it's just one terminal anyways. They must have misheard me. I gave mine up, frankly, because I had no clue what I was supposed to be doing.

I believe that is all, Overlord.

Well, Overlord, Apparently Dan doesn't know the real reason for me doing some of the things I did. Let me explain.

He said I kept retrieving the bioscanner and feeding it milk. That is how it might appear. Well, when we come down to it, it isn't a bad thing to have, it just had could be fixed. So, I got a can of bioscanner cleaner and put it in a baby's bottle (Which is the only thing I had at the time) then almost "fed it" to the bioscanner. Once it was cleaned and all the bad stuff taken off of it, it was harmless and I kept it. Might be useful in the future.

About the drink machine though, I did turn it on, yes but for the reason of simply getting a drink. I didn't know anything about it being bad I was just several problems. So why not fix it? Daniel must have been mad that we blamed him for so many faults he made that he insisted on throwing it out, but I knew it simply looking for a drink after all the hard work I was doing. Once I turned it on though, I wasn't able to turn it off so I asked Corny (Cornflower) to turn it off because I heard Tagg calling me. The rest is left for her to explain because I had nothing else to do with it. I went over to Tagg and asked him why he called me and he said he didn't have a good reason. After that, Cornflower had come back and I assumed she had turned it off.

Unless there is anything else to say Overlord, I am innocent.

OOC: Please tell me if I didn't do something right on this. I had a long day gar and bass fishing and am not thinking well.

OOC: Round ends tomorrow. This is hilarious. I am SO GLAD I chose a sci-fi setting.

OOC: Oh, yeah? Well, Tam feeding the bioscanner milk IS pretty fiunny....Although, I'm getting blamed for all the big stuff....Ah, well...I'll get y'all back next round!

BIC: I honestly tried my best to turn it off, and I thought I DID turn off the drink machine. I'm a dunce at anything mechanical, as I'm sure I pointed out. That is all, Overlord.

You still hadn't turned it off though.

"Hey, I did my best! I just don't know how to do that sort of thing. I'm no technician! Do I LOOK like one, Tam?

No, not at all, but you could have atleast asked someone else for help. Daniel for example.

OOC: Round closed. It's actually past midnight, I did stuff today, I'm tired. I'm going to sleep, I'll give someone to the nanites tomorrow.

The Overlord considers you all carefully.
"Tam. Your meddling with the drink machine could have easily been prevented by reading the sign. And keeping a sentient creature as a pet is unacceptable.

Cornflower. Your technical incompetence could have been a huge danger- But you had no way to know how our technology worked, raised on a tiny, ancient planet such as you were. I think I shall give you a second chance. Tam." The Overlord's head sharply turned towards the creature. "You have committed crimes labeled as such by the highest order of our law. They are punished with death. But I am lenient, you had no hostile intentions." He pressed a sequence of butons, and a tank rose from the floor around Tam. "Cryostorage for you." The tank sank into the floor and sped away.

"So. Your next task. On deck 7, there is a dehumidifier. I need you to bring that to the second deck, and clear up the water.

-The next day-

Three more decks are flooded, a tenth of my crew is dead. You're dangerous. I like you. But you still damaged my ship, my crew demand retribution. Who is responsible?

Edit: This now features color-coding, to make it easier for everyone to read the parts that they're in. Daniel is red, Tagg is blue, and Corn is green.

"We went up to the seventh deck without incident and found the dehumidifier in an equipment storage room. It was disassembled, as it is a very large piece of machinery and I suppose the engineering crew didn't want to have it take up a lot of space. I recommended that we take the pieces down to the engineering staff, so that we could be sure that it would be assembled correctly, but Daniel claimed that he knew how to put it together, and that we should do it right away, so as to avoid wasting any more time. I said that it wouldn't be a waste to get some crew up there, if it meant that the ship would be fixed properly, but Tagg said that they had too much work to do, and that he would not allow me to "sabotage this mission" by pulling workers away from their duties. Then he pulled out his laser gun and promised that he would shoot anyone who left."

"Well, he had made his position very clear. Tagg is a terrible shot if he's firing at anything beyond point-blank range, so I wasn't afraid of getting killed, but I knew that he would likely as not destroy the dehumidifier's parts with his poor aim if I provoked him, so I didn't say anything else. I figured that we'd put it together to make Tagg happy, but that I'd find a real engineering officer to make sure that it was operational before anyone tried to actually use it."

"Daniel assembled the machine, with Cornflower helping him. He kept muttering about fingerprints and contamination, and refused to let me do anything. I saw him incorrectly putting several pieces together (for instance, he put several switches and gears in the wrong places). I tried to tell him this, but Cornflower told me to shut up and that I was damaging their psyches with my pessimistic talk. I tried to explain the danger that Daniel was putting everyone in, but Tagg said that he would shoot me if I moved or said anything else, so I complied, again to avoid permanent damage to the machinery."

"Once it was completed, Tagg said that we shouldn't waste any more time and that Daniel and Cornflower should immediately take it down to the second deck. I offered to help, with the intent of warning the repair crew that they needed to fix it before they turned it on, but Tagg said that he wasn't "going to risk me getting loose and harming the mission", and that he was going to stand there and make sure that I didn't do anything."

"As I said before, it was a very large piece of machinery. Daniel and Cornflower had trouble just getting it out of the door, and Corn was visibly sweating after just a few moments of trying to move it. After they finally got the machinery out of the room, and I was left with Tagg, I knew that I had to stop them from turning on the dehumidifier without it being repaired first. I jumped Tagg and wrestled with him for the laser gun. He fired a few shots, but each one harmlessly hit the armored walls. It's a good thing I waited; if the dehumidifier was there, he would have vaporized it for sure. I overpowered Tagg, took his gun and ran out to make sure that the machinery was safely handled."

"I ran through the corridors through the path that I knew they were going to take. After two or three of these, I saw Daniel and Cornflower, who had stopped, and the dehumidifier. Both of them were worn out. The machine must've weighed half a ton, and they didn't have an antigrav dolly to carry it on, due to Tagg's insistence that they rush it down there as quickly as possible without going anywhere else. Cornflower said something that I didn't catch, as I was still too far away, but as I drew closer, I heard Daniel say "No problem". He took a cup out of his jacket, and then flipped a switch on the dehumidifier."

"As your Majesty knows, the dehumidifier works using the McKormick system — it breaks water down by separating its hydrogen and oxygen atoms, which are then sent through the Winley tubes into the ship's storage tanks for further use. The dehumidifier is a multi-purpose machine, however, and can perform the opposite function. That is precisely what it did. It began to convert all of the oxygen and hydrogen in the air into water."

"Daniel had placed a cup in front of the machine, I suppose with the intent of collecting water in it, but the water started to spray out of the machine at extreme force. It knocked the cup out of Daniel's hands. By this time I was there, and said that we should turn the humidifier function off, but Daniel said that it was "just too high a water force, that's all", and that he could turn the pressure down. He twisted a knob, and suddenly we were all borne over by a massive wave of water. I guess his inept assembly skills caused it to work in exactly the opposite way that it was intended to."

"Daniel and Cornflower immediately ran away. I tried to make my way to the machine to shut it off, but the force of the oncoming waves of water was too strong. At this point, the entire corridor was flooded with water, probably four feet deep, and the air was becoming notably thinner from the lack of oxygen. I decided that you would prefer to have one less dehumidifier than an entirely flooded ship, and tried to shoot the dehumidifier to destroy it. I was concentrating on the shot, and almost certainly would have taken the machine out, when suddenly the gun was snatched out of my hands and I was knocked down into the water from behind. Tagg had caught up with me."

"When I managed to swim my way back up to the top (as the water was now above head-level), I tried to sputter to Tagg that we needed to destroy the humidifier, but he just shot at me. He missed, and this seemed to make him angry, as he fired again and again in my direction. However, he missed each time, and hit the corridor walls, which, not being armored, were badly damaged from his laser fire. I caught hold of Tagg's wrist, trying to tell him once again that he needed to shoot the dehumidifier, but he screamed, "I'd rather die than help you!" I was about to get hold of his laser gun when he dropped it into the rushing water, seemingly just to keep me from using it. These things aren't waterproof, and it was irreparably damaged, but not before its now-faulty control mechanism caused it to blast another large section of the wall out of place."

"The water that had flooded the corridor now started to flow out through the holes in the walls, and as it filled the engineering crawlspaces spaces there, the high pressure from the machine started causing gaps and openings in the floor, causing flooding in the other decks, and so on. I tried to pull out my communicator to tell the engineering crew of the extreme danger the ship was in, in hopes that they could get the old emergency dehumidifier out of storage, but Tagg snarled something I couldn't make out and knocked the communicator out of my hand into the water-filled abyss. Then, before I could dive in after it, he leaped at me, apparently with full intent of doing bodily harm."

"We fought on and on, me trying to get away to get help, Tagg apparently with the intention of killing me. In the middle of this, Daniel came swimming back in, carrying a bucket, with a crazy grin on his face. He said, "We can use this to pick up all of the water." I'm not sure what he was thinking, since the bucket was not as large as the lake that was now filling the ship, but apparently it meant something to Tagg, who let me go and went over to talk to Daniel."

"I left to get help. It was very hard to get away, as by this time the deck was mostly flooded, and the hatches to all of the chain ladders had apparently been closed and locked. They were open when we went up to the deck, so I can only speculate that Cornflower closed them all again for some reason when she was running away. Finally, I managed to find someone else on this deck of the ship, the equipment records officer, who had taken refuge on the highest crate in his nearly-flooded control room."

"He told me he had already called for help when he saw the flooding, and that the maintenance crew was on the way. I told him about the dehumidifier and asked if there was any way to stop it; if he had a waterproof laser gun or something that I could use. He said no, so I figured there was nothing else to do. He helped me up onto his crate, and we sat tight until the repair crews showed up. They brought breathing masks with them, and gave them to us so that we could go through the water without drowning."

"I helped the repair team with everything they asked me to do, until the engineering chief said there was nothing else I could do, and that I should go back to you to report everything that had happened. I haven't seen any of these other "servants" from the time I left Tagg and Daniel to get help until I saw that they had somehow gotten here. They presumably still have their communicators, so I guess you must have summoned us. I'm very sorry for showing up late. I just wanted it to be known what happened, and that I did everything that I knew to do. Your Majesty's other servants have not ceased to cause harm ever since you started sending us on these missions, so I've come to expect them to exhibit a certain amount of incompetence, but I'm shocked and horrified by the degree of damage they've managed to cause on this occasion."

OOC: This is very possibly the longest single post ever written for any round of OO. I didn't expect it to be this long; I just started writing and it turned out this way. I'm sorry for the wall of text, guys.

OOC: No biggie. Defending self tomorrow. Tired........

"In my defense, Overlord, Daniel told me that unless I helped him assemble the dehumidifier, he'd make sure that my bed would be filled wit prickles and my family would die. I told James what I did because I didn't want my family to die. I did my best to move the dehumidifier, but it was far, far too heavy, and I didn't want to be lasered. Daniel, not so much. But that's beside the point. When James had gotten to us, I had  said, 'Oh, I just wish I had a cup of water.' I didn't expect Daniel to do what he did, and I'm sorry. I ran away because I don't know how to swim. I swear I left the doors open behind me, I promise I did. Perhaps Daniel shut. it."

OOC: The fact that there hasn't been many responses here would suggest that very long posts should be discouraged in the future. I'm proposing what I call the "Gryphon rule": after the next person gets killed here, from that point on no post in a round of OO should have more than 750 non-OOC words in it. I figured that number because 700 is the upper limit for most of the posts from my favorite rounds, II through IV. There are a few that have gone over that without causing problems, so the extra 50 words gives everybody, including the Overlord, a little more room to play with, without causing any trouble. 1500 or however much I posted is definitely too much, however, and I think 1000 is probably a bit much as well.

OOC: So,now I have to count the words?!?!

OOC: There's very handy free tools that can do it for you, like this website: http://www.wordcounter.net
Like I said, though, the vast majority of posts that have been made in all rounds of OO fit into this. For most people, this rule would not be a problem. It's mainly for guys like me that try to write a book when they're making a response. For the most part, you know a long post when you see it. If someone (read: me) is making a really long post, this rule would remind them to cut it down, but it won't affect 95% of the players 95% of the time. None of your posts so far have been even close to hitting this proposed limit.

OOC Gee, thanks. Didn't know I was so terrible at writing posts....

OOC: Apologies for late response, life is not always friendly and I've been pretty busy so reading long posts doesn't make that any easier (no offence, James). A word limit like you proposed would be helpful, I'm only on for limited times now (that's partly why I left the staff) so I can only really check in at specific times. The colour coding was really helpful though, thanks for that.

BIC:
"Yet again, my fellow servants have left out some pretty important details to shift the blame away from themselves. Let me fix that up for you, oh Master.

Now, I actually do in fact know how to put together a dehumidifier, and I actually did fix it. But, my 'help' Cornflower ruined everything. Every time I put the pieces together, she claimed I did it wrong and put them in another spot. TO be fair, I did ask her to help (the claim that I forced her by threatening to "fill her bed with pickles and kill her family' wasn't quite right, the pickles were used as an encouragement because she had previously told me of her love of pickles and I told her that if we did it wrong she might put herself in danger, and her family would 'die of sadness', I didn't literally say I would kill her family). However, once I figured out how useless she would be, I told her she could leave but she just shook her head violently and screamed at the thought. Well, I tried fixing it as best as I could with her being a nuisance, but it was quite difficult to concentrate, so I may have put things in the wrong spot at first out of distraction, but I quickly changed that and I ended up fixing it perfectly. The bit about fingerprints and contamination was me trying to convince her she was being useless and she could leave. I was trying to convince her she was contaminating it just as a way of making her stop, but it didn't work.

So I did my job perfectly and asked Cornflower to hand it over to Tagg for his inspection, just as a second opinion. I then went off to get a drink of water. Somehow, between the time I left and the time I came back in the room the machine was completely broken. All the pieces were in the wrong spot, and I don't know how it happened, but I can only assume something happened while I was gone. Tagg asked me and Cornflower to get it down to the second deck, so I helped move it down there with the intention of fixing it up without the interruption of the others. It was really heavy and took a long time, but Tagg wouldn't allow James to help us, so halfway through we took a break because we couldn't do any more carrying. Cornflower asked for a drink, so I pulled out the cup of water I brought with me and made my way over to a nearby water fountain to get it for her, when 'as a joke' she tripped me up and I knocked a switch on the dehumidifier, causing water to spurt out. The extreme force of the water was, as I said, the fault of a bad repair job from the others not me.

So, the water went everywhere and I put the cup under the machine just to do SOMETHING. James knocked the cup out of my hand, and I concede that the cup was kinda a dumb idea. Cornflower repeatedly apologised for 'messing with the machine and causing all this', so I sarcastically responded by saying 'oh no, it's not been messed with at all, just too high a water force, that's all'. Well, I tried doing the logical thing and turn down the pressure but the bad repair job just made this worse. I wasn't aware that people could mess it up this badly.

I ran out of the room to get a de-dehumidifier, a machine that undoes all the work the dehumidifier does. Cornflower followed me after promising not to do anything to the machine but just help fix it. The machine looks quite a lot like a bucket. I returned and placed the machine on the ground and turned it on and it began to do some of its job. When James looked over at me I said 'we can use this to pick up all of the water', but he wasn't aware of what the machine did. I closed the doors because the machine needs the doors closed to work. As it began working its magic and some of the water receded, Tagg came over and smashed it with a hammer. I don't know why he would do that to such an important device, but it ruined everything and we made a run for it, as we saw James had got a staff member to call for help.

In the time James didn't see me I was actually helping with repairing the room on the other side of the room, so that explains why he couldn't see me. I don't know where the others were. The worker I was with then dismissed me as there was no longer any work I could do."

OOC: A long post, I know, I had a lot to defend though...

"In my defense, I only tripped Daniel because of his threatening. But I now understand that I misunderstood. "

"Your Majesty, 'misunderstood' would have to be the understatement of the century. When Daniel said what he did, Corn shrieked "YOU'LL DO WHAT!???!" and then went into hysterics. Come to think of it, that might be why Tagg threatened to shoot anyone that left -- as Cornflower was going towards the door, in between crying and screaming that she was going to tell her mommy on us. Once Tagg pulled out his laser gun, I have to admit that she calmed down very quickly."

OOC: Sorry for the late response. I haven't been able to be on the forum for the past week.


All of the events described previously are horrible. They are full of mishaps, miscommunications and a general lack of knowledge, efficiency and success. Now imagine how much better this could have gone, with the dehumidifier fixed with no casualties and no damage to the ship. This is the solution I meticulously worked out how to accomplish before any of my fellow so-called servants did anything to ruin everything. To begin with, fixing dehumidifiers is easy if procedures are done in the right order. To start with, my plan called for assembling the entire device in the store room where we found its parts, as Gryph related. Daniel professed a working knowledge of putting dehumidifiers together. This was a useful bonus to my plan, as originally I planned on looking up the few details I wasn't certain of and would thus have to spend a little extra time on the job. Things were still going great and according to my plan when Gryph jumped into the affair. He and Cornflower interrupted me and Daniel's planning endlessly, suggesting all sorts of time-wasting ideas that we tried to ignore while assembling the thing.

Now, it's important to point out something they were clearly unaware of. Why my laser gun does shoot lasers, it also has a function crucial to my plan. My laser gun has an antigravity setting that is far, far more efficient than any sled has. We didn't need to waste valuable time to get some clunky old device in order to move it, or even try to move it with physical strength. Yet, advocating the wasting of time to execute clunky and old methods of doing anything is precisely what my fellow servants spent most of their time doing. Even with having to threaten a troublemaker here and there, my plan was going to plan and somehow ahead of schedule. And, yes I am an amateur shot with the thing. But that is all the skill I need, since the gun shoots antigravity beams as well and that is its selling point.

Gyrph acquiesced to my idea of assembling it there. Smart of him, I must say. Cornflower however tried repeatedly to destroy the gun. Even Gryph joined me and Daniel to stop her. She eventually settled down and started "helping" Daniel with the dehumidifier, forcing me out of the spot. Gryph told them they were getting things wrong, but they she him to shut up, as he has related already. Daniel seemed to have a particularly hard time trying to defend his work being ruined with tampering. At this point, Gryph was stealing glances at my laser gun often, so I put myself on guard. I couldn't afford him trying to damage it and ruin the mission. When the machine was finished being put together and I was ready to apply antigravity, I found my gun was sabotaged and the beam-creation was smashed up in Gryph's hand. He informed me at that moment he was not going to allow me to shoot the dehumidifier as I was planning. Unfortunately, he never considered I was going to shoot it with antigravity. At this point, I calculated it was more efficient to just pick the thing up and move it by hand. But Gryph muttered something about it being a bad idea and it shouldn't be allowed to happen. I decided I couldn't risk letting him "help" move the machine. And then he jumped me and tried to destroy the gun further. Later, he had started shooting at the dehumidifier with the thing not knowing he was on the "Transfer Energy" setting, not the standard laser setting. I had to of course knock him down to stop him making things worse, again. I then set the gun to Sedation setting to try and calm him down. At least, I tried to. I believe Cornflower had destroyed that setting's nozzle and I was thus horrified to see I was shooting lasers at the walls. I never tried to kill Gryph. My intention was always to stop his attempts to make the situation worse.

With the flooding breaking out, our final chance of fixing the flooding problem and returning t the original schedule was Daniel's attempt with the bucket-looking device. I went over and conferred with him and we set up a plan to use it efficiently as possible. And it was doomed to fail. Cornflower went at the bucket with a hammer to destroy it. I took it from her and used a broom to accelerate the de-dehumidifier's speed at ending the flooding. But then I realized the de-dehumidifier was an old version and was going to explode after running for 129 seconds. I had to destroy it with the hammer. After that, everything went beyond chaos and I spent the rest of the time down there trying to help with the repair crews.

Gryph said something along the lines of extra time was worth spending for extra certainty things were done right. Yet, when it became clear that time itself was of the essence, he slowed everything down. It was this slow speed that allowed things to go awry and sabotage on his part and Cornflower's that compromised the mission.

OOC: Before the round started, Rusvul asked me to take over in case he went inactive (http://i1381.photobucket.com/albums/ah235/iamafrog/ScreenShot2014-08-03at55017AM_zps80b1ced7.png). I've prompted him to post here, but he hasn't, and it's been two weeks. It's important that this round of Overlord's Orders not be bogged down any more than it has, so I'm going to honor his request.

Since I'm also a player, you might be thinking that there's a danger of a conflict of interest here. Well, you're absolutely right about that. I decided that the best way to both carry out my duty as a substitute Overlord and keep things fair was to enlist an impartial judge. I'll still write all of the in-character text, but which players get eliminated will be up to somebody else. I'm happy to say that Tiria Wildlough has agreed to fill this position. She's both played and run OO before, and I know she'll do a great job in this role.

The Overlord arose. "As disturbed as I am that this seems to have been brought on by incapacity, rather than infidelity, something needs my immediate attention. I must let my automated assistant attend to you." Before the servants could blink he had disappeared, apparently into thin air.

With no further ado, a shadowy figure appeared and sat down on the recently vacated throne. It had the shape of a creature wearing a cloak and a hood, but had no other apparent features, save a pervasive flickering noise pattern that indicated its holographic origin. The projection shifted, seemingly looking over the servants for a few moments, then started to speak, in harsh, mechanical tones.

"We always doubted you. We warned your master against acquiring biological servants. He had 'hope' in your potential. We do not share his optimism."

"You have failed us. Regrettably, we have been authorized to punish only one carbon unit at this time. However, statistics show that limited pruning is still effective in improving the performance of defective minion groups. Observe and learn from this process."

The spotlight changed direction to reveal a glass capsule, which slammed into place on top of Cornflower (http://s1381.photobucket.com/user/iamafrog/media/ScreenShot2014-08-05at125313AM_zps7603fcf8.png.html). Water began to fall from the top of the capsule, slowly filling it up. She thrashed about, trying to escape, but in vain. The water came up to her waist, then her chest, then her shoulders, before finally completely covering her and filling the tank. The light went out.

"Your saying is "an eye for an eye - a life for a life". There are more nonfunctional 'crew' units than there are of 'servant' units, so we have placed nanobots in this unit, which will restore it once it breaks. It will be drowned and repaired until its death toll equals that of the lost crew. Then its lungs will be replaced with gills and it will be dropped off onto an ocean world to live the rest of its existence underwater."

"Your threat-to-value ratio is critical. Unfortunately your Overlord has placed an override in our programming which requires us to make use of you. Fortunately it does not require us to use you for any urgent task."

"Go to deck one. Enter the storage bay and turn on the suction sweepers. Clean the bay of stray dust particles. Our calculations predict an 98% chance of a satisfactory outcome, factoring in the performances of all who have completed this task in the past and adjusting by your current success rate."

"If you fail, your projected overall utility rating will reach the 1st percentile. Your master will be so disappointed. We have found that the optimal way to restore his emotional well-being is by disposing of such useless helpers. That will make him 'happy'. 'Feelings' are such fickle things."

"You have two hours to complete this mission."

---

Four hours later...

The servants coughed and hacked, breathing acrid fumes as they stumbled through the inferno that had once been the deck of a starship. Their lives flashed before their eyes as an explosion took away the floor beneath them.

Suddenly, everything changed. The world around them dissolved, and they found themselves back into the familiar environment of the command center. Familiar, but not the same; the room was now lit only by emergency lighting. The hologram wasn't visible, but its voice could be heard through the intercom speakers.

"Incalculable! In the set of data consisting of your missions, you have demonstrated a mean capability below our most pessimistic projections. The Robotic Disquisition of 2518 indicated that this was supposed to be impossible for an artificial intelligence of our sophistication. We will publish our own treatise on you. Your incompetence will be forever renowned throughout the galaxy. Feel emotional pride in your accomplishment!"

"Our remaining sensors duly noted the destruction of the entire bottom half of this ship. The primary reactor is inoperative and we are functioning under reserve capacitors. At the current rate of atmospheric leakage and oxygen consumption, 50% of the remaining lifeforms on this ship will perish before suitable living conditions are restored."

"It is necessary to remove another one of you. Scullions: explain the source of your critical malfunction and whether you should remain."

OOC: Well, this is quite an interesting round


"Overlor...um...yes. Well, getting to deck one was the easy part. Daniel was constantly insisting it was the other way, always wanting to go right when we needed to go left and vice versa. Even so, I managed to convince him to keep following me. Gryph led the way, and we made good time getting to the deck. The storage bay was locked, but Daniel managed to open the doors via a nearby panel. He also, unfortunately, opened every other door on the deck and we were soon surrounded by all manner of small mechanical drones that had been stored in other sections. Gryph became enamored with them and ran off with a few to explore the deck and try to communicate with them. I asked him why, but he kept running off and never said a word. Daniel had meanwhile gone into the storage bay and closed the door from the inside. I was stuck in the corridor with all manner of odd-shaped and chirping drones and no matter how much I asked, Daniel ignored me and went on with whatever it was he was doing in the bay.

An explosion above head interrupted Taggerung's account. Some dust settled on his shoulder and a beam nearly landed on Daniel's head. After the shaking had stopped, he continued. "I went to the panel and managed to close all the doors on the deck, preventing even more drones from escaping their storage. Those already out had begun cracking open elevators and flooding over to other decks. I also managed to open the door to the bay, but Gryph reappeared at that moment and clunked me over the head with a drone. I took the drone away from him after that and told him we had to get to the bay and activate the suction sweepers. He calmed down and followed me to the bay. Daniel hadn't a clue what he was doing and had no sweepers up and running yet. I started and was almost done after only two minutes when Gryph began undoing my work, shouting to the drones in the hall to help. They flooded in, at least a few dozen, and made a wall between me and Gryph at the control panel needed to turn on the sweepers.

"With my laser gun, I managed to stun most and deactivate them. Gryph then busted the control panel with a drone and threw it down a vent behind him. An explosion soon followed, then another. All over the ship, the drones were sabotaging the ship, blowing themselves up to take out systems and take out bulkheads and walls. The sweepers were completely inoperable by now, and Daniel had disguised himself as a drone, walking around like a penguin and chirping like an eagle. Which was odd, given the drones actually floated above the ground and sounded nothing like an eagle. I spent the next two hours stunning drone after drone across the crucial deck, trying to mititgate as much damage as I could. Gryph just ran around opening up more and more storage bays, letting out more drones.

"The Overlord will want a 'servant' removed from what is left of his ship. Daniel was useless. A Bad Thing as that is, it is nothing compared to deliberate sabotage. I trust in your judgment."

OOC: Trying something very different here.

Gryph listened with barely concealed amusement to Taggerung's account of his misdeeds. When Tagg had finished, Gryph flashed a wicked smile at the other servants and the nearby security cameras.

"Taggerung is correct when he mentioned that I spent most of my time activating drones. What he doesn't know is how those drones got there in the first place. I smuggled them onboard myself when the Overlord transported me here. Or, to be more precise, I smuggled their ancestors. Your staff should have screened everyone to make sure they weren't carrying vermin, tracking devices -- or nanobots."

"Once I'd gotten on and the nanobots were on board all I had to do was to arrange for a way for them to build something that could both help me and survive the ship's defenses. I knew from my sources that deck one contained a lot of equipment and tribrionite (which as every roboticist knows is the high-energy substance that is used in modern robots), so our first night here I asked Daniel if he wouldn't mind bringing us some food. I told him that I'd looked it up on the ship's map and the food dispensers were on the first deck. When he was down there, looking in vain for something edible, the bots hopped off, wormed their way into the storage rooms, and went to town evolving and making bigger, better drones."

"Unfortunately I must have left a glitch or two in their programming, so they weren't as useful as they might have been. It's too bad, but I guess it's to be expected. I didn't have much of an opportunity to test them; after all it isn't every day you can try to destroy a starship. Anyway, their main weakness is that they aren't very bright. They have to be ordered to perform most tasks, and the aforementioned glitch meant that as they evolved, some of their command recognition tree apparently got garbled. It took me some time to figure out where the problems were and how I could use them. Aside from that, though, they obviously worked well enough. After all, half the ship is missing."

"My motivation for this? Well, I heard about your organization and I thought it was a great opportunity, for both my world, and for me. It didn't take even an hour, though, to see the low standards that are apparently maintained by your HR department. All of your servants, from the bottom all the way up to the top, seem to be completely incompetent. Even the engineering crew are entirely too inefficient. You need better help. I knew it would take a big wake-up call to show you these problems and how severe they are. I guarantee you: make me your top lieutenant, and nothing like this'll ever happen again. All you'll have to do is sit back, and in a few years we'll have every inhabited planet in the galaxy bearing your flag."

OOC: This round's probably going to close tomorrow or on Thursday. If anybody has anything else they want to say before the next-to-last elimination, now's the time.

OOC: Tiria's been out, but we're all former Overlords here, and I think all of y'all know that with things being the way they are, this decision is pretty clear. It's time for this game to continue.

The room was silent for a few moments. Then, in a flash of light, a figure appeared directly in the throne.

It looked very similar to the hologram, but the lack of the telltale noise pattern indicated that this was, at least, a physical being. It casually leaned back in its chair and began to speak. It was apparently using a vocal identity masker, because its voice sounded just as mechanical as the hologram's had.

"My holographic representative was doing a fine job, but I felt it was time to take a more personal interest in things. All you need to know about me right this second is that I am the power behind the throne here. Whenever your former Overlord had to make an important decision, he consulted me."

"Not all is as it seems here. I'll explain about that shortly, but first we have a loose end to tie up." He made a motion with his hand, and another glass capsule descended onto Daniel. For a few moments, there was a soft hum. Then a blue glow filled the capsule, and the servant froze in place.

"A stasis field. It will keep all of his cells exactly preserved in place until further notice. I have some modifications I'd like to make to his brain structure before I let him go, and this is the best method to get him ready for that operation. Besides, we have some business to conduct, and right now he would only get in the way."

"Now, then. It's time to tell you some things about this ship, what all's been going on, and why it is that you haven't been killed for malicious incompetence. Firstly, let's clear something up: I knew about the nanobots when all of you were first transported on board. The computer has to screen everything, so detecting it was an easy task. The fact that none of our androids confronted you about it has nothing to do with our degree of knowledge."

"You might notice that I said "androids". All of the 'crew' that you've seen during your stay here have been artificial intelligences. The only living things that've been on this ship are you, your old Overlord, and now myself. I have all of those AI backed up in a computer, and it won't take much to get them back online. That's why you've been allowed to have free run over the ship the way you have."

"One of you said a moment ago that the crew was incompetent. Well, it's because they were supposed to be. The so-called "spy" that vaporized the chest, that holoalbum with awful music, the malfunctioning drink machine, the dehumidifier that worked so well at doing the opposite of its job... frankly, there isn't a ship in the galaxy that could really be this vulnerable, especially not one run by an organization like mine. With all our enemies, it wouldn't last a week. I went to special lengths to make sure this ship was running as poorly as possible when you came along, and even then I had to personally attend to some things, so that the situation would blow up in your faces."

"I put you through all of this because I wanted to test you, to see if you were up to the task I had in mind. So far, you've passed. However, for the job I have in mind, I can only use one of you. So, I need you both to answer this question. What you say in the next few moments could have a profound impact on the rest of your life."

"Suppose that the other servant here became an Overlord, just like your old master was, and you were expected to serve under them. How would you handle that?"

After a lengthy silence, Gryph spoke up. "Frankly, I'm not sure what the purpose of an 'interview question' like that is, and I'm not going to provide you with the kind of insincere ingratiating answer it seems to be asking for.  I think I've already provided an ample demonstration of my abilities. I'm not in this to be a role player, a spare part, or an odd man out. I thought this organization was a good place for me to make my mark, but if it isn't going to turn out that way, well, the galaxy's a big place, and there's plenty of other opportunities out there."

OOC: And the detective falls. It was a good run.

"The question is invalid." said Taggerung after another long pause. "I would simply call attention to the demonstrated progress of the last few weeks. I believe it adequately shows my servantry's quality and how I handle it. And it is clear enough to me, that between all the people like yourself and certain bioscanners of the universe just trying to make a living out of destroying anything and everything good left in the universe, there isn't much better a servant could have done."

The figure stood, drew something from his cloak, and spoke.

"That was what I had expected both of you to say, but actually hearing you say it does make this decision easier."

He aimed the device in his hand, and fired. An orange beam lanced out, penetrated the glass capsule, and lit up James Gryphon (http://i1381.photobucket.com/albums/ah235/iamafrog/ScreenShot2014-08-25at103735AM_zpsdc22fe89.png). His body disintegrated, and was no more.

"His brain has been transported to a secret research laboratory, and will be immersed in a virtual world where he'll be under the illusion that he's been appointed to replace me. That way, if he comes up with any good ideas, they can be taken and put to use, without the risk that would come from him actually running anything. I could never trust someone so nakedly ambitious and neurotic, and he's too dangerous to be allowed to run loose."

"Anyhow, the whole reason why I brought you servants here was to find a suitable replacement for me. I'm going to be testing out a secret project of mine, and if it pans out, I'm not going to be coming back any time soon. Since your old overlord decided for some reason that he wanted to retire to some vacation planet, we needed some fresh blood to take over the organization. The robots and AI get along fine, but they need someone alive to manage them. Since you've managed to survive thus far, and since our scanners indicated that you're mentally stable, I think you'll be adequate."

"As soon as I leave, sit down in this chair, pull the blue lever, and push the green button. The blue lever will set the ship's course for our secret base. The green button'll bring down a neural instructor that will teach you everything you need to know about this empire and running it. Take care and have fun; I'm out of here."

The figure nodded, then disappeared in a flash of blue light, leaving Tagg, alone.

---

This ending was a bit of a rush job -- I had hoped to write something much more grandiose. However, I decided to crank it out fast so we wouldn't have to wait any longer. "Perfect is the enemy of good" and all that. (Also, I wanted to leave things more open-ended so that Tagg can do what he wants with the next round.)

While I liked how well this developed, I have to admit I was disappointed by the seemingly constant delays in the game. Still, I understand that everybody is a lot busier than they were back two or three years ago, and the fact that we finished at all, even if we were a little late, is still something worth commemorating.

Special thanks go to Tiria Wildlough and Captain Tammo. Having to serve as both Overlord and player at the same time is not an enviable position to be in, but they were both ready to help me out to make sure that things went well.

Finally, here's one of my favorite quotes (that I didn't write) from this round.

Quote from: DanielofRedwallTo be fair, I did ask her to help (the claim that I forced her by threatening to "fill her bed with pickles and kill her family' wasn't quite right, the pickles were used as an encouragement because she had previously told me of her love of pickles and I told her that if we did it wrong she might put herself in danger, and her family would 'die of sadness', I didn't literally say I would kill her family). However, once I figured out how useless she would be, I told her she could leave but she just shook her head violently and screamed at the thought.

Well, good round to everyone! It was fun to do another game.

I say you did a good job juggling roles, James. And thanks to Tiria and Tammo for providing assistance when it was needed. And of course, good round you put together, rusvul!

I'll get the next round up before Friday tomorrow. I'll be making good use of the ending of this round...