Overlord's Orders IX

[Faiyloe]

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

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)     

[James Gryphon]

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.

[Rusvul]

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!

[Taggerung_of_Redwall]

"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.

[James Gryphon]

"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."

[Cornflower MM]

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."

[Rusvul]

OOC: Yes, in fact, I do.

[Taggerung_of_Redwall]

"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."

[Tam and Martin]

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.

[James Gryphon]

"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.

[Tam and Martin]

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.

[Cornflower MM]

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

[Rusvul]

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

[DanielofRedwall]

"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.

[Cornflower MM]

"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.