mA05 – Ingrid Janssen’s Kidnapped Lover

Renji’s Pirate UniWeb Server, Part 1

A Radical Blurb against Mars

It’s hard to tell when the idea for a New Martian Initiative first formed. Sure, the history files will state that after the Settlements Resource War, Didier Moris, son of famed Dr. Etienne Moris, was the first to propose formation of the new monolith of governance in this burgoening world; The Great Auto-Construct was the focus of the plan. A basis of the mechanical military of autonomous mechs, thousands strong and ready for command. One mightily majestic armada. Ready to represent this, ‘new’ Mars.

This information, as the documents may state at Dome Alpha as martian law, is falsified. There was never a Didier Moris, not on Mars, nor anywhere at that. Etienne Moris did move to Mars, but he was the last of his clan. That is the lesser known reality. So what of the defiant symbol versus the galactic frontier that was the Auto-Construct?

The first colonists who discovered such a hard to miss ‘intelligent factory’ can only give sparse recurrences of a time without it embedded in the red planets iron-oxide soil. Heresay and investigation within the domes will yield nothing of the truth. Only by crusing around the surface outside of civilization, will you see the great work created by one of the few bold thinkers who emigrated to the red planet; An artist who was known on Ganymede as Chookoku bequeathed his epic scattering of murals, a series depicting a beautiful meteor shower along large cliffs facing the mecha fortress. The meteors carved bright pink lines through what was then non-purified and weak atmosphere, and as one follows Chookoku’s work, all heavenly objects seem to appear lower and lower until the mighty shadow of New Martian Industry appears before your eyes instead. Not surprisingly, the existence of Chookoku on Mars is faded, even though I, Renji, knew him well.

He was my world.

However, nowadays, anyone would tell you the ‘well known’ origin and dismiss any correlation with the shower of heavenly bodies and the construct itself. After all, it makes more sense for the common people to rally behind the son of a man so crucial to Mars’ expansion as Dr. Moris apparently was. Do not be fooled, there is a message in Chookoku-senpai’s work.

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Drifting in space, the Ultra Violette and pilot seem to be sobbing!

Electronic noise mixed with human tears permeate the cockpit out towards the void of space amidst floating debris from a destroyed convoy vessel. This being the third in a string of assaults against Renji’s interplanetary supply line, actions completely fruitless in the eyes of Ingrid. The tears continue as she considers taking a better option.

“Where are you, Quentin?” she mutters softly, holding her hand out and pressing the palm flat against the monitors cramped together before her eyes. With each destroyed ship, the Ultra Violette pieces together what pre-existing information it can, all signs pointing out towards unknown sectors that seem like garbled bits of data and barely correlate.

What could the space pirate have done with him? Images of the slave line only turn her sobs into outright bawls, knowing Quentins life would be much tougher than even her own experience. Could be involved in internment mining projects, or even cognitive rewriting as a shell-soldier, or worse! This seemed to snap Ingrid’s sense back into focus, the faculties of Ultra Violette syncing with the pilot and returning an ok_ready status. The mech lets out a jet of steam, the moisture changing composition to hail quickly. Here in the frigid grasp of the silent void, everything is at a standstill…

And more importantly, what was she?

Ingrid had seen this side of herself, but it was so long ago. It hadn’t been since growing up near Olympus Mons that she last felt that intense warmth throughout her body, the sense of time and space as a webbed material surrounding her. The moment will always feel brief, but when the world loses its lustre, the events during this consciousness pile up behind her. An hour would only feel like five minutes. She never bothered to talk about it, and as she grew older she learned to lock up the ability into her subconscious. Paired with the others in chains, not a clue where anything she desperately tried to make hers in her life had lept off too. Asking why she had been left behind like a faded bauble, when this feeling came back. She knew what must come next.

No matter how difficult the search, or the price paid by her lover, Ingrid Janssen will stop at nothing to get him back.

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