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 Two Stars are destined to collide. Ryouga and Ephraim, your inexorable path begins here.  Learn and teach. You may now draw Birth Cards.
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May 15, 2021 04:21
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| # ? Jun 9, 2024 21:53 |
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7: You are lucky enough to gain an education - where? In what did you excel? You'd think it was because of my dad, huh? Well, I wasn't. Trust me; my dad didn't do me any favors as a child. Dr. Sakuta Ideguchi had much more important things to work on than his child. He had giant, mechanical weapons to work on. I don't need to go in-depth on my grades. When I was younger, I was seen as a well-rounded child. Sociable, but with good grades, good at sports. I wasn't a class president type, nor was I a slacker. I wasn't a nerd, but I wasn't a jock, either. But yes, that all changed with my... I guess you could call it 'high school,' even if we were less concerned with proms and cliques than we were with tactics and Titans. Ah, yes, the crown jewel of the Terra Federation's military training program: the Lunar Military School. We had a lot of regular classes there. I still learned everyday math, science, language, and the like. And with my previous education, I did well in multiple areas. But the true calling I had found was piloting a Titan. When it came to moving and fighting in that thing, it was like I had found where I had belonged. When I first got into it, I knew that this is what I would do. Yes, the Federation had called a ceasefire before I was even born. But I wasn't going to let this opportunity for my true calling to slip me by.
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May 15, 2021 05:12
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5. You know little of your rival's land. Describe a rumor you've heard. You want to hear about the Terra Federation, kid? Those murderous vipers? Forget it. The Union of Free Systems paid a high cost in blood and resource to be free of them, and as much as we desperately want to be left alone, it's only a matter of time before those rapacious devourers cast aside their 'ceasefire' again and come hunting. Seriously? You're persistent, I'll give you that. Given their brutal aggressive nature, not a lot of verifiable fact has come out of the Sol system, but there's some we were able to glean from the wreckage they left on Proxima Centauri Prime. They're a repressive, monoculture regime who hold Humanity's original home system in an iron grip, the burnt out husk of the homeworld, Mars, the Jovians, the Saturnians. Rumour has it the moon itself has been converted into a vast war factory, the substance of Terra's satellite churned up to make their hellish, murderous war machines they call Titans, with the impressionable youth of well connected inner party faithful bundled off to an indoctrination centre where they are brainwashed into believing they belong at the controls of those murder machines. It's not like the volunteer forces piloting our own JOTUN mechs that are the only thing that stand between the Terra Federation and reclaiming all the systems they still think of as mere colonies.
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May 15, 2021 16:08
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9. You are particularly fond of a certain technique. What is it? Oh, I am proud of this one. So. A Titan's systems all work together in harmony, defense and movement and attack, yada yada. But I had a little ace up my sleeve. I call it the Slipstream Charge. Firstly, I divert my power from my defensive systems as well as my ranged weapons. It all goes into my Titan's melee sidearm and, most importantly, mobility. Titans don't have an average speed-it depends on how heavily armored they are and how they're made to be mobile. But this trick works with almost any kind of Titan... wouldn't know if it could work in a JOTUN, though. So, yeah. Divert all power to mobility and melee strike, and let loose a burst of speed that can easily make a sniper lose my position. I use that maneuverability to get up close and use that speed for a powerful melee strike. It's a hell of a finisher, or if I need to confuse a target, but it does leave me vulnerable. Whenever I let whoever I was teaming up know that I was using it, all eyes had to be on me for a second in case it didn't work out, they anticipated it, or just in case.
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May 15, 2021 19:03
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2. You find yourself in a dangerous situation and need to defend someone. Who? Three Titans, one Jotun. Well, one and a half, given the defensive failsafes, but Orlánd's machine was out of the fight, and needed reminding of the fact if that half was going to see sunset. "Get back to the city," I told him, "Protect the evacuation. You know what just one of these things can do to the civilian population. I'll hold them off, you'll have enough time." I didn't fancy my chances, not one little bit. Apart from the very best pilots, these were one-on-one matchups, and not a guarantee at that. Nonetheless, I levelled my weapons array at the most damaged titan and prepared to sell my life as dearly as I could. "And tell my husband I love him."
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May 15, 2021 21:25
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Jack: Your homeland is particularly known for something. What is it? Well, I guess it would have to depend on what you meant by 'homeland'. Do you mean Japan, or the Terra Federation in general? I could give blindingly obvious answers. Idols. Video games. Titans. Military might. No, I won't elaborate on which come from where. But I'm gonna go with something that means something to me. See, not all Titans are immediately put into work as military weapons. Sure, there are lot of them that are, but there are plenty of civilian models that are used for work-construction, crop harvest, ocean exploration, transportation of heavy goods, etc. LMA training covers not just military work with Titans, but also training for usage out of combat. We are being trained to fight in case the Union does break the ceasefire on their end, naturally, but we're not just soldiers. We're expected to have a life outside of fighting. ...I guess that makes my answer "Titans". A blindingly obvious answer. Heh. Funny how when you try to avoid something you come around to it.
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May 15, 2021 21:45
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10. You are frustrated in your training. What do you do to overcome your issue? We are outgunned Outmanned Outnumbered Outplanned We gotta make an all out stand I'm gonna need a right hand man... - Right Hand Man, Hamilton. It was no use. The disgusting ruin of Terra still had its factories, and Titans just had the edge in sleek design. Jotuns were a product of the diaspora, all the former colonies free of the Sol system, a bootstrapped level of industry that needed time to match the centuries of Terra's development. Still, they had more resources in general at their disposal, pristine worlds. But as it was, early-stage Jotuns, with the best piloting in the worlds, were not a match for Titan designs, stagnant as they tended to be. Every simulation showed up the discrepancy, every exercise, and it was disheartening. "We're really going to have to overengineer these things. Ruggedize them. Titans are slick, fast, flashy. Jotuns have to be robust, able to take everything the Terrans can dish out without flinching, slowing down or being crippled. If we're going to be able to match the imperialist bastards, it has to be through being practically unkillable, with ordinance to match. We can't sacrifice a moon to churn these out, not yet, so every last one we build needs to keep coming home and be easily repairable."
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May 16, 2021 02:11
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6. You are lucky enough to be trained by a master. Who are they? Lucky was right. Only a select few with high grades and good scores in the Titan piloting courses get to be trained under the legendary Garret Udain. Udain was a... well, not a friend, but he knew my father. Apparently, my dad even helped him fine-tune his personal Titan, the Oceanus. But anyway, Garret Udain. A legendary commander, tactician, and, of course, Titan pilot. He was there on the front lines of Pluto when the UFS began their first rebellion. Firstly, as a bodyguard to the diplomats during the early stages when it looked like it might be a clean, easy break with minimal bloodshed, and a firm alliance between two powers. And then, of course, that maniac MacNamara shot one of the councilmen in that terror attack. Udain was at the conference that happened, doing security. It was his fast thinking and commands that kept the attack from going any worse than it did. Didn't stop MacNamara from getting away, but the civilians were kept mostly safe and the building didn't explode like the terrorist's plan was, but still, he did well. He's still got those nerves of steel, an intelligent mind, and a cool head. He calls his training philosophy the Triple Ts: Titans, Tactics, Toughness. How to fight in a giant mechanical weapon. How to command a battle to minimize casualties and maximize chances of victory. And, if all goes wrong, how to hit someone in the solar plexus. I don't know if there is anyone better I could have studied under.
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May 16, 2021 03:10
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3. You disagree with your betters. Do you gain their respect or their disdain, if so, how? I told the fools not to go to Pluto. Classic wag-the-dog from the sick bastards who had their iron grip over the federation. I was too junior at the time to be listened to, no matter how hard I pressed it. How naive we were. To think they might be willing to negotiate in good faith, a clean break, the dangled promise of an alliance. But no. A false flag operation. A Terran agent by the name of Isias MacNamara poisoned his way onto the delegation, a nasty biological agent that seemed like a minor stomach bug until his victims perished in agony weeks after they'd been invalided out of the mission. The biolabs of Titan had a whole bunch of nasty surprises for us of that ilk. Murdered the only earnest peacenik in the Terran delegation in a loud, messy way, let the hawks and warmongers live with surgical precision. The folks who were there said their head of security let him go and then claimed some kind of bomb plot, easy to see the atrocities that don't happen when the propaganda machine was in full flow. The Terrans got the war they wanted, right where they could turn the screw with their superior advantages. Sure, I got a hell of a lot more listened to after the fact, but it was far too late after that disaster. They bloodied our nose plenty more times after that.
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May 16, 2021 03:27
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King: You are not alone in this world - who helped raised you into who you are now? I've said it before and I'll say it again: apart from anything dad did to machines in my life, he was basically a ghost. His relationship with my mother was never strained or in jeopardy-they loved each other. I could hear them giggling and talking like newlyweds throughout my life, calling each other "Sakuta" and "Michiko" back when I thought their names were literally just "Mom" and "Dad". He was just... very busy. So really, all of this? It's on mom. She wasn't perfect-what parent is. But throughout my life, I can't think of anyone who has been more influential to me. She instilled several virtues in me when I was younger. She raised me to value kindness. Courage. Collaboration. Mercy. Yeah, it's cheesy and childish, but I still think they stick with me. I'm not going to shoot unarmed civilians. I'm not going to run away from a fight like a coward and leave allies to die. I'm going to help my teammates, and I know they'll help me, too. And I do want any future between the Alliance and the UFS to be civil. She encouraged my hobbies. When I said I wanted to, quote, "Pilot the machines that dad makes" at the precocious age of 6, she smiled and said that it was a lot of hard work but she thought I could do it. And lastly, she helped me when I was in bad spots. Whenever I had free time at LMS, I made sure to call her. When I was worried about a test, I had made some mistake, or even when I was just stressed, she comforted me. She reminded me that I was smart and kind, and strong. I'm proud to be her son. At least, more than I'm proud to be Sakuta's son, at least.
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May 16, 2021 03:43
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Ace: Despite your youth, you have a particular talent that has drawn a good deal of attention from your betters. What is it? You want to know why I got fast-tracked? Why I was in a position to offer advice on the doomed pluto peace talks despite how young I was at the time? I'm a pattern-seer. Deductive reasoning, the capacity to grok, call it what you will, but my mind can join the dots fast, and with an extraordinarily high success rate. Little things that add up into the shadow of the big picture. Fault lines in design philosophies that will lead to defeat. Evidence of enemy activity and hostile ill intent. Hell, even which bits to shoot off a full triad of Titans to ensure you survive and they don't, even if it costs you a few bits in the process. And yes, it works just fine with this eye, too. That's why they listen, nowadays. That's why they act. Me, and those like me, because I sure as hell wasn't going to be a single point of failure, are one of the reasons we're still in with a shot at long term freedom, despite all the heinous things the Terrans are doing. Did you know they're deliberately encouraging fathers to be distant, uncaring, uninvolved? Harms the psyche of their children, never good enough for them, makes them strive, try to overachieve, try too hard. Makes them pliant, eager to find accepting authority figures who will take them in, eager to impress in the fields they are led to, to spite their fathers. The father is sacrificed, the fatherland prevails. Sickening.
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May 16, 2021 10:23
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8: You have a negative experience. Who do you turn to for comfort? loving Alex. It was just a training exercise, you weren't supposed to do that! It was a mock fight in Titans. Alex must have been soooooooooooooooooooooooooo desperate to win that he'd pull a dirty trick and attack directly where I was inside my practice Titan. I didn't get any bones broken, or the like. But the shock gave me a concussion, and there was a lot of bruising. I was in the hospital for at least a week. Couldn't look at screens or paper the whole time. After a mom call, I mostly just settled into napping, taking painkillers, eating and sleeping, with occasional check-ins from friends. Udain said he'd lay into Alex, and from what I can tell, he did-he never bothered me again. Casual friends dropped in to say high, some got flowers. It was Rita who was the best. She was also in Udain's classes, just like me. Every day when she had a free moment she came in to talk about what had happened. It was good that someone was there, aside from my mom, who was the boundary of space away, and dad, who might have been closer but was much busier (even if when he heard about it he did, shockingly, call me). But Rita made the blur of nap-eat-take-pill-sleep much better. It was good to know what was happening. I felt like I could trust her. I had plenty in the past, when we were training and doing Titan work, but that was when I knew: If I had the luxury of getting to decide my squad, Rita would be in it, no doubt.
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May 16, 2021 19:12
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Queen: You find something unusual on your travels. What is it? It was a training run, out on Barnard's Star Secundus. A colony in the truest sense of the word, with a cadre of Jotuns onworld to hold the fort until the forces on Primus could traverse in-system should the Terrans attack. Anyway, running that cadre through its paces was the closest thing to R and R on offer after I ended up needing a bunch of replacement parts, and served as a perfect shakedown cruise. So, a live fire exercise far from any of the settlements, in a field of massive, house sized boulders scattered about like the building blocks of some toddler god. There we were, dodging between them in gigantic, stompy war machines, when I called a halt to proceedings. See, what with us dodging, occasionally successfully, those boulders were getting hit, but they weren't really getting damaged. When the scenery is taking less damage than a Jotun, you sit up and take notice. Full spectrum analysis, field tests, plenty of science later, and we realized what we had stumbled into was what was going to be called Duralloy when we worked out how to harvest, synthesize and shape it. It changed everything.
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May 16, 2021 23:03
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4: You spend a peaceful day exploring your homeland. Describe it. So, we get brief holidays. Enough to visit our homes for about a week. I asked Rita if she wanted to come (as well as some other friends), but she had plans. So I went back to Tokyo to see my mom after a long time. There was a lot of catching up, a lot of home cooking. But one of my days I had decided I was just going to walk around the city and see what had been happening while I was gone. Akihabara was my first stop. I checked out the new manga coming out, made a few purchases for the long ride back to LMA (thank god the moon-to-earth trip was accounted for so I didn't have only 1 days with Mom. ) relating to new games and manga. I was starting to outgrow some stuff so Shibuya was the next stop as I went clothing shopping. Made sure it was all within casual wear regulations, but I still think it looked good. In a fit of nostalgia I watched a live show for that Hyper Dragon X series I remembered liking as a child. Was kind of weird to be one of the few teenagers in a crowd of mostly little kids and their parents, but I will admit I got into it... "I'll show you the power of the Courage Flame, evildoers! MAGNIFICENT PYRO BLAST!" Went to the batting cages. I had played baseball in middle school as a hobby but dropped it given that it wouldn't work with the moon's gravity. It was nice to get back into the 'swing' of things. My last stop was to Tokyo Tower, just to see the top again. Some views are still breathtaking. It was a good day. I'm glad I was able to just relax and walk around once again.
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May 16, 2021 23:29
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Two Stars draw nearer. Ryouga and Ephraim, path continues.  Grow and inspire. You may now draw Inspiral Cards.
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May 17, 2021 02:08
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5. What keeps you going? What do you fight for? I fight for love. I love my home, our steading on Alpha Centauri Tertius. Not that I get to see it all that often. I love our nation, the Union of Free Systems. ProximaCent, AlphaCent, Barnard's, Tau Ceti, Trappist, Sirius, Luyten, Kapetyn, Epsilon Eradini, Epsilon Indi, so many others. Humanity coming together, free of the shackles of the past. I love my husband, and our family. I will do anything to keep them safe. Make any sacrifice. I've proven that already.
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May 17, 2021 09:29
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Ace: Your homeland has changed since your youth - for better, or for worse? To say that things have been growing tenser would be an understatement. To be fair, we are far away enough from the border at Earth and the moon that we wouldn't have to worry about outright war breaking out right on here. And the ceasefire is still holding. But every day, it feels like the governments are passing more laws about Titans, finding new things out about the UFS, hearing a new rumor about MacNamara's weird personal little cult somewhere all the way off in the Sagittarius system. There is still a superficial sheen to all of it. Soap operas and animes and video games are still getting made, people are still doing their job. But there's a dark shadow hanging over the whole affair, despair, fear, anxiety. We know that something is gonna happen, soon. I hope that it doesn't, but I'm preparing that it will.
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May 17, 2021 20:51
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Jack: Your very existence causes disruption in the established social order. How? That's pattern-seeing for you. If it's any consolation, we saw it coming and did what we could to ease the transition. Some of our number needed fast-tracked into advisory roles, officer roles, as fast as possible. Testing for those similarly gifted. Once we were in position, we were able to trim the dead weight, get hindrances reassigned somewhere useful, keep them happy and onside enough to forestall the problems they would otherwise be causing. We revolutionized the Union, streamlined it, made it so much better organized. We needed to, as well. The Terrans were not shy in trying to sneak in false flag operatives, the spawn of the long gone MacNamara. We rooted them out quickly and efficiently, though that probably won't stop the Terran propaganda machine using their ghosts as scapegoats. They have no shame.
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May 18, 2021 04:14
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King: What is your absolute favorite place? Inside of ol' Hyperion. I mean, I had it custom-made for me. Not only does it fit my fighting style and my skills, it's also comfortable on the inside (without sacrificing any efficiency. I'm not one of those gaudy types who would make the seat, like, encrusted with diamonds or whatever.). It's practical, it's comfortable, it's strong, it's protective, and it's got good storage space for long trips between planets. It's even got a second seat. That's usually rare for a Titan. For combat, that's for a secondary pilot. I focus on movement, keeping an eye on the enemy, deciding how to move, etc. but my partner (Usually Rita, but sometimes Claude or Mayuri step in when she's busy) can keep an eye on my energy, make sure that there's nobody sneaking up behind for a sneak attack, activate a secondary weapon, and, if I'm knocked out or the like, they can assume control.
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May 18, 2021 04:23
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Two: Your opponent’s homeland is well known to you by now - what do you think of it? The Sol System deserved better than the bastards that pollute it. It was true, the moon a stripmined factory and indoctrination camp. The Jovians and Saturnians practically enslaved, on a much tighter yoke. Mars, the Venusian sky cities and the vile rotting carbuncle that birthed humanity dominating the rest. Oppression is everywhere, an ocean of it, subjugators planning to impose their will everywhere they can reach. This pernicious cancer has thankfully been kept within the bounds of Sol, for now. I wish we could free them all, but we must see to our own homes and defending them first.
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May 18, 2021 04:38
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3: You encounter someone you met in your youth - how have they changed for the better (or the worse) since you met them? I gotta say, I'm glad that he saw the error of his ways. Alex really was straightened out by Udain. While I was doing my Sol Tour, checking out the various planets to see where I fit in, I found Alex on Neptune. Pluto, after the incident, basically became a no man's land, so Neptune is technically the outer edge of the Terra Federation. Alex, when he recognized me, immediately went to apologize for what he'd done. I had put it behind me, mostly because I had sort of forgotten it. But Alex was inclusive and slightly retreating whenever we interacted. I don't think he was scared of me, more that I reminded him of what Udain put him through as penitance. It was all under the bridge for me. I told Alex that I'd remember him if and when I got a chance to put together a team, and he smiled and thanked me for thinking of him.
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May 18, 2021 04:47
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Queen: What is something the common people have come to associate with you? Hope. Hope that we can remain free despite Terran aggression. Hope that our forces will be successful when we are attacked. Hope that Terran double agents will be taken out before they can carry on harming our people. Hope that our cities will not be crushed beneath Titan heels. It's not an easy thing to bear. I'm not infallible, none of us are. We know what those pernicious vipers are capable of, and that they're willing to invade at the drop of a hat or reconquer by any means. So, I have to get it right, every time. make it right, every time. Whatever the costs.
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May 18, 2021 12:35
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8: It's been a long time since you started down this path. How have you improved? I've certainly been growing. There's the simple stuff-my reaction time is improving, I've gotten more aware of how to fight in zero gravity, etc. Hyperion certain is a step up. Building around Slipstream Charge certainly made it more impactful. Hyperion can handle high speeds better, it can use that boost for longer, it's got a stronger melee weapon so it hits harder. But to be honest... I think my greatest area in improvement is my mindset. I don't see Slipstream Charge as a be-all-end-all fight ender like it used to be. Udain helped me realize what its flaws were: that it left me open and forced the whole team to focus on me and that while its first usage against a foe certainly can surprise them, once they know it's coming it easier to block against. Slipstream Charge is still a good way to end a fight quickly and decisively. It's just not a perfect one.
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May 18, 2021 20:10
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9: You have been honoured for your achievements. How? The medals are an irrelevance, good PR but they are a fiat currency of respect with nothing backing them. The higher honour is to be listened to, to have my recommendations taken on board, to have policy shifted, courses corrected. The greatest honour is the consequence of all that. Lives saved. Worlds improved. Technology advanced. Legions of robust Jotuns clad in Duralloy on each world, vigilant for Terran incursions. To be a part of the thriving of our people, that is what matters to me, that is the greatest reward.
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May 19, 2021 05:35
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10: You gain a petty foe in your homeland. What happened? My status as Sakuta Ideguchi's son is notable, but we're not really a 'military' family. I got where I did through skill, not blood. Which, naturally, pisses off some old money/military family types. This military brat... what was his name... Klein... Keith..., Klaus, that was it. He comes from this veteran family who was there setting up bases on other planets and exploring the galaxy and he wants to be a great soldier defending the Terra Federation from those, quote, "anarchistic fools calling themselves a Union". He's stupid. He's probably gonna get assigned to Earth Defense. But he's annoying, and he's always trying to challenge me to Titan duels to see that his 'illustrious bloodline proves his worth' or whatever nonsense he's dribbling on about. It's easier to just ignore him.
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May 20, 2021 00:46
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7. You find a brief pause in your busy life for a meal. What do you eat? A breather, a break, some rest and relaxation time. I could see where things were going to go if I didn't have the chance to unwind, so I went home. Alpha Centauri Tertius. The third habitable world of the Alpha Centauri binary, still new, rough around the edges. That was part of its charm, and why our steading was here. My husband greeted me with open arms, and the delicious smell of a vegetable chowder on the stove. My husband is a terrible cook. The food was almost unpalatably burnt, and it somehow managed to be both overspiced and bland simultaneously. I didn't care, and ate everything he gave me. It's good to be home.
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May 20, 2021 13:24
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4: An individual wronged by your Rival tells their story. What is it? I didn't hear about it firsthand. I was informed of it through channels. We get a few defectors from the Union every year or two. They usually don't say much that we don't already know, aside from minor updates on a new civil war or the like. This one, though, had military experience. The one thing that stuck out to me (his name was Kai Legarno, btw) was his descriptions of one man. Commandant Ephraim Zeichenfilm. Just the name intimidates you, doesn't it? But it ain't got nothing on his epithets. "Steel Hellhound." "Red Reaper.". "Black Thunderbolt." I've heard about him in passing from minor intelligence. He discovered that disgustingly tough metal that Jotuns are now made of, Duralloy. He's loyal, tough. He's a good pilot. But Kai's report confirms what I suspected. He is a fanatic towards what the Union 'stands for'. And his fanaticism is backed up by what Kai calls an oracle's vision. His foresight, his precision, his analysis of enemy formations, his ability to connect the past to the present, and what he wants to accomplish to what he needs to do, leads some to call him a prophet. Kai was one of the men who was 'trained' by him on Barnard's Star, the planet Secundus. Kai saw him lay into the soldiers. He didn't harm them, but he yelled and screamed and preached fire and annihilation. To Ephraim, the Union is constantly under threat by attacks from the Federation. And more and more, people buy into his delusions. Kai kept his head down until he could fine a good opportunity to flee. I only hope that when peace comes and we can join hands once again, he will be able to be convinced.
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May 21, 2021 06:19
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6. You've heard of your rival by now. What do you know (Or think you know) about them? We desperately needed intel on the enemy, and to keep them on the back foot on our own capabilities. So, we sent in a trickle of our best intelligencers and a few sleeper agents across the border, trusting to Terran hubris to accept that Union folk would genuinely want to return, feed them a bunch of self-evident information, stuff their own moles had already sent, a few wild goose chases like civil wars in distant systems that remained in peace and harmony. But the biggest prize we sent was information on one of our highest value assets, namely myself. With currency like that, we could get our people in with the biggest up and comers the Terrans had, under the guise of briefing them on a new threat. We couldn't give them the truth, of course. I instructed Kai Legarno, one of our brightest and best double agents, to feed them a bunch of guff, make me sound like a paranoid fanatic, a cult leader, someone who raises his voice early and often, who rants and raves. Throw in a bunch of suitably threatening epithets agreed on beforehand with the intelligence corps to help paint the false picture we want to present. Someone easy to file away and dismiss whilst still enough of a plausible threat to give them pause, all the while staying well away from my actual value to the Union save in the broadest strokes and most undeniable truths, good pilot, found duralloy, that sort of thing. It worked like a charm. He got in there, sold the debrief like the professional he was, and started soaking up intel for us. Take this bright spark of a Titan pilot: Ryouga Ideguchi Son of Michiko and Sakuta Ideguchi Indoctrinated at the Lunar military school, trained under Garret Udain. Hospitalised with concussion in a training incident. Cadet responsible chastised, sent to Neptune. Current Titan: Hyperion. Model built around a singular maneuver, 'Slipstream Charge', detailed in appendix A, appropriate counterstrategies in appendix B. High speed, extended boost, heavy melee attachment. Secondary seat, known copilots Rita, Claude and Mayuri, see appendix C. Sakuta Ideguchi is well renowned. Ryouga likes to claim he advanced by skill rather than family connections, potential psychological weak point reinforced by 'forsake the father for the sake of the fatherland' doctrine. Hobbies: Games, Manga, Anime, Baseball.
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May 21, 2021 17:14
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Two Stars draw within sight, their gravity tearing at the world.. Ryouga and Ephraim, your inexorable path continues.  Approach and scout. You may now draw Coalescence Cards.
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May 21, 2021 23:29
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8: Who is your Rival's greatest ally? While Kai's debrief was useful, we had already heard of Ephraim beforehand. One doesn't rise up those ranks that quickly and stay quiet. Ephraim may have discovered Duralloy, but he wasn't the one who put it to use. He was a soldier, not a scientist or an engineer. Luckily, he had one on hand. Olivia Raqion. She was a military scientist, skilled with building Jotuns and upgrading them. They say before Duralloy, she was the one working on making them more durable, tougher, easier to use, more easy-to-repair. And then, of course, that new alloy came in. The tough big ones got even tougher, and even the fast but fragile models could be shockingly durable. And then, of course, she's the one responsible for his Jotun unit. Loki. She repairs it, she upgrades it, she keeps it running smoothly. I'm almost impressed by her resume. My father even mentioned she might be his equal in some respects.
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May 22, 2021 00:09
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3: What led you down the path you take today? I have always said I was in this for love, and that's as true today as it always has been. I took great pains to make sure I wasn't a single point of failure, getting other pattern seers in the right places. But that doesn't change the unavoidable fact that I have a single point of failure. My husband is my rock and my anchor, my joy and my laughter, my world, my system, my galaxy. losing him would destroy me, more so than anything else. So, we took precautions. Project Olivia. A super genius engineer, a miracle worker, my strong right hand. The lynchpin of my successes. The designer and maintainer of my personal Jotun, and the brilliant mind behind so many of our designs. Mostly a work of fiction: Jotuns aren't custom-built the way Titans are, but modular around central designs for easy repair and maintenance, I could get shot out of one Jotun and be back in another in the time it could take to reach a spare. It was my husband's idea to have my 'personal Jotun' called Loki, to fit in with the whole fanatical firebrand ethos, a crazy lying god for a crazy lying prophet. So, the work of a great many people, my husband included, gets lumped together into this fantastical superperson who just happens to have their office right where nothing particularly important actually is. A decoy and alias, to disguise and protect my greatest ally, the man I gladly give my life to, my husband. I follow him down this path today, towards our garden during a brief sojourn home. We're going to be picking vegetables together, he's going to ruin them in the kitchen, and we will happily eat together and pretend he didn't. It will be wonderful.
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May 22, 2021 00:43
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4: The world grows worse. What has reached your ears? Both the Federation and the Union are tense. The ceasefire is still holding, but it feels like it could give out at any minute. Children are taught to run for shelters when an alarm rings. There are apps on personal comm devices to report suspicious activity. There's still that plastic, superficial sheen. Hyper Dragon X shows still play. But every day it feels like that veneer is going to be ripped off. I thought. I hoped. I wished. That we could see things each other's ways. We could negotiate, pay reparations, and everything would be okay. Union and Federation working in harmony to explore deeper space, find new planets. That Titans would become for industrial and exploration uses, maybe with battles becoming a sport. That everything would resolve with cooperation and kindness and love winning out. Now that feels like a childish, naive dream. I still want it to happen... but there's a feeling in my stomach that grows larger every day. Something I can't deny, despite all of the minor good news I hear. "War is inevitable."
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May 22, 2021 01:03
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King: Your Rival, what do you think of them, truly? Ryouga Ideguchi? Not much. They're a Titan pilot, good enough at their job by Terran standards to be retained. No real political or societal impact. If they were killed tomorrow, the next Titan pilot in line could be reassigned to do what they do easily enough. Not a priority unless and until their Titan is sent into Union territory in which case standard Titan removal protocols apply.
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May 22, 2021 12:45
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7: Describe the unseen aftermath of one of your Rival's great victories. Are you aware of something called "The Shot Heard 'Round The World"? For context's sake: It's referred to in two contexts, and I refer to the first one. There was a sound of a loud gunshot, or something similar to it, that, rang out on April 19th, 1775, at the American cities of Lexington and Concord, at the beginning of what they called the Revolutionary War. The thing is, we don't know what caused it. We don't know if the British shot first, or the Americans did, or if it was an unrelated sound. But that sound was interpreted by both sides as a gunshot. And then, fighting broke out. I bring it up because we are still not sure what happened to Sirius. I've heard reports that they struck first. I've heard some reports that it was a preemptive strike on our end. For all we know, a generator could have puttered out in a loud way and started it. But he was there. Ephraim was on Sirius. And he led the Union's forces. I've seen the reports. It was a bloodbath. His tactics were flawless. He knew what we were going to do. He knew how to counter them. I'm not sure if he's a prophet, but he is certainly very perceptive and has good foresight. I'll give him credit. He did manage to avoid major, intentional civilian damages or casualties. War means that not ever life can be saved, of course, and some of those idiots on our end went off half-cocked, but he did his best. But... well, you need only look at the damages done to Basset's industrial district. Ruined factories, crushed under the weight of Titans and Jotuns as they brawled in the streets and skies. Evacuated, yes. But people are going to be out of work for days, and turning 'rebuilding them' into a job only goes so much. It goes to show that the Union's politicians and generals don't care about the people they nominally rule and represent. They sit on ivory towers, moving military people like chess pieces, not noticing the little people crushed on the black and white squares. Ephraim included.
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May 28, 2021 07:06
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2:Your Rival somehow knows something about your past that you'd rather keep hidden. What is it? The Terran bastards struck our world of Sirius Prime, bringing war and shattering the ceasefire, Titans crushing homes and factories underfoot almost as fast as we could evacuate them. Basset is a desolation, homes, livelihoods jobs ruined, and all for the sake of Terran greed, Terran ambition, striking at a Union world that long rejected their perfidious ways. We fought them to a standstill, and stalemate invasions are a loss for the invader. It was during the rebuilding effort, Jotuns doing their best to stand in for the cranes and bulldozers to replace the lost capability in short order, that we made the chilling discovery, a carefully looted data center that had contained a backup of among other things, the Sirian census and citizen registry. If they examine what they have, tucked away in the exabytes of data, they will find details of the birth, emigration and marriage of one Sirian native in particular. They have my Husband's details, linked to my name.
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May 28, 2021 11:49
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Queen: How have you improved the world by your actions? I wouldn't say that much, heh, but... okay, you asked. Hyperion's dual-pilot system was at least partially a prototype, a test run. It had been done before but this was the first one that actually saw field use. And me and Rita (or occasionally Claude or Mayuri) made an excellent tag-team in it. Ever since that, production and training have started for generic two-person models of Titan. With good teamwork, a "Dual Titan" can vastly outperform a "Solo Titan" in relevant areas. Duties can be split to multitask, one person can react at the moment while another formulates a plan, etc. Dad has apparently been wanting to try this system for a while, and with my output, he had the data to put it into mass production. I'm glad it helped him... even if it keeps him busy. And the thing is about Dual Titans... it might be just in my head, but I feel like pilots are more connected with each other. It almost feels like a telepathic link. It's not, we still need to use words and gestures, but it feels like two souls fighting as one. A connection that drives our abilities upward. There's a word for this... Camaraderie. Well, actually, with Rita, it feels like... a little more. But it's not just me. I've heard from other Dual Titan pilots and they agree that fighting in sync with someone they trust makes them feel invincible. Titans aren't our only weapons. Our bonds are our strength.
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Jun 1, 2021 03:20
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5. Someone you know has been impacted by your rival's works. Who, and how? ProxCent drew the short straw this time. A brutal chevauchee by Terran Dual Titans on Proxima Centauri Secundus, cause damage, steal info and resources, jump back to Sol before the reinforcements from ProxCent Prime or out of system could evict them. Among the casualties was Dr. Luisa Gorman, a brilliant pediatrician and an old schoolfriend who perished when her hospital was targeted for a surprise strike, the double-piloted terror machines making short work of the civilian neighbourhood before they could evacuate. With two controllers in perfect sync, these latest monsters were able to complete their missions before we could intercept, speed of thought, action and coordination proving decisive in their murderous intrusion. Our sources say Ryouga Ideguchi is the name inextricably linked with this pernicious new design. I'll keep an eye out for him in future.
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Jun 1, 2021 07:49
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6: Where is somewhere you absolutely do not want to confront your Rival and why? This one is purely logical and rational: Anywhere with high gravity, but especially not Libra Beta. Hyperion is light, fast, and agile, and while there is only a slight downgrade in those parameters on planets with roughly Earth-like gravity, in places like that, where the gravity is still low enough for humanity to live on without being crushed but still noticeably heavier, that could be a problem. Slipstream Charge would probably not even work. Hyperion isn't totally useless in those environments but I'd be at a severe disadvantage, and I wouldn't like it.
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Jun 6, 2021 16:06
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Jack: You spread a rumour about your rival. What is it? We had to discredit the Dual Titan tech: It was useful, it was clever, it was effective. So, we got word to our agents in Sol to implement a disinformation campaign, faking reports filed by Dual Titan pilots who had since lost their lives. The reports claimed mental transfer of intimate details from the copilot to the main pilot, as well as indecent flashes of Rita, Claude and Mayuri, Ryouga's known copilots. We had the paper trail set up to make it look like the entire Dual Titan concept was a means for Ryouga to illicitly, intrusively and illegally interact with his copilots, recording their most compromising thoughts for his own amusement without their knowledge or consent. It was a bit of a long shot, but the scandal potential could be very damaging, and sowing doubt and mistrust between Ryouga and his copilots or between Titan pilots and the Dual Titan system in general was a useful and worthy goal that would hopefully prevent any further ProxCent style massacres.
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Jun 6, 2021 21:24
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| # ? Jun 9, 2024 21:53 |
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Ace: Who amongst your followers and acquaintances would most easily be swayed by your Rival and why? Dispelling those rumors is a waste of time. The facts will sort out the truth. I trust Rita, Claude, and Mayuri to back me up because they're competent and we're friends. We're friends because we were in the same class in school. We were in the same class in school because we were competent. And we outperform in Hyperion than we would in individual Titans. Thinking back to my classes, I'm reminded of one of Alex's 'friends'. Alex himself got straightened out because it was his idea and he actually did what gave me that concussion, but Ivan was the one who set it up by distracting me. Ivan was always kind of a... toadie. He was the gopher of their little bully circle, the snack provider, the errand boy. And he seemed to... like it? He was smart enough to get into the class, but he didn't really have a... vision. He liked following people. He liked not having to think too much. Ivan disappeared after school. That's not rare for LMS graduates, but I wonder where he ended up.
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Jun 9, 2021 05:05
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