You order the Scouts to fly East to the Botanical Testing Facility, emphasizing the need for stealth above all. Should discovery be imminent, standing orders are left to eliminate witnesses, and then self-destruct via overloading the batteries of the Blasters to eliminate all traces of Kai incursion. After a half-day's flight, the Scouts touch down outside the domed facility, briefly roll in dust to acquire a level of visual camoflage, and make a stealthy approach. After briefly scouting the outside, the Scouts report that there appear to be no Hive attachments, and that the entrance to the facility appears to be unobserved by mechanical devices. They enter, proceeding through the airlock, and find the air inside is very humid. There are indeed living facilities for Humans within, as well as human Environmental Suits, although scent-traces indicate Humans have not come by for at least a month, and that the few who did simply came to replace parts before leaving. The facility is highly automated, with seed banks, auto-cloners, and a wealth of sensory arrays, dedicated to measuring light, soil, moisture, and other conditions. Unable to access the technology, the Scouts are unable to analyze the soils, but it is evident that large amounts of soil have been replaced with soil similar to that You assume would be Human-Planet growing soil, as evidenced by the dark color of it. The investigation continues until night; with the risk of detection being low, You order them to remain in the facility overnight, and if possible to take from the seed banks. There is kudzu, kiwi, potatoes, sprouts, clover, cabbage, lettuce, tomato, radish, quinoa, hops, wheat, seaweeds, algae, mushroom spores, cannabis, papaver, and many other kinds; You assume they have been modified to tolerate the prevalent conditions on the Iron Planet. What these symbols mean, of course, is entirely beyond Your comprehension and concern - probably different varieties of Human Flowers of Life.
Come morning, equipped with soil samples, spores, and seeds, they return back to the Hive, taking slightly longer than before as a result of their burden.
Earlier, You had decided to put off reproduction until the last possible moment, and instead chose to spend the Royal Jelly on the most intelligent of the Pollinators, forcing it to develop traits akin to the Commander, albeit more focused on greater psychic communion with the Flowers of Life. After having ascertained the success of these changes, You ordered the L1 Pollinator to prepare a Dormant Flower and attempt to create a new breed of Flowers that are to the Queen Flower what Commanders are to Queens. Surprisingly enough, this process appears to have been successful, as the individual Flower is larger and more pale than regular Flowers, though not as much as a Queen's Flower. Time will tell if this Flower is capable of producing the needed Nectar; You estimate that should it occur, the production time of Royal Jelly would be shortened by a day. Unfortunately, You are prevented from having the Pollinators begin most of the Pollination, as the Evergreen is not currently Active; You leave standing orders to implement the Surface Evergreen breeding, and the Queen breeding as soon as it becomes possible. In the meantime, the Pollinators begin the process of reproducing the Underground flowers, which are steadily growing used to the lack of light.
In the meantime, You have been busy with bioresearch. First came the analysis of the alien species: the first is an oxygen-breating detrivore gastropod without a shell. The second proves to be a corpse of Human origins, although it does not actually appear to be a Human; instead, it is a larger, knuckle-walking primate that has undergone some amount of gene modification over generations to more closely resemble Humans, mostly in terms of intelligence. The last species is a large avian species from the same planet as the Xenoflora samples. More importantly, however, is the Grub's digestive processes; upon analysis, You find that their gastric juices are more acidic and more is produced than Drones and other stages of development; their internal flora is also more diverse. It would appear that the reduction in pH of more developed Kai is enough to kill off the bacteria within or at least reduce the populations to be inable to digest as much. The Hybrid is doing fine. You note to send a Nurse down to the Deep Hive in lieu of dedicating resources to developing a machine to replicate the Nurse processess, lay an appropriate egg, and have the Tech Drones begin to assemble an additional Synthesizer and Stasis Chamber in the Deep Hive.
Lastly, You order the Soldier to begin upgrading the Rocket Launchers to incorporate Pollen Fuel, both for propulsion and payload. At this, the Soldier finds limited success: the weapon that is created is more like a rocket-propelled grenade than an actual rocket. While it has a greater ammunition capacity, the damage, penetration, and rage are impaired, as well as the launcher itself needing a brief cooldown time before subsequent launches. Unwilling to test the minimum time needed to fire before risking a cook-off, the Soldier presents the weapon to you and the information on it.
Damage: Very High
Penetration: High
Range: High
Accuracy: Explosive
Rate of Fire: Moderately Slow
Ammunition Capacity: 32 RPG's
For some reason, You are beginning to believe that Mars is not the ideal of place to raise Your children, and that it is, in fact, profoundly cold.
Night has fallen on Day 10.
Now what?
3 Scouts (EPS MkII, Pumped Pulse Blaster) (Full, Stimmed) [Home]
SW Geological Facility
NW Geological Facility
E Botanical Testing Facility
SE Outpost
SSE Manufacturing Facility
N Human Hive Ship (Mobile) (Losing Signal)
Fully Independent
1 L1 Queen Kai (B-Caste, Mining-Adapted, Minor Cold Tolerance) (Sated) (Superalloy Heavy Combat Suit MkII, Heavy EMG, Light EMG)
Independent
1 Level 3 Nurse Drone (B-Caste) (Not Hungry)
2 Level 2 Navigation Drones (T-Caste) (Not Hungry)
Intelligent
8 Drones (T-Caste) (Not Hungry)
1 L2 Heavy Soldier (S-Caste) (Superalloy Heavy Combat Suit MkII, HE Autocannon, Pollen RPG)
1 L1 Pollinator
---
4 Soldiers (S-Caste) (Stasis) (Combat Suit MkII)
5 Armored Soldiers (B-Caste) (Stasis) (Combat Suit MkII)
Dependent
16 Pollinators (B-Caste) (Not Hungry)
23 Drones (B-Caste) (Not Hungry)
12 Digging Drones (M-Caste) (Not Hungry)
Unthinking
2 Grubs (B-Caste) (Full)
8 Bore Worms
1 Hybridrone (B-Caste) (Full) (Active.2)
Laid:
20 Scout Eggs (B-Caste)
1 Stalker Egg (B_Caste)
5 Burrowing Soldier Eggs (M-Caste)
1 Spined Predator Egg (M-Caste)
1 Spined Nurse Egg (M-Caste)
---
Unlaid:
10 Burrowing Soldier Eggs (M-Caste)
10 Spined Soldier Eggs (B-Caste)
5 Scout Eggs (B-Caste)
3 Spined Nurse Eggs (M-Caste)
1 Commander Egg (B-Caste)
Weaponry-
1 Queen-Sized Heavy Energy Machine Gun
1 Queen-Sized Light Energy Machine Gun
2 Ship-Based Point Defense Lasers
5 Soldier-Sized Light Energy Machine Guns
10 EMG Batteries
10 Drone-Sized Digging Tools
10 Soldier-Sized Digging Tools
Armory
15 Drone-Sized EPS
Technology/Utility
n/a
Parts/Resources
5 Large Heavy Armor Plates
3 Partially Damaged Xenobiological Samples (Stasis)
Water/Ice
Aluminum
Lithium
Titanium
Gold
Copper
Superalloys
Chromium
Palladium
Universal Elemental Supply (Hydrogen, Helium, Oxygen, Neon, Iron, Nitrogen, Silicon, Magnesium, Sulfur)
Iron Spheres
Large Iron Spheres
Agriculture
6 Dormant Flowers
4 Barrels of Refined Pollen Fuel
Dead:
Dead Mammal-Caste
Dead Avian-Caste
Dead Gastropod-Caste
Food:
3 Flowers of Life
1 StimFlower of Life
1 Hybridrone Flower (Toxic)
1 NectarFlower
Synthetic Food:
4 Units of Synthetic StimFood
Drones - 1/10 of a Unit of Food
Soldiers - 5/10 of a Unit of Food
Levels 1-4 - A Unit of Food
Predator / Nurse / Commander - 1.5 Units Of Food
Queen - 2 Units of Food / Reabsorb 20 Eggs
Level 5 - 3 Units of Food
Your Nest
Location -
HereVisibility - Very Hard To Detect
Heavy Blast Door
- Sensory Arrays
- PD Laser Hallway
- Laser Trap
- Explosive Trap (Minefield)
- Acid Trap
Reinforced Oversized Insulated Hive Chamber
- Sensory Computers
- Climate Control System
- Level 2 Industrial Lab with a Fusion Plant, Climate-Controlled Computer-Aided Design System, Small Atomic Separator, Universal Parts Assembler, Pollen Refinery, Molecular Assembler, Weapons Assembler, and an Armed Suit Assembler
-
Flower Garden with 10 Pollinated Active.2 Flowers of Life (Underground Variant)
Secured Queen's Chamber with 1 Active.1 Queen's Flower
- Level 2 Flower Chamber with 9 Active.1 Flowers of Life and 1 Recovering.2 Evergreen Flower (Optimal)
- Level 2 Flower Chamber with 1 Immature.2 "Princess" Flower of Life
Level 1 Queen's Biolab
Active.1 Hydroponic Spiny Nectar Flower
- Stasis Chamber
- Nursery
Secured Geothermal Bore Hole
- Sensory Arrays
- Secured Mining Tunnels
- Secured Ice Tunnel
- Secured Silicate Aluminum/Lithium Crystal Tunnel
- Chromium/Palladium Salts Tunnel
Sealed Armored Reinforced Hive Chamber
Heavy Blast Doors
- PD Laser Hallway
- Crush Trap
- Explosive Traps
- Level 1 Industrial Lab with a Fusion Plant, Universal Parts Assembler, Pollen Refinery, Molecular Assembler, Weapons Assembler, and an Armed Suit Assembler
Level 2 Reinforced Flower Chamber with 0 Flowers of Life
Level 1 Queen's Biolab
Author
Topic: You Are A Kai Queen, 2.0: Week 3 (Read 56237 times)