THE JUMPGATE DEFINITIVE GUIDE - Tripod

almost like him. Until he acts like a stingy Sol with only 50 credits to rub
together. Jerk. So! Welcome to my lovely digital family. Heh. Yay.
So, basically, I have a top-of the line AI in every ship I fly, with a central
database that updates every version to each other every 30 seconds. Cool stuff. I
never get hacked either. HA! A shot in the arm for security. What are the odds of
getting hacked with 12 advanced AI's and an artifact Amananth contruct riding herd
on my system defense? Not bloody likely, says I. God, I need to stop rambling. You
try writing with people talking to you inside your head. Bloody distracting. I get a
real-time spell-checker for my trouble though. Bloody whoopee. I think I'm rambling
again. I suspect by this point, I'm doing it solely to piss off Aristotle, too. So
humor me? He's funny when he gets upset. He splutters. I'm sure you have never heard
an AI splutter - but trust me - it's hilarious.
So. Here I am, trying to ride herd on a 3 toed monkey of a programmer that's
updating the command center, right? I get that straightened out. I tell him - "you
need to pull the data from *this* database, not the bloody personnel files. Not
everyone wants to read bogomips' duty log, k? We all know she can kill hordes of
flux with two hands tied behind her back, and that the triple phocs are just, oh, so
boring, anymore. That's nice. But you know what, Mr. 3 toed monkey programmer? That
does *not* go on the front page of the feed. Know what I mean?" Programmers. Can't
do a damn thing with them. So, that emergency taken care of, I go back to work on
paperwork. Tons of paperwork. I need a clone, Jeeves. Send him right over, and be a
good chap, what? I wish. Paperwork. I have to fly, too. Cool beans. So, having
shrunk the Cinatai mountain peak of paperwork down to mere hillock size, I go over
my personal nest egg. Investments, supplies, procurement, systems functionality
checks, financial briefs. The works. Ah, the wonders of joining the "high-speed"
world of interstellar commerce. I own a Solrain shipping firm supplying the stations
- not one of the big jobbies - just a small independent outfit that was looking for
an out-faction backer. Seems they ran into some problems with overhead and the
vaunted Solrain beauracracy was about to dump them on their ear. I bailed them out,
and they get to wave the flag of "neutral, un-aligned shipping". I make bloody well
sure they *stay* neutral, too. Factionalism is a headache I have no desire to tangle
with. Patriotic? Sure. Blindly serving your fction's interests at the expense of the
Reconstrruction? Nah. Don't get me wrong. I have nothing against Factionalism. But
to each his own. There's plenty of em going around. Somebody has to be bloody
neutral, or inter-factional commerce would grind to a halt, eventually. Your eyes
are glazing over, Ensign. Ah, an Oct. Good man. Carry on.
Where was I? Oh yes. Finances taken care of. Now for a little personal time. Tend to
my artifact hoard, sell the pieces I'm not intending on using. Assemble the pieces I
need for a truly badass ship. All I'm missing is an AB-4, now. Eh, it'll come.
That's a side business, if a lucrative one. I'm not flashy. I don't hang out my
shingle. Not a bit. I get everything I want - and sell whatever's left over. Or I
buy cheap, sell high. Whatever. I made enough to get comfortable on. That's about
it. The rest is going towards my next project. A station. An eight-module hummer.
Want to hear about it? Too bad. Cause I don't know a damn thing about the buggers
yet. I know what everyone else knows - except the people that field tested em.
Bastards. Oh well. Bugger em. I'll get mine too. I'm just tired of living on the
fly. GBS is as close to a home as I have. Even that isn't the same though. I'm
stealing my flight crew from there, though. Bwahahaha. I might hire away that junior
dispatcher, too. He's got a good handle on traffic, from what I've seen. He bought
me a drink after the Battle of GBS, too. Good guy. Night bartender might move, also.
We are seriously going to rape GBS of staff. Oh well. Let ISU hire some new ones.
They've about taken over the bloody place by now anyway. Our whole old guard will
ship over to our POS network when it comes online. Hope ISU realizes that, and is
starting to look for new hires. Hell, I might help em. I still want to stop by the
old stomping ground occasionally.
So, now that I've introduced myself, and gave you a little taste of the life. Well,
my life isn't exactly the "standard". I'll tell you that up front. I'm ummm...
flamboyant? But hey, welcome to the life of your eccentric Air Group Commander - in
our parlance? The CAG. That rambling introduction was a bit of briefing, a bit of
F-3
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