\\– EMERALD COMBINE GUILD –\\
\\– Adaptive COSM Education Net… ONLINE –\\
\\– initiating final prepartory tutorial… –\\
\\– higher accuracy historical data received… UPDATING DATABASE –\\
\\– displaying tutorial text summary… –\\
Morning, sleepyhead….
Adapt, overcome, endure, survive. These are the only rules. They have always been and they will always be. Every single thing must either obey these rules or they are lost. Simple. Well bubbi, your it, your our attempt at staying in this game. We’ve know the rules all along, but that isn’t always enough, but at least it gives us a bit of a edge.
Well, you should at least be told what’s going on, bubbi. Knowledge is power and all that flarg. Short version, some star that we call Diantos decided that it really wanted to check out what was going on over on our end of the galaxy. Unfortunately, we already had a star, Malkari, and a mighty jealous one at that. That decided to have a little tussle over who would be in charge, which just happened to destroy the planets that our race lived on. Most species have thrown in the towel at that, but it takes more than that to snuff out the likes of us. The way I see it, the planets weren’t following the rules, so they lost. We, on the other hand, had a few tricks in our bag.
Some lucky snoogers got to ride this Ark thing outta here before the “fued” hit full—
\\– EDIT… Reference new data store “A Brief History of Malkari”, paper copy included –\\
—what you are here for. You are our winning ticket, our shinning hope, so to say. But there is a hitch; you aren’t the only one left. Like all our great acts of genius, everyone else has tried to claim it as their own and hitch a ride on our coattails. But you say “Hey, these snoogers are my brothers, why don’t we just all work together and make sure that we all survive.” Well bubbi, it ain’t that easy. See, most of the snoogers that are left are touched in the head, to be polite. It was their bumbling that got us where we are now. I mean, would the Guilds have formed if the Gores or the Birds new what was best?
Check this out….
\\– collating COSMNet transmissions… –\\
\\– preparing priorities reports… –\\
We got 150 asteroidal masses from Grade D to G. A peasoup fog of ABCs. We won’t be hunting too hard for fuels. And the goods out there, bubbi! You wouldn’t believe me if I told you about the free ores and ices floating around out there; just get blasted out and on your ship. Rebuilding business will be a snap.
Once the undesirables are routed out of their rabbit holes, that is. Other COSMNets are coming online every minute. Only five—no, wait. Now seven Emerald Combine ident signals are being received. So far, there are a total of 28 non-Em idents. We’ve beat longer odds than that! You’ll do great, just great….
These are the leftovers to be cleaned up:
>> The Golden Order of Reason. Yep, the Gores made it through. Seems their sorry Vault designs melted up PRETTY easily. They got eight Vaults that are cycling; estimate they will have more out there in the soup, spinning open soon. The Big Boys had almost 2000 of them; poor slobs. Get at ’em quick and they’ll probably be ripe for the picking. Just bring some hankies for the snifflers, ’cause they’re gonna be whining for mommy when they see how light on living Vaults they are. Shoulda cut a deal with us for the new shields….
>> Diamond Cooperative. We knew the Old Boys would make it, so we got some hard data from latest specs for your to goggle. (Incomplete)….
>> Blue Talon Corps. And the Birdies, always the Bird Boys. They managed to save seven of their Airys for our use. How kind of them to store up their fancy ships for us. We’ll have to get at them post haste. Just keep your tush lively for their big guns—their COSMs are pinging for nearby bodies; you can bet there are heavy barrels tracking the skies along with those eyes. Just remember: they’re pests only, strictly lower crust. Swat ’em like the flies they pretend to be. Or buy ’em. Same deal.
>> Crimson Dawn. What? They had a 4.5% chance of getting ONE Vault through the smack-up, now they got five?! What are the odds… 100,000:1 against, first estimate—
\\– analyzing gravity flux patterns… –\\
\\– factoring Vault distribution from last Sealing reports… –\\
—LOOONG odds, bubbi. I’m up to 3.9 million to one and I haven’t started limiting veracity of Crimson Dawn controlled Vaults. They musta had an angle. Jebediah Arktron, their loonie leader, always said he had a gift. I used to have his “Way” thing around here somewhere, but we’re REAL low on COSM memory here. Trying to just catalog and track our new neighbors is fragging some old orders. Hang a sec….
\\– resorting highest priority data… –\\
\\– summarizing… –\\
Okay, then. Pay attention; we’re only gonna bang this scenario out ONE time:
What a merry little party you’ve got. Other Departments are coming online and the Guild Trade Net is active. We’ve got a handful of stores remaining and this chunk of rock—that used to be fifty miles under a lovely grasslands on Perdu, by the way—holds some handy materials to get a leg up with.
The other four Guilds are sure to be on to us soon, so sally forth with some heavy D first. We got about 15 designs hanging ready to crank out. I’ve spooled up the Tech Net to continue the research that we had to shut down for the Cataclysm. The boys will have some boffo stuff forr you before too long.
Next, we need a cash reserve, you follow me bubbi? The materials left out there in that mess are precious stuff if we’re gonna rebuild. You can bet your last o-ring that the other Guilds will be out mining in no time, and then the inflation begins. The only way to enjoy inflation is to be the bank, right?
And on the subject of banks, you should be out there pillaging the other Vaults ASAP! Don’t get all mushy on us now, just do your job, pull the line. The other Vaults that haven’t cycled are either broken or radded out by now. This Guild of Light communique tells the plight of the rushing robins. And those that scheduled later cycling are just too dumb to be left with their cookies. Any Guild that waited longer than Max Background Rad level to start cycling would probably not have the cachungas to hold together the Malkari Dust anyway. (Malkari Dust: I just made that up, it’s more accurate now than Malkari System—whaddaya think?)
Once the Emerald Combine is back in charge of the best tech and the fattest coffers, we’ll work on following the Arcs… or not. I mean, we get the Dust organized in a nice, neat, tidy way, maybe we just forget about the old GOR, the foolish factions, the ancestors that left us here to die. Maybe WE become the Gov and make the new Home World right here on this chunk of grassland from Perdu….
\\– summary concluded… –\\
\\– deleting temporary memory… THIS MAY TAKE A MOMENT –\\
Chapter Designations
Executive Department
Operations Department
Propeganda Department
Finance Department
Aquisitions Department
Eliminations Department
Defense Department
Special Services Department
Government
Monopolist corporate
Ship Designations
(Incomplete)