A.D.R. Defense Division: Inquiry to OMNE

[ADR]

A brief message from ADR, not identified as being sent by any particular individual or department, inquired as to the price of individual units of OMNE's new 'products' - specifically the graviton cannon, the MPW, and the exo-proto mining suit - to be built and delivered.

A message would be sent back from O.M.NE stating the incredibly steep prices for each unit, stating that for the two weapons they were priced in groups of five, and for the mining suits it was individually. But a very specific deal would be mentioned. If the A.D.R agreed to do one of the following the overall price of whatever they choose to purchase would be cut by a staggering 60%, since the A.D.R has been a close friend in the past. They could either give funds to help the construction of factories on Eli-3, resources for that same purpose, or if the A.D.R would allow O.M.N.E to see their research in the following fields: Artificial intelligence, robotics, and the controls associated with both. If they opted to share their research, future purchases of advanced products would also be given, along with product updates as innovation occurs.

ADR skeptically countered with a request to see the newly developed OMNE units first-hand before agreeing to any formal trade deals.

The response from O.M.N.E came swiftly, asking if they would prefer a video of the units in usage, or if they would like to meet at the Eli-3 northern most outpost 0067 for a up close demonstration of the units in question.

They replied that a video would be useful and very appreciated, but they would also like to have some delegates meet at the Eli-3 outpost for a demonstration, and that they would be happy to schedule for any time that would be convenient for the demonstrators.

Coordinates would be sent to the client agreeing that a true demonstration would be far better than a video along with a small message saying the following "This testing facility is located very far north on the planet in a very jagged rocky area with temperatures not unlike tundra, with wind reaching 30 miles per hour at times so bring a coat."

((lol @ "so bring a coat" XD ))

As they had corresponded, a team of ADR scientists, researchers, and marketing specialists was dispatched to the coordinates. They were all dressed heavily, and not at all accustomed to anything other than the sub-tropical warmth and ocean breezes of Reza or the slightly cooler, comfortably engineered temperatures of Rescenta.

They had three MP guards. Once they reached the coordinates in their shuttle, they landed and waited for contact from OMNE.

Their coordiantes would put them on a landing pad in a rocky frozen tundra, a paved path lead to the base but it was a long one, so the walk would be difficult. A few men met them there, their leader, an aged man of 68 years walked up to them. He was bundled up, but not as much as them, and he didnt seemed to be preturbed by the horrible winds and frigid temperatures, he had obviously been there awhile. When he spoke he had a thick german accent.

"Hello everyone! My name is Johnson Höhle, I am one of the weapons engineers here on Eli-3, head of the outpost we are bringing you today. You're from the A.D.R correct? Here for the demonstration of the Graviton Cannon and the M.P.W Gun?"

The head representative came forth - a wiry, tan-skinned man with thick glasses and a hefty coat. He had a lanyard with an ID on it bearing his photo and the insignia of the ADR Defense Division's engineering branch.

"Thank you for having us, I am Sammat White, Chief Research and Development Coordinator, of Rescenta Base Three. Yes, we have come for the demonstrations."

Johnson smiled wide and extended his hand to shake in greeting "you are very welcome! We are so excited to be showing this weapons off to potential buyers, we have been working on these for a very long time. So please, please follow me. It's a ways down the path we would have arranged for transportation but the path up to the base is rather small, due to the constraints of the terrain."

He shook the man's hand gladly, his own still clad in heavy gloves. One of the MP's stood vigilant at his side, and the rest of the party was ready and waiting, eager to be out of the cold.

"Welcome to Eli-3 Testing Base Delta. We are the third largest base on Eli-3, if you will follow me to the entrance we can get you out of the cold in a giffy."

When they were inside everything looked very, very sterile, a lot of white walls and not many windows if any.

The group seemed much more comfortable inside, even in the sterile environment. They seemed to be an assembly of research and technician types, with a few business-looking officials thrown in. The MP's double-checked that everyone had made it in safely, and Sammat responded with a smile.

"We are glad to be here. Many thanks. We're excited to see what you've been working on."

He smiled "As am I my friend." As he led them through the facility they would see a few different kinds of experimentation and science going on. A lot of it seeming to center around Plasma based weapons and tech, genetic manipulation, and complex but not sentient or self aware A.I. Though a few other areas were very clearly off limits with posted armed guards and doors that red "classified research, only top level researchers and O.M.N.E directors admitted."

"The weapons rooms are coming up but still a ways into the facility, they have to be rather large and secured you see, while damage to the facility is very rare, it has happened. So if you have any questions about what you see on the way, go ahead and ask, I'd be happy to answer"

"What other projects are you working on?" Sammat asked openly, hoping to see how detailed an answer he would get by offering the opportunity.

"Personally, I'm working on two other large projects at the moments. I'm designing new mining lasers for the asteroid cracker fleet so they can cut into the stone quicker while using less power, even though they are already rather efficient you can never have enough efficiency." He chuckled "The other project is going a tad slower than I'd like to be honest, designing a quadrupedal scout drone to survey the jungle landscape of Eli-2. Getting down to recharge them after a long while would be difficult, we only have two stations on world, and solar is unreliable due to some areas of severly dense jungle canopy. Bu these two weapons have been my main focus."

It seemed unusual that a mining laser and scout drone would both be referred to as weapons, some of the ADR scientists noticed, but nonetheless Sammat cordially rolled along with the conversation.

"Fascinating! I know that most of our mining equipment is contracted out, but I do believe that our sub-departments have handled projects concerning drones and geographical surveying equipment before. Interesting, to be sure - to have to map out an entire planet."

"Very interesting to be sure, the flora while beautiful is much like what you would see in any jungle environment, while the fauna…well that's a quite a different story. According to reports front he stations we have there, most of if not all the fauna seems to be insect-like in nature and form into large hive structures like ants or bees, even the larger animals. But while I would love to keep discussing the interesting bits of Eli-2, that's not why you're here of course." He smiled wide and laughed.

They came upon a gigantic room, they must have been also going down deep into the planet as they walked, because this room was completely underground, but it's size was staggering. At one end held a huge sheet of a dark red and black metal, and at the other a very intimidating large dual barreled cannon placement roared to life, the barrel's glowing a deep blue, humming loudly with a deep rumble.

"This is the Graviton Cannon, I won't go into the deep details but it draws in and charges graviton particles into shells it then loads into the barrels. Upon firing the shell it not only exploded like a normal cannon round, the graviton particles cause the gravity around the explosion to fluctuate and spike, ripping armor and hull apart easily. Now we have only testing on Elium, the metal you see at the end. While it isn't nearly as hard as say Cascadium, it is a very durable substance, justas durable as most other metal found elsewhere in Crest. It takes a few minutes to charge, I wanted it to be ready when we got here, but obviously there was a scheduling error."

He cast an obvious glare over to the control booth where one technician gave a timid shrug and aid over an intercom "Sorry, we got the command late, there was quite a bit of work to do on the Securion projects."

Johnson nodded and sighed, looking to Sammat "I am sorry for the delay, the R and D sections of O.M.N.E have been restructured recently and we are still getting used to the new chain of command."

Sammat smiled easily, never taking his eyes off of the interesting technology in front of him.

"Not a problem, sir. We've been dealing with quite the same type of problems on Rescenta lately. If I had a credit for every worthless tech I've had to fire in the past month, I'd be on a Cascadian resort right now." Almost without changing his tone, he seamlessly moved from joking to a more business-like side of things. "So, this Graviton Cannon...give me some specs. What's the estimated production time for more like it, and exactly how much firepower can it put out?"

Johnson smiled and chuckled at the Cascadian Resort comment, obviously knowing where the man was coming from. "Well, what you see before you was the first cannon built that was close in spec to the model that's market ready, the differences are negligible, slightly different design choices that are only aesthetic make this one different than the market version. Those differing design choices make construction take just a bit longer, this one was built and primed in about a week and a half, but we have a full factory on one of Eli-3's moons ready to make these instead of a just a floor in this lab, so I would say a full load from that factory would be about 20 in maybe two weeks. When it comes to how much it can dish out, well, due to the amount of time it takes to drag in and charge the graviton particles it is a bit more sluggish then I would want it to be, it takes about 10 minutes to charge and load. But once you see the result here I'm sure you'll understand the ten minute charge time is worth the wait."

A voice came from the control room "Cannon is prepped and ready to fire sir, on your mark."

Johnson looked at his new friends and smiled "Ready for the show?"

"Twenty in two weeks?" Sammat repeated to clarify. He tried to cloak the surprise in his voice. "Impressive, Mr. Johnson. Yes, please, go ahead. We're all quite anxious to see."

"Yes sir, twenty in two weeks, O.M.N.E factories are some of the most efficient places I've ever seen, and they are absolutely massive." He chuckled before turning around and nodding to the control booth.

What happened next would be both awe inspiring and rather terrifying. The cannons roared like beasts and shot two of their rounds into the metal at the other side of the room. The initial explosion did the damage one would expect of two heavy weapon rounds but what came next was the main selling point. The explosion had an odd shimmer around it as it quickly compressed due to the shifting graviton explosion. The slab began to crumple and fold like gravity was crushing it, and it ripped huge gashes across the slab, effectively ripping it to pieces like it was paper.

"Now, this slab of metal was not entirely as thick as, for example, the hull of a Novalysian Battle Ship, so the damage would not be so all encompassing, if it was there would be no need to build twenty at a time." He chuckled "But the damage a ship or a station with a armed weapons bank of these could do to an oncoming fleet would catastrophic. No matter how thick their hull was. This took years of research and considerable amounts of money, but this weapon and it's companion which you will see soon, have revolutionized warfare."

"Indeed." Sammat nodded. The ADR team looked on through a veil of skepticism, but their interest was readily apparent. This was big, and they knew it. It was just what they were looking for.

Sammat left a few moments of silence to think. "So, this companion you mentioned?..."

Johnson smiled "Yes the M.P.W gun, it has a much faster rate of fire, almost like a heavy machine gun. It can do damage to armor and hull but not nearly as much as this cannon before you, it is made to target shields specifically. It destabilizes the shield in the area around where it hits, an area of a few yards in diameter. Big enough for Graviton Cannon to fire it's payload through."

"Can we see it?" Sammat dropped the formalities temporarily, letting his curiosity get the best of him. This is why they were here.