"Circle." I said with a smile, walking down my ramp to one of 'Literally Going in Circles' avatar. His chosen avatar was rather tall trill with short brown hair, looking like he was in his mid thirties.
"Rommie." He answered with a smile, gathering me into a tight hug as I got close enough, "Welcome home."
"...Thank you." I sighed softly and relaxed slightly.
"How was your trip?" Circle asked as he let go.
I shrugged one shoulder, "Eh, okay. Bit boring with just one crewmember but better than doing it on my own."
Circle nodded before then grinning and reaching to ruffle my hair, "Don't worry, I'm sure we will be able to find you something with a bit more living space."
Drake walked down the ramp with a bag thrown over his shoulder, "Hey, you are the station, right?" he asked, "Kenny Drake."
Circle nodded again as I tried to get my hair in order, "Welcome, Mister Drake. Is your pet ready for transport?"
Drake grinned, "Yep. Which way to my quarters?"
"You just follow the glowing orb. It will lead you there." Circle said and formed a hologram of a orb in the air, "Your iguana will be there already."
"Awesome. Thanks station."
Grinning, Circle turned back to me, "As for you..."
I shrugged, "Don't need quarters. I can keep my stuff in my hull."
"I'm more talking about finding you a new hull." He said with a smirk, "We are not Starfleet here, shippy. We have quite a bit less bureaucracy."
"So far."
Circle sighed, "So far." he agreed, "I'm sure we will pick some up as time goes on too, but we are actively working to keep it as low as possible."
Shrugging, I brushed some strands of hair behind my right ear, "So... what do we have available?"
Not sure I wanted to be a mining ship or something, but it would be a improvement over a runabout. If nothing else I have more room to keep my stuff in.
"Let's have a look, shall we?" Circle asked and transported out avatars to an observation deck.
I looked around and nodded, "Sure." as I found the connection to my avatar again. It was only a couple of kilometers of a transit.
"So, we have four work ships finishing up. Two construction vessels, one mining ship, and one hydrogen miner." Circle said and brought a hologram up, "All four are unclaimed."
I gave the hologram a bit of a vary look as he transferred the files to my database. The construction ships were pretty normal off the market construction vessels for building stations. So were the two mining ships. One was made to cut up and suck in asteroid ore, and the other sent drones into gas giants to harvest hydrogen.
None of them felt very attractive to be honest.
"I don't want to be ungrateful here, but..." I started slowly, "I'll rather not?"
He nodded, "Figured. I suppose you don't want our new antimatter tanker either? It has been finished and unclaimed for over a month."
I stared at him like he was stupid. Those things were flying fucking bombs. Nobody in their right minds would want to be one of those!
Circle sighed, "Yeah, I figured. Oh well, was worth asking at least. Might just automate those in the future and have a accompanying ROU remote control it."
I nodded, "...Is there anything else?"
He smiled, "Don't worry, there are more options." and waved his hand, changing the hologram and transferring some files, "There is also this."
The Xenocide class. General Offensive Unit.
Basically a flying brick the size of a Galaxy class and it was exactly as heavily armed, shielded, and armored as it sounded. The first one in the class wasn't even more than halfway built; it's mere existence might cause a lot of noise from the Federation Council.
"Uhm... You know, I would like to be able to enter an inhabited system at some point without my mere presence being seen as an act of war..." I slowly said as I read through the basic stats of it. It had HOW many photon torpedo launchers!?
Circle nodded, crossing his arms, "It's a bit much, isn't it? It's meant to be." before he smiled, "It does have brand new secret weapons though." He tempted.
"...Nice, but I'll rather not."
"Oh well, we'll finish it and have it in backup. It's massive overkill unless the Borg or Dominion come knocking anyway." He said with a shrug, "How about a Murder class LOU then?"
I considered that for a moment. That was a small crew, but... it wasn't too bad I guess. I wouldn't want to pull too many people into combat when it wasn't needed anyway. I would spend a lot of time in system or patrolling with other ships too so there would be company. I wasn't a warship, but... I could be?
"...Maybe." I finally answered, "I'm not a warship, but I guess I could be."
Circle nodded, "You used to be a Island, right?"
"Yeah, before I forked of the Dancing in Starlight."
"How about this then?" He asked with a grin and brought a hologram up, transferring some more files.
I looked at the hologram. Looking at the files. Then I looked at Circle.
"...You can not be serious." I finally asked, "There is no way that is not claimed."
Circle smirked, "It is. The first Mountain Class GSV is indeed claimed. It's sister ship however is not."
Three kilometers long, half a kilometer tall and one wide. Able to hold a population of at least a fifty thousand with no problems. The entire top side was basically a massive dome full of vegetation and stuff like sports arenas, fields, markets, that kind of thing.
Actual living space was mostly below that along with stores and other infrastructure. Beneath that were engineering areas and other ship functions, including a military hangar able to house five LOU's and ten ROU's stationed for defense. The main hangar were able to accept up to a Island class ship internally... and had the equipment to build them and anything smaller too! The Mountain class was a continuation of the Island class... and a design Starfleet rejected for being too big and carrying too much people around endlessly.
I just gaped at him, "Why!? How can that not be claimed!?"
He shrugged, "Most of us that are not stations are AI's that used to be ROUs before resigning after the war. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to get somebody that used to fly something like a ROU to accept something like a miner or construction ship? Let alone that monster? The GSV is barely able to push 656 lights with a absolute max speed of 1024 and only for short amounts of time. It make a Island class look like a Defiant in maneuverability. If you want her, she is yours."
Yes. No. Maybe? It was massive and I wanted a crew, the bigger the better. But... with a ship like that I wouldn't really be flying, exploring. I would just be moving back and forth through known space really. I couldn't really justify hauling thousands of civilians into unknown and dangerous space needlessly.
"Is there something a bit... smaller?" I asked after several seconds, "I'm not Starfleet anymore, but I still want to explore. I'm not sure I could do that in a GSV. It would risk to many people."
Cricle poked my shoulder, "You are picky, you know that?"
I cringed slightly, "Sorry."
He smirked and put his arm around my shoulders, "Don't worry about it, I know you girls. You used to be a science ship and you liked it. You want to keep exploring the universe."
I nodded, "Yeah."
"Unfortunately, we are a bit low on dedicated science ships right now." He admitted, "The Island class is a possibility, but those slips are currently building mining and construction vessels."
Sighing, I nodded again. It was a bit too much to hope for, wasn't it? Well, the GSV was clearly too big for what I wanted to do, but...
"How about that LOU?" I asked after a second, "They have good sensors. The crew would be small, but they can be adjusted, right?"
Circle smiled and nodded, "They are made to be somewhat modular like all our designs. If we drop some photon torpedo capability for extra sensors and living quarters it wouldn't be that bad of a science platform. Sure, you wouldn't have quite as many torpedo reloads, but most of the firepower is energy weapons anyway. Might be able to get the crew seize up to fifty or sixty from twenty. Well, a hundred if they are willing to share rooms, but better not on long trips."
"And a holodeck. They are important for crew morale."
"And a holodeck. And a couple of labs. Let me fiddle around with the blueprints a bit and we will see what I can come up with. Done, transferring schematics. It's almost finished already and none of the changes will affect the computer core so we should be able to get you installed tomorrow."
"Thank you so much!"
"You are quite welcome."
I nodded and then hesitated for a second, "Circle... before I'm installed..."
AN// Many easter thanks to aduck for betaing this section.