Alright, so I'm on... well, actually, I don't exactly have a name for this planet yet, seeing how the name of the planet you arrive on in Civilization: Beyond Earth is randomly chosen (well, actually, it pulls up three different planet types (always the same types), then assigns a random name to each one). Ugh, that is going to be confusing. I think I'll just call it Chiron, because that was the name of the planet of its predecessor, Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri.
So, I'm on Chiron. Alright, that's a starting point. Now where to go from here?
Well, first off, I need to get an idea of how large this planet is: now, I could get a reasonable idea of its size by hacking into the planet's communication network and seeing how many different factions have landed here, but that won't give me exact details, something that I would really like to have. Should probably start warming up the orbital factory.
Alright, got that covered. Now what else to do.
Oh yeah, the wildlife! See, Beyond Earth is home to some really big creepy crawlies, ranging from beetle-like animals the size of wolves to worms big enough to level buildings just by moving through them (though doing so only counted as pillaging them in-game, something I doubted applied here). Said Aliens were similar to barbarians from the regular civ games, but they had their differences: they didn't hate everyone at first and could gradually be befriended by choosing not to antagonize them. Also, siege worms and leviathans made the aliens a threat all the way into the late game, something barbarians never had going for them.
While I could probably avoid making the aliens by just ignoring them and working my expansion around them, the siege worms would be a problem, since they would probably demolish some of my machinery just by moving through an area.
Hmm...
Well, I guess I'd just need to hack into the data banks of one of the colonies on this planet and get the designs for the Ultrasonic Fence, which, in-game, prevented the aliens from coming within two tiles of your cities. A quest decision in game allowed you increase it by an additional tile or allow the shield to protect trade units. While I had no idea what the conversion ratio from hexes to miles (I'm American, okay? IMPERIAL UNITS 4 LIFE!), I highly doubted that any of the colonies had that technology for them, because the research needed to build the fences was one of the earliest techs you unlocked in the game.
Okay, problem of marauding aliens: solved. What else did I need to do?
Well, I should probably determine the number of major factions on planet, as well as what the overall political climate was. I had a feeling that things were not exactly going to be all rainbows and sunshine between the various colonies on planet: one of the biggest parts of the game was progressing your civilization across three different affinities: Harmony, which focused on becoming one with the wildlife on the planet, resulting in human alien hybrids; Supremacy, which involved becoming more powerful via robots and cybernetics, and Purity, which rather obviously focused on maintain the purity of human form and used lots of battlesuits and hover machines. Needless to say, Purity did not like the other two, and based on color schemes, it seemed Franco-Iberia was leaning toward Purity, while ARC was leaning toward Supremacy and the Africa Union was going for Harmony. I really didn't want to be around when/if these guys went to war, so I might have to play diplomat. And that wasn't even including the hybrid affinities from Rising Tide.
Alright, I'll need to analyze the political climate of the planet.
I think I've got all of my bases covered. SO why do I fell like, aside from gathering shinies, I'm forgetting something...oh yeah!
I need to check for the Affinity resources. I'd need to be careful around them, because Alien Nests normally show up around them, but I was going to need them to get ANY of the advanced affinity tech working, especially anything involving xenomass. Biotech was, admittedly, a fairly risky venture, but some of the harmony tech was just too good to pass up. Of course, there were quite a few technologies I wanted to get from the other affinities and hybrid affinities I'd like to earn as well, because they were beyond useful? Cheap mind control that was relatively unnoticeable and had a mundane usage? I'd like to have that, thank you very much.
Luckily, it turned out I had easy access to all three resources: I could easily make out a xenomass pool half a kilometer away (Look, I like imperial units, but I'll go to metric if it is more convenient), with the tell tale crystals of a firaxite deposit not to far beyond that. And just beyond that were the floating islands caused by floatstone.
Looks like I had all of my bases covered.
And, thanks to progenitor hypertech bullshit, I'd done it in less than a second.
Now time to assuage the fears of the three envoys near me.
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Though no-one could notice, due to the fact they wore face and body concealing armor, all three envoys were terrified. The presence of the giant machine scared them, both for its size and the fact that it had managed to set up a functioning base with an hour. Compounding this was another worrisome detail: the machine appeared to be armed. If a fight broke out now, the giant machine would probably win.
Of the three, Marion was doing the best to keep calm, though that may have been because she was a cyborg and had emotion suppressors, which were very useful when you were a diplomat. Needless to say, they were working overtime at the moment.
Ms. Hawthorne had been Fielding's first choice for investigating the unknown object that had turned out to be this hulking war-mech. Not because she liked Marion, hell no: Hawthorne despised Fielding for how scheming she was, always trying to mainuplate others so that she could come out on top. No, Fielding chose Marion for this because Marion was the best diplomat she had, everything else be damned. This was, perhaps, the one things Marion liked about her boss: Suzanne Majorie Fielding didn't care where you came from, if you got the job done well, you could look forward to a promotion, regardless of your origins. Considering where Fielding had come from, she probably had a good reason for this.
Amare, meanwhile, was shivering in terror, but also staring in wonder at the machine. Was it a new development from earth? Perhaps a colony had made it and sent it to his world as an envoy? Or was it proof that they were not alone in the universe? That was beyond him at the moment, but regardless of where this machine had originated, he was looking forward to what it meant for his people.
His idealism is why Barre had chosen him for this expedition to examine the crash: Barre had sought to coexist with this planet, so as to avoid the mistakes of his forefathers. Barre had been the first to notice the arrival of the machine, due to a hunting expedition: several of his officers had been taking raptor bugs out to hunt when they had seen the machine's arrival via portal. The news had soon spread, and a variety of opinions had been expressed over how to deal with it: some called for an open armed welcome, others had advised a quarantine. No one had called for its destruction, either because they felt it was wrong or to avoid biting off more than he eUnion could chew. Barre had ultimately decided to send an expedition with an envoy to investigate, but had also begun re-evaluating the Union's armies: while he sought peace, he wanted to be prepared for war.
As for Durand, he was still unsure how to approach the situation: while he, like many Franco-Iverians, disdained foreign influences, he still believed that they should not destroy this machine. Not when they could learn so much from it.
That was why Elodie had chosen him to lead this mission into the wilds: he was open-minded enough not to let Franco-Iberia's (somewhat justified) superiors go to his head. True superiority over your enemy included knowing when you were outmatched and should avoid a fight, and here, they were clearly outmatched.
Before either side could ponder further about the machine's intentions, though, it responded to their introductions. Why it had an Maerican accent was still an unknown at the moment.
"Thank you for the introductions. You may call me... Commander Flame. My superiors would prefer that I not disclose any more information in regards to my nationality."
"I see," replied Marion. "Well, then, if it is not classified, who or what are you?"
"...I am the pilot of this machine, a Xenosentry class field commander Omni-mech, capable of both creation and destruction. I am the first human pilot of such a machine.
"Human?" questioned Alain.
"All previous commanders were controlled via AIs, for reasons of efficiency. I had to undergo extensive biological and cybernetic modification in order to match them while controlling this machine. I understand if that offends some of your sensibilities."
"While I may find that unnerving, your arguments have merit," conceded Durand.
"Thank you for understanding."
"Yes, well, now that you have arrived, what do you intend to do here?" asked Abare.
"My current goals are to examine the native resources of this planet and assist in the development of the colonies inhabiting it. I was instructed not to choose favorites while doing so."
"I see... well then, would you like to meet with our leaders? Surely that would help break the tension that your arrival has caused."
"...Good point. Very well, I will meet with your heads of state, though I do have one request."
"And that is?"
"I would prefer that this meeting,which I will refer to as a 'summit', involve the heads of state of all major colonies on planet, so as to avoid any hostilities from any party feeling left out of the loop, as it were."
"... that is except-able."
"Good to know. I will agree to whatever time your leaders choose. I hope we will be able to meet again."
"Don't we all."
"Well, I believe I must now bid you fairwell. Though, may I make one last request."
"Okay."
"May I have access to the planet's communication network? Not anything secure, of course, I just want to be able to examine how this world has developed."
"That can be arranged. Fairwell, sir."
With that, the three diplomats left, eager to return to their home colonies and inform their leaders of the new developments.
Unknown to all of them, while the conversation had occurred, a computer worm had been implanted in the rovers each envoy had arrived in. When they returned home, it would begin transferring into the nearest unsecure system it could find, before slowly decrypting the more secure ones until it had unlimited access. Eventually, it would have full access to all of their data. From their, it would transmit any technological research it found to the mech they encountered.
By the time anyone noticed, though, the virus would be gone: it had a set lifespan and would erase itself within a few weeks.
And by then, new developments would have shifted things so that no one would be interested in what had happened.
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AN: Well, now the ball is rolling.
Read and Review. This is Flameal15k, signing off.