AsteroidQuest/Polo Quest
Polo Quest is an individual story arc within the larger AsteroidQuest. Chronologically, it takes place several months after the events of the AsteroidQuest Intermission.
There is a separate page for tracking current stats and inventory.
 This article contains spoilers! You were warned.
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Characters
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Polo
Out titular hero, back in action. She's been lying low and training since her last mission, but now she's been assigned to an inspection team as part of a joint-ultrahive effort to search out the salikai, who are still at large.
She's also still working through a few problems and coming to terms with her unexpected celebrity as a war hero. This despite the fact that according to the official story put out, she was killed in action on the warship (a deliberate cover up to protect her from any Salikai agents).
Sadly, the dress uniform doesn't stick around very long.
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Rokoa
Crazyface herself, Polo's own personal rival, frenemy, all around maddening person to be around, and the aforementioned source of any of Polo's lingering issues. Mercifully, she's been kicked off the planet (but nowhere near far enough for Polo's tastes) and will only be able to torment Polo in memory.
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Korli
A science hiver, born underground and a salikai slave. She took a chance and managed to escape in the chaos during the salikai's retreat and evacuation of the spire facility. Along with several members of her hive fortunate enough to be captured by and rescued from the warship, she joined Polo's ultrahive, told them everything she knew, and volunteered to join the search. She serves as the inspection team's technician.
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| Rokann Biles | |
Rokann
A veteran soldier who contributed to the binding of her ultrahive, which for her included participating in 15 continuous years of war at a young age. Although she has a better attitude than one might expect from that description, and a thing for theatrics.
Biles
Certified by his ultrahive as a top ranked survivalist, a distinction that is by no means easy to earn. The final test takes more than a year and a half, and consists of being dropped in naked in the nine of the harshest environments of the planet and left to survive for a month, one after the other.
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Lucera
Inspector Lucera, as he prefers to be addressed. The man in charge, and the only neumono around as short as Polo.
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Katzati
The inspection team's cartographer. Friendly, cuddly, and good natured. And huge, in more way than one. Her size is somewhat unusual for a neumono, as usually their metabolism would prevent an individual from being able to put on or keep as much weight as she has.
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Marra
A soldier, and lifelong friend of Rokann. Somewhat gruff. Serves as Lucera's bodyguard.
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Kort
The inspection team's translator. He's here to talk to the voklit.
He's kind of a grump.
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| Vern Viln | |
Viln
A native inhabitant of the reservation the team has come to inspect. Like many voklit, he has a profound distaste for modern technology, and follows a code of honor that is sometimes confusing to outsiders.
Unlike many voklit, he has taken an interest in learning to speak English.
Vern
Viln's somewhat more withdrawn friend and hunting companion. He does not speak any English.
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Niam
A more recently escaped member of the science hive, with more up to date intelligence. Technically not the real Niam, he is one of the first successful neumono clones.
He wears a monogoggle to compensate for poor eyesight, a flaw introduced in the cloning process.
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Moi
Another escaped science hiver, used as a test subject for an experimental cloaking bioarmor suit. Her optical camouflage, when active, renders her invisible under visible light, x-ray, infrared and night-vision. As these cloaking enhancements demand the full resources of the bioarmor, Moi's suit does not provide the protection or physical enhancements of conventional bioarmor.
Moi's suit comes with one debilitating drawback; the prototype is 80% bioarmor, well above her own PBAT score. The suit was attached under surgical conditions, and trying to remove the armor normally would be fatal. As is, any damage to the suit or even pulling back the hood or using the intended openings is intensely painful.
Ultrahives
An ultrahive is a cooperative collection of hives allied with each other for the purpose of establishing a safe nexus. This association is political in nature, and not based in a shared empathy the same way the formation of a hive is. (Although obviously the member-hives of a given ultrahive must be emphatically compatible to a certain degree). From a governance standpoint, if individual hives are states, ultrahives are countries.
Ultrahives tend to have fantastically mediocre names, due to the difficulty in getting anyone to agree on anything when they are formed.
Neumono Tree
Polo's ultrahive. The Neumono Tree took in the formally independent Sealock hive following the conflict in the AsteroidQeust Intermission, as well as several recused members of the underground science hive, including Korli. If and when the rest of her hive is rescued they will likely become members as well.
The Tree is also responsible for caring for and studying Three Stripes and the tribal hive he befriended.
The total number and composition of hives in the Tree is unknown, but the Three Stripes Intermission suggests at least one other science hive is included.
Neumono Coalition
The ultrahive that actually organized this inspection, and is responsible for oversight of the voklit reservation. Biles, Rokann, Lucera, Katzati, Marra and Kort are all members of different hives in the Coalition. The Hunter Hive is a member as well.
