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Active Ships:
Tomas.Mendes - Carabela HF
Visione.Ricordato - Pilgrim Liner/Family Flagship and Living Quarters/Spacebourne Repair Platform -----
Planned Ships:
Miguel.Mendes - Rapier VHF
MNS-Visione.Ordinato - Maltese capital ship of unknown class, likely Sarissa -----
Family Structure:
Tomas Mendes, primary character and elder of two brothers, age 37
Miguel Mendes, primary character and younger of two brothers, age 20
Arturio Mendes, secondary character, family head and father of Tomas and Miguel, age 95, captain of the Visione Ricordato
Ravenna Mendes, secondary character, wife to Arturio Mendes, deceased in childbirth with Elisavet 819 AS
Marcelina Mendes, secondary character, sister to Tomas and Miguel, age 14
Esmund Mendes, secondary character, brother to Tomas and Miguel, age 7
Elisavet Mendes, secondary character, sister to Tomas and Miguel, age 2
Fiorino Fontaine, tertiary character, cargomaster and Maltese native worker aboard Ricordato
Zachary Oster, tertiary character, Maltese native flight deck technician and engineer aboard Ricordato
Eloisa Wagner, tertiary character, freed Rheinlander slave and medic aboard Ricordato
Mckenna O'Brien, tertiary character, freed Bretonian slave and Mendes family nurse aboard Ricordato
Various freedmen and employees, varying between 12 and 20 individuals required to run the Ricordato, since it does not have advanced AI and automatic systems. ---------------------------
On the bridge of the Visione Ricordato, a man sat in the center seat alone, musing over the past.
For two years most of the Mendes family and their few retainers had toiled in open space in Omicron 81 on the TTF-400 series 'Pilgrim Liner' that Arturio had bought from the shipyard with the bulk of the family's remaining wealth. 819 AS had been very, very hard on him and his...from the death of his beloved wife Ravenna during the birth of their child Elisavet to the defeat and forced abandonment of Tomas' brand-new Storta-class MNS Seta against the Gauls and the subsequent bankrupting of their accounts...there had been times that he had secretly wished the Order or the Corsairs had found them at their refitting space twenty klicks away from Cartagena and wiped out their feeble, struggling efforts to survive. He certainly didn't feel that he was doing his best for the children. They, including the then newborn Elisavet, had been living within the Liner's bridge module for most of that two years, cramped in the only habitable place on the ship. Food had been scarce at times, money to pay the dock technicians scarcer. Much of the effort on the ship had had to be performed by Fontaine, Oster, and Miguel while Tomas was away attempting to scrounge work and credits smuggling the orange to far away places aboard the transports of other families, or lately having been stuck in Liberty aboard one of those new Serenity class transports mining helium for export and sale in Kusari. Still, things could be much worse. In the wake of Contari's failed attempt to take the leadership of the cartels from the 101st, he and his had paid dearly for their early support in quiet, subtle little ways. Vendors had suddenly run out of product as they approached to buy. Shipyard repair queues seemed to magically get longer as they joined them. Their business contacts preferred other clients suddenly, even if those other clients weren't paying the rates Arturio could. Against these odds however, he and his eldest son had managed to save his family from the slaver's markets on Malta. He should have known, in those darkest times when the drink flowed freely and that flechette pistol he usually kept magnetically attached to the underside of his desk looked awful friendly, that Tomas would do anything to keep his sisters from experiencing that fate, but he had almost succcumbed to their lure anyway. Perhaps it was this fact that led to Tomas' insistance that the slaves they had bought to work the Ricordato had been freed immediately and paid wages equal to those of the dockworkers, and in excess of in the case of Eloisa Wagner, the ship's doctor. It was a financial burden that he felt they did not need (and indeed he privately thought his eldest more than a little strange because of it) but Tomas believed they would be more of an asset and more trustworthy if they were treated as equals, and over time he had learned to trust his son's judgment in such matters.
Yes, things had been bleak for him and his family. But now - now things had finally begun to look up. The surge in funds from Tomas' legal adventures in Liberty had allowed them to repressurize and clean up the Liner's living decks, letting his family spread to other parts of the ship. Heavy machinery and the external repair manipulator had been reinstalled, and the ship's manufacturing and cargo storage centers had been restored to their original functions and then some. Navigation had been restored and modern sensors and shields had been installed. The old, massive powerplant had been revitalized and converted into something resembling a current day transport drive system.
Now the decks of the Visione Ricordato, '(their) vision remembered', thrummed softly in tune with the idling powerplant; a ship's heartbeat, one that resonated throughout every experienced spacer, as familiar to them as their own. Soon it would also become familiar to them, if the spirits allowed it. Arturio sat in the center seat on the bridge of his finally spaceworthy ship, the yard's mobile construction scaffolding still visible as it was being tugged away from the side of the ship and returned to Cartagena. At his side his youngest son Esmund had since joined him and stood attentively, having been allowed onto the bridge for this moment. He was too young to understand the significance, but not too young to be ignorant that it -was- significant. The other children were secured below. Fiorino and Zachary had both reported readiness from their sections. Tomas had already launched his fighter to explore and map the routes to Baffin, Kusarian and Libertonian spaces, and would meet up with them along the way. Miguel had come up to the bridge with his brother and now manned the helm of the ship, ready for his father's order to take them out. Yes, it was finally time...all the testing, and the worrying, and...the sacrifices, including that of his wife, who might have lived had they been able to afford proper care for her...all of it led to this moment. The time for idle musing over the past was over. This was the time for them to reach out and retake a place among the stars, and it began here - with a simple gesture to Miguel and the words "Move us away from this place, and onwards - to our destiny". He reached over and took Esmund's hand, squeezing it affectionately. It was a rare thing from Arturio Mendes, and showed how moved he was to finally be on their way.
It was also not the time for regret, though that would come later in the evening and away from prying eyes, as it always did.
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-OOC-
The Mendes family is intended to be a minor family pushed aside after their defeat early in the civil war between Contari Lance and the 101st. I flew a mission or two into Gallia with the Lance as an indy capship pilot in their extremely early days and then left the server awhile for personal reasons, and now need to explain what they've been up to in the intervening two years and why they have not been any sort of presence in Maltese society or their surroundings. Their premise is that after scraping the barrel they have accrued enough to move their family and their operations to a Pilgrim Liner and begin carving out a new place in Maltese society, as well as the Omicrons. In-RP they do not bear a grudge against the Lance, preferring to accept responsibility for their own actions rather than fruitlessly blaming theirs. Their stance towards the 101st is neutral cooperativeness, and nothing more than that. There was a reason they sided with the Lance early, after all; they still somewhat believe that they do not represent the best interests of the Nacion as a whole, but concede that they are still the dominating force. If that's not the case (I can't even find Contari Lance info pages or faction information without doing more digging than I have done) someone please let me know. I don't usually see members from any of these factions due to the difference in play time.
This family is most supportive of the actions of the Crimson Cross ([+]) as they too hold the spirits in high regard and understand somewhat how important Cardamine is to their relation with them. Tomas has had run ins with the K'Hara before in-RP, as a NPC on another one of my ships from way back.
Tag - None currently, not trying to be a true faction yet (if ever), capital ships and transports will usually start with 'Visione', fighters are just the pilot's First.Last name.
Diplomacy (this only takes into account players and player factions encountered to date, not NPC factions - the Outcast ID speaks for itself concerning those.)
Allied
Outcasts (Nacion Maltesa), Crimson Cross [+] Friendly
[Y] Pirate Group
Captain Antares Neutral
Everyone not otherwise listed Unfriendly
Samura Hostile
Independant Miners Guild At War
Gallic Royal Navy
Technology
Outcast, Sirius Civilian. ====================
Please feel free to post feedback or suggestions in this thread.
Interesting read, will be interesting to RP with you on my Cross if I get a chance. The Contari Lance is still around but its activity took a bit of a dive recently so they aren't on all that often but they are still around.