#Lore 24 – Entry #109 – Sci-Fi Month II #18 – The Obstinate Phoenix
From the Personal Logs of Captain Durgen Silvercask, decryption algorithm successful, translated from original Dwarven Script:
She is certainly a decorated vessel, that I cannot deny, but were I to say that I had no reservations about her being attached to this expedition, I would be lying to myself. She has nearly reached three consecutive centuries of service, so I suppose the brass wanted to give her an easy assignment before they may finally decommission her. I’m honestly surprised she hasn’t met that fate sooner, given her rather…unique record.
Let’s see…in the dozen battles she’s been part of during that time, she has been severely damaged in all of them, even crash-landed on a planet’s surface twice. And yet, somehow, each time, she’s been able to recover herself enough to get back home, even turning the tide of two battles that she returned to after getting knocked out of the fight, one of those having been after she crashed.
I’m not sure if the gods of fortune are blessing her or cursing her, but her name is certainly appropriate regardless.
She’s a rather unique vessel even without that remarkable record; I’ve spoken to her current captain, Raryliss Steelforger (with a family name like that, I’d almost have thought she was a dwarf, given her build, but she’s undeniably a kobold, of the silver-scaled variety), at some length about her history. Somewhat experimental when she was constructed, the Phoenix is a rare joint construction effort between the dwarves and kobolds. Though we’re certainly not as hostile to one another as we used to be, we still don’t mingle too often. Still, that’s a dwarf-designed skeleton inside the Phoenix, the bulk of construction made using that unique kobold dragon’s breath forging process combined with tried-and-true dwarven construction methods. Was and still is the largest such construction made with the kobolds’ breath, and what an endeavor that must have been.
She’s been refitted multiple times, but the Phoenix remains a battlecruiser at her heart. She’s something of a hybrid with her current configuration, what her captain has dubbed an “assault carrier”. She’s packing the biggest guns of any of the battlecruisers in the fleet and has a pair of (admittedly small) hangar bays for launching escort fighters; she’s got her own fighter group stationed aboard, the Summer-Flame Dragons, I believe is the correct translation, all kobolds. Most of her crew are kobolds, with the bulk of the others consisting of rattenvolk and gnomes, and after her first refit, that’s historically been the case. Suppose that would make sense as to why she’s been able to overcome such terrible damage time and again; credit where it’s due, those folk can certain repair anything if it’s at all possible.
Whatever the makeup of her crew, the Phoenix is a fine vessel, and though I’m still not sure what to make the exact nature of her record, I’m certain she will prove to be a valuable addition to the expedition. I was a bit concerned when I was made aware of a certain technician who has a reputation as something of a jinx being aboard her, but Captain Steelforger assures me that, now that Engineer Longtail is aboard a kobold ship, they’ll have nothing to worry about. Doesn’t exactly deny what the security department had uncovered about the tech, really makes her record seem a bit more like intentional sabotage, but perhaps there’s more to it than that. I’m hardly an expert on kobold culture, after all, so I’m not aware of what other connotations the captain’s statement may have.