Amazing & Amusing sci-fi ships encountered

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Moya is a Leviathan transport vessel-- a living sentient bio-mechanical space ship, who was once captured by the Peacekeepers, The people who the Peacekeepers imprisoned on her escaped by accidentally causing the Peacekeeper Control collar, to realease, allowing Moya to escape herself. She was 23 cycles old when John Crichton came aboard, making her 27-28 cycles old at the end of the Peacekeeper/Scarran War.
Being bio-mechanoid Moya contained both biological and technological components.

Moya, like all Leviathans, has no weapons and is capable of only one defensive maneuver, Starburst. The ability to starburst is a faster than light drive system that is unmatched in its ability to evade pursuers. A starbursting Leviathan cannot be caught unless its drive system is disrupted just as it begins ignition. Once a Leviathan has entered starburst, it can travel enormous distances in far less time than most other vessels. Aiding this ability to evade is the imprecise nature of travelling by starburst. Often even the ship and its pilot have no idea where they are after a starburst.

This randomness is likely biological, due to its not having been duplicated on any other sort of ship, despite the Peacekeepers interest in the starburst ability. Starburst begins with an energy build up in an internal chamber which surges through the pilot's den, around the pilot. The energy is then released out the rear of the ship to surge over the ship's hull. Upon reaching the nose of the ship it opens a tear into another dimension and the ship enters it. The ship is shifted through that dimension until it is pushed out at random achieving travel speeds unmatched by all but wormhole travel. Only the [[Scarran]s have ships that can come close to the performance of a Leviathan.

As with many others of her race, Moya was captured by a Peacekeeper squad at a young age. Her original pilot was slain and another, more cooperative Pilot was was bonded with a her. This artificially rushed process caused the both Pilot (Moya) and Moya a great deal of pain. Their mismatched nerve endings caused no end of mischief and never quite healed. The problem was only corrected after Pilot was temporarily removed to fly Chriton's module back through a wormhole just as it opened, thereby making it impossible to ever open again. After Pilot was put back in his place in the Pilot's den, the nerve endings were not glued or soldered, but allowed to grow together naturally.

Moya and Pilot, with the help of Crichton, Zhaan, Rygel and Ka D'Argo, manage to escape. Moya has become a friend and home to her crew and they have been through many bizarre, disheartening, and exhilarating events together. Indeed, on one occasion, when Crichton was asked why the crew were fighting so hard to save Moya, Crichton compared Moya to a mother, as she "gave birth" to all of them by bringing them together and giving them a home.

She has given birth to one offspring, a male by the name of Talyn, named by Aeryn Sun after her father. Due to a genetic alterion project, which occurred a few cycles before her escape, she is capable of producing Leviathan-Gunship hybrids, of which Talyn is one.

Daryl wrote:Julian May's Saga of the Exiles series has a ship that is similar to the one you mentioned, being sentient, biological, and extremely large.

Fred Saberhagen's Berserkers are enormous sentient robot ships that destroy all life when they find it.

Anne McCaffrey's Ship who Sang has a human brain wired into it in such a way that the ship is like a body to it.

John Ringo's books have lots of male fantasy gear. His Troy is a large nickel iron asteroid hollowed out that uses massive sun powered lasers, while his Pozleen ships are battle globes that can split up.

While not ships the Bolos are damn tough.

To many to mention but the novellas in Analog magazine had many interesting ship concepts.

barkerpa3466 wrote:One of my favorites is a enemy\alien supper carrier brought back to life to help a desperate alliance defeat an impending invasion.

False Colors (Wing Commander)
by William R. Forstchen, William H. Keith

Wiki:
The novel was subject to a dispute between Peter David and Richard Arnold, who wished the Borg character Rhiannon to be removed, with the logic that Borg could not be female. This was prior to a regular female Borg character, Seven of Nine, appearing in Star Trek: Voyager. Because of this, the novel was printed with a disclaimer making it explicitly apocryphal.[2][3]

The plot centers around the actions of a woman named Delcara from a race which has been assimilated by the Borg, who has gone to extreme lengths to exact her revenge upon them. Delcara controls a Planet Killer, later revealed to be the finished version of the one fought by the USS Enterprise during the events of "The Doomsday Machine" episode of the original Star Trek. This Planet Killer is also 'inhabited' by the psychic impressions of its creators which exist as part of the Planet Killer's control system. Both Delcara and the 'ghosts' within the Planet Killer share a hatred of the Borg, and both Planet Killers are claimed to have come from just outside the galactic barrier surrounding our own galaxy. The Borg, having assimilated a Ferengi ship along the way, invade the Planet Killer, and force Delcara to attempt to reach Warp 10, then assumed unbreakable in Star Trek canon (later disproven in Voyager, though with grave consequences if the proper protection isn't in place), in order to reach the heart of Borg space to exact her revenge before she dies from severe phaser wounds.

Michael Everett wrote:Although they are nowhere near a match for the previously-mentioned starships, the Starfuries from Babylon 5 are so well-designed that NASA asked for the blueprints so that they could work out how to build them for themselves!

When an official government body wants to turn a fictional starship into reality, you know that you're doing something right.

As for the starship I think ranks among the greats... the Nadesico, although quite a bit of that is the crew. The captain is a barely-out-of-her-teens tactical genius bordering on genki girl, the three full-time armoured-suit pilots spend more time teasing each other about their attraction to the fourth (and only male) armoured-suit pilot (who is completely oblivious to their feelings about him) than actually fighting, a chief engineer who likes to make dioramas of famous armoured-suit battles, a doctor who is almost addicted to giving presentations on any (relevant) subject under the sun and a systems-controller who is a specially-raised-for-the-job little miss snarker and who turns out to be a princess... chaotic doesn't even begin to describe it.

Oh, and they have to find time to fight off alien invaders as well.
Somehow...

cthia wrote:
From Star Trek: Next Generation novel Vendetta

This ship could cut into the Borg like butter. Borg ships became little more than targets. Piloted by the last remaining citizen of its Borg assimilated race, Delcara ...

Wiki:
The novel was subject to a dispute between Peter David and Richard Arnold, who wished the Borg character Rhiannon to be removed, with the logic that Borg could not be female. This was prior to a regular female Borg character, Seven of Nine, appearing in Star Trek: Voyager. Because of this, the novel was printed with a disclaimer making it explicitly apocryphal.[2][3]

The plot centers around the actions of a woman named Delcara from a race which has been assimilated by the Borg, who has gone to extreme lengths to exact her revenge upon them. Delcara controls a Planet Killer, later revealed to be the finished version of the one fought by the USS Enterprise during the events of "The Doomsday Machine" episode of the original Star Trek. This Planet Killer is also 'inhabited' by the psychic impressions of its creators which exist as part of the Planet Killer's control system. Both Delcara and the 'ghosts' within the Planet Killer share a hatred of the Borg, and both Planet Killers are claimed to have come from just outside the galactic barrier surrounding our own galaxy. The Borg, having assimilated a Ferengi ship along the way, invade the Planet Killer, and force Delcara to attempt to reach Warp 10, then assumed unbreakable in Star Trek canon (later disproven in Voyager, though with grave consequences if the proper protection isn't in place), in order to reach the heart of Borg space to exact her revenge before she dies from severe phaser wounds.

http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/The_Doo ... e_(episode)

The Lexx is a bio-engineered planet-destroying bioship in the shape of a giant wingless dragonfly. It was grown by ingesting organ collections from the protein bank on the Cluster, the seat of the Divine Order, for use by His Divine Shadow. The Lexx was originally intended as the ultimate deterrent: the threat of a weapon that could instantly obliterate any planet would keep the remaining "Heretic" worlds of the Light Universe in line, and those that refused to capitulate would be summarily destroyed to reinforce the point. This plan was foiled when the crew commandeered it to escape from the Cluster.

The most important function of the Lexx is its ability to destroy entire planets with a single, high-powered blast. Its only weapon is initiated by command from the captain only, followed by a highly dramatic sequence when the Ocular Parabola found on the surface of its eye tissue flips from a smooth surfaced dome into a complex array of satellite dish-like structures. Huge amounts of yellowish-orange particles are released en masse from the array and focused by Lexx's nervous system to a point just above its mouth. Once focused, the particles burst into a massive, forward-moving, planar wave which expands ahead of the Lexx exponentially until colliding with an object of sufficient mass to disperse it, usually a planet. The wave instantly vaporizes smaller ships without losing momentum. Though the Lexx is designed to destroy entire planets, it can fire less intense blasts to hit smaller targets; however, the smallest area it seems capable of destroying is roughly the size of an entire city

A special living energy being known as the "key" is required to control the Lexx, and it will usually only respond to its owner. However, if the ship is in a deficient mental state, it may respond to anyone. A special holographic hand-scanner on the bridge confirms that the captain of the ship possesses the key. The captain then controls the Lexx through voice commands.

The Lexx itself is sentient, but not very intelligent. The show's creators have compared it to a dog. The Lexx often takes orders literally, even when it's not being addressed directly (Stan accidentally orders the Lexx to destroy a planet when he explains its function to some astronauts). It acknowledges commands and comments with a droning, simple male voice; for example, "As you command, Stan." The Lexx has emotions (it actively enjoys destroying planets, for instance, and becomes rather petulant when denied the opportunity), and is, to a small extent, capable of acting of its own accord when in defense of itself. In the final episode of the show, as the Lexx is dying, it tells Stan that he was always its favorite captain, since they both enjoy destroying planets.

Being alive, the Lexx needs to eat. It can digest any form of organic matter, and will usually land on a planet's surface to scoop up suitable organic foodstuffs; however, it is content to simply blow up a planet and feast on the sizable chunks. When denied food, the Lexx can become rather cranky, but will always attempt to follow orders no matter what is happening. The moral dilemma of destroying inhabited worlds for Lexx's functioning and survival is a recurring plot theme, and occasionally Lexx will swallow passing ships without informing the crew. Another means of collecting energy is to "resorb" discarded items left on its floors.

The Lexx has various amenities for the crew, though unusual in their implementation. It has showers which use long, phallic, writhing shower-heads that are activated by squeezing a pair of nearby balls. Food suitable for the crew consists of an orange, green, or blue paste-like substance, which is squirted from phallic dispensers, much to Stan's disgust. Lexx has commodes that use large, waggling tongues for user sanitation. A cryo-chamber is also available, primarily used by Kai to preserve his protoblood supply.

The Lexx also hosts a contingent of smaller bio-engineered ornithopter-like craft called "moths", which the crew often use for short-range travel in space, in a planet's atmosphere, or even within the vast Lexx itself. The moths are insect-like ships (as befits their name), and twitter constantly as they travel. The moths fly themselves, with a joystick used by the occupants only to direct their movement. The moth only uses its wings when in an atmosphere, and has a "jet pack" of sorts on its underbelly when traveling through space. Stan usually sleeps in the husk of one of the dead moths. The Lexx has a crew of moth breeders, zombie-like human slaves re-engineered entirely for moth breeding, to produce these craft when necessary.

When the Lexx arrives on Earth, it becomes pregnant after an encounter with an Earth dragon fly, suggesting that the ship is in fact female even though it speaks in a male voice (in the English-language version; the version shown in Germany gave the ship a female voice). Conversely, when a sex-changing virus sweeps through the ship, the Lexx is affected and develops stereotypical feminine characteristics, suggesting that it is normally male.

The Lexx ages several thousand years during the run of the series, and in later seasons its advanced age and decrepitude following millennia of starvation and neglect lead to it becoming increasingly unstable. In the final episode of the series, Lexx dies, giving birth to a smaller, very Lexx-like ship, the result of a brief union with an insect from Earth. The new ship, dubbed "Little Lexx" by Stan and Xev, imprints upon Stan when he tells it that he is its captain. This causes Little Lexx's key, blue like the original Lexx key that His Divine Shadow had, instead of the yellow copy that the Ostral B heretics made, to bind with Stan's right hand.

The Lexx was named after show creator Lex Gigeroff.