Deep in the BroadsStart a new personal quest to meet up with Harjinder again so I can talk to her about what I've found. I don't know what she'll recommend, but she shouldn't set people on me. Or at least more people.
Start quest 3 and sail the boat up the river again. Don't go all the way to Mob territory, but try to get close enough for telepathic contact with Mitchel
New personal quest:
Consult the WifeLast thing Sandeep learned was Harjinder was living somewhere in the north part of Norwich, in an old bingo hall Sandeep had once stayed in himself. It's time to re-connect.
Reward: +1 tally
Location: North Norwich city
[Sandeep rolled 2+3+2weird=7]
Sandeep sails the boat through the twisting swamplands of the broads towards Postwick. He feels the shape of two minds at the edge of his mindsenses. It's definitely Mitchel, but he's not alone. There's a woman with him. They're doing something inland in the overgrown town of Brundall.
Somewhere in GML territory"Aw man zebras are my favorite animal, take the wheel I'm gonna shot them in their faces."
Let Rovin take the wheel, then go to the back of the RV and shoot the zebras from a back window.
[Burt rolled 6+6+2body+1scopedgun+1veteran=16!]
Rovin takes the wheel while Burt takes his Lee Enfield and pushes open the back window of the RV. Rovin keeps the car steady while Burt carefully lines up each shot. The first bullet hits a zebra clean in the forehead camera. Its armoured legs keep running until it veers off into the overgrowth out of sight. The second bullet rips through the neck of another of the cyberbeasts, its head lolls to the side and the whole thing collapses in a cascade of sparks on the cracked tarmac. The third one hits the chest of the last zebra. There's a splatter of rotten ichor, but the thing keeps running. Along with the razor-winged flamingo, there's just the two foes left.Burt has used three bullets.
Spooner RowTry to make my way back to the cloud seeder. Attack anyone who follows me
[Sandra rolled 1+2+1body=4]
Sandra begins rolling back up the hill. The rain pours down in droves and she gets stuck in a great muddy track in the hillside. As she struggles, her sense of being in the metallic body begins to waver. When she comes to, it's many hours later. The rain is still tipping down with force and the encampment of pirates has left entirely.
Over Nexus she gets a message from Sable. "Great job!" Sable says. "You cleared out those pirates amazingly. If dropped you some Kudos. We could really use you in the upcoming fight in Bungay. Come on back to Thetford when you can."Sandra gains +1 Distance.
Let it Rain is complete!
Sandra gains +4 tallies, +1 kudos, +1eyes rep
“Well, not what I was expectin - nevermind, no time to explain. I’m Auze, Tortle trainer, and here’s two of my three tortles. As for the third, he’s what you’ve been hearing-sorry, needed a distraction. Got all them over there stunned, even the Mockery*. We have ‘bout a minute to act upon it, and the Mockeries’re plannin’ somethin’ up on that hill, so what shall we do?”
Go with Dell, this is quite a situation we’re all in. Spend 5 tallies on increasing empathy
[Auze rolled 6+3+3empathy+1keep=13]
The rain begins drenching the small group of humans on the edge of the camp. Dell leads them all back half a mile away to a crumbling barn where he keeps a jeep. It stinks of the vegetable oil that is used to power the old machinery. Only the chassis remains, the seats and doors removed to lighten the load and save on fuel.
"That situation was getting more and more chaotic," Dell explains. "Not only the pirates, but the Mob and two different uploxed and now you arriving with those mutant animals... Someone was bound to be killed, and that's not worth whatever intelligence we had hoped to gain."
He shakes Auze's hand. "I'm Dell, current forward General of the Keep. How might I be of assistance? Do you want a ride back to the city?
Watton”Sorry for the feelings of unpleasantness Glitterbox, the reasoning that the legends are interested in tourist morphs is to see if they have any information on the GML or other antagonists for us as a third party for information, no negative intent on our part. Is this is why you are a bit anxious Glitter, that you are a tourist or one of your best friends is one of them?”
Karen will approach and than try to calm down Glitterbox’s anxiety and try to gain the Uploxed trust, as well as trying to determine whether he is a tourist morph or knows any fellow tourists.
”You might call me a bounty hunter now Mr. Murdok, and I plan to get this Gh0st morph either peacefully or through him or her’s morph body on your work bench with this person’s technology as my bounty. I’ll see if anyone from the local town have any leads for this Gh0st before I head directly towards the Legends base”
Jäger shall leave Murdok’s workspace and go and try and find information from any of the residents here about the last known whereabouts for this Gh0st uploxed through a bit of carousing the town, going to the depraved chain man, Glitterbox, or Killazilla and anyone else worth mentioning for this crucial knowledge.
[Karen rolled 5+1+1empathy+1journalist=8]
[Jäger rolled 6+2+3empathy=11]
Jäger goes to the man in the cage in the centre of town. He's thin and feeble, slumped half conscious in the middle of the box. He's got a dishevelled beard, his eyebrows are singed off and several of his fingers are missing. Nailed to the cage is the sign:
CREEKAL SMITH 5 DAYS TIMEOUT FOR FIGHTING AGAIN
Close up it's clear that the cage has been unlocked. The five days were up and the prisoner hadn't noticed. Jäger asks the man about Gh0st.
"Food," Creekal whispers. "I'll tell you for food."
It's trivial for Jäger to find a cup of hot blackberries. The meat people in the town seem to live off slops of boiled berries and a rough bread made from flour ground from various weeds. Descendants of crops that were once rife in the area.
Creekal quickly revives as he holds the warm cup in his broken hands. "I made some mines for Gh0st a few months ago. He was transporting them out east, making kudos from Terraterra. I asked him if I should work on any more but he said not to bother. I guess he's still out east."
Next Jäger speaks with Glitterbox and Killazilla. They're in conversation with a woman in a business suit.
"You could say I'm a tourist darling, sure," says Glitterbox's avatar, an animated face on his television screen body. "All a tourist is, is someone who has moved on upstairs who likes to spend a bit of time in the veridical world. Someone who is here to see the sights. Not looking to kill people or play games or hug trees or whatever else."
Karen sees a humanoid killer robot armed to the teeth stroll up. It asks the pair she's speaking with if they've seen a ghost or know anything about Terraterror building in the east. The dino-assassin bot makes a quick reply in his sing-song cadence.
"Double T, building out east? We was just talking about that shit." says Killazilla. On Glitterbox's TV body, the screen crackles into a live feed with the Terraterror logo in the corner. It's of a vast labyrinth made of scrap surrounded a huge tower. The feed flicks through various screens. A great tentacled mass is briefly spotted slouching through a chamber. A group of mutants stand in front of a huge swinging blade while one of them writhes in agony on the ground. A room full of shining gold, rubies, gems slowly roils as something moves beneath all of the coinage. And in a dark corridor, a six armed humanoid robotic figure flickers out of the shadows looks at the camera with its laser eyes and then flickers out of existence back in to the darkness. There's no mistaking the technology. That must be Gh0st!
Glitterbox's voxel avatar face appears on his screen again, cutting off the feed. "Now that's what I call entertainment!" he says.
"Word. As soon as my latest gig wraps up, I'm heading to Laxfield myself."
The Road West of Spooner Row"MISS MARIE, I AM SO SO SORRY, BUT FOR YOUR SURVIVAL'S SAKE YOU NEED TO TAKE THE WHEEL! MY MORPH LACKS THUMBS AND CAN'T DRIVE PROPERLY!"
Try to keep control of the vehicle until Marie gets her act together enough to steer the Semi-trailer truck cab! Try not to let us drive off the road until that point!
[P4 rolled 5+4+2body-1vehicle=10]
Remarkably, P4 manages to keep the vehicle on the road. By now the rain is pouring down and there are cars revving behind them. In the thick rain P4 swings the cab off onto a side road that curves round into a tunnel under the main road. Soon after, they hear the sound of the Pirate's convoy ride over the road above them. P4 is safe for now.
"What the hell do you want, deadman?" Marie hisses. She seems to realise that if P4 wanted to kill her, he could have done so. Now's the time to make demands.
Laxfield Labyrinth“There had been no mention of tentacles earlier, what’s going on with Ben?!?”
I think our best bet is probably the slope. We may not be able to retreat from there, but let’s face it, we wouldn’t really be able to retreat through the swinging blades, either, and we’re less likely to get injured going down the slope.
[Darrin rolled 4+4+1empathy+1london=10]
The others help Ben to his feet. His pain begins to subside and the big man says, breathlessly, "There's a Ben here in the labyrinth. I can feel it. His mind, it's pure madness, drunkenness and cruelty. As I reached out to him, I started to manifest his... abilities. These tentacles."
The Londoners talk about this for a while among themselves before agreeing it's time to move on. They gingerly approach the slope down.
"I'll go first," says Balthazar. "I can take more of a beating."
He slips down the slope and a short while later calls up that it's safe to proceed. Darrin is last down. Never the most physically adroit he slips into a head first position and speeds down, landing in a dishevelled heap at the end of a long slope.
"That was fun!" says Chloe Fontaine.
Gavel is already mapping the next room. The walls and ceiling are formed of scrap metal and old household appliances welded together. Narrow, twisting passages lead north and west. Above the northern entrance a screen flickers on and the image of a man in a tiger mask appears. He holds a computer animated microphone as he holds forth on the proceedings.
"Will our brave hombres head west into certain danger? Or will they sneak back north to the entrance and find another route around? Keep tuned in to find out!"
The screen flickers off, leaving the group to stand about in the dark intersection.
"What the hell was that about?" says Doc Stone.
"I'm not sure, but if there's danger maybe we shouldn't go west," says Big Ben, rubbing his head with his new tentacle.
"It's blatantly a bluff," says Chloe, "They want us to waste more time in this place and move further away from the tower. Let's go west."
"What do you think Dr Amoretto?" Balthazar asks.
Balthazar: looks like a devil, invulnerable to pain, cannot be cut, bruised or burnt
Chloe Fontaine: Can kill people with her voice and shatter glass
Gavel: send holographic projections of hammers from his eyes which can measure and assess
Doc Stone: can burst obsidian pillars out of the ground, haphazardly, with lava
Big Ben: can psychically connect to people called Ben and use their knowledge and powers
Cromer Zoo BaseTheodore volunteers.
Undergoing The Warp Isolate Process:
- Lose all current hunger
- For each current mutation roll 1d10+luck. On a 10+, keep the mutation. Otherwise you lose the mutation. On a 3 or less, you also gain 1 hunger.
- Gain 1d6 new themed mutations. A themed mutation has a 50/50 chance of either improving an existing mutation, or generating a new power that is on a similar theme to an existing power. If you have no mutations to begin with a random one is chosen.
- Any new mutations gained after this point will be themed.
[Theodore rolls 1+2luck=3 on his golden tongue]
[Theodore rolls 6+2luck=8 on his whiskers]
[Theodore rolls 6!]
Theodore Ansen is strapped to a hard mattress in a backroom of the zoo. Bright lights shine down on him. He's encouraged to drink drink a flask of nutrient mix.
"As you might have surmised," says Dr Davis, "The mutations aren't purely physical. Rather, new clusters of information are entangled with your cells, and this information causes your body to manifest the mutations. Remove the clusters, and the mutations recede. That's the idea anyway. First we need to prime your body, hence the drink you've just had. Now..."
He runs a smart phone over Theodore's prone form, a small light attachment sheds a beam of purple light. Theodore starts shaking all over. First he feels his tongue tingle and gets an intense desire to swallow it. As that desire dims, his whiskers draw back into his body. And then the changes really begin. His skin shifts brightly coloured at first, then much more muted, and then back to his normal appearance. His fingers curl into a tight grip. His eyes bulge, telescoping new layers of lens, independently looking around the room.
"It's worked!" says Davis, and then, trying to sound less surprised. "Of course it would work. Of course!"
Over the next few days Theodore learns his new powers. He can see with incredible breadth and depth like never before. His skin can shift into any colour he can dream of, or warp entirely, hair and all, to look exactly like anyone he sees. And his grip is incredible, holding tight onto anything he can grasp.
"You're like the Chameleon Men of Elgron-7!" says Timmy as he sees his friend come into his new powers.
"Now you've helped me, perhaps I can help you," say Davis. He passes Theodore a smart phone with a light attachment and a bag of nutrient mixes. "Give someone the mix and scan them with this," he says, "And the Warp Isolate Process will do the rest!"Theodore gains +1 hunger.
Theodore gains Chameleon Skin: brightly coloured shifting skin. Theodore gains Lizard Grip. Theodore gains Chameleon Eyes. Theodore's Chameleon Skin upgrades to Camouflage Skin. Theodore's Chameleon Eyes upgrade to Hypervision. Theodore's Camouflage Skin upgrades to Doppelganger Flesh.
Mutation Evolved is complete! Theodore gains +2 tallies.
Doppelganger FleshWith a bit of concentration, you can turn your appearance into anyone you can see before you. You can also change your skin colour at will in any combination. This can be used to match your surroundings.
Lizard GripYour hands are formed of intensely strong, curling fingers, allowing you to climb and hold on to things with your weird prowess instead of your normal bodily strength.
HypervisionYou can see in 360 degrees, and with effort may focus in detail on things very small or very far away.
Dedham ValeFeint as though I'm about to clumsily attack the rider with their own stun prod, then quickly lean down and jam it into the spokes of their front wheel instead.
If that works out and/or if I have time, check on the rest of this wild car chase - what became of the enemy truck that rammed us, and my courageous comrade who jumped across to it? Try to avail myself of that single-shot rifle I was going for earlier.
[Ben rolled 5+3+2wits+1fighter+1stunrod=12]
Ben feints and leans forward, ramming the stun rod into the spokes of the motorbike. The bike flips over and cartwheels down the road, its rider flung off and lost on the road behind him. That dealt with, Ben turns to face the big truck on the other side of the pickup. His compatriot is clinging to the roof of the cab, a knife in his teeth. The driver is manically swerving, his shotgun passed to a dog collar-wearing passenger who is a hurriedly trying to reload the gun.
Ben grabs the rifle off the bed of the pickup. It's got one shot, better make it count.Ben has lost a stun rod. Ben gains a single-shot pneumatic rifle.
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Topic: Warped II! a postapocalypse quest roleplaying game - An End of Sorts (Read 40961 times)