"We're here because somebody stole our ride and our best guess is somebody here took it. We're here to take it back."
If possible, manually move rounds from my current Jormungandr clip and put it in my 25-round clip. Then, regardless of the result, reload my Jormungandr with the 25/29 round clip.
You set about merging two of your clips while you talk with Jake. There isn't a reason to hold anything back, but there really isn't any reason to go into detail with him. The fact that you stole the ship in question is irrelevant, and your knowledge of the Father holding Hoke goes a lot beyond best guess, but explaining that would probably lead into the Father's oddly personal desire to get one of you.
Jake shakes his head.
"He controls the Hangars, the Shifting Man, or the Father, whichever you prefer. They ain't guarded really, but they're sealed as tight as anything." Jake's fingers clench and unclench slowly before he continues.
"Automated defenses still work too, it's where... It's where the rest of the people that got sent up with me died." The twenty-eighth iron slug hovers above the waiting magazine, frozen as you stare at Jake. Dominique's introduction of him was a little spare, just a random survivor, but "got sent up" doesn't sound random, and if he knows where the hangar is... Even if you can't leave you can still get aboard your ship again, with a full medical facility, quad barreled machinegun, and all the other amenities of a luxury transport. [gather information 4+1]
"Jake, assume for a moment that I know nothing about you, then start at the beginning of everything." Jake looks at you, or looks roughly near you, then takes a deep breath and starts talking. You listen intently. His beginning is a bit close to the action for you, but he claims not to have noticed anything out of the ordinary before security started going haywire. Apparently the bulk of the facility's staff was attending a baby shower of all things when security turned on them, gunning them down and capturing as many as the deadheads and robotics could grab. His information on that event, however, is garbled, coming third-hand from another wrench jockey who heard it from a caterer. He realized something was up when a deadhead tried to club him into insensibility, nearly killing him before a friend of his took a prybar to its skull. After that he roved the facility looking for another rock to crawl under, keeping to the largest gang of survivors he could find. There are a few points he glosses over, usually where the maintenance gang ran into fleeing scientists, and you suspect those points were needlessly bloody. Eventually they caught up with what sounds like an army of survivors, led by a man named Harrison, and were assimilated into what Jake claimed was a force numbering in the hundreds. Jake talks about Harrison raiding armories for equipment, but it doesn't sound like something he was there for, just that Harrison had actual guns for his people. Jake's recollection of the events after focuses mainly on the constant attacks that harried Harrison's men into a corner, killing almost two-thirds of his forces and pushing them into the red-maintenance level. There they stayed, blockaded by the Shifting Man's children, and sending out an occasional group to slip through and try to find a way out. Jake and four others went out on that mission, and they were all killed, one by one, until it was just down to Jake, locked in a maintenance chute, starving to death.
You ask a few question here and there, but mostly you marvel at the fact that nobody decided to talk to Jake before this. From what you've heard of Dominique's account it sounds like she skipped to the savage beating part of interrogation and forgot to ask any real questions. You aim to remedy that.
"You mentioned passing through the hangar, where is it?" "There are two," Jake says, ridiculously eager to please.
"The secure hangar is on the fifth floor, and the maintenance hangar is on the floor below it, but there's a system to lower and raise vehicles between the two." You're about to ask another question when James groans suddenly, the loudest sound he's made in a long time. You're halfway over to check on him when something explodes from down in the backworks of the restaurant.
---
Dominique WakemanThat door was making Dom nervous. She'd seen one like that before, back in that locked room where Taric had been messing with a computer... and now Taric had disappeared, meaning it was just her. Although she didn't particularly want to, she advanced forward and tried the door.
Cautiously, infinitely cautiously, you reach out to open the door. The glow doesn't seem menacing, but it certainly doesn't look like anything natural. Despite that, nothing happens when your fingers touch the handle, and you breath a sigh of relief. Maybe it's just something to do with your sight, some weird psychic thing that only makes sense in ten-syllable latin. You tug the door open, and for a moment you can feel something pop loose, like pulling a suction cup off a wall.
[Soak 3+1] A fist catches you in the stomach as the door explodes outwards. The shining lines, the sense of pressure, vanish as the door splinters along the glowing markings, sending out a wave of metallic shrapnel that overtakes you while you're still flying backwards from the initial shockwave. (Armor -18, -14, -11, -9, -7. HP -1, -6, -5, -3) Your new armor saves you from the worse of the blast, but more than one shard pricks through the soft sections of your armor or slides cuttingly across the unarmored sections of your body.
You land on your back with a dozen small pieces of metal sticking out of your armor like a porcupine's quills, the force of your impact knocking the breath from your lungs. In spite of that, you really don't feel that unwell. Pissed off? Yes. Angry enough to kill whoever did that to the door? Probably. Wounded? No.
You brush the shards of metal out of your hair and armor, then regard the offending door. It's still standing, the explosion seemingly limiting itself to the outer half of the door. It's thinner now, glowing at the edges, [Door Integrity 1] and it looks like it could fall over in a stiff breeze. You punch it instead of waiting for that breeze. The door topples, tearing away from its semi-molten sides.
The room inside is pretty much what you expected, a plain circular chamber with a couple of chairs bolted to the floor in front of consoles. The lights of the consoles are dark now, but there's a set of heavy breakers on the opposite wall that
should control power. The unusual thing is the armored corpses sprawled in one of the chairs. Its armor is scarred beyond use, showing enough burns and holes to make yours look new-made. The corpse is missing a chunk from his jaw, and his right arm ends in a splintered stump just past the elbow. Why he's dead is hardly a mystery, you're just curious how someone with his injuries could have survived long enough to reach that chair. [Observation 5] In the few places that aren't scarred and burned, you pick out a bit of grey and silver paint on the dead man's armor. If it was whole and made of cloth, the pattern would be twin to the uniform you're wearing.
---
Aaron White"Were going after the ORS, jamie looks like i could punch him out in one hit and you dont look like your best day either Paula"
Medical supplies beyond what little Paula has would be immeasurably useful, and the more advanced the better. If you could load up with enough ORS... hell, the battle is more than half won if the Shifting Man can't keep you injured. You motion for Paula to lead, and you head into the growth half of the labs.
[Observation 5] [Luck 3] Between the well posted signage and Paula's experience you're able to find the chamber that contains the ORS mother as if you'd been going there every day. The trouble is that you can see a trio of corpses lolling out of the room, each one of them equipped like you are now, in modified maintenance suits that mark them clearly as Harrison's men. Judging from the holes and they way they've fallen, you'd say they were shot out of that room.
[Failed roll not shown] You've found the room, but the room could very well be occupied by something with a very big gun. Something that doesn't like your kind. You won't know until you check, but that means someone has to stick their head around that corner.
---
James EvanJames attempted to fish the arm out of the water without touching it, so he could shoot it.
[Will 4 Vs 2] The fungal arm, writhing and twitching, emerges from the water slowly. It strikes at you, twisting against your cage of will, but it is weak, and you are strong. You raise your shotgun, framing the arm against the black pillar in front of you. Then you pull the trigger, almost smiling as the recoil jars your arm. [Quickshot 4+1] (No armor, 71 total damage) The shotgun tears the arm apart at point blank range, flesh, bone, and moldy putrescence dissolving together. The impact of the buckshot tears the arm out of your mental grasp, knocking the fleshy slurry of its remains into the dead blackness. It disappears without a trace.
You turn back to the beach, victorious for the first time in a long time. Your shadow, still darkly garbed, is holding the cube now, cradling it in his severed arm and manipulating it with the other hand. Blight looking at you in a vaguely irritated manner, undoubtedly for destroying that thing before she could make it pay for whatever it had done to her. You're about to ask your shadow what he's doing when he finishes and turns to look at you.
"Keep your heart rate down, try not to get excited, avoid anything with fish oil in it, and for the love of God, do not have sex," he says calmly.
"You still need medical attention, more even than you needed it before. And try not to get hit in the head too much." The last seems added in as an afterthought, with only a baring of teeth to name it a joke.
You try and respond, to say something, but you feel strange... Fuzzy. Forming words takes more energy and knowledge than you can summon at the moment. You fall to your knees, staring at the cube that your shadow still cradles. You have enough time to wonder what he did to you before the effort of keeping your back straight overwhelms you. The last thing your remember is collapsing face down into the surf.
You open your eyes. Then you close them again. It doesn't seem to make any difference. Your head feels like someone just had a battle royal inside it, your tongue is wedged uncomfortably in the side of your cheek, and your mouth is as dry as paper. Wherever you are, it doesn't seem to be a big improvement. Then you hear something explode.
---
Turn RecapTarran Listening
Dominique is not so fine anymore
Aaron is Contemplating
James is... is waking up? Heresy!
Relevant ItemsMemory Stick (Dom)
Security Card November (Dom)
Broken Pad (Taric)
Ident Badge -Pyotr Ivanov- (Taric)
Ident Badge -Kira Masse- (Tarran)
Ident Badge -Naomi Weiss- (Tarran)
Unpowered Pad (Tarran)
L1RF Key (Tarran)
Health: 76/85
Stamina: 85/85
Carried weight: 81/180
Attire:Red Maintenance Jumpsuit, Heavily Modified Red Maintenance Suit (46/115, 45 lbs).
Inv:
Phoenix pistol (2/3) (9 lbs)
CFG bars x2 (3)
Crowbar (8lbs)
Simple Knife (2lbs)
Bone Spike (1lbs)
Fifty feet of rope (10 lbs)
Homemade grappling hook (2 lbs)
D-Grade rations x4 (4 lbs)
Status: Floor 13
Paula Ria
Health: 39/55
Stamina: 37/55
Description: Short, brown haired. The years she spent as a researcher at Delphi added lines to her face, the year she spent as a prisoner here added a decade and stole what weight she had from her frail body.
Personality Complication: Soft. Despite her recent hellish ordeals, Ria was a born and raised Technocrat. She's gotten conditioned to hardship, but the pain and the cold decisions that need to be made in her new life still stun her.
Skills: Mechanical 3, Intuition 1, Dodging 1
Attributes,
Strength (Str): 1
Dexterity (Dex): 3
Endurance (End): 1
Charisma (Char): 4
Intelligence (Int): 9
Willpower: (Will): 3
Equipment: Light Body Armor 36/50, Stained Labcoat, Military grade night-vision goggles. Chimera Pistol 15/15, Diagnostic pad, energy cell x2, Light Plasma Torch (60/100), Basic Medical Kit (2/5), Fifty feet of rope, Homemade grappling hook, D-Grade rations x4.
Henry Myers
Health: 13/75
Stamina: 16/75 (Light Bleeding, -3 stamina per turn)
Description: An emaciated man of average height. He's mostly bald now, thanks both due to a receding hairline and to a chemical spill that permanently injured his scalp.
Personality Complication: Maudlin. Henry has a dark streak a mile wide, and he usually shares it at every available person. He's a good man, but the tendency to vent every depressing thought that runs through his head makes him a little irritating.
Skills: Soak 2, Marksman 2, Stamina 1
Attributes,
Strength (Str): 6
Dexterity (Dex): 6
Endurance (End): 3
Charisma (Char): 1
Intelligence (Int): 3
Willpower: (Will): 4
Equipment: Maintenance Jumpsuit, Heavily Modified Maintenance Suit (23/90). Kapre Light Rifle 9/15, .30 caliber clips (15) x2, Pack of Flares, Fifty feet of rope, Homemade grappling hook, D-Grade rations x4.
Cale Levi
Health: 105/105
Stamina: 105/105
Description: A tall young man, blond and brown eyed. He's in fairly decent shape, considering his recent lifestyle.
Personality Complication: Young, and kinda Stupid. Cale is a young man, and though time has aged him quickly, he still occasionally acts on wild impulse.
Skills: Mechanical 1, Melee 2, Dodge 1
Attributes,
Strength (Str): 3
Dexterity (Dex): 6
Endurance (End): 6
Charisma (Char): 4
Intelligence (Int): 3
Willpower: (Will): 1
Equipment: Maintenance Jumpsuit, Heavily Modified Maintenance Suit (78/90). Sleipnir SMG (5/30 | 35/60), .223 clips (30) x2, Energy cell x2, Crude Combat Blade, Neuroflash grenade x2, Fifty feet of rope, Homemade grappling hook, D-Grade rations x4.
Health: 63/70
Stamina: 70/70
Carried Weight: 138/140 (-25%)
Attire: Technocrat Commander Dress uniform [11lbs] Standard Body armor, 66/100. [35lbs]
Inv:
Energy Cell x6 (3 lbs)
Taric's Frankenstein Versatility Rifle (A30, E65, 31lbs, in hand,) (Can't use laser)
.220 gauss clip x3
Basilisk pulse rifle 4/5 (13 lbs)
Piru Gauss Rifle (4/5 4/5 16lbs)
.45 Gauss slugs x2 (5)
Disruptor Pistol (4/4 4lbs)
Saun's Helmet (Quarter full of ants, enclosed.) (3lbs)
Box of terrible scrap components (20lbs)
Memory Foam centerfold
colonist rations x5 (5lbs)
Tripwire emitter
Status: ?
Health: 75/75
Stamina: 75/75
Carried Weight: 146/150 (-25%)
Attire: High-prelate Uniform [8lbs] Standard Body Armor 48/100. [35lbs]
Inv:
Tarran's Ichneumon Anti-Armor Rifle -Scope- (1/1, 20lbs, 1 rounds in speed loader)
1' sabot packs x1 (2)
Combat Knife (1lb)
Sleipnir SMG (A0, E25 9lbs,)
Sleipnir SMG (A0, E25 9lbs,)
Energy cells x4
8 .220 gauss clips (35)
Basic First Aid Kit 3/5 (5lbs)
Jormungandr Assault Rifle (A29, E39), 16lbs. In hand,
Artemis Railgun (E 3/3, A 3/3, 18lbs)
.50 Rail Clip (3)
Credit Chit (Unknown)
Status: Unknown Restaurant, lowest tier.
Health: 100/135
Stamina: 115/115
Carried Weight: 135/210 (-25%)
Attire: Arbiter dress Uniform, pristine [10lbs] Standard Body Armor, 29/100. [35lbs]
Inv:
Dominique's Abassy Heavy pistol -laser sight- [6, 8lbs]
Stun club (50/50 11lbs)
Fuath Riot suppression carbine [6, 13lbs, Caustic load]
.50 caliber pistol clips x7 (7, 2lbs)
Full Bottle of Wine x1 (1lb, sealed)
Jormungandr Assault Rifle (A35, E70, 16lbs. In hand)
LR Jormungandr Battle Rifle (13/35 A, 8/15 E, Damaged, 17lbs)
Artemis Railgun (E 3/3, A 3/3, 18lbs)
.220 gauss slugs x1 (35)
.220 gauss slugs x1 (30)
Smoke Grenades x1 (neg)
Energy cells x3
Energy cell (90%) x1
.50 Rail Clip (3) x1
Field rations x1
Phoenix Pistol [2, 9lbs]
Basic medical kit (1/5) (5lbs)
Data storage drive [Romance novels]
Unknown Chemical Hypo x3 (Neg)
Partially sorted (1/3) stack of Technocrat stamped papers (Bad novel)
Status: Unknown Restaurant, back rooms.
Health: 33/75
Stamina: 75/75
Carried weight: 105/240 (-25%)
Attire: Exarch Dress uniform [8lbs] James' Light Body armor 47/50 (50/50) [25lbs]
Inv:
Renfield SMG (10, 10lbs, in hand)
Riot shield (10lbs 30/30)
Piru Gauss Rifle (E5/5 A5/5 16lbs)
.45 Gauss slug clip (5)
Simone's Song (6lbs 4/7 -Frangible Rounds-)
.50 caliber Frangible pistol clips (7) x1
Dybbuk Flechette Canister Rifle (1/2 35 lbs)
20 mm flechette canisters (x2, 1 lb)
Status: Unknown Restaurant. Incredibly Smelly.
Author
Topic: Deviation-22. The End of All Things. (Read 527050 times)