An SOS on Formaline

 Present:

• Anastasia "Stasi" Tepes. Zhodani Soldier from Querion – Shane
• Emerse Gee. Daryen Scientist from Torment – Darryl
• "Riley" O'Reilly. Sword-Worlder Pilot from Winston - Richard
• Anton Tositova. Solomani Gunner from Entrope - Ian
• Itzy Ende. Sword-Worlder Soldier from Winston - Chris
• Sang "Spanner" Hoang. Sword-Worlder Mechanic from Winston – Jeff
• Hoff Ende. Sword-Worlder Scientist from Winston - Kevin
• Gnostic Hands. Solomani Scientist from Entrope – Jamie
• Belle Ende. Sword-Worlder Medic from Winston - Steven
• Split "Penny" Ende. Sword-Worlder Minstrel from Winston - Jason
• NPC: Scurry. Drone Gunner from Winston
• NPC: Zeraphina Althira. Zhodani Diplomat from Querion
• NPC: Finn Cyborg from Querion

 by Jason

We start aboard Ye Faerie Queene after escaping the spiders (and abandoning Liz). The ship continued to orbit the moon, Formaline.

“Ah,” said Belle, removing a rod-like piece from the giant spider she was dissecting. “This is the creature’s backbone, one of the two items, a so-called 'Margrave', we need to power up the Ancients’ complex back on Winston. A 'margrave of an avian spinosa'.”

One of the scientists in the group immediately queried this - "Backbone? I thought spiders were invertebrates."

"Shut up nerd," said one of the non-scientific types in the group. "Your own eyes saw this was no mere spider. I can’t believe your ego’s trying to point score after what happened to Liz. At least we can say Liz’s life and sacrifice had some purpose!"

"Ahem, right then," said Hoff. "So let’s prepare for our next stop, this moon we’re orbiting, Formaline. My records show it has an earth-like diameter but a gravity of 16 per cent. Formaline takes 306 days to orbit the gas giant Lophomyrtus. It’s cold, around -20C where we’re going, but the atmosphere’s breathable. Anyway, we should be perfectly comfortable in our vac suits, or even our cold weather clothing."

Gnostic asked how the atmosphere could exist. 

"Various theories," said Hoff. "The smaller sun, denser planet, the radiation from the gas giant, or maybe it was artificially created."

Riley oriented the ship for an approach into Formaline’s atmosphere. As we flew in, interference from the gas giant caused us to lose radio contact with Winston. Almost immediately afterwards, we picked up a repeating SOS signal from the surface. Emerse, monitoring the signal, said it had a Zhodani signature to it.

As we got closer to the surface, we saw lights. Riley got us to within one km of the location, from where we could observe several make-shift shelters, a couple of air-rafts and three bright lights on poles. The site was somewhat overgrown with shrubs and climbing foliage common to the area.

Emerse called out over several radio frequencies, but got no answer. Could someone still be there? Could it be a trap?

We decided to land the ship around 100m from the camp. Judging by the appearance of the place, we surmised this could be the final resting place of survivors from the Zhodani freighter above, the Gnost Roma. They’d have lain here almost 20 years.

Soon after, the radio crackled to life. “Hello, hello,” in Galanglic [ Traveller English].

"Identify yourself," said a startled Emerse.

"I’m Toby, Toby. From the Gnost Roma. My God, you’re the first ship we’ve seen in five years, and that went right by."

"You can see us? Where are you?"

"Oh no, can’t see you, just heard the radio noise. I’m in one of the buildings here."

"How long have you been here?"

"Oh, oh, 19 or almost 20 years. Hang on, I’ll go get the boss."

Planet Querion in Querion system,
Querion sub-sector,
Spinward Matches sector

Moments later a woman’s voice came over the radio.

"This is Ivanka Tepes of the Zhodani from Querion. To whom am I speaking?"

"I’m Riley, Captain O’Reilly" (cue some incredulous background gasps from the party - followed by heated but quick discussion about the right of Riley to call himself our leader. Well, he has the right to call himself a ship captain, we decided. But certainly not the boss of us.).

Ivanka went on to explain her party of five Zhodani (all women of course) and two humans (including Toby) had scratched out a living here since escaping the Gnost Roma by air-raft 19 years ago. They’d set up a power converter and found a source of food.

Zeraphina then took over the mike and she and Ivanka had an animated conversation we couldn’t really follow.

It was agreed we’d meet up in person. Zeraphina, Anton, Gnostic and Split representing the party, dressed up warm and walked towards the survivors outside. Itzy provided security from the rear.

We were welcomed with delight and open arms - but decided not to go for full hugs, these mainly being blood-sucking vampires after all. Their group included a Vargr [uplifted dog, bipedal] and a cyborg (Finn) in addition to the Zhodani and the humans. They confirmed they’d got stuck here after their comms were unexpectedly cut off by the same interference we’d experienced coming into the atmosphere.

We asked about the spiders and the grey creature we’d seen on the disabled freighter above. Both the same lifeforms, just at different lifecycle stages, they said.

They’d been passing Formaline, using the moon as a gravity assist, when they were hit by two projectiles. The projectiles turned out to be a means for the spider creatures to board the freighter and attack the crew, killing most. The survivors powered-off the ship (since mysteriously re-powered somewhat) and used the only two air-rafts to escape to the moon’s surface.

Air-raft (and not "air/raft")

To their surprise, once here they discovered a colony of the same spider creatures living about 10km away, around the same location as one of the Ancients’ facilities. The groups had come into conflict occasionally, but firearms seemed sufficient to kill any that got too close.

"Right, let’s do a deal," said Riley. "I estimate I can get you all aboard our ship and back to civilization - but I’ll need 50 per cent of your air-rafts and half of any minerals you’ve found as compensation."

"I suppose that’s acceptable," said Ivanka.

"And the cyborg," said Riley. "We’ll need him too."

"Finn you mean? I’m afraid he’s an intelligent and independent being, I have no right to give him away like a piece of property."

"Isn’t he illegal?"

"Oh no, he's a cyborg, not an android which would be illegal. Cyborgs have a living brain and Finn's brain is Zhodani."

"Alright then. Just the raft - can you help us get it on board?"

Anastasia "Stasi" Tepes

While this discussion took place, Zeraphina had been talking to her other sisters in the survivor group. She found a particular friend in Anastasia "Stasi" Tepes [Shane's new character], who in turn had a special bond with Finn.

Stasi helped us get the air-raft on the Queene (it took about a day). She decided she’d like to keep hanging out with Zeraphina and us. In return, she persuaded Finn to join us as well - performing a ruse where she pretended in front of Riley to be able to command Finn to do her bidding.

It was very cramped, but we managed to get everyone on board Ye Faerie Queene and lifted off. Our guests suffered greatly, finding proper gravity pretty hard to deal with after their 19 years on-moon 16% gravity.

Back in space, we set a course for the outer reaches of the gas giant’s atmosphere (20-hour trip at 1G). Riley performed a rather clever technique to scoop up the extra fuel we needed. It was getting mighty hot by the time we got out of there.

Then it was a 63 hour trip (@1G) to the space station above Winston. We radioed ahead to say we were coming and space control asked Riley where we’d come from and what we’d been up to.

Riley described the way we’d found the freighter, battled spiders as big as yer head and afterwards heard the SOS that led us to rescuing the survivors. Space control sounded very surprised and interested and had a number of follow up questions. Riley clammed up and they decided to bring us in.

On the way, all the vamps had camped out in Zeraphina’s cabin. Their two human companions looked very punctured and ill, and said very little.

Zeraphina came out and announced that her sisters were feeling very poorly and were in urgent need of blood donations. She asked for the male members of our party to volunteer themselves - in a way that sounded like we didn’t have much choice. It took an awful lot of persuading, but first Anton and Gnostic agreed, then Hoff, then Itzy.

Emerse shut himself in another cabin, saying he couldn’t be disturbed. He really felt apprehensive about biters and decided he needed to build a double power taser for his protection. He must have been feeling a bit distracted because he crossed the wires during construction and gave himself an awful shock.

Space Control around Winston

The space control people instructed us to connect with dock X (quarantine) at the station. We hid our contraband spider margrave in a hidden hatch in the hold.

Before we docked, those of us in the Ende family made an encrypted call to Contessa (Belle, Itzy and Hoff's mum). We told her everything that had happened minus mentioning Finn. She thanked us for the update and said we’d be pleased to hear that the projectile weapon we’d ordered for the ship was almost ready and could be mounted to the ship during our stay at the space station.

Very soon after we docked, some armed humans in hazard suits pushed their way in and barked orders at us to lie down on the floor. All of us complied except for Captain O’Reilly. They gave him one more chance, at which point he asked under whose authority on his ship. They then tazed him to the ground, where he lay wet coughing and vomiting for several minutes.

After putting gas masks on us, then going about the interior of the ship applying a biological spray, the officers came back and asked us all to cooperate in providing blood samples. Oh the irony for both our men and the Zhodanis.

We were all thinking the quality of the communication we’d received thus far could really have been improved and were of a mind to write a very stern letter to the space station commander. We mumbled and complained under our breath, but submitted to the blood tests. Well, all of us except O’Reilly. After another round of tazing, he was literally dragged off somewhere else from the rest of us. The Zhodanis were taken to a separate room as well.

Soon after, we were told our blood samples had cleared us of any pathogens, but we were forbidden from going back to Winston for the time being. We were free to move the ship to dock B for installation of our projectile weapon. The officers asked who our leader was - we said Belle - and an appointment was made for her to talk to the commander of the space station.

Meanwhile, O’Reilly came to in a very bare-looking interview room. He was asked for a blood sample again, with emphasis that this was them asking nicely and they would not take his blood without his consent. He told them to go jump without a spacesuit. ZAP! Down he went again. If you were a fly on the wall, you’d have observed there was an attractive spray across the floor from both Riley’s mouth and rear end, and absolutely no contents left in his bowels or stomach.

This time when Riley woke up, he agreed it would be considerate to all on board the space station if he were to volunteer a blood sample. The test came back clear. He was returned to us while Belle was off visiting the commander.

Belle and Itzy (accompanying as guard) were received warmly by the commander’s assistant and taken to a comfortable if spartan interview room in his complex. Several troops already there ensured Belle and Itzy were clearly outnumbered.

The commander entered the room and introduced himself as Director Gluteus Febrile. He asked where Belle and her crew had been and whether they’d brought anything back from the expedition that his officers hadn’t already seen. Belle reiterated we’d been to Formaline, heard the SOS and discovered the survivors. She said very little about spiders, except to agree with O’Reilly’s original report that they were big bastards - and really you’d have to talk to him or Emerse to learn more as I wasn’t even there. Said nothing about the Ancients. Not much more was said and she was released.

There was a bit of follow up questioning with Emerse and a more compliant O’Reilly. They confined their discussion to the freighter and its spiders and didn’t give too much more away. It sounded like the Sword-worlder Space Force might later be engaged to investigate the freighter further.

With all that drama behind us, we were kind of relieved we wouldn’t be going straight back to Winston. We said goodbye to the survivors we’d rescued - goodness knows what they’d be doing next. Stasi and Finn had become good mates with Zeraphina and decided to stay with us.

We decided on our next course of action, which was to visit one of the other Ancients’ sites on our map of the solar system - this time the second farthest planet out, Dollar. The trip took a good eight days (183 hours@1G) this time, which gave us all time to get to know our new party members a bit better. Stasi had a habit of never looking you in the eye when talking with her - her gaze was more toward the neck. Finn was the only one of us able to keep up with O’Reilly’s drinking, although once that was discovered, the whisky locker got locked.

We studied Dollar - a much different place with a 7 per cent gravity and temperature around -220C. It had a 25.6 year orbit around the sun, and a day length of 37 hours. We’d definitely need our vac suit skills this time around. It seemed nothing had ever been done with this planet, but its solidity and lack of atmosphere suggested it was safe to land on.

Emerse spent his time building a drone on tracks capable of working in Zero G.

Riley spent a lot of time getting his new air-raft ready for a trip from orbit to planet surface. Hoff’s superior engineering skills allowed him to spend some time assisting Riley and making expert repairs to his mistakes. Riley would then reverse Hoff’s fixes and the cycle would go on. It kept them both amused and occupied.

Ye Faerie Queene's
new projectile gun turret

Anton was extremely keen to let rip with the ship’s new gun. But without a legitimate target, he had to make do with practising and making all the gun noises himself.

Gnostic claimed the Crown of the Ancients (Liz had this previously) so he spent a day of the trip to get it attuned to him.

Once we got into orbit, we used our coordinates to pinpoint where the Ancients’ site was. We didn’t need to worry about using up fuel this time, so took the ship to the planet’s surface and about a kilometre out from the site - we knew from our experience on Winston that our more advanced electronics would fail closer in. 

We then donned our vac suits and took the air-raft through the freezing twilight space outside. Finn, Itzy and Split stayed in the air-raft. Finn had plenty of electronics on him and was not willing to risk his life support to enter the field.

Gnostic, wearing the crown, detected a glow on the perimeter of the circle around the centre of the site. As he directed us there, we realised this site was identical to the dishes we’d found on Winston - including the tunnel entrance. There was no water this time, and without sufficient atmosphere to generate moisture or ice, the tunnel was clear.

Now came the tricky bit. Few of us were proficient with our vac suits. Maybe we should have done some practice rather than going to bars all the time. Ah well, how hard could it be? We exited the raft and found we could communicate by pressing helmets together and yelling. Progress was slow. Emerse in particular practically needed to be carried - there was quite a bit of corn, peas and diced carrots on the inside of his visor (but he was still talking). 

We roped ourselves together and Gnostic, probably the best of us in a vac suit, took the lead.

Finn, wearing no helmet, motioned to Gnostic to take his helmet off. So Gnostic paused, then complied and the tunnel was warm and pressurized (with air). Everyone followed suit except for Stasi and Belle.

Down a little way, there was a glowing yellow circle around the tunnel which only Gnostic, with the Crown, could see. (This was about the spot where the soldier exploded back in Winston in a similar tunnel network.) 

Emerse carefully slid his fingers past the threshold. Nothing happened. So he walked through. The circle went green. Then everyone followed.

About another 50 paces, Gnostic saw another yellow circle. This time is was Gnostic's turn to gingerly side his fingers past. The same result, the circle went green and everyone got past.

Then they came to a door way with a swirling surface like steam (this mimicked the doorways on Winston) It had a handprint on the side. Gnostic used his (ungloved) hand in the print and the door "opened" (the steam vanished).

Then they all entered another control room like in Winston but it was a bit different. It only had one additional tunnel. Whereas the Winston one had five tunnels.

Dollar Ancients' control panel

There was a radio telescope receiver in the centre, like the Winston one, but this one was twice the size.

And there was another control panel on the wall, like the one from Winston.

The doors had handprints next to them. Gnostic opened the far one opposite the entrance; the steam vanished and a tunnel was visible, disappearing into the darkness. Gnostic headed down a little way and he saw what looked like web on the floor and walls; web similar to that on the Zhodani freighter...  oh dear. 

He bravely retreated and "shut" the door.

RIP Liz

Present:

• "Liz" Holmes. Sword-Worlder Soldier from Winston – Shane
• Emerse Gee. Daryen Scientist from Torment – Darryl
• MARMALADING: "Riley" O'Reilly. Sword-Worlder Pilot from Winston - Richard
  
• Anton Tositova. Solomani Gunner from Entrope - Ian
• Itzy Ende. Sword-Worlder Soldier from Winston - Chris
• "Spanner" Hoang. Sword-Worlder Mechanic from Winston – Jeff
  
• Hoff Ende. Sword-Worlder Scientist from Winston - Kevin
• Gnostic Hands. Solomani Scientist from Entrope – Jamie
• Belle Ende. Sword-Worlder Medic from Winston - Steven
• Split "Penny" Ende. Sword-Worlder Minstrel from Winston - Jason
• NPC: Scurry. Drone Gunner from Winston

 by Jeff

The sharp beams from the away team's suit lights cut through the darkness and illuminated the corridor ahead. Empty. Spanner's plan to lure the spider creatures out of the corridor and expose them to vacuum worked flawlessly. Apart from the glistening slimy material running along the corners of the corridor at floor and ceiling level, there was nothing there. Time to advance ...

"Little help please" stammered Liz, still suffering from the previous spider attack.

Spanner attempted some First Aid, but given her meagre skills, the inhospitable conditions, and operating in the Vac Suit, she didn't hold out much hope for any success. By some miracle [critical success roll of 1 against a skill level of 3, miracle indeed] Spanner was able to ease Liz's pain [1 hit point cured]

As the away crew of Anton, Liz, Spanner, and Zeraphina (the Zhodani tag-along) prepared to move forwards along the corridor, a quiet beeping sounded back down the corridor behind them, and an orange light began to flash. From the bridge of Ye Faerie Queene, via Emerse's fancy earpiece communicators, came some frantic shouting.

"Bzzz - The hold door is closing" yelled Gnostic, "We need to get out now"
"Bzzz - It's OK" called Emerse, "I'll just open it up again"
"Bzzz - It's NOT OK" screeched Emerse a second later, "Access to the controls are down" 

There was no access to the door controls

There was a hurried debate, and Riley rammed the throttle stick down and raced for the rapidly closing door. [Richard had arranged last week that Riley would do any required piloting/driving this week while he was away, since there is no one else capable of flying the ship. A successful penalty roll was made (roll two dice, take the worst result)] 

Ye Faerie Queene raced neatly through the diminishing opening like an orange pip squeezed between finger and thumb.

"Yee-haw" called Riley as he deftly spun ye Faerie Queene through a 180 and brought her to a halt, facing back towards the cargo hold door.

"Bzzz - Looks like you're all on your own in there" noted Itzy through the comms.
"Bzzz - Head on for the bridge" called Emerse, "Should be kind of straight ahead, then up"

Using the internal corridor control panels, Spanner re-pressurised the corridor and Anton flipped up his helmet visor.

"Thank god" he panted, "It's bloody nice to be out of that. I can see much better now too"

Spanner took a few minutes to collect a sample of the glistening slime in the corners of the corridor, and then the team moved forward along the corridor to another sealed door.

"Vacuum" noted Spanner, "Better close that visor again"

Anton sealed his helmet and waved permission for Spanner to open up the door, via the manual control. The electronics were still down, flashing the familiar Error 503 message. Hauling down on the manual lever, Spanner cautiously cranked open the door, revealing a small room and a ladder rising "up" into a shaft.

"Bzzz - The bridge should be up above you" hissed Emerse's voice from the communicators.

Liz drew her handgun, stood at the bottom of the shaft, and looked "up"; Darkness.
She pushed off and propelled herself up the shaft. Anton moved in behind here and followed.

"Arrrgggghhhh" screamed Liz as she arrived at the bridge level, legs suddenly flailing wildly above Anton's head.

[Shane had to make a Psyche roll as Liz reached the top of the shaft and her lights illuminated the contents. The Psyche stat governs mental fortitude against horrors (think Cthulhu), so Liz must have seen something horrific. Unfortunately, Shane failed the roll and Liz flipped out, no longer able to communicate as she screamed and screamed and thrashed about, her eyes rolled back in her head. Her Psyche stat. also dropped by one, making it even more difficult to confront the horrific, until undergoing a successful counselling session with a Psycho-Analyser]

Anton grabbed Liz's leg and hurriedly dragged her back down to the room where the others waited.

"Bzzz - What's all that noise?" hissed Emerse over the communicators.
"Bzzz - Did you see anything on Liz's camera?" called Anton.
"Bzzz - Nope" replied Emerse, "Just darkness"

Liz slowly settled but was curled up into a foetal ball on the corridor floor, blubbering quietly.
Spanner was below the shaft, keeping on eye open for anything that might want to come down.

"I guess I'll take a look" Spanner decided, "Anton, prepare to recover me too"

"Arrrgggghhhh" screamed Spanner as she arrived at the bridge level, just like Liz.

Anton and Zeraphina manoeuvred the unresponsive Liz and Spanner back to the previous corridor, closed the interconnecting door, and re-pressurised the zone. Liz, and then Spanner, slowly recovered, but had no recollection of what had happened, and certainly no recollection of seeing anything up in the bridge.

Anton tried to get Liz to recall anything, but all that happened was that Liz had another panic attack.
[Made another Psyche roll, failed, flipped out, and dropped another Psyche point. She was now on only 4/20 points]

"Bzzz - The bridge is definitely out" declared Anton.

With Liz again on the floor thrashing about and blubbering, Anton and Spanner made their way back to the cargo hold, now repressurised, to see if there was any way out of the ship from there. Zeraphina stayed with Liz in the corridor to make sure she didn't get into any trouble.

"Bzzz -The hold's out too" reported Spanner, "The door hydraulics are out, no fluid pressure, and no pumps locally"
"Bzzz - We'll take a look at bridge from out here" noted Emerse from the Faerie Queene.
"Bzzz - Liz has come to and settled down now" noted Zeraphina.

While Spanner checked the cargo hold more thoroughly, Riley took the Faerie Queene up towards the bridge, aligning the bridge viewports of each ship to see if they could get a look inside.

"Is this a good idea?" questioned Split.

Closer inspection of the cargo ship's hull around the bridge location revealed that what was initially thought to be an asteroid type impact rupture, was in fact a perfectly circular and smooth penetration, about three metres in diameter, directly through the hull into the bridge, just above the viewport. But the viewport and the penetration were both sealed off on the inside by a glistening, slimy membrane that prevented any observations into the bridge.

"Bzzz - We'll go take a look at the other hole" decided Gnostic, "You guys should also head back down towards the rear of the ship and see if you can find the main storage hold and the crew quarters"
"Bzzz - We can surely get you out through that hole" he concluded.

Racing back along the side of the cargo ship, Riley positioned the Faerie Queene over the other area of damage. Another perfectly formed circular opening, but without the slimy seal.

"Bzzz - That's into the crew quarters" noted Emerse, studying his generic Zhodani freighter schematic.
"Bzzz - That's where we are heading then" declared Anton.

Collecting Liz and Zeraphina on the way, Anton and Spanner moved along the main corridor towards the rear of the ship, soon arriving at another closed bulkhead door.

"Vacuum" noted Spanner, "Visors down and check suit seals"

As soon as everyone was ready, Spanner used the manual door control to open up the bulkhead door. Air started whistling out around the door as soon as it cracked opened, the draft increasing as the door opened. Liz must have still been a little upset after her prior panic attacks as she stumbled in the draft and staggered forward through the door. Lightning quick, Zeraphina threw out an arm and grabbed Liz as she was sucked past Anton and Spanner, nearly tumbling off the short ledge on the other side of the door. The ledge overlooked the huge cargo storage hold at the rear of the ship, a "drop" of some thirty metres down to the floor.

[I guess terms like "up" and "drop" don't mean much in zero G, but she would have tumbled across the width of the hold and may have collided with the far wall]

 

"Huh?" responded Liz.

"Hey Liz" questioned Anton, "How did you get those two puncture wounds on your neck?"
"Huh?" responded Liz.

Spanner turned to Zeraphina. "You didn't .... Nah ... surely not"

Pulling themselves down the rungs attached to the wall below the ledge, the away team made their way to the floor of the cargo hold. There were only three doors visible, the one they had just come through, the giant cargo hold doors (not functioning), and one right in front of them at the bottom of the ladder.

Spanner flicked her hands across the control panel and reported atmosphere on the far side. Then she activated the hold pressurisation command and waited for the ship to flood the cargo hold with breathable atmosphere. That took a good ten minutes but gave options around having their visors open or closed. Then the door was opened, manually, as all control functions apart from the atmosphere controls were not functioning. Damn the 503 error!

A passage, matching the one above, led off towards the front of the ship. Glistening slimy strands of the same web type substance as the corridor above clustered along the corners of the passage. The ship lights were off, so it was only the suit torches that illuminated the way ahead.

"I can hear better with the visor up" noted Anton, having opened up his helmet visor.
"Good idea" replied Liz, "Don't want to be surprised by anything"

[Turned out this wasn't actually a good idea at all, but read on ...]

Closing the door behind them, the team moved slowly forward along the passage. Liz, wielding her handgun and with her sword strapped to her back, took the lead. Anton followed, with Spanner and Zeraphina at the rear.

About five metres down the passage, Liz spotted one of the spider creatures, last encountered in the passages above, lurking in the web at the roof level. Bringing her handgun to bear, Liz took aim as the spider launched itself directly at her. Surprised by the spider's flying attack, Liz fumbled and dropped her handgun. The spider hit her straight in the face and immediately latched on.

Screaming hysterically, Liz stumbled backwards into the rest of the team. Anton pushed her off, but Zeraphina managed to grab the creature and with a mighty yank, pulled it off Liz's face. It didn't give up easily though, and as it came away, a large chuck of the skin from Liz's face came with it.

[Shane fumbled his handgun attack, rolling a 1 on the D20, then he also failed Liz's Psyche roll, so Liz flipped out. Since she had encountered these spider-like creatures before she didn't drop a Psyche point but was certainly out of action for a period. Andrew's attack roll on behalf on the NPC Zeraphina was successful, and she managed to rip the spider away, dealing 6 points of damage to it, but damaged Liz by 3 points in the process]\

"Bzzz - Liz, are you OK?" called Belle through the communicator.
"Bzzz- I'm fine" Liz eventually responded, "Just some scratches"
"Bzzz - Well, be careful then"

Spanner took a sample of the spider blood and tissue in another of the glass vials.
Anton and Liz closed up their visors, deciding that the increase in protection was worth the drop in perception. They moved forward, Anton now at the front and Liz at the rear.

A mummified and desiccated Zhodani body 

After about forty meters of uninterrupted passage, but still with glistening web material along the sides, the team arrived at two doors, one each side. About ten metres ahead they could see a barrier across the passage, formed from a thick layer of the glistening web-like material. Carefully opening the left had door and peeking in, Spanner jumped back with a gasp. A mummified and desiccated Zhodani body hung from the ceiling, held by a net of the glistening sticky web-like strands. A quick glance around the room didn't note anything worth investigating so Spanned closed the door and turned to the other one on the right.

No body in that one, but Spanner heard a scuttling of small feet from somewhere up in the ceiling darkness and hurriedly slammed the door shut. 

"Quick" she called, "Back up. Into the main hold"
"Now what?" asked Anton.
"We might be able to burn through that webby barrier" suggested Spanner.
"With what?" asked Anton.

A quick search through the cargo hold didn't reveal much. Some old sacks and remnants of stored wheat, probably the last cargo run before the ship ran afoul of ... whatever.

"Wheat husk will burn" noted Anton.
"And we could salvage the gunpowder from Liz's handgun ammo" mused Spanner.

A makeshift firebomb was constructed from the gleaned wheat remnants and half the ammunition. It was carefully placed at the base of the web wall in the main corridor, and remotely detonated using the shorted wires trick from behind the cargo hold door.

There was a huge flash of orange light from down the corridor, and then the viewport was obscured by a billowing cloud of smoke.

"That'll do the trick" hoped Spanner.

Spanner peered through the viewport in the door into the smoky corridor beyond.
Was there something there? A figure, hidden by the smoke?

"Arggghhhh" screamed Spanner, throwing herself back from the door and falling to the ground.
She curled herself into a foetal ball, whimpering, and not responsive.

Anton stepped past her and up to the viewport. Peering into the smoky corridor, all he saw was whisps of smoke slowly clearing away through the grills in the corridor ceiling. Shrugging his shoulders, Anton pulled down on the manual door lever and opened up the corridor. Stepping through the door, he strode in, Liz and Zeraphina followed. Spanner had recovered from her panic attack and cautiously stepped up behind them.
She couldn't recall what had triggered her attack and was quite nervous about entering!

As Anton peered down the corridor towards where the webby barrier had been, he made out something crouched down on the floor. A greyish coloured shape, its back towards him, was kneeling on the ground picking at something. 

"Liz" he whispered, "Shoot that thing"
"BOOM" echoed Liz's handgun as she fired into the shape.

The hideous creature charged

The bullet struck it dead centre, a squirt of strangely coloured blood erupting from the wound. Lightning fast, the thing leapt up, spun about, and flew towards Anton.
It was hideous, tentacles flapping around its face and strange articulated legs.
Everyone leapt backwards through the hold door and Anton slammed it closed.
Spanner's fingers danced across the control panel, starting the depressurization sequence, hoping that whatever that was, it couldn't breathe vacuum!

The thing thumped into the door a couple of times, then retreated back up the corridor, a blue-black coloured blood running down its back from the bullet wound. It disappeared into the dark end of the corridor.

"What the heck was that?" shouted Anton, shocked by the thing.
"I can kill it" noted Liz, handgun shaking in her hand.

"I can't open the door while the hold is in vacuum" she reported, "I've tried everything"

After repressurising the hold, and carefully checking through the viewport, the team opened up the corridor again and slowly advanced.

Once they had passed the location where the web seal had been, they came to another bulkhead door, open, leading on into some darkened room beyond.

"Close that already" grunted Anton.

Spanner reached out to shut the door, and something swung down out of the darkness behind the door. An alien claw, but Spanner spotted it swinging and managed to avoid it. The door closed with a reassuring thud, and everyone rapidly backed away, Spanned jamming one of her tools into the door mechanism.

"Maybe it can't use the doors?" hoped Spanner.
"We can't even fight" muttered Anton, "We can't go that way"
"I could kill it" exclaimed Liz.

"Bzzz - What are our options?" asked Anton to the crew on the Faerie Queene.
"Bzzz - We are going to drill out the rivets on the terrestrial maintenance hatch into the Docking Hold" reported Emerse. "Might take a few hours though" Emerse qualified, "Hold tight"

The away team settled down in the cargo hold to wait. Spanned kept an eye on the door to the corridor, Anton closed his eyes and appeared to nap, Liz fidgeted and twisted trying to get comfortable, and Zeraphina stood over Liz, quiet and motionless.

After an hour, Liz moved over towards Anton.

"You're looking kinda hot" she declared and threw herself down onto him.

Attempting to give Anton a passionate kiss on the lips, Liz grabbed Anton's shoulders.
But Anton wasn't napping, his senses alert, and he quickly dodged aside. They had a short struggle, Liz trying to pull Anton into her embrace, and Anton resisting.

[Opposed Strength rolls, and Shane "fumbled", rolling a 20, and then a "miss"] 

Throwing Liz to the floor and restraining her, Anton quickly tied her up and lashed her to the rungs of the ladder. Liz was thrashing about, straining against her ropes, strange slimy spittle spraying from her grimacing mouth.

"Ewww" Anton complained, "What the hell?"
"I'm fine" screeched Liz, "Let me go"
"No damn way" stated Anton, stepping well clear.

"Bzzz - A few more hours" reported Emerse from the Faerie Queene.
"Bzzz - Split is out there cutting off the rivets holding the hatch closed" 

An hour later Liz began to scream and thrash about. There was definitely something seriously wrong with her, although she continued to deny it. The rest of the away team decided that they had better get her up to the main corridor near the Docking Hold, otherwise it might not be possible to later, particularly if her condition continued to deteriorate.

"Bzzz - not long now" reported Emerse.
"Bzzz - Belle here. We are concerned that Liz might be infected. She can't come back to the Faerie Queene until we have analysed those samples. Sorry"
"Bzzz - Yeah, she ain't good" replied Anton.
"Bzzz - No ... I ... am ... fine" Liz panted between whimpers.

There was a dull thud that vibrated through the hull as Split threw the maintenance hatch off and it clanked along the hull before spinning off into space. Leaving Liz in the pressurised upper corridor, the rest of the away team (Anton, Spanner, and Zeraphina) hauled themselves out through the hatch, along the tether, and into the Faerie Queene's airlock.

Spanner handed the various sample over to Belle, who immediately took them to her makeshift lab and began an analysis.

"It'll be a few hours" Belle stated, "Keep an eye on Liz"

An hour later we all watched on Liz's suit camera as she began to writhe violently on the corridor floor, screaming in pain. The camera caught glimpses of the corridor and her suit as her head thrashed wildly around. We watched in horror as her chest bulged out and then erupted. A series of spider creatures crawled out and scuttled away down the corridor.

"Oh crap" wailed Belle.

Belle continued her sample analysis. 

About an hour later, Gnostic, still watching through Liz's suit camera, saw a long grey arm and claw swing into view. The view shattered into white noise.

"I'm shutting down all comms to and from Liz's suit" he noted.

Sometime later, Belle called out from the lab.

"You need to go back in there" she declared, "I've identified this. A 'margrave' is an old term for a bodily organelle in the abdomen of some species of large arachnids. Could this be an Avian Spinosa?!"

...

Off World

 Present:

• "Liz" Holmes. Sword-Worlder Soldier from Winston – Shane
• Emerse Gee. Daryen Scientist from Torment – Darryl
• "Riley" O'Reilly. Sword-Worlder Pilot from Winston - Richard
• Anton Tositova. Solomani Gunner from Entrope - Ian
• Itzy Ende. Sword-Worlder Soldier from Winston - Chris
• Sang "Spanner" Hoang. Sword-Worlder Mechanic from Winston – Jeff
• MARMALADING: Hoff Ende. Sword-Worlder Scientist from Winston - Kevin
• MARMALADING: Gnostic Hands. Solomani Scientist from Entrope – Jamie
• Belle Ende. Sword-Worlder Medic from Winston - Steven
• MARMALADING: Split "Penny" Ende. Sword-Worlder Minstrel from Winston - Jason
• NPC: Scurry. Drone Gunner from Winston

 by Ian

Home Base

The party are gathered at the Ende home base in Bitter End, recovering from their field trip and planning for the next journey. We have a few days while the hydrogen plant and Emerse's walkie-talkies are completed.

Emerse awakens from his marmalade and notices his precious hair sticky and molded into spikes. He heads off to the washroom with his brush, comb and product to put things right. Grumbling about being made a fool of.

Riley gets permission and budget from Contessa for a reimaging and make over of the Montrose truck and gear. Contessa keenly agrees and the truck gets repainted, a new tarpaulin, replacement number plates.

The group also get Ye Faerie Queene repainted to suit. A beautiful black based green to suit such a classic as this ship is. The ship is old, simple, yet reliable. Exactly what the group need. Well, Anton wishes there was a little more room in the accommodation...

Anton asks for more grenades but there are none to be found. [Rolls 20 - fail - on luck to see if any available].

Anton also asks for a gun for the ship as there is an empty gun mount. Contessa agrees but confirms that there are none near but can be ordered in. It is agreed that the part would get sent to the space station in orbit and we can fit on our return. Every old classic deserves a mounted gun!

Liz managed to forge an ID for the Montrose clan (spending one luck for the success) from the ID taken from the slain Suzanne Prentis. Liz now has her name and photo on a valid ID that is linked to the Montrose Clan.

Emerse arranges for a satellite connection to the inter-webs. He now has connectivity to Galactipedia.

The party's navigators, try to work out the Ancients provided co-ordinates, using all the tools they have. Very little luck as nothing modern is even aware of the Ancients - other than relating to mystical stories, myth and legend. Finally the coordinates are entered into the Ye Faerie Queene's navigation computer and it seemed to understand the format and translated into modern navigation points. They were polar coordinates; one was on the system's gas giant Lophomyrtus's third major moon Formaline, and the other was to the distant planet Dollar (7.2AU). This matched the symbols on the control room that had the Ancients icon next to them.

Busy, busy loading up goods and supplies for the upcoming trip. Importantly was the allocation to all of vacc-suits.

Treasure divvy time-out

We took some time to offer the recent treasure items in the four Ancients items.

- Richard bagsed the "Ring of Reflect"; 5 laser damage armour.

- The "Crown of the Ancients" was a dice roll between Shane and Darryl (Liz and Emerse) and Shane won.

*We noted some risk around having the crown that does the translation of Ancients into ours, with Liz, our (as yet undiscovered) pathological liar. Looking forward to how that goes!*

The "Staff of Enema" and the "Jolly Jumper" are still up for grabs and waiting on the marmaladers to return.

Departure Day

Zeraphina

Contessa gathers all together. Standing next to her is an outrageously striking Zhodani woman who is familiar to the group. She is introduced as Zeraphina Althira, a Zhodani "Navigator" (Archaeologist). (She was one of the Zhodanis on the jeep after the fight with the Montrose men.)

"Zeraphina will be joining you, please ensure one of the state rooms is made available for our esteemed guest" Contessa decrees. 

The group groans as they know that there are only four state rooms as it is, and they are not big!

After the group formalities are completed, Contessa moves her favorite waking son, Itsy, to one side and quietly requests: 

"Can you please make sure that when Zeraphina's blood supplies run low, ensure your men folk can feed her?! Make sure you are last, of course". (Zhodanis are vampires)

Itsy ponders.. Hmmm.. Anton is rather beefy and would be ideal with so much extra to share, but then the male marmaladers would also be ideal as they won't argue? We shall cross that bridge when we get to it...

The party then allocate the state rooms, in the following way:

1. The Women: Belle, Liz, Spanner, Split
2. The Ende brothers: Hoff, Itsy
3. The remaining men: Anton, Emerse, Riley
4. Zeraphina

Emerse's communicators are ready and are allocated. They are multi-channeled (public and private configurable) with a range of up to two kms.

With the hydrogen fuel tanks full and fully stocked-up, and the launch pending, Zeraphina arrives and shakes everyone's hands. Well, more like crushes everyone's hands. Those with low strengths whimper with the pain (Zhodanis are very strong).

Everyone straps in and the classic Ye Faerie Queene (YFQ) blasts off to orbit, and docks with the space station (in a geo-stationary orbit at the end of the space elevator). All goes well. YFG is topped up with more fuel as leaving planet takes a lot of fuel - about half of a full tank! Some of the party disembark for the thirty mins to an hour for a lunch and early drink, courtesy of the Ende's tab.

All return to the ship and the coordinates are set for the moon Formaline, the third moon from Lophomyrtus, the gas giant.

YFQ doesn't have grav plates, so to get gravity, the ship accelerates (with its fusion-powered ion engines) at 1G, toward the half-way point, for about 40 hours, then turns around and decelerates at 1G for the rest of the journey.

The 1G allows for normal movement and relative comfort for the crew. Liz and Riley spend hours discussing navigation and ship mastery with Liz not accidentally revealing her ineptness. Liz's bullshit was just good enough to avoid being sprung!

The YFG warnings ring before the 39 hour transition to remind the crew to shut down the ship, ready for zero G. Items are stored and the toilet seats locked shut (most important!). The crew strap in as the ship flips around ready to begin deacceleration.

(Fun Math. At the point of the end of the acceleration, the YFG was travelling at roughly 1400 kilometres per second !!!

Snap quiz: how many AUs is the entire trip? 1 AU = 150 million km)

As the gravity changes, everyone rolls a CON roll to avoid nausea. The party all pass [with only one luck needed for Belle]. However, poor Zeraphina did not fare so well. Unfathomable noises of retching and heaving come from her room. Investigating afterward showed the state room layered with blood and gore as Zeraphina released all her stomach contents.

"Which of you men are the servant? My room needs a clean!" No one responds... "Oh, I guess I'll clean it myself then. Grrrr".

Formaline - the Moon

Formaline is roughly 6000 km diameter. The gravity is 16% of G. Don't jump too hard! Would love to see the view of the gas giant from here.

The ship glides toward its orbital position. All smooth and easy. But before arriving, a red blip appears on the radar that draws Riley's attention. The blip is 500,000 km away in its own stable orbit around the moon. Radar picked it up because the long range detection alerted it to not being a natural rock shape, and something more manufactured.

Long range scanning did not detect much. In fact, the lack of detection of anything was a sign in itself. No light, no transponder, no electromagnetic waves or engine signatures. Nothing.

The crew decide to investigate. It helped when Zeraphina walked onto the bridge and demanded that we go over and investigate.

YFQ is altered course to close in on the object.

The Wreck

Closing to 10,000 km, the telescope could finally be used. In the dim sunlight, it could be seen to be a larger freighter that was sitting cold. There are two large asteroid holes punched through the upper hull.

The wreck

Zeraphina confirmed that the ship looked like a Zhodani freighter. Often used to transport food from Winston, to Entrope, the adjacent star system - where it is difficult to grow food.

The ship is 300m long with 50m x 20m of hull.

The crew hail the ship and send out comms for response. Nothing...

"Take us in Captain". 

They decide to close and minutes later the YFQ is along side with a full view of the freighter.

Now that we are really close, the name of the ship can be read: "Gnost Roma". Querying Galactipedia determined that this was indeed a Zhodani freighter that went missing 20 years ago in this system, on its return trip from Entrope. It was reported as empty when it went missing. The crew of 20 were reported as lost on duty.

The members of the crew that were more computer and ship systems savvy knew that the far ship may be able to receive remote commands to control the freighter cargo door. Emerse had a go and managed to send the exact protocol needed!  [Roll of 1 on a skill check] and the cargo door slowly lowered from the underside of the ship.

The YFQ maneuvered through the opening and magnificently docked in the hold. [Riley rolled a 1 on spacecraft]. It was decided to leave the hold door open and put up with the decompressed space, rather than block the exit.

Volunteers were called for to go investigate. There were not so many that could handle the vacc suit, so in the end only Anton, Spanner, Liz and Zeraphina suited up and made their way to the hold door to the main ship. They entered the air lock, and Spanner confirmed that the door controls had power and pressurization should be working and the inside of the ship was already safe??? After some hissing and blowing, a pressurized atmosphere that was suitable was available in the chamber, but they didn't want to take helmets off.

Emerse was to remain on the YFQ and try to access the ships main systems. He did not have much luck doing this. Emerse was essentially blocked out of everything other than the cargo door by design.

With the new communicators and suit lights on bright mode, suit cameras operational and feeding to the YFQ bridge, the party opened the freighter door and carefully inspected. They were in a short corridor and nothing obvious to report. Was pitch black without the suit lights. Spanner checked systems as they went and there was nominal power being fed to some of the control panels, such as doors and lights, but no power to the lights themselves.

They proceeded onward.

Instructions on where the bridge should be are given and the small group head toward a door up ahead, off this corridor, that should lead to two companion-ways, then a shaft, up to the freighter bridge. (The bridge area was where one of the breaches were)

Scuttle scuttle

The suit lights pick up a scuttling movement and the sound of many feet could be heard. Zeroing in on the sound, the lights pick up a revolting spider, the size of a small dog heading toward Liz who was bravely leading our group.

Liz lets lose with a mighty swing of her two-handed machete and dents the spider. It fights back. Anton and Spanner ineffectively beat on the spider with their fists. Zeraphina stands back with her arms across her face in defence.

Round after round of this rather pathetic fight ensues.

[Liz is ok with the sword but suffers -1 damage because she is one of the party weaklings - with a two-handed sword. You read that correct.

Did not help that Ian, who was rolling the Shane's D10 damage die, was rolling 1's and 2's all night. Even WITH -1 we could have finished much earlier!

Anton and Spanner are hopeless and not meant for direct combat. They both use their very low 'brawl' skill and, surprisingly, do indeed hit sometimes.

The all powerful spider was literally being killed at 1hp damage per round, with rounds where the spider won thrown in.]

Eventually, the final blows are given and the spider is mush on the floor. Zeraphina is looking nervously at the team in front of her.

They proceed and locate the door of interest. It opens away from the corridor and into the next room or corridor. Assumption is that you could depressurize the corridor and the vacuum would really lock that door shut, protecting those in the room from the corridor.

Spanner uses the manual door mechanism to allow a narrow view into the next room. Shining a light and looking revealed many spider eyes reflecting. The door is rapidly shut.

Spanner ponders and a quick plan is devised.

The door opener seemed to be working fine. Spanner attached a wire from her tool kit, to the door control lines. They extended this wire to the pressure chamber back at the entrance to the hold. The team sat in the chamber and wire-remotely opened the door. They quickly SHUT the chamber door and waited for a minute or two. They then closed the far door.

While visibility was not that great, after a minute or so, with just the right light angle and look through the inspection window, the crew could see spider legs scuttling around in the corridor.

The depressurization button was pressed and the air from the corridor was vented! Whoosh....

The corridor was left depressurized for a minute or two and Spanner used the ship's systems and pumped the corridor with air again. They crept out to find eight spiders all dead on the floor! The plan worked perfectly!

But inspection of the door showed a red error light on the panel. The door control was no longer responding and presented a 503 error. No access to the control. It is as if the access had been revoked from somewhere else?

The remote group used the manual lever opener (that still worked) and saw the area that was previously full of the spiders, was now empty.

The Spoils of War

Present:

• "Liz" Holmes. Sword-Worlder Soldier from Winston – Shane
• MARMALADING: Emerse Gee. Daryen Scientist from Torment – Darryl
• "Riley" O'Reilly. Sword-Worlder Pilot from Winston - Richard
  
• Anton Tositova. Solomani Gunner from Entrope - Ian
• MARMALADING: Itzy Ende. Sword-Worlder Soldier from Winston - Chris
• MARMALADING: Sang "Spanner" Hoang. Sword-Worlder Mechanic from Winston – Jeff
  
• Hoff Ende. Sword-Worlder Scientist from Winston - Kevin
• Gnostic Hands. Solomani Scientist from Entrope – Jamie
• Belle Ende. Sword-Worlder Medic from Winston - Steven
• Split "Penny" Ende. Sword-Worlder Minstrel from Winston - Jason
• NPC: Scurry. Drone Gunner from Winston

 by Richard 

We leave the three guards and the unconscious Montrose bitch, Suzanne Prentis, at the cave entrance. Itzy had made sure she was well tied before he collapsed, marmalade dripping from his mouth.

Making our way down the tunnel and into the circular room, Split opens the far door using the four-finger hand-print before Riley and she lead the way down a sloping tunnel that we feel is spiraling down in a wide circle. 

Split wears the crown and carries the staff. Gnostic wears the belt and the ring is back with the marmalading Spanner.

Ahead is more steam with another hand print. Gnostic tries to open it but fails; Split is successful and the steam dissipates revealing a large circular room.

In the centre of the room there is a large metal structure that the scientists Gnostic and Hoff think looks like a radio telescope receiver. Gnostic guessed, from dead-reckoning, that we were about under the centre of the crater.

There is a hand-print opener next to it and above high in the ceiling is a closed circular door like structure.

"Better not open that," says Gnostic. "From my calculations we are directly below the crater". 

There appear to be five other exists, all with steam blocking them and with a hand print and a symbol next to them.

On the far wall is a large wall-size screen with stylized diagram of the room with symbols and glowing lights. There are several of the hand-prints next to the symbols.

The door we have just come through has a green light above it. The others have red lights.

After much debate and confusion, Riley places his hand on the hand print near the DNA symbol. 

Nothing happens. Gnostic touches the same hand-print by the DNA symbol and it lights up. 

Hoff then puts his hand on the opening mechanism at the door (by the DNA symbol) and the steam disappears revealing a tunnel behind. Footsteps coming toward us can be heard.

Hoff backs away, Liz and Riley draw weapons and everyone else carefully watches the door. The sound of footsteps gets nearer but nothing is seen.

Split puts her crown on and sees (and only she sees) a lizard creature standing near her. Before her very eyes it morphs itself into a muscled man with a large appendage and very small thong.

The servitor

We all watch Split speak to an unknown and invisible creature. The one-sided conversation goes for some time "Initiate procedure, open data base, list available procedures…. "

Split eventually takes the crown off and explains to us what is going on. It appears that Split has found herself a servitor that will respond to questions if it knows the information. 

Knowing this we all suggest many questions, as only you can imagine, and Split puts back on the crown and resumes the one-sided discussion (from our perspective)

"What is your purpose" ("to serve you")

"What's behind the door with the tunnel?" ("that’s for The Shamed")

"Is that safe?" ("no")

"What's behind the door with the face?" ("main power")

"Behind the solar system" ("device activation")

"Behind the mushroom?" ("victuals supply")

"Behind the DNA?" ("servitor lair")

Split removes the crown and updates us. Armed with this information we start opening the doors one at a time except the one deemed "The Shamed" and dangerous.

The solar system symbol which we were advised is device activation – after a few attempts Anton opens the door and a low humming is heard. Split, Anton and Gnostic with the servitor go down the revealed tunnel. After a short distance they enter a circular room with a stylized carved picture of the solar system on the far wall - it matches the number of planets and major moons of the Winston system.  

Winston is the closest planet to the big star, and the circle matches where the gas giant Lophomyrtus orbits. We suspect the little symbols are indications of Ancients: Winston, Formaline, the third moon of Lophomyrtus, and the outer planet Dollar.

We take an etching and retreat. (No electronics works in any part of this place.)

The face symbol – is actually an energy symbol which we were told is main power – we touch the symbol on the main screen and it goes green.  Liz then touches the hand symbol and the steam disappears revealing a passage which we go down. As we approach it gets warmer and warmer until we can bare it no more and retreat. Split sends the servitor down and after some 15 or so minutes it returns. Split then puts the crown on and enters into deep discussion. "Malfunction… needs repair… identify power source …."

By this time Gnostic has touched the screen and the energy symbol has gone red.

"Maybe I've turned it off," he says.

In the meantime, we have opened the DNA door again which we were told is the servitor lair. We go down a short passage to another circular room with three alcoves. After some questioning by Split it is clear there is only one active servitor.

Finally, the "mushroom" door which we are advised is sustenance. We open it and go down another short tunnel to a circular room with a large table in the middle. There are many symbols on the far wall representing different food types. Anton pushes the one for bread and a grey sludge appears on the table. Anton takes some in his hand and takes a bite. His eyes light up.

"that is the most delicious bread I have ever had" he proclaims.

Riley tries some: "yeah not to bad" he says.

Hoff takes a bite and immediately starts vomiting [having failed his poison defence roll].

"It's disgusting "he moans.

We try various other symbols which all result in a grey gelatinous goop appearing that has various tastes largely dependent on whether you make your poison save or not.

We leave the room and concentrate on the energy source.

"It seems to have cooled down," declares Gnostic. "I will go down".

Gnostic goes down the passage and we hear a scream from him as he rushes out his face white and fearful. "It's awful!" he whimpers.

"It can't be that bad," proclaims Split and goes down the tunnel. Another scream and she recoils in horror losing a Psyche point.

"Leave it to me" says Liz and goes down the tunnel. She comes back a minute or so later. "It's pretty ugly alright" she says. "It’s a large tentacled creature attached to wires. It seems petty agitated".

"Draw it" says Riley

"I can" volunteers Gnostic. A three-year-old could do a better sketch as it turns out

Energy source

"Leave it to me" says Liz. She rolls a 1 on her forgery skill and draws an amazing representation. In fact, it is so amazing and life-like that everyone who looks at it needs to make a Psyche roll.

Split puts back on the crown and starts engaging with her servitor.

 

Eventually she removes the crown and updates us. "The tentacled creature is the energy source but is in need of repair" she explains. "It requires the generative apthera of a volatile canker and the margrave of an avian spinosa."

"Well, where do we get those?" asks Gnostic

"All I can do is say what the servitor says" responds Split, "it makes no sense to me. I am not sure what those words mean. The servitor could help no more."

With that she puts the crown on and then starts uttering some numbers and letters. "1561271BC1098718, 0741027E0108760, "

"Coordinates?" says Gnostic.

"Write them down" says Anton

"It's too quick"

"It's ok" chimes in Riley "I remember them."

"Yeah yeah" says Gnostic

Riley then repeats them verbatim "I have a eidetic memory" he smiles contentedly.

With all of this information and everything else seeming a dead end, we decide its best to return to the Ende mansion and report our findings.

"Wait, we haven’t opened the roof door," says Riley

"Don’t do that!" reminds Gnostic

But too late. Riley had placed his hand on the symbol. Fortunately, nothing happened [failed door roll]. 

"The crater above is a lake of water. You will flood us all!" yelled Gnostic.

We decide to leave but realise the light on the tunnel trap (the rightmost hand on the board) door is now solid red; it was flashing red earlier. 

"How long since that soldier was zapped?" asks Hoff.

"About 50 hours ago " responds Gnostic looking at his watch.

"Disable it at the screen again" suggests Belle.

"But how do we get back?" asks Riley "It will only be off for 50 hours"

"That’s what servants are for" responds Gnostic.

We all stare at him in disbelief seeing his humanity draining before our eyes.

 

"We need to go. Let's solve that later" says Split. "I think we have what we need with the map and the coordinates"

And with that we leave up the passages we came from until we get back to the cave mouth and the guards.

"Who tied up the Montrose bitch?" asks Belle leaning over her.

"That was Itzy," says Riley. "Why?"

"She's dead."

"Ooops" we say in unison.

We put her body with all the other Montrose bodies next to the Montrose truck. "This truck would be useful for us" says Riley.

"But it has a flat tyre" reminds Hoff. (The spare was also flat, being shot out last time)

"Why don’t a few of us go back to town, get a spare tyre and come back?" volunteers Riley. 

With that Riley, Anton and Liz head back to town in the pick-up truck and to the Ende mansion.

We return the next day well-watered, fed and rested and with a spare truck tyre plus an additional five Ende guards and a mounted heavy machine gun. Contessa Ende had seemed well-pleased with our progress.

Meanwhile, it was an uneventful night for those who waited at the cave. While they waited, they buried the Montrose bodies (and Suzanne) but took her Montrose ID.

Upon the return of the spare tyre, it is fitted and Riley drives the Montrose truck with everyone on board back to the mansion. Split drives the pick-up and the tractor is left in the cave with eight Ende guards and a heavy machine gun.

The night ends with us having the following items for divvy up and action:

• 

  Montrose truck

  One 53 Bedford S truck stolen from the Montrose's. Riley's plan is to have this painted and with a new number plate and different colour tarp.
• ID of Suzanne Prentis of Montrose employment. Plan is to have Liz forge another's identity onto this. Maybe useful later.
• Ring of Reflect - currently worn by Spanner and identified as a ring that absorbs 5 points of laser damage per shot (like armour).
• Crown of the Ancients – currently in the possession of Split and identified that it allows communication with Ancients servitors.
• Staff of the Enema – currently carried by Split and identified that when it hits someone they immediately void their bowl and lose next round's attack.
• Jolly Jumper belt currently worn by Gnostic. Enables the wearer to jump 2D4 + 2 storeys (16m – 40m) but need a DEX roll when you land or take D6 hp per two storeys jumped.