How Many?

  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
• Sang "Spanner" Hoang. Sword-Worlder Mechanic from Winston – Jeff
• MARMALADING: Hoff Ende. Sword-Worlder Scientist from Winston - Kevin
• Gnostic Hands. Solomani Scientist from Entrope – Jamie
• MARMALADING: Belle Ende. Sword-Worlder Medic from Winston - Steven
• MARMALADING: Split "Penny" Ende. Sword-Worlder Minstrel from Winston - Jason
• NPC: Scurry. Drone Gunner from Winston
• NPC: Finn Cyborg from Querion

by Jeff

Prestart activities: 

In the weekly run up to actual gaming, our "experience" rolls were undertaken. Darryl managed to increase his Computer skill up to 18 with a successful D20 roll of 18, 1 point higher than the 17 it was previously on. Taking advantage of the system Requisite rules, Darryl utilized 8 points of his 18 Computer skill, dropping it back to 10, and increased his MND Requisite by 1 point to 18. This gives some significant positive advantages to Emerse as a character, including a 1-point increase to all his MIND-based proficiencies.  

Other notable occurrences during the prestart - Richard succeeded in all his 6 rolls, Jeff failed in all his first 6!

On with the story:

Smell the beautiful aroma

Sydney Walsh wasn't at the x-boat office. Apparently, he was down at the local film studio being filmed drinking his own urine, as a good and trusted senior x-boat planetary official must do if their cargo is lost!

When he finally arrived, he immediately joined Riley for a large whiskey and hurriedly chugged it down.

"Uggg" he complained, "Cold urine is just yuk."

The rules require it be chilled.

Then he passed over the information on the source addresses for each of the eight cantinas from the lost x-boat.

1. Mr R Herring, Main St, Ansel City TO Tonsil family - 5/14 Dalgety St, Phantasm, Jilarky protectorate
2. Guilty as Charged Law Firm, Main St, Ansel City TO H.G.Tomaine - Delta Gamma Phi Ltd, 11 Beach Rd, Cape Verde on Verde Island
3. Harrington Bio Genetics, 1/11 Park Lane, Tover Town TO Dr Harrington - 110 Duke St, Anselport, United States of Rodriguez
4. Wenches R Us, 14 Duntroon St, Ansel City TO Olga Shpak* - 261 Main St, Port Royale, Hoganton
5. Sakharnaya Sliva Ltd., 4 Doboy Lane, Ansel City TO Maria Dubiensk* - Rogue Is. lighthouse
6. Sugar Plum Ice Cream Ltd., Main St, Ansel City TO Anya Monoslava* - Olha Penitentiary, Olha Island chain 
7. J.P.Sopwith, 3 LaMancha Tce, Ansel City TO Smith family - Apartment 17/12 Rupy lane, Kingston
8. Taksidermiya Morozhenogo Ltd, 112 Main St, Ansel City TO Jorgensen family - Twilight Lane, Fullers Earth

"Look" stated Stasi, "This Zhodani phrase 'Sakharnaya Sliva' translates as 'Sugar Plum', suspiciously like Sugar Plum Ice Cream! And that other Zhodani 'Taksidermiya Morozhengo' means 'ice cream taxidermy'."

"And this one, Rogue Is. Lighthouse" commented Gnostic, "It's about as remote as you can find here on Entrope!"

While Anton picked up each of the six-remaining cantinas, gave them a shake and a tap, Emerse sat down at his computer and ran a series of information searches on each of the cantina destinations.

"Can't find anything on 1, 2, and 5" Emerse eventually reported, "But number 3 seems quite legitimate, number 4 has a lot of rumours about human trafficking, and that Anya Monoslava at number 6 is a Zhodani corporal in the Penitentiary guard with a "spotless" record"

"Nothing more suspicious than a "spotless" record" stated Riley.

"All this research has given me a headache" complained Emerse, "I'm off for a lie-down"

"Rumours of human trafficking will be enough to get a court order to open and investigate their cantina" declared Sydney, and he went off to his office to get that process underway. 

"As official x-boat employees" pondered Gnostic, "We will be able to visit all these places and deliver their cantinas"

"And they will have to open them in front of us!" declared Anton excitedly.

"Let's start with the remote Lighthouse" decided Gnostic.

It was decided that first thing the following morning, the crew would take the x-boat company air-raft and make the eight-hour flight out to the Rogue Is. Lighthouse to "deliver" the cantina.

Emerse managed to find a nice compact handgun on the black market in the seedy part of Kingston, [A successful Survival-Urban roll on his proficiency of 6, the best in the party] and it is handed over to Stasi to carry. Of course, weapons are totally illegal on Entrope, but Stasi was our best shooter and was unlikely to be questioned, being a burley six-foot Zhodani vampire woman with a permanent scowl!

Morning dawned, perfectly clear and still with a light breeze wafting in from the ocean. We loaded cantina number 5 into the air-raft and Riley lifted us off the launch jetty for the eight-hour trip. We headed off over the ocean.

With an hour left before our arrival at Rogue Island, the radio blared to life, startling everybody.

"zzz Unknown craft, please identify yourself. click"

"Um, hello" responded Gnostic, "This is x-boat raft 24601"

"zzz Raft 24601, please state your purpose. click"

"Well, um, we are from the X-boat Corporation and have your cantina."

"zzz Raft 24601, please proceed. click"

"Strewth mate" commented Riley, "That seemed ... officious"

"And totally suspicious" mumbled Emerse.

Sometime later a small island appeared in the front port. A tower structure jutted up out of a larger building at one end of the island, with a few smaller outbuildings dotted around the landside. The island was low lying, no contour to speak of, and generally covered with a wind-blown bushy brown scrub. A short jetty jutted off the south end of the island, adjacent to the lighthouse. The wind had got up during our trip and was gusting across the island. White caps were rolling against the low rocky shoreline, flattened down by the wind, and a fine sea-spray shrouded the island with a grey haze.

"zzz Raft 24601" stuttered the radio, "Please proceed to south-side landing pad. click"

Sure enough, a flat and cleared zone could be seen at the south side of the lighthouse structure, and Riley sweetly brough the air-raft to a perfect halt exactly over the centre of the clearing and gently lowered the air-raft to land.

As the engines quietened, a door in the nearby lighthouse building opened up and two figures stepped out. The first was a Zhodani woman, tall like most of the Zhodani we had seen, with the characteristic pale skin and long albino blond hair falling down past her shoulders. Dressed in a sturdy white overcoat, she strode confidently down the concrete path towards us. A smaller human male shuffled along behind her; his head bowed towards the ground.

Anton grabbed the cantina from storage, and he, Gnostic, and Riley exited the air-raft to meet with the Zhodani.

"Velcome" the woman said, "I am Maria Dubiensk"
"Thanks" responded Anton, "I am Anton, and here is your cantina, which I shall open for you"

Anton brandishes the key

Anton had been assigned the mochila master key by Sydney Walsh, had spoken the x-boat oath, and signed his name on the x-boat cantina delivery officer contract, which he now took very seriously.

Anton fished the key, which was hanging from a chain around his neck, up from below his thick yellow x-boat jacket, and ceremonially slipped it into the cantina lock, gave it a half turn, and lifted the lid.

Anton, Gnostic, Riley, and Maria all leaned over and peered into the open cantina. There were two glass jars, a large grey metal box, and a fat ring binder packed into the cabinet. 

The two glass jars were full of a thick white viscous material and secured with metal screw lids, like a preserving jar full of white phlegm. The ring binder was full of pages of paper and bulging against the side of the cantina.

"Nothing alive in there" thought Anton.

"That white stuff looks like compacted spider web" thought Gnostic.

"Nothing to drink" noted Riley

"Hmmm" stated Maria, "Vhy is the delivery so late?"

She grabbed the contents of the cantina and handed them off to her male subordinate.

Gnostic explained the circumstances off the x-boat mis-jump, the successful recovery of their cantina, and thus the small delay in delivery. Documentation of receipt was presented and signed, and Maria turned to head back to the lighthouse building.

"Excuse me" prompted Anton, "Is you man OK? He looks quite unwell"

Anton had made a successful Perception role and recognised the man's haggard and drooling appearance as that of a Zhodani food source, a "blood bag" in the local parlance, who has been feed on too regularly. 

"Would you like some fresh blood" Anton offered, barring his own neck towards Maria.

Maria's eyes lit up immediately, and she suggested Anton "come on inside for a bit"

At this point the rest of the crew on board the air-raft, who had been listening in on all the conversation through the Emerse-designed and constructed personal communication network, manufactured a ship malfunction and sent Stasi out to request some repair components and delay our leaving. The thought was to perhaps get inside the buildings for a decent period of time, conduct some searches of whatever facilities they had in there, and see if there was actually some xeno-biological research being undertaken. 

As soon as Maria saw Stasi, she crouched slightly with her back arching and hissed like a cat.

Stasi responded in kind, and then they slowly paced in a circle facing each other, hissing.

After a full revolution, they both stood up and introduced themselves. 

Apparently a traditional Zhodani greeting ritual!

Stasi, Anton, Gnostic, and Riley followed Maria and her pet male into the Lighthouse building. As the door closed behind them, all communications died with with a "zzzt".  Emerse looked across at Spanner.

"The building is shielded" he declared, "They're on their own"

The Lighthouse

Stasi followed Maria into the building, Anton and Gnostic following close behind, with Riley at the rear. The door swung closed behind him with a thud, and comms with the ship immediately dropped out. They were in an entry lobby, plushly appointed with a bunch of comfortable couches and a well-stocked bar along one wall. Staircases led up and down from the centre of the room, and two human males were present, one behind the bar and the other standing near the staircase leading up into the Lighthouse tower.

"This way" gestured Maria to Anton, taking him by the hand and leading towards the staircase down.

"These men will look after you" Maria called as she and Anton disappeared down the staircase.

Anton gave a big thumbs-up to Riley as he passed out of sight, grinning from ear to ear.

"Would you like drink?" offered the man behind the bar.

"Whiskey thanks" replied Riley.

"Sorry, we only have Gin or Campari here" he apologised.

"Oh" added Stasi, "We need a spool of copper wire for ship repairs"

"Yes mistress" responded the other man and immediately rushed off up the stairs.

As he darted through the door at the top of the stairs, a third human male come down to take his place.

As drinks were provided and everyone relaxed somewhat, information was gleaned.

Three Zhodani were present in the facility, who "undertook astronomical observations" from the top of the lighthouse each night. Five human males were also present, four of whom we had now met. There were a number of levels above us up the height of the lighthouse, but we were not allowed up. The bedrooms were down below.

The Bedroom

Maria gestures for Anton

Maria led Anton into a well-appointed bedroom, took off her clothes and jumped on the bed.

"Feed before or after?" she asked Anton.

"How about both?" suggested Anton.

"MMMM" Maria purred, "Kinky", and dragged him down onto the bed before plunging her fangs into his neck.

Anton briefly noticed that the staircase continued down to at least another level below, before he was overcome with pleasure and lost track of time, and his surroundings. Sometime later and feeling tired but well sated [A Zhodani blood feed drains at least one hit-point, Anton was down two after his lustful activities] Anton and Maria returned upstairs to the lobby room.

In The Lobby

A spool of copper wire had been provided, and taken out to the ship, and over the next few hours as the "repairs" were undertaken there was no opportunity to explore upstairs. The men kept a close watch on everyone, and the other two Zhodani put in appearances. 

Stepharina (better looking than Maria) came down from upstairs first, and then Iryna (even better looking than Stepharina) appeared for a chat. They both did their hissing/circling greeting with Stasi.

Anton hovered around Irina and offered to share his blood again, but Irina refused as she stated that Anton had been "claimed" by Maria and it was apparently bad manners to feed off someone else's male. At least, in the same day!

We were told that it would be impossible for us to stay overnight in the facility, "totally not allowed" and that if the repairs to the ship were difficult, one of the males could come out to assist. Riley, after a few gins and Campari, and quite strategically, began to tell of our recent exploits with Ancient sites, artifact discoveries, and battles with spiders. The lovely Irina (who was dressed in a white lab coat and apparently their main scientist type) reacted with some surprise at Riley's stories but quickly covered up her shock and displayed only mild interest. Maria and Stepharina clustered around Riley and listened intently to his stories. We spotted then exchanging meaningful glances on a number of occasions as Riley talked!

As Riley talked on about dealing with living spiders and even having some on our ship for Emerse to experiment on, Stepharina excused herself and headed up the stairs. Gnostic spotted a large metallic automated and armed robot sentry as the upstairs door swung closed. Maria asked about the challenges with planetary biosecurity, and Riley offered to provide "a special delivery" for them if they ever wanted something living brought to their remote island. "I'm a top pilot" Riles noted, with a wink.

Maria provided Riley with a contact card which noted a specific frequency that would bypass the Lighthouse facilities electronic security measures and make direct contact.

Kingston

Eventually we couldn't legitimately delay our departure any longer and took our leave of the island and headed back to Kingston to report to Sydney. We gave Sydney a detailed summary of everything we saw, and didn't see, and a similar detailed report was sent back to Contessa via encrypted burst transmission. 

There would be a two week wait for a reply on that though.

Sydney told us that this delivery to the Lighthouse had been the third one over the last few weeks from the same source. But that the penitentiary delivery would be its first one.

Cantina 6 was destined for the Olha Island Penitentiary, and we planned that trip for tomorrow. But in the meantime, the court order allowing inspection of the cantina 4, from Wenches R Us, has come through, so in the presence of Sydney, Anton used his master key and opened up cantina 6 "in error".

"Wait" yelled Sydney, "That's not number four"

"Sorry" mumbled Anton, quickly relocking the box and turning to the real number 4.

"Click"

Anton picked out one of four ring binders of A4 sized laminated glossy photos of girls and women.

Flicking through the pages with a delighted grin, Anton reported "Nothing that suspicious here"

But Sydney felt otherwise and referred the cabinet and its contents back to the courts.

Riley invited us all for a drink and the evening passed uneventfully.

The next morning, we again loaded up the x-boat air-raft and took off for the Olha Island chain with cantina 6. Spanner and Emerse had prepared a couple of electronic tricks and quickly put the x-boat CCTV system into a video loop so Anton could carry out a necessary, but illegal, inspection of the cantina before we arrived. No surprise, two glass jars full of a white viscous liquid, a large grey metal box, and a fat ring binder packing them in tightly.

"We'll need a sample of that white material" decided Gnostic and produced a small sample container.

Carefully opening one of the two full jars, Gnostic was quite surprised when the material attempted to explode out of the jar like a geyser but was able to reseal the lid with only a small quantity of white material escaping out into the room and splattering over the adjacent wall. 

"Crap" he yelled, "What is this stuff?"

The white gloop had expanded significantly as it had ejected from the original jar and now looked much more web-like. It was splattered over the wall and wasn't at all still. There were strange ripples pulsing across the surface of the spill, and maybe even small shapes writhing below the surface.

"Look" cried Emerse in a panic, "Things"

"How many?" asked Stasi.

Gnostic grabbed a small sample into his specimen jar.

Riley let rip with a flare, burning the stuff off the face of the wall.

Still one hour before we arrived at the Olha Island Penitentiary.

Spiders from Mars

 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
• Sang "Spanner" Hoang. Sword-Worlder Mechanic from Winston – Jeff
• MARMALADING: 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: Finn Cyborg from Querion

by Jeff

The crew were all abord the Lost Crown and were on their way back to Entrope, through sub-space, with the recovered Mochila cantinas (the X-boat mail storage is called a "mochila" which has eight compartments called "cantinas").

Everyone settled into their various staterooms for the six-day journey and contemplated the twisted reality observable through the ports. Emerse had moved into the spare bunk in Riley's room and had erected a privacy curtain across the front of the bunk so he could keep the others away from his personal business.

Riley was swinging round the Ancient's Staff of the Enema and considering the rounded end. [Richard decided that he would claim the Staff, one of the Ancient's treasure items recovered from the Ancient's site back on Winston]

Anton was munching on prunes and garlic, belching and farting unashamedly.

Emerse was wondering if Anton and Riley were always so disgusting, or if they were making a special effort.

Stasi was feeling very hungry and quite run down. [The vampiric Zhodani are required to feed on human blood at least twice a week or their body functions begin to degrade. When "hungry" (haven't fed for more than three days) all their rolls are made at a penalty (two dice, take the worst). This is of course intolerable to the Zhodani]

"Could one of you men feed me?" Stasi requested over the intercom, "Finn's a little past it currently"
"No"

"No"

"No"

"No"

"No" 

The replies were initially not encouraging, but eventually Anton, Gnostic, and Riley agreed to provide blood services on a daily rotation so that Stasi could keep up her ability to function, and Finn wouldn't "crash". [Feeding a Zhodani drains one hit-point of health (which is easily recovered with a night of peaceful rest), state the Zhodani]

Finn had been keeping Stasi going for a good few weeks and was looking very pale and anaemic!

Jump-space Night One

Stasi woke with a start and jerked up into a sitting position. She was feeling a lot better after Anton's gift of blood services, but she just realised that Finn hadn't been recovered from his involuntary space walk back at the X-boat crash site. [Finn had failed his Zero Gee roll on the EVA excursion to the X-boat, lost his direction, and accidentally launched himself off towards the depths of uninhabited space]  

Finn had been left floating in space

Stasi recalled him bouncing around at the end of his tether but had just remembered that he was never reeled back into the ship and was probably still at the end of the tether, cut off from the ship when it entered jump space, and floating alone in the icy cold vacuum of space!

Reaching for the intercom, Stasi shouted out for Riley, "Quick Riley, turn the ship back, we left Finn behind"

"No" replied Riley, "The jump is pre-programmed and can't be modified in-flight. It'll be two weeks before we could be back to the X-boat crash site"

"ARRRGGGHHHH" screamed Stasi hysterically and then woke with a start and jerked up into a sitting position.

Finn was resting comfortably in his bunk beside her.

"WTF?" Stasi wondered, "Was that just a dream?"

Jump-space Night Two

A quiet clanking noise awakened Gnostic from his pleasant dream of being awarded the Nobel prize for chemistry after his masterful research into the spider-like creatures discovered around the Ancient sites on Winston, Dollar, and Formaline. Looking around, he noticed that the stateroom door wasn't secured and was slightly open and rattling in its frame. The vibrations induced by sub-space travel would definitely account for the rattling he figured, but how could the door become unlatched?

Sliding out from under his covers, Gnostic strode over towards the door. A strange slurping noise was coming from out in the corridor, so he quietly opened the door a crack and peered out.

Stasi was crouched down in the corridor over the crumpled body of Riley, her back towards him, and was sucking at Riley's stomach. Riley had been ripped open, guts and entrails ripped out and sprawling across the deck, and blood was splattered across the corridor floor and walls. Stasi turned from her feeding and looked straight back at Gnostic, and grinned.

"ARRRGGGHHHH" screamed Gnostic, slamming the stateroom door closed and falling backwards to the deck.

Gnostic woke with a start, still tucked cosily beneath his bedsheets in his bunk.

"Phew, just a bloody bream" he sighed.

Jump-space Night Three

Before Riley retiring for the night, perchance to dream, he ran his normal evening systems checks on the ship's control systems. One of the system integrity warning lights was flashing red so Riley ran a diagnostic protocol. Strange, apparently a Tamagotchi borne virus had wormed into system and had latched onto the life-support routines. "Bloody Emerse" Riley muttered, "Must have believed our taunting that we would flush the hold to space and connected his damn Tamagotchi to the system and hijacked the controls"

Riley strode down to their shared stateroom to give Emerse a piece of his mind, but he wasn't there. Anton was there though, rubbing some form of lubricant gel over the end of the Staff of the Enema. "Where's that bloody Emerse?" growled Riley, "He's been fiddling with the ship's systems"

"Dunno" replied Anton, "He run off when I threated to jamb this here greasy staff up where the sun doesn't shine!"

"Ha, nice one" chuckled Riley, "But I better go get the systems cleaned up in case that dolt does something nasty"

Grabbing Spanner on the way back to the bridge, the two of them clustered around the ship's interface screen and began the cleanup. First task was to launch the automatic virus-sweeper which would isolate the infected code and lock it down in the flush-cache. 

"Is this going to work then?" asked Riley

"Of course" responded Spanner confidently, hitting the Activate button.

"WARNING" blared the ships speakers, "LIFE SUPPORT SYSTEMS SHUTDOWN"

"What?" shouted Riley, "Fix the damn thing"

"WARNING. TWO MINUTES UNTIL ATMOSPHERE EVACUATION"

A loud hissing developed as the air in the bridge was sucked out the ventilation grills"

"That's not good" stammered Spanner, "Vac suits - now!"

Riley spun and ran for his vac. suit, which was stored in the bridge's emergency cupboard.

But the cupboard wouldn't open.

Riley hammered on the cupboard as his vision started to speckle with black dots, which grew larger and larger.

"ARRRGggh h ..." spluttered Riley as he toppled to the ground, unconscious.

Riley woke with a start, in his bed in the stateroom. Anton farted in the next bunk.

"Oh, thank god, everything is actually normal" he sighed

Jump-space Night Four

For Belle the days were spent researching the samples of the sticky strands of web-like material recovered from the surface of the X-boat. Penny was assisting her, and many tests had been undertaken. Although a decent DNA sample was unable to be extracted, the mass spectrometry analysis had revealed some interesting molecular compositions which they had been cross-referencing with the samples from the margrave of the avian spinosa and the generative apthera of the volatile canker.

Strict environmental controls were of course maintained, with the samples only accessed within the glove-box to ensure no contamination of the ship's environment.

While running a chemical comparison that afternoon, Belle noticed that the corner of her stateroom (the lab was setup in the stateroom) had what looked like a spray of white mould-like material anchored across the corner. Taking a closer look, she realised that this was the actual web material, somehow out of its containment and in the room. Calling to Penny, Belle peered at the web, spotting some small spheres embedded in the web.

"Shit" Belle yelled, "Containment Breach", and Penny immediately activated the negative pressure seal for the room.

As the extractors began pumping a portion of the room's atmosphere out through the ship's hull, to create a negative pressure within the room, Penny also hit the ship's alarm.

The rest of the crew rushed down to the doors to Belle's stateroom and peered in through the windows. 

Well, except for Emerse, he ran straight to his vac suit and immediately put it on.

Penny was prodding the small spheres with her probe.

"Hey" she called, "These are all wriggling and squirming"

"BURN THEM" yelled Riley from the corridor.

Belle grabbed her ethanol jar, whipped off the cap, stuffed in a rag, and past it to Penny.

Penny lit the rag and threw the jar towards the corner.

"BOOM" and the stateroom was engulfed with fire!

Belle woke with a start, in her bed, in the stateroom. The corner of the room looked fine.
"What a nightmare" she thought.

Jump-space Night Five

Scurry hovered up in front of Spanner and started talking.

"Why did you give me these anti-grav attachments and their heavy batteries?"
"You know my range is super limited now, right?"

"Can you give me back my wings please?"

"And what are these other attachments you have given me?"

"I have two arms with extra things that I can spin up to use. Why do I need these?"

"This one's a stupid drill bit, what am I going to do with this?"

Scurry spun up her drill attachment and drove the bit into Spanners eye.
"ARRRGGGHHHH" screamed Spanner, blood and gore erupting from her eye socket.

Spanner woke with a start, still in her bed, with Scurry inactive in her own pod.
"Bloody hell" Spanner muttered, "No pleasing some AIs"

Jump-space Night Six

Emerse found his pet Tamagotchi in two pieces on his workshop bench. A large two-handed sword had been smashed down onto it, cracking it into two and splintering the bench.

"Ferkin Stasi" Emerse fumed, grabbing his gun and storming off towards Stasi's room.

"BONG BONG" rang out through the corridor as Emerse ponded on Stasi's stateroom door with his handgun.

"Piss off, I'm busy" called Stasi.

"BONG BONG" pounded Emerse.

Stasi jerked open her door and yelled, "Stop that bloody noise!"

"BOOM" went Emerse's gun, the bullet sailing past Stasi's ear and ricocheting around inside the room.

Stasi grabbed Emerse by the hair, pulled him into her room and threw him to the floor.
"Stop, stop" screamed Emerse, "Not the hair"

Stasi drew back her lips, extended her fangs, and sunk them straight into Emerse's neck.

"ARRRGGGHHHH" screamed Emerse, waving his gun futilely towards Stasi as his blood gushed out like a broken dam and washed over Stasi's chin.

Emerse woke with a start, his Tamagotchi beeping contentedly on the pillow beside him.

He brushed his hair smooth to calm down and made an entry in his logbook "Don't try to shoot Stasi"

Entrope

Right on schedule the Lost Crown ejected into normal space, safely in the Entrope system and on a perfect approach to Entrope. Riley grinned smugly, took a drink, and guided the ship sweetly into the space station dock.

Taking the web samples in their hardy containment chamber, and leaving the recovered cantinas locked in the hold, the crew took the orbital elevator down to the planet surface and grabbed the next shuttle out to Kingston.

It was a short bus ride to Sydney Walsh's residence where the crew made their report.

• Six cantinas recovered.
• Pilot and one cantina lost inside an asteroid.
• Suspected live avian spinosa sample in the second partially destroyed cantina.
• Spider carcass destroyed, but web samples recovered.

"So, who sent those cantinas?" demanded Emerse, "And, who is meant to be receiving them?"

Sydney was able to divulge the delivery addresses of all the cantinas but noted that to find out the sender information would take a court order and could take some time.

"Also" he concluded, "Some packages have arrived form Winston for you"

The packages proved to be a handy distraction, and Emerse cooled down somewhat as the two boxes from Contessa were opened and examined by Belle and Penny. 

A Hallpass and a Psycrest Bracelet, our Zhodani payment for services rendered.

1. Hallpass - an anti-hall-effect technology field generator, 5 minutes per day capacity, 3m radius field sphere
2. Psycrest Bracelet - A Psyche regenerator, swops D4 HP for 1 Psyche point recovered

Anton claimed the Hallpass, while Riley claimed the Psycrest Bracelet.

Once the items had been examined, discussed, and allocated, further discussion with Sydney continued.

It turned out that the two suspect Mochila cantinas were destined for local planet delivery, number seven here to Kingston, while the eighth was bound for Fullers Earth, a relatively nearby settlement.

The local Kingston delivery was to the "Smith" family, Apartment 17/12 Rupy Lane, Kingston, so Gnostic, Penny, and Anton donned x-boat service uniforms, purchased some condolence chocolates, and set off to deliver the news regarding the cantina in the x-boat van.

The others retired to the closest pub, Belle compiled a full report and sent if off, by x-boat, to Contessa, and Sydney got the paperwork under way to find out the various cantina sender details.

When Gnostic, Penny, and Anton arrived at the Smith residence they found a rundown family apartment with a scrappy messy yard. One Gloria Smith, an aging grandmother type, answered the door and seemed totally distraught after hearing about the x-boat accident. Anton was totally unsympathetic, but Penny artfully calmed her down, offered the chocolates, confirmed that the x-boat leadership would indeed drink their own urine (as claimed in all the x-boat promotional advertisements, and even slapped Anton on the cheek after a particularly rude comment.

"This may help" Penny suggested, just before delivering the powerful blow to Anton's head.

After offering appropriate comfort and assorted platitudes, Gnostic and Anton retired to the van while Penny slipped into the shadows and crept around the side of the house and listened in through the lounge window while Gloria made a distraught call to her relations who had shipped the cantina. A bunch of unreplaceable family records and heirlooms. Penny figured they sounded totally legit.

Emerse did some Smith family research via his Tamagotchi and also concluded the shipment was legitimate, definitely no spiders in cantina seven! 

"So", declared Belle after hearing the news, "Cantina eight must be the culprit"

The orbital elevator

Sydney Walsh needed the remaining six cantinas, which were awaiting collection from the Lost Crown up at the space station, so Riley and four burley and heavily armed x-boat guards headed off for the orbital elevator. 

Initially the four guards gave Riley the cold-shoulder treatment, but after shouting a few drinks in the elevator bar, a friendly push-and-shove brawl (where Riley received a number of heavy blows and suffered ten points of damage), and a few old-soldier exploit stories, they were all getting along like long-lost friends.

The six cantinas were retrieved and taken down to the x-boat depot in Kingston.

Sydney revealed that the destinations for those six cantinas were:

1. Tonsil family - Jilarky protectorate
2. H.G.Tomaine - Cape Verde on Verde Island.
3. Dr Harrington -  Anselport in the United States of Rodriguez
4. Olga Shpak* - Port Royale in Hoganton
5. M.Dubiensk* - Rogue Is lighthouse in Tungsten
6. Anya Monoslava* - Olha Penitentiary in the Olha Island chain. 

"Half of them are Zhodani names [ones with *]" noted Stasi, "Could that be relevant?"

That night, no one had any disturbing dreams, about which the crew were very happy.

The next day everyone assembled for breakfast prior to their planned trip to Fullers Earth, where the Jorgensen family of Twilight Lane were the recorded recipients of cantina eight. Emerse hadn't been able to find out any details of the family [failed his Admin roll], so once again Gnostic, Penny, and Anton donned their x-boat employee garb and paid a visit to the residence. This time it was a large mansion on an extensive gated estate.

Penny stood in front of the gate camera, smiled, and pushed the buzzer.

"Yes" squeaked the speaker

"This is Penny from x-boat" replied Penny, "Here with an important message regarding your delivery"
"Bzzzz" went the gate lock, and the gate swung slowly open.

"Please come on up to the house" squeaked the speaker.

Gnostic, Penny, and Anton made their way up the long winding drive, past immaculately laid out and maintained gardens and lawns, while the gate swung slowly shut behind them.

"Clunk" went the gate lock.

Clarice the maid

Penny used the door knocker and gave three thumps.

After quite some time the door eventually swung open, and a young maid peered out.

"Hello" she said, "This is Mrs Jorgenson, the owner" and a more elegantly dressed middle-aged women appeared.

"Where is the cantina?" she asked in a gruff and raspy male voice, quite at odds with her appearance. 

"Can we first please verify your identity?" asked Penny.

"I am Maria Jorgenson" the women replied, displaying an official photo ID credential.

"I'm afraid we have some bad news ..." started Penny

Penny gave the rehearsed spiel regarding the mis-jump, the very low (but non-zero likelihood), the company's most sincere condolences, insurance, yadda, yadda.

"But ..." stammered Mrs Jorgenson, "This never happens. Or you will drink your own urine!"

"Not me madam" replied Penny, "That will be our senior planetary director. We can send you the video if you want. I'm sure you will be fully satisfied by his total commitment to the x-boat company pledge" 

As Mrs Jorgenson was completing the insurance claim form (sender: Antonio Bratislava, contents: rare stuffed animal collection, value: 435,000 Imperium Credits) she asked Penny lots of questions.

"So, the cantina was totally destroyed then? 

Were any portions of the contents recovered at all? 

Even the smallest portion would do."

Eventually all the paperwork was complete, all the good research information collected, and Mrs Jorgenson retired back into the house, grumbling about "this transport disaster"

"What's with her?" Gnostic asked the maid, giving her a saucy wink.

"She", replied Clarice the maid, "is he. He is part way through his current rejuvenation treatments, including gender switch, and can be terribly grumpy. You noticed the voice of course. Vocal cord rejuvenation is the final treatment, it's most disconcerting though"

She was very chatty, having liked the look of Gnostic, but eventually waved Gnostic goodbye and closed the door.

"Isn't Jorgenson a Zhodani surname?" asked Anton.

The crew re-assembled at the local x-boat office and Penny filled the others in on the Jorgenson visit.

"Totally suspicious" declared Emerse, ""the smallest portion will do" indeed"
"And a Zhodani sender" noted Riley, "Those bastards are probably looking to conquer the universe"
"No offence Stasi" he added.

"None taken," replied Stasi, "Ve are looking to conquer der universe!"

"Are they trying to activate more of those Ancient sites?" wondered Spanner.

"But why transport spiders?" asked Emerse.

"There are no Ancient sites in the Entrope system" noted Anton (who is from Entrope).
"But there is just one jump away in Torment" declared Emerse, "And just two jumps away in Zeta 2"

"Well, I can confirm that the avian spinosa (the spiders) are the juvenile form of the volatile canker (the grey humanoid creatures we encountered on the destroyed ship)" stated Belle. "Although I haven't yet found any evolutionary link to the actual power source creature. But, given the way that creature absorbed the canker, it's a strong possibility that all three of those things are genetically related."

"But where did the spider come from?" asked Riley.

"Maybe it came from Mars" suggested Spanner.