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
- MARMALADING: 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 Jason (Penny “Split” Ende)
Plaven and Plavia
Like I said to the boys afterwards, it took only a few minutes talking to Roger to realize he was a romantic, naive and overly optimistic fool. This was a problem for us. If we took on Wotan and failed, we’d never get our jump drive and we’d never leave this awful system.
Then it was lightly defended?
We asked Roger what he aimed to do and how he expected his rebel force to take the system. He said, “We’ll resist, grow the movement and overthrow Wotan and his fascist regime. Then we’ll construct an anarcho-syndicalist utopia based on democratic principles.”
In hindsight, what a douche. I still have no idea how Roger found himself as a leader of upwards of 150 rebels and seen as a threat to Wotan Skullcrusher. Sure, the man had a heart, but by his age, he should have had a plan and a few street-smarts. People were entrusting their lives to him. I wondered if he was a virgin. From that first negotiation in his hole in the tree hideout, I pegged him as a "Woger".
In our discussions back at our air-raft, we entertained the idea of helping Woger if he could pull something out of the bag. If there was any chance we could get his warriors to engage Wotan’s Corvette in space and on equal terms, there remained a chance we could win a ship upgrade and get home 50 per cent faster.
We schemed if we could obtain another three air-rafts, we could get towards 48 rebels up to Wotan's corvette in one trip. This we’d do by going back now and convincing Wotan the rebels could only be defeated by a ground force – then flying with them down to the moon and having the force destroyed and their air-rafts taken by Woger’s rebels in ambush. Emerse reckoned he could get Anton to use his alien Hall Pass, which would take out the troops’ laser guns, giving the rebels an advantage.
We went back and told Woger that, while back at our air-raft, we’d heard from Skullcrusher’s minions over the comms. They’d discovered we were contracted to X-Boat Corporation and were now keen to parley with us to get into the good graces of our bosses. We went through our plan with Woger and asked him to have his 150 troops ambush the Skullcrusher troops in the forest when we returned. We discussed the logistics of then getting Woger’s fighters to the corvette.
"Yes, yes," he said. "I have my pilots ready to take over the additional air-rafts once we succeed - Finn McRory, Mack O'Hollis, and Mac O'Brien."
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| Corvette Denpasar Ligature |
When Woger told me that the max troop capacity of a corvette was 200 troops, my faith in him succeeding fell to about one per cent (yeah, there’s still a remnant of idealism in me). After all, that Wotan was a mega-creep and I don’t think any of us except Anton (living the post-pubescent dream of his life with a couple of slave girls) would have helped him if we had a real choice. So we continued with our plan.
We flew back and docked with the corvette, Denpasar Ligature. Four guards boarded and motioned us into Wotan’s throne room. Wotan was there and immediately quizzed me on our mission – “So is he dead then?”
I explained we’d found Roger deep in a well-fortified position in the forest and that it would be essential to take a ground force in to take him.
“While didn’t you just kill him when you were there?”
"Well, he was surrounded by guards, we wouldn’t have stood a chance – much like with your supporters here, no-one would ever be able to take you. "
Wotan seemed pleased to hear that, and I thought our plan was underway.
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| Attack from orbit |
Immediately, he ordered a space-based artillery attack on the location using weapons, I learned, could penetrate structures up to one kilometre underground. Oops.
I decided the only course of action now was to continue persuading Wotan a ground assault was required to be sure Roger had been hit. He agreed and arranged for a platoon (37 troops made up of three squads) to follow us down in three air-rafts as per our original plan.
Surely, Woger and most of his troops had been sensible enough to retreat to a backup location after we left?
I hailed Woger on the encrypted communicator he’d given me. “Urrgh, we’re pretty sick.” he said. “Maybe only ten of us left, and most wounded. What the hell happened?”
Time for a last throw of the dice to see what comes up. I convinced Woger to make a last stand, going ahead with our original plan and hoping it could be pulled off.
“I’m hurt bad, but lucky,” he said. “Finn, Mack and Mac are still with me.”
Within minutes we were on our way back to the moon Plavia’s surface, three air-rafts of troops following us.
The platoon was led by Lieutenant Carol Pera, the same officer that had smashed O’Reilly’s hand with a hammer when the Lost Crown was boarded by the Denpasar Ligature’s stormtroopers.
All of us were pretty shocked when we stepped out of the raft. There wasn’t much left in a 1500m radius of Woger’s underground fort. The forest was gone and the land was a series of unrecognizable clay craters.
We encouraged the platoon to move out ahead of us to seek signs of life. A pilot was left with each air-raft, including Emerse and Belle with our craft.
A few hundred metres in, we came under sporadic machine gun attack from some light shrubbery. Wotan’s troops replied with laser carbines and mortar shells.
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| Poor Lieutenant Pera |
In the initial confusion, Riley took deliberate aim at Pera and shot her in the back of the head – dead instantly. Everyone was focused on the shrubbery and no-one noticed from what direction the bullet had come. Ah ha, sweet revenge. Riley then ran forward to feign assistance and took Pera’s double-handed laser carbine. Figuring it was now 100 per cent clear there was no rebellion about to happen, and with the better part of valour, Riley took a few shots at rebels in the shrubs, but missed.
Similarly, Stasi now saw value in a public demonstration of support for Wotan – and shot and killed one of the rebels.
Gnostic caught the same fervour, running forward to cure the wounds of two fallen Wotan troops, saving their lives.
Not much later, the troops overwhelmed Roger’s position – they killed a final couple of injured rebels (Mack and Mac) and took an unconscious Roger prisoner. All other rebels were dead for the loss of two Wotan privates and Lt Pera.
As we all headed back to the air-rafts, I threw Roger’s communicator into one of the craters. Giving him his "R" back was all I could do.
Soon afterwards, we were back on the Ligature and were whisked straight to the throne room.
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| Wotan and Zhodanis |
Once we’d confirmed with Wotan that we’d get our jump drive re-installed, Stasi requested a separate audience with Wotan. Before the rest of us us returned to the Crown, Wotan congratulated us all for a successful mission, saluted Riley for his service and rewarded Gnostic with a medal.
Wotan had the poor Roger carried away and commented that he looked forward to a very long torture
session.
From what we’ve pieced together, Stasi then did a pretty good job of intimidating Wotan, claiming the rank of Zhodani ambassador and informing Wotan he appeared “to have a slight problem.”
"Surely you're aware how big the Zhodani empire is," she said. "You would not want to incur their wrath - you appear to have two Zhodani you didn't make me aware of that have been held against their will."
“You should be aware, as per protocol, I have a message pre-programmed to be sent if I do not send a follow up report to Zhodani command about your disposition towards us. The Empire would look favourably on the repatriation of those girls. If you hand them to me, I'll attest how helpful you were - but if you don't, I would view that as a negative for my report back. Of course it's all up to you."
Wotan appeared convinced [ Intimidate roll for Stasi ] – and to save face said he was happy to put the Zhodani women in Stasi’s custody as long as they receive true justice.
"You may feel they were treated a little harshly," he said, "but they were part of the rebels."
They shook on the deal.
We were all back on the Crown when the two Zhodani slaves were delivered to us. They immediately offered themselves to Gnostic as their master. Another “gift” from Wotan? Gnostic turned them down and appealed to Stasi.
"Not the deal I made," she said. "They’re supposed to be my slaves."
Gnostic insisted the women be given the opportunity to clean up and dress.
Stasi spoke with the slaves, who explained they genuinely understood themselves to be Gnostic’s but were otherwise ravenous. Gnostic was able to follow the lingo and claimed no part of it.
Meanwhile, Emerse had run off in fear that he’d have his neck bitten and once again feel the non-consensual release of blood from his veins.
Stasi was forced to set a rule of no feeding off the crew without consent and for the Zhodani to be confined to her state room for the rest of the trip.
She sent a request to Wotan for some of his crew volunteers to be delivered to feed herself and the two other Zhodanis.
Emerse was not convinced and became increasingly worked up. He said he’d shoot the Zhodani if they left the state room. He was told to calm down and replied he’d stay in the hold if he had to.
Wotan got back in touch with us. He confirmed his people had repaired and reinstalled the jump drive. He instructed Anton to take a message back to X-boat management about putting Plaven back on the X-boat circuit. And reminded us to put in a good word with the Zhodani as well.
Before leaving, Wotan said he’d happily provide food for the Zhodani as a gesture of friendship to the Empire. Soon after, three beaten up guys were thrown into the Lost Crown.
Now fed and clothed, the Zhodani women agreed to stay in the state room – but told Stasi they expected to be hungry again in a few days.
Meanwhile, Emerse was inspecting the ship’s information and mechanical systems following Wotan's repairs and upgrades. It turned out all our systems were riddled with virus and trojans. Cameras and sensors had been installed in the engine room. It took another five days for Emerse to identify and dispose of these intrusions and throughout this time.
Wotan asked why the delay, We came up with excuses such as the need for additional forms of potato chips in our supplies until the work was done.
At the three-day mark, the Zhodani women asked to have another feed. It was at this point that we learned their names, because through reluctant agreement, Gnostic and Anton agreed to offer themselves. Natalia took a feed [2hp] from Gnostic, while Svetlana took a feed [5hp] from Anton during a session he described as mind-blowing.
Escape – to Zhodani space
Gnostic restudied his charts and announced we had four choices of where to go next from Plaven:
- Ninjar – a Zhodani hub (a platonic democracy with a Z-boat system and interchange to X-boats). (ZhIN=Zhodani - Iadr Nsobl Province)
- Quar - under military occupation (Imperium/Zhodani tension). (CsIm=Client State Imperium)
- Gougeste (same)
- Emerald - an Imperium system but would take us back a jump.
It seemed Ninjar was the most safe option - and would allow us to offload the two slave Zhodani women, while Stasi could make her report to the Zhodani empire.
Riley asked Belle to sedate Emerse before the jump (effectively a seven-day induced coma) - “Otherwise he'll go nuts when he knows where we're going,” he said.
Belle performed the procedure successfully, starting with a sedative, followed by the heavy stuff, intubating Emerse and putting him on a ventilator.
Gnostic was then able to put the coordinates in for the jump. The jump went without mishap and was
perfectly navigated – much to Gnostic’s relief. We decided to arrive at the standard mark – around 100 diameters (four hours) out from the authorities.
As soon as we arrived, we were hailed - "Imperium ship, prepare to be boarded."
Riley responded by explaining we were an X-boat but was not believed. We remembered our ship was still Sword-World registered (despite originally being Zhodani) and was contracted to the X-Boat Corp rather than being an actual X-boat.
Six Zhodani troops boarded us. They looked around and greeted Stasi, who was off in the corner.
"There are three Zhodani here, but you are not in command (gesture towards Riley)? Why not?” they said.
Stasi upped the intimidation stakes by responding, "What makes you think I'm not? It helps us to travel this way in many of the systems we pass through.”
“But why haven't your slaves been taught to speak Zhodani?”
“I am an ambassador,” said Stasi. "I seek conference with the Ministry of Galactic Relations. I work the way I wish and am not accustomed to being questioned."
“So you're definitely in charge then - as far as you're concerned?”
“Yes.”
Stasi was then given a few minutes to gather her things, including the diplomatic pouch from Wotan - and then disembarked. Before leaving, she instructed us “crew” to play along and pretend Stasi was the boss.
As soon as Stasi left, we were hailed over the ship’s comms and told not to move the ship or we'd be fired upon.
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| Antonia Billyck |
Stasi’s report on Wotan was that he was easily manipulated and intimidated but not to be trusted.
She request official recognition as an ambassador – noting her role in bringing the Winston system to the Zhodani empire in addition to this more recent diplomatic coup with Plaven.
Feeling flush with success, she then requested a Zhodani Corvette to improve the effectiveness of her
mission. Oh – that in addition to being given ship’s supplies and fuel. Antonia said she’d work on it – and that it would take a day or two.
Finally, Stasi asked to offload the two former slaves here. There was considerable surprise that Stasi would want to tip the balance still further towards scum humans – but the request was accepted given the above argument.
Just over a day later, Antonia came back to confirm a corvette would be supplied, but that it would come with a squad of Zhodani.
Stasi said thanks but the reason for her success was precisely that we were not seen as Zhodani.
Antonia said the squad was part of the deal – no squad, no corvette.
Stasi said, okay no corvette then. She then pressed to be given the rank of ambassador more officially and asked for upgrades to the Lost Crown.
Antonia responded, confirming Stasi would be recognized as an ambassador but that the Crown had already received as much upgrading as possible and there was nothing more they could do.
More jumps
When Stasi returned, Gnostic was checking his calculations for the next jump. There were two options, but assuming we wanted to stay out of Zhodani space, we decided to target Stave, a non-aligned human charismatic dictatorship system (high-port with fuel). Belle woke Emerse without mishap as we left the Zhodani system. He asked for, and received, three positive psych-analysis sessions with Belle over the next few days.
Gnostic’s calcs were good again and we arrived in the Stave system. Once hailed, we repeated our story
(X-boat misjump), which Riley was getting down to a smooth patter. We were asked if we had any Zhodani on board and when we replied yes were told Stasi would need to report to the guards when we arrived.
We were boarded by four guards, one was a Vargr. Gnostic attempted his Vargr language skills and was
laughed at.
Stasi was interrogated – she said she was a bodyguard for the captain. Riley was questioned about this and agreed, adding that unlike most Zhodani, Stasi was not at all defiant. We got our clearance after explaining we just wanted to refuel and go.
Gnostic now set the next course – we had a choice of two: Caloran - a fascist dictatorship, or an Imperium Client-state planet, Fronde. We decided to go to the fascists to protect Stasi from the Imperium.
The jump once again went well. We materialized in the system at the usual spot and were immediately hailed to prepare to be boarded. Riley gave his speech about who we were and how we were on our way back to Entropy. This time, we were asked to dock.
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| X-boat reps |
They asked if we were intending to visit the planet Caloran, we said no. We were told the nearby systems didn’t like Zhodani either – "We find that Zhodani often like to take over."
Finally they added, “I suppose you haven’t managed to keep up with the news. Entropy is now a Zhodani client state – it’s been taken over. Like Winston."
Again, Gnostic set a course. This time to Arden - a benevolent democracy (but with a “dislike” of the Zhodani). As we materialized in the system we got the usual greeting and replied with our story about being an X-boat contractor. By now, it seemed we were known of.
We were asked to declare any Zhodani on board – Riley made the decision to say we were Zhodani free.
While we waited, we tuned in to the planetary TV shows. One well-resourced TV channel was running footage of a gallows with ten Zhodani on it, twisting in the wind.
The local X-boat rep came on board, asked where were going and provided a third mochila for us to deliver. This one was also destined for system 728-907.
We then refueled, travelled to the edge of the system and prepared to jump again.
Gnostic said, “So far so good – just six or seven jumps to go.”
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| (One possible six-jump trip in orange) |
728-907
Some Galactipedia research on 728-907:
System 728-907 is in Imperium space. Orbitting the G2V star is a large unchristened planet, in the goldilocks zone, with good gravity and a breathable atmosphere. It was recently surveyed, and has no evidence of higher animal life (or sophonts), although extensive tropical forestation and insect presence have been noted. There is a primitive (no fuel) high-port in orbit. The Ministry of Colonization has designated the world for seeding within the next century, with a view to colonization upon availability of personnel and funds.
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