Round 4:
Sydney walks backwards until her shoulder blades touch the wall.
Isu follows after the robot and, with a powerful thrust at a weak point in its damaged armor, plunges his blade deep into the robot's innards. He sweeps the longsword out in an arc, tearing power conduits and a variety of rainbow-colored wiring.
The robot freezes in place. Begins emitting a heavy black smoke. And finally, collapses to the floor.
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In the short but deadly encounter with the robot, its malfunctioning weapons had scorched or outright destroyed most of the equipment on the walls behind the party. The equipment and wall-screens to the north side of the chamber are on the other hand relatively intact.
In any case, though the robot is damaged, a scholar or collector on Absalom Station may be interested in its remains as a curiosity or for salvage.
At the far end of the chamber, screens cycle through a rapid-fire array of abstract images. You also notice that in the room's far north-western corner a wall panel measuring about 3x3 feet appears to be affixed with a metal handle.
Solaria goes to Isu and comforts the kasathan soldier, "You fought well yet again, we are indebted to your strength and resolve in battle."
Although she is unable to really help the kasathan, she hopes her words encourage him in the confrontations to come. She cannot but feel that his bravery has kept the group from disaster.
Looking around the room, she cannot stop her eyes from taking in the array of swirling colours and abstract notions.
While Isu (and anyone else who wants to) rests, Ted and Solaria inspect the robot and unusual equipment around the room. Ted simply gets the impression that the technology cladding the walls is not of Pact Worlds origin, but not anything beyond that.
Solaria spends some time watching the symbols and shapes being shown and eventually comes to the conclusion that these are messages in some kind of language, likely one more pictographic than the typical writing systems common in the Pact Worlds. With so little context, its unlikely that it would be quick to decode exactly what these words might mean, but an experienced linguist may be interested in this find.
"This language is so pretty, shame I have no idea what it means, do you think we should record the pictorial details for a language expert to decipher?" she asks her companions, if they have better datapad than hers.
She turns to see Isu pulling the handle, "Are you sure Isu?" she says with some alarm and some excitement of new discoveries.
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Arcalinte obliges and uses his personal comm unit to snap a few pictures of the writing on the walls before Isu pulls the lever. He sighs, fully expecting the floor to open up under them and drop them into a tank of crocodiles or something.
Isu gives the handle a solid pull but the hatch door barely budges. He tries again with more force and once again the door doesn't yield. Even with all his strength, a strength that is partially diminished by the blood he'd lost earlier, Isu is unable to pry to door open. From the way it feels, and the lack of any visible keyhole or electronic lock, it may be that the hatch door has been welded shut from the other side.
Either that, or the door is a fake designed to make the opener look foolish. One of those two.
Sydney bends down on one knee to inspect the broken robot. she examines the outer panels and the fried wires underneath.
"This robot is different from anything I've seen on the Pact Worlds. We should take it with us when we get off this... rock" She straightens, puts her hands deep in her jacket pockets and takes time to look around the room.
While her allies take a look at the hatch and start taking photos of the strange symbology flashing on the screens, Sydney gives the terminals a try. Although the terminals clearly have some things that are identifiably buttons, pressing them has no obvious effect on what's being displayed. After a couple of minutes attempting different keystrokes and a couple more looking for some kind of external access port, it starts to be clear that this alien technology is either malfunctioning or was intended to be accessed in a different way.
Looking at screens and images across them, Sydney's sharp eye catches a flash of something that might have been a schematic or pictoral representation of a ring-like structure, but it vanishes before she can inspect it, and as she keeps watching, it doesn't come back up.
Pushing causes the hatch door to yield no better than any other interaction. It seems either violent force or a deft hand (and appropriate engineering tools) would be necessary to get this thing open.
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"Pulling doesn't work. This one thought maybe pushing would work. That failed. This one failed you all. This one shall not fail! GAHHHH!!! Arc, Ted, Spectre. Help me you fools! GAHHH!"
Isu puts all four hands on the handles and attempts to rip the door directly from the wall! He screams in exertion.... but thankfully thinks to mute his comms!
Solaria watches as Arc and Isu struggle to open the door, her head tilts to the side as she asks, "Perhaps we could just blast it down?" her voice quite quiet and unsure.
Solaria shrugs and tries to help Isu in his determined quest
Although the terminals clearly have some things that are identifiably buttons, pressing them has no obvious effect on what's being displayed. After a couple of minutes attempting different keystrokes and a couple more looking for some kind of external access port, it starts to be clear that this alien technology is either malfunctioning or was intended to be accessed in a different way.
"I think this might be a control room. With these terminals and buttons," Sydney Kermit types on the platform, trying to get a reaction from the system.
Looking at screens and images across them, Sydney's sharp eye catches a flash of something that might have been a schematic or pictoral representation of a ring-like structure, but it vanishes before she can inspect it, and as she keeps watching, it doesn't come back up.
Sydney leans forward and squints, "Did you see that? That ring-like structure?" She rubs her eyes and stares again but it doesn't come back.
~*~*~*~*~
Sydney approaches Isu and cracks her knuckles. "Is it locked?" She helps pull on the door.
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Spectre pauses at the console for a moment, his head swiveling toward Isu.
"Your inability to open the portal through brute strength demonstrates the limits of your approach," he drones. "I find the concept of attempting to break the door less effective than simply finding the control for it."
If he were capable of a shrug, he might have done so at this point, but nevertheless moves to aid in opening the door.
After a minute of coordinated tugging, the metal holding the hatch door in place starts to bend... then twist... then tear... and suddenly you're all falling back in a heap with the entire hatch door held in your hands. Not only have you pulled the door off its internal hinges, but you've managed to tear it free of the slagged metal that had effectively "welded" it to the doorframe!
Beyond the hatch door, you see a tiny room with a low ceiling, little more than a closet. It is empty save for a single humanoid body in an old looking space suit (in a style common around the Pact Worlds around 75 years ago), as well as a discarded pistol. The helmet of the space suit is scorched on the side of the head.
Solaria wonders whether the welds were on the inside or out, was the man interred or was he making a bolt hole from which he never escaped? "A tomb now, but was it meant to be?" she asks.
"This was probably the overseer of this place," Sydney interjects. She bends down to search the body.
Solaria inspects the hatch door from the other side and notes that the side facing the interior of the tiny room is a mess of slagged metal. It seems that whoever was inside the room used a medium-to-high energy weapon to melt the metal and seal themselves in the room!
Sydney inspects the body carefully and gleans quite a bit of information. First of all, she can immediately tell that the withered, form inside is a woman who died from an energy blast to the head. The scorch marks on the exterior of the suit match horrible burns to the side of the face and a partially slagged skull. This is very obviously the cause of her death. Beyond that, the woman clearly suffered a number of other wounds. Her suit is pierced in a dozen locations, showing signs of massive tooth-marks.
Still on the woman's body are a few items. Her armor's upgrade slot contains a brown force field (out of power, but a new battery would power it). Her satchel contains two needle-tipped capsules labelled "Lesser Restoration - single use", which many of you would recognize as spell amps. Her satchel also contains a datapad (out of power, but any battery from a personal comm device would power it) and a survival knife.
While Sydney takes a look at the woman's gear, the rest of you realize something strange about her. Though it's difficult to make out due to the withered appearance of her face, this woman bears a startling strong resemblance to the ghostly creature that attacked your group while Sydney was still on the Acreon.
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"This person... this woman... was the ghost from earlier? She must have died a horrible and miserable death to come back as a ghost, surely... This capsule... Please, is this what this one needs to get better? Let this one try one! Please!"
Looking to the party for permission, , Isu plunges the spell amp into the injector patch on his suit.
Isu sighs in relief as his strength courses back into his body!
"Please Isu take it, your prowess in taking on our foes head on, means your both deserve and need the restitution." Solaria says as she looks at the body.
Solaria is taken aback by the marks on the woman, her eyes grow wide as she realises, "Whatever killed this woman wasn't one of those aweful blue creatures, not an akata. The teeth marks are different, the wounds much cleaner and, dare I say more deadly." Immediately she takes out her datapad and enters a photo of the teeth marks, hoping to identify more about the deadly creature that did this.
Solaria recognizes the bite marks as the work of a particularly odd creature, a Garaggakal. The punctures wrap all around the dead woman's limbs, matching the lamprey-like mouth of that specific alien creature. Off the top of your head, you remember that the garaggakal are solitary creatures native to the Drift. Sometimes called a "drift wraith", these sentient creatures primarily interact with others by attempting to eat them.
Spectre inspects the pistol lying next to the woman and identifies it as roughly equivalent to a static arc pistol, though built with outdated technology. From the damaged look of the barrel, it does seem likely that the pistol was used to fuse the door shut.
Furthermore, Spectre repowers the datapad and finds it to be functional, if a little archaic. Within, the data structure has been stripped clean, leaving only a single vid recording. You set the vid to play and see the following:
Sydney shifts her weight from foot to foot, hands in her jacket pockets. "Well that sucks for her... Nice for us though."
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"That she thing talks about, this terrify creature. It must be here. And this one holds the force field that the dead woman keeps on talking about. We must get this force field active! Anyone, anyone with a battery? Could this... this backup generator armor upgrade power the forcefield? Maybe... this one can take the battery out of this one's pistol, charge it with the generator, and then... use it to power the force field? What do you skillful ones think?"
"What, the creature still lives and could be here?" Solaria exclaims, her voice showing fear for the first time. She continues, with wavering words, "Perhaps, we need to rest and plan our investigations further, if it still lurks here." She looks at the dead woman, "Even her measures were not enough to save her." as she looks to each of the current party, Who will live to tell the tale?? if any!
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Spectre considers the message. "I had contemplated her would being self-inflicted, but did not have enough data to reach that conclusion. I had anticipated that she had killed herself to avoid dying of thirst," he adds. "But this creature is another matter entirely."
He makes some calculations before continuing. "Might she be referring to a ship that no longer has an owner?" he wonders. "If so, it could be a lucrative proposition to locate it."
Solaria recognizes the bite marks as the work of a particularly odd creature, a Garaggakal. The punctures wrap all around the dead woman's limbs, matching the lamprey-like mouth of that specific alien creature. Off the top of your head, you remember that the garaggakal are solitary creatures native to the Drift. Sometimes called a "drift wraith", these sentient creatures primarily interact with others by attempting to eat them.
"So what's a Garaggakal?" Sydney questions to Solaria. "If it attacked her, it's probably still here and I want to be prepared." The operative reaches towards her thighs to touch her guns. Making sure they're still available, she returns her hands to her jacket pockets.