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Taking off the in shuttle Ratatatat cannot keep still you watch him run all over the place looking at the ship's systems.
"Seehere?..Rightthere?..Youarenotlooking...Looknowthere...Theenginepowerisn otgood...limitedweapons?..Transportornotthisbad...Needsmoregunneryontheaft. ..Whoispilotingthisship?..Youfeelthat?..Shiprightenginesneedtobelookedat... "
When the doors open and the droid meets them Ratatatat looks at Fitch on the screen.
"Weaintmeat!...Theandroidswouldbreakattooth...bitingintothemandtheyainttast ey...Youneedhelpfixing?..YouluckyImhere...ThereaintnoshipIcantmakebetter." As the screen shuts off Ratatatat curses. "Alrightletsgo...fromtheshuttlewetook...ifitssamepersonresponsible...wehave lotstodo!"
The shuttle pilot drifts down to the closest bay leading to E-deck, and a lift carries you down the rest of the way. A heavily underused section of the Master of Stars, E-Deck consists mostly of primary access corridors and adjoining chambers. According to your blueprints, most side rooms are crew quarters or communal living spaces.
A small emergency light illuminates a set of closed doors leading into E-Deck. What do you do?
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Ratatatat quickly finds his way to the front of the procession. "I'lltakepoint...dontthinkwehaveanythingtoreallyworryabout....butafterthela struninwiththoseguards...yeahI'lltakepoint...pluslookingathalfofya...youwou ldn'tknowthedifference...betweenthemaincapacitorpowerstream...andtheT9trans istermodules...hehehe." Ratatatat adjusts his eyes and looks down the hallway. "LetsfindtheE-deck...sowecangetoutofhere." with that he starts walking down the hall heading for the E-deck with the Zero rifle locked and loaded.
The doors are normally magnetically sealed, but with the power off, Ratatat manages to pry them open. Inside is... Pitch blackness!
Those of you with darkvision notice a console on the right side of the entrance with a blinking red light on it. Two cameras are pointed at the doors from which you entered with another pointing to the back of the warehouse, but everything is likely disabled without power. Scattered barrels and boxes line the floor.
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Poppilo activates his infrared sensors installed in his armor, peering into the darkness.
He stares intently around, not liking what he is seeing. There are too many places for things to hide. Concentrating briefly, Poppilo's antenna starts animating agitatedly, as he starts scanning the warehouse for intelligent minds.
School divination (mind-affecting)
Casting Time 1 standard action
Range 60 ft.
Area cone-shaped emanation
Duration concentration, up to 1 minute/level
Saving Throw Will negates, see text; Spell Resistance no
You detect the surface thoughts of intelligent creatures around you. The amount of information revealed depends on how long you study a particular area or target.
1st Round: You detect the presence or absence of thoughts from conscious creatures that have Intelligence scores of at least 1 (or an Intelligence modifier of –5) or higher.
2nd Round: You detect the number of thinking minds and the Intelligence score (or modifier) of each. If the highest Intelligence score is 26 (or a modifier of +8) or higher and at least 10 points higher than your own Intelligence score (or 5 points higher than your own Intelligence modifier), you are stunned for 1 round and the spell ends. This spell doesn’t let you determine the location of the thinking minds if you can’t see the creatures whose thoughts you are detecting.
3rd Round: You can read the surface thoughts of any mind in the area. A target who succeeds at its Will save prevents you from reading its thoughts, and you must cast detect thoughts again to have another chance. Creatures of animal intelligence (an Intelligence score of 1 or 2 or an Intelligence modifier of –4 or lower) have simple, instinctual thoughts.
Each round, you can turn to detect thoughts in a new area. The spell can penetrate barriers, but 3 feet of dirt or wood, 1 foot of stone, 1 inch of common metal, a thin sheet of lead, or any force field blocks it.
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Faraeon holsters his semi-auto pistol and feels around on his belt for some kind of flashlight, then smacks his forehead as he has a sudden realization. He presses a finger to the palm of his hand, and the sub-dermal implant he had accepted earlier that day suddenly becomes useful as it begins to shed light around him. "Hey, it works,"[b] he exclaims happily. [b]"Don't forget your implants, team. They give at least a little bit of light."
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Ratatatat is about to protest when he feels the bright light shining off Runner. "Surenowyouareabeacon...OneshotSPLAT!..I'llbepawdeepinantennae..." he continues to mumble some theories on why the lights aren't working and that the station needs a new engineering crew ASAP. "Guessyou'renotdoneyet?" his attention moves back to 5 who looks like she has something happening with the console.
In your mind, you hear the thoughts of two children.
"I thought I heard something. Someone's coming. We better hide!"
"They're here for our pet, I bet!"
I-5 tinkers with the console for a minute, and reroutes power into the warehouse. With a final press of the 'Enter' key, the lights flicker and illuminate the immediate area in soft yellow light. The computer screen changes to a view of the cameras, and on them, you see two human children hiding behind a barrel in the far corner of the room.
A thick bulkhead to the port side leads farther onto the deck, while a similar bulkhead to the aft connects to an arterial hallway that runs the length of the deck.
The two children, a girl and a boy, peek out from behind the barrel and then approach Ehdd, holding hands. The boy looks down at his feet and speaks softly. "Umm, s-s-sorry sir, we were just scared. Please don't hurt us, okay?"
"Well, sir, we were trapped in a barrel here. Then all the lights went out!" The boy says. "Yeah, we were carried in here in a box, and then it went dark!" The girl adds. "No, you're wrong, we wandered in here and found a pet!" The boy retorts. "A pet? What are you talking about, Lan? There are no pets here. You're stupid."
"NO, YOU'RE STUPID! STUPID!" The girl whacks the boy in the back.
"HEY! I'm gonna tell dad!"
"Umm, we discovered a weird crab thing in here, and we made it our pet," the boy says. "We named him Mister Krabs. Yeah, we hid him in the room over there so that no one would find him. But then we went to get food and came back, and, and the lights went out. Um, we did something bad too..." the girl whimpers. "The fire extinguishers in here will sense your heat and go off if you try to cross into that room," the boy says, pointing to the adjacent chamber. "We did it to protect our pet. Please don't tell on us!"
Static buzzes from your communicators, and Fitch's voice rings out. "Hey! Did you find anything in there?"
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"Indeed we did, Mistress Fitch," Faraeon squawks back over his comm unit. "A couple of kids. Apparently they found some kind of crab...thing? Anyway, we're looking into it now." Faraeon approaches the children and gives them a warm smile. He leans down to address them on their own level and says in a somewhat simpering voice, "Hey there, kiddos! Recognize me? I'm Faraeon Star-Jumper, from the Grav-Runs? I know, impressive stuff, but that's not important right now. Can you tell us more about this pet of yours? What does it eat?"
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"Aw, some stinky kids!" Despite his words though, Poppilo squats in front of them and pats their heads. "Don't be scared of that bug-man. He's just scaring ya on purpose. He is famous in Pact Worlds! He claims. You might wanna get his autograph later! Oh, and this bug-head, too. He's apparently famous as well."
"Now, how long have you had Mr Crab? I guess it doesn't eat little children! Help us find him, and we'll make sure he is safe."
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"Anyrecordingsdownhere?..Camerasandnovideo?..Fitchneedstofixthisplaceup...G otthesekidswanderingabout...withsomepetcrab?..Betyaiteatsantennae?..Askthem kids...justhowbigisMrKrabs?..AndgetFitchonthe..." hearing Fitch Ratatatat pipes in "HeyFitchyougot...anyrecordsdetailing...anycrablikespecies...Igotbaditchabo ut...thispetthesekidsaretalkingabout."
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Heat sensors setting off fire extinguishers? These kids did that? I can hardly even work my comm unit!
Ehdd keeps an eye on the children, well numerous eyes really, as he slowly chews and speaks with the group only "Damn trouble making kids.. where are the parents these days. In my day we'd get our hides tanned for doing something like this... and no sugar water for days!"
"Oh yeah, you're that upcoming racing pro. So cool!" The boy says to Faraeon. "I'm Kieu Si, and this is my sister, Kieu Lan."
"Mr. Crabs eats pretty much whatever you feed him! I think he prefers rats though," Lan says, giggling at Ratatat. "We've had him for only a few days. He crawled out of a storage box here. He should be in that room next door, at least that's where we saw him last."
Fitch shouts across your comm units, "WHAT?! A crab?! In there!? No, no, no. That's gotta be an alien of some sort. Please make contact with the thing right away before circumstances in there get even more out of hand!"
I-5 switches the screen to display the camera's feed from the room next door, but she doesn't see any sort of biological (or mechanized) creature in it.
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"WhoyoucallingRAT?..Youlittlerunt...BetyaIcoulddangleyouinthatroom...BetyaM rKrabscomesforalatenighttreat?" Ratatatat switches to 'NILes' "AlrightIgotpoint...Popthedooropen...Igotatastesforsomebisque!"
Ratatatat moves across the platform and down the stairs to the next door. He looks at the others and waits for someone to open it up the door with his NIL grenade launcher ready to fire.
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"No, no! They didn't call you a r... uh ... whatever you think they called you. They're talking about actual r... uh ... what you think they called you. And the fire extinguisher is still rigged!" Poppilo rushes up behind Ratatat, not quite daring to get too close, but worried that he would actually turn the crab ... uh ... alien in bisque. He turns to Fareon as he passed. "Hey bughead, your antenna workin'? Find the alien before he does! I don't think Fitch would wannit in a soup!" I still want my reward!
Ratatatat tinkers with the thermal sensors and manages to cut the right wire. The hiss of steam escaping assures you that the fire extinguisher system has been disabled.
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Ratatatat snickers at the rude little runts "Don'tgowandering...we'llseewhatcrabeatsrats...little$#!%$can'twaittobringyoubacktoFitch...Alri ghtletsmove...PirateQueenpopthedooropen...I'mhungryforsomebisque."
He grips the NIL grenade launcher and gets ready to cook.
The kids stay put in the entry room. The adjacent room consists of two adjoining chambers. Four large containment capsules fill the fore room, three of which hold stasis-locked objects, including a tablet, a strange curved sword, and an odd spiral of bioluminescent coral. A crack leaks fluid from the fourth capsule, which displays a foot-wide breach near the bottom. The aft room contains several desks, each hosting a deactivated computer terminal.
Still no sign of the alien, though. Any ideas?
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Ehdd moves up cautiously behind the others and peers into the room after Ratatat, eyeing up the breached capsule "Hey I-5, call back Fitch and ask her what was held in that stasis capsule? I kinda bet it was something that looks crabby?"
He gives the room a quick eyeball while he grasps his pistol nervously
Ehdd's antennae perk up as he senses something in the light fixture above his head. The lightbulb is missing and something is moving inside the ceiling panels.
I-5 loses track of the alien. Ehdd still senses movement in the ceiling, but can't quite track its precise location while behind his barrel safehaven.