Rain quickly moves up past Recorva and Stefani, moving up to prevent the verthani at the end of the hallway from attacking either of them.
Recorva blasts the verthani at the end of the left corridor, but Stefani's shot comes up short. Damon rushes the other one, punching him before falling back, leaving flames in his wake. The guard slashes the vesk as he retreats.
The verthani down the left hall moves to confront Rain, slashing at the drone with his knife. The other one switches to an ice carbine rifle and fires at Damon, but he comes up short.
Stefani hits the side of her weapon a few times and then moves a little closer to her target before firing again.
"Come and get me, you frost-bitten coward!" Damon runs forward at the shooter, once again attempting to strike and retreat in flames.
Recorva will target the same Verthani as before, taking aim at them before firing off two rapid shots at their center mass.
Rain will charge up his hammer, arcs of electricity running along it as he brings it up to strike at the Verthani in front of him.
Once her allies are in the hall dealing out massive amounts of energy at the adversaries at the ends of the hall, Shabad calls her semi-automatic pistol to her hand and steps up to where she can take a shot at the one to the west
.
Aside from Recorva, everybody hits with their attacks. Both guards are still only lightly wounded, though, and they continue to retaliate against Rain and Damon.
"At least these guys know how to take a beating," Stefani calls out as she fires again.
"They sure do. Lets keep giving them one." Recorva then takes another shot at the Verthani attacking Rain.
Shifting to a more defensive stance, Rain still continues to attack the Verthani he is engaged with. Electricity sparking off of his hammer, he brings it in a swift uppercut towards his opponent.
Shabad shifts and shoots at the other security guard that Damon is trying to barbecue after Stefani, Recorva, and Raine seemed to be zeroing in on the other.
Damon's solar armor flares brighter and brighter, suffusing the crew with supernatural plasma. Time seems to slow and the vesk launches himself at the gun-toting verthani.
Stefani and Recorva shoot the wounded guard. As Rain brings his hammer down, the verthani briefly flickers into shadows, but materializes again in time for the drone to deliver a critical hit that slays the guard!
Damon rushes in to attack the other guard but he dodges the vesk's attacks. Shabad lands a good hit on him. The guard switches back to his knife, slicing Damon once.
"Just... die... already!"
Shabad fires again, but Damon's aggressive rush at the guard forces Shabad to direct her shot to the side and she misses. She takes her eyes off the fight for a moment to glance down the hall toward the work area. It wouldn't do to be caught unawares if some workers decided to come help with the fight.
Recorva will turn to face the remaining Verthani now that the other has fallen. Aiming at their center mass, she will let excess power build up in her weapon before releasing the trigger.
Seeing that it would be difficult to engage the remaining Verthani without either risking an attack from them or potentially running off around the nearby corner, Rain will take a defensive position where he is currently positioned.
Damon lands a good blow on the remaining guard, then Stefani and Recorva blast him to finish him off!
Shabad checks the bodies for items that might open doors or provide access to computer systems.
She keeps her weapon ready in case more security arrives.
Other then another set of key cards, Shabad doesn't find anything useful on the bodies.
When you are ready, Damon continues on his original path, opening the doors to the central room in this wing. Gleaming white ceramic tiles line the floor and walls of this spacious laboratory. Six ten-foot-tall glass observation tanks display hideously transformed humanoids suspended in a glowing blue liquid. The disfigured corpses are a patchwork of mismatched limbs, dissected abdomens, and extra rows of teeth set in impossible places. Three stainless steel tables in the center of the room are equipped with metal restraints. To the west, a massive computer towers eight feet tall, trailing wires and cables slick with blood into the shadows.
A human man stands in the center of the room. His skin is pale with several black splotches around his neck, his eyes are glassy, and he is pierced in several places by cables connected to cybernetic augmentations and tubes that pump blood throughout his body. He has gray hair and a gray-and-black beard. He is wearing a white jumpsuit that is stained with patches of his own blood. He does not react to your presence.
You recognize the man from some of the video logs in Eclipse Innovation headquarters. This is--or was--Dr. Irvi Qindor.
Shabad stands in the door, not wanting to see what is in the display cases and fearing there might be something wrong with Dr. Qindor. She stands in the door, pistol at the ready. "Dr. Qindor? What happened to you?"
The doctor makes no response.
Scanning the shadows with his rifle ready, Damon waits uneasily for an ambush.
Shabad bites her lip as the former doctor does not respond. "We're looking for Rhyse and his transmission source. This place looks like more of their perverse experiments. Probably nothing we need here. The doc looks like a zombie, probably beyond help."
She seems to be thinking out loud. Finally she says, "I say we shut this door and come back if we don't find what we're looking for elsewhere."
She holds one of the key cards near the door, poised to shut it but checking to see if anyone objects.
"So we're just going to leave him like this?" Stefani questions with a frown. "At the very least we should put him out of his misery, shouldn't we?"
"I'm not sure he's alive. He might just be animated. In any case, the shadow effects blur the distinction between pleasure and pain. But if you want to dispatch him, it's your call."
Stefani raises her weapon for a moment, but then shakes her head and turns away. "Not my place," she says.
"Once we've disabled the transmission and taken care of Rhyse, we can return and see if there is anything to be done for the doctor. Maybe by then we will learn how to reverse some of the corruption that these poor victims have suffered."
She closes the door, fighting back the urge to tear through the compound, yelling for Rhyse to show himself.
She turns to the room on the corner of the hall intersections and tries the key card found on the workers who attacked the group.
"Watch that other door and keep an eye on the halls for more security."
A sign on the door indicates that this room is Kaeon Rhyse's personal office. The key card works, and the door opens to reveal a black metal desk, equipped with a hard-backed metal chair and a computer workstation. Aside from the desk, the office is unfurnished.
As you attempt to gain access to the computer, a hologram of a well-dressed verthani appears near the door--Kaeon Rhyse himself! "It’s exceedingly rude to go looking through other people’s belongings. If you want to know something, just ask," the hologram scolds.
"Well since you're opening yourself up to questions, I have to ask ... Do you actually pay someone to make your hair look like that? Because between you and me ... it looks like shit."
"Well since you're opening yourself up to questions, I have to ask ... Do you actually pay someone to make your hair look like that? Because between you and me ... it looks like s+%@."
"All hair looks like shit," Damon mutters, clearly unaware he's speaking out loud, "Gives me the heebie-jeebies."
The old vesk turns to the smug hologram. "Ya know, once you've murdered a whole damn asteroid full of people by convincin' them to make jewelry outta their own guts, I don't think you've got standing to look down your nose at us. You wanna play the gracious host? Do us all a favor, and shut this damn place down!"
Stefani turns to glare at Damonkayo. "You know what gives me the heebie-jeebies? That ... thing ... you vesk call a ..." She shakes her head. "Nevermind. It creeps me the f#%+ out just thinking about it." Turning back to Kaeon again, her smile returns. "So we're in agreement then? New stylist and shut this place down?"
Shabad makes a rude hand gesture at the hologram as she sits down at the access port. She activates Delay Countermeasures spell. Then she jacks in and works on getting past the firewalls.
While androids don't sweat, the frown on Shabad's face indicated she wasn't successful on her first try. She was glad she had activated her spell, which gave her a few more tries.
"Bingo," she says softly and relaxes slightly.
Kaeon's hologram looks at Damon and Stefani with narrowed eyes. "Yes, I pay to have my hair styled like this. Good grooming is apparently lost on the likes of you. Unfortunately, I don't think I'll be shutting this research facility down any time soon. I will give you a chance to surrender now before any more blood needs to be shed."
Meanwhile, Shabad manages to hack into the computer system. She finds two modules inside labeled "Black Site Floor Plan" and "Journal."
The floor plan contains a three-dimensional map of the entire black site, including an image the site’s hidden fourth level, which can only be accessed with a black Eclipse key card. There is also an inaccessible fifth level, which houses a particle accelerator. ccessible fifth level, which houses a particle accelerator. The representation of the particle accelerator contains notes about its construction, listing highly complex theoretical equations alongside runes that appear to be magical in nature.
The journal contains a series of text documents chronicling Kaeon’s personal life from 5 years ago to the present day. It will take about an hour to skim through all of these documents.
Shabad does not want to spend an hour reading the journal, but she will copy the text if she can to store on her computer and make a copy of the map of the complex.
She studies the accelerator until she finds she cannot make sense of the magic runes. As she explores the data, she narrates what she is finding. "Okay, got a map. Five levels. The fourth requires a special access card, apparently coded as black. Not sure how we get to the fifth although I might be able to use a spell to teleport there. Seems to house some kind of particle accelerator. Here are some notes." [Long gaps of silence, frowns, mild curse words, etc.] "Can't figure out what the thing does, but I'd wager a life supply of Doctor D's Doughnuts we will need to destroy it. Let's continue exploring. Maybe I can figure this out when I see it."
Kaeon's hologram seems perturbed that Shabad is ignoring him. "You have chosen the way of pain, then. Good. You will come to embrace its glory soon enough." The image flickers and disappears.
Kaeon's hologram seems perturbed that Shabad is ignoring him. "You have chosen the way of pain, then. Good. You will come to embrace its glory soon enough." The image flickers and disappears.
"What, did he think we were gonna get squeamish at this point? We chose the way o' pain a while ago." Damon pauses for a moment, chewing over his words, before shaking his head. "What's the plan, Doc?"
Recorva will have been staying out of the way for the discussion with the hologram of Kaeon, seeing that the room was rather small. Now she moves to stand in the doorway. "Personally, I think that out first priority should be to clear the rest of this level, make sure that we don't leave any surprises behind us. After that we should probably head down to the second level, to try and disable the broadcast studio, as it might be the source of the signal. After that, it seems that the bunker might be the only strategic point left here. But that is just my thoughts on this."
Shabad listens to Recorva, nodding occasionally. "Sounds good to me, except we may find some of Rhyse's abominations on ice just to slow us down before getting to the heart of this place. I say we check out the security station and see if we can score one of these black key cards or else hack the security system to make sure we can get where we need to go and reduce the chance of setting off traps.
"But if we encounter some sewn together experiment that starts after us, I say we retreat and head down to the next level. I don't think anything from this level will follow us. Most of those workers are still coding even after we killed four of their colleagues. And we just had a fierce fire fight in this hall and nothing else has emerged to threaten us. If I can hack the security cameras, maybe I can spot something we may want to investigate, but I'm not sure we need to clear the level. What do the rest of you think?"
"If I can hack the security cameras, maybe I can spot something we may want to investigate, but I'm not sure we need to clear the level. What do the rest of you think?"
"Work smart, not hard. I like it, Doc."
You head down the hall to the security station. Two large screens along the western wall of this darkened room glow with a sickly green light. Each screen is divided into dozens of individual squares, broadcasting live security recordings from around the complex. Some of the feeds show scientists bent over strange machines or bloody operation tables, while others display darkness. A black metal locker stands against the eastern wall.
Nobody is watching the feeds here--the guards already emerged to attack you. It will take several minutes to look at all of the rooms closely enough to glean information.
Inside the locker, you find two flash grenades III, an ultra-capacity battery, and 30 small arm rounds, as well as a spell gem of mystic cure (4th) and two spell gems of restoration.
Shabad does not use grenades unless she fabricates them, but she seems to be the only member of the group with a use for the small arms rounds, so she will take them. Sadly, she can't cast the spells on the spell gems, as the spells are not known to technomancers.
While others are studying the feeds, Shabad will get a start on reading/skimming the journal of Keon Rhyse, looking for clues that might help understand what led him to this line of attack on reality.
It will take several minutes to look at all of the rooms closely enough to glean information.
Damon starts scanning the feeds, trying to get an idea of the layout and occupation of the facility.
Recorva will nod at Shabads assessment of the situation. "True, I hadn't thought about the residents of this floor not necessarily following after us when we head down. My thoughts were to mainly try to determine if there were any more actively aggressive threats on this floor and take them out, but if we can avoid them altogether that would be good as well."
Once in the security station, Recorva will have Rain carry any of the equipment from the locker that nobody else claims.
Shabad only makes it partway through Kaeon's journal. The early sections include ideas for new tech and plans to launch a nonprofit organization to gift technology to disadvantaged Cuvacarans.
Looking through the feeds, Damon can see only a couple rooms on this level are occupied. In one lab (the northernmost marked E7), six humanoids in white lab coats monitor the workstations and stand around the glass booth peering at a seventh humanoid within, who also wears a white lab coat. A section of the subject’s skull has been removed, revealing his brain wired directly into the computers. The scientists appear to be sending direct electrical stimuli into the subject’s brain, murmuring excitedly about the results. In another operating theater (E12), four corrupted verthani surgeons dressed in scrubs surround the operating table, on which lies a human “patient.” They have just amputated the human’s arm and are attempting to suture the arm of a sexton velstrac to the stump.
On the second floor, a large room (E18) is filled with rows of mundane office cubicles occupied by human and verthani employees. Their naked flesh is plastered with electrodes, the wires attached to the computers in front of them. Some of the employees appear to be unconscious, while others cut at their own flesh with blades or flagellate themselves with bundled network cables.
The broadcast studio (E19) contains a polished wooden table in the room’s center that is surrounded by additional lights, cameras, and microphones. Damon notices a man who appears to be Kaeon Rhyse tinkering with the equipment here!
The rooms on the third floor all appear empty. There are no cameras on the fourth floor.
The broadcast studio (E19) contains a polished wooden table in the room’s center that is surrounded by additional lights, cameras, and microphones. Damon notices a man who appears to be Kaeon Rhyse tinkering with the equipment here!
"There!" Damon stabs at one of the monitors with a weathered claw. "There's the head of the snake. Let's take him out and then sanitize this hell hole with an orbital bombardment."
"Nuke 'em from orbit," Stephani says with a grin. "It's the only way to be sure."
Shabad makes a digital bookmark at the point in the journal she has reached as the location of Rhyse is identified. She looks at the other images to see things for herself. When she sees the worker whipping themselves, she mutters, "I guess the classic workplace sign would not be understood here: The beatings will continue until moral improves."
"So far, nothing in the journal to suggest this guy was a monster born. Seems downright virtuous, was going to start a non-profit for disadvantaged people in Cuvacara. Something must have happened to him."
"My curiosity is aroused. Let me read on a bit. Keep an eye on Rhyse and we'll head for him soon. There might be something important we should know. I doubt there is much we can do for the poor soul on the slab. but see of they show signs of resistance."
Shabad returns to the journal and does a search for New Elysium, to see what he was doing just before the resort became part of his plans.
An entry dated 2 years ago details Kaeon’s first visit to New Elysium. The tone of the entries changes dramatically at this point and takes on an unnerving fervor. While touring an underground maintenance area, Kaeon was visited by a “dark, brilliant” entity calling herself Dr. Lestana Gragant. She showed him that all beings can find pleasure in pain. Afterward the entries focus on Kaeon’s “conversion” of Eclipse’s board members and other staff, the company’s relocation to the black site, and the release of Penumbra. All of them contain glowing, almost reverential praise of Dr. Gragant. The last entry of the journal notes that Kaeon hopes to free Gragant from her Shadow Plane prison so she can transform the universe into a utopia free from the fear of pain.