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"Ah I see. Inspiring people not as a good example but as a bad example? I guess that could be 'inspirational' in one sense of the word. But he does make a great person to stand behind. And that would have hurt most us us worse, I guess."
Vyviane acts like she's starting to pack up her pistol as she natters away, making herself seem less like a threat before snapping her weapon up and arcing a jolt into the black cat.
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"It's almost like the two of you DON'T think getting close enough to your opponents to hit them really hard is the most important thing in a battle," Chorizal comments with obvious confusion in his voice.
As though to punctuate the point, he drops his laser and whips out his doshko as he closes the remaining distance with the gray cat.
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"I've got them pinned down! Surround them and destroy them Starfinders," J'Shun yells as he wrestles with the cats' appendages that are wrapped around him. With four hands available, even though he is grappled from both sides, he still manages to brace his tactical shield to defend himself with and level his tactical pistol at the beast to his right before firing off an explosive round at it.
Rastar moved in - striking to good effect.
Viv was fooling no one - but still landed her shot.
J'shun manages to get his sidearm into play and chip away at the creature too.
Chorizal runs toward the creature and encounters its superior reach:
Reach - Attack
Chorizal closes the distance and lands a mighty - and likely fatal - strike to the creature. It remains standing but has turned completely feral.
G 10
B 25
Start state: Grey 25, Black 10
Bodo moves in and shoots black fur!
***
Black fur steps away from Rastar, and lashes once more at J'Shun!
Attack
Damage
+Grapple (fail)
Grey fur has gone completely mad, and lashes at Chorizal.
Attack
Damage
+Grapple (fail)
It then falls in a heap.
R3
Vivyane
Chorizal
Rastar
Bodo
J'Shun
ENEMY
G Down.
B 16
J'Shun and Rastar land blows, but Chorizal had some unlucky timing, missing the opportunity.
R3
Vivyane
Chorizal - acted
Rastar - acted
Bodo
J'Shun - acted
ENEMY
G Down.
B 32
The black cat reels under the assault - but has not yet fallen!
B 38
Bodo tags the beast which seems to be standing only through some herculean effort.
It attacks J'Shun once more.
Attack
Damage
Then expires.
The group of zrulicats that viciously attacked your group appear gaunt and underfed, but the bits of intestine on their claws and in their teeth suggest they’ve been hunting recently.
You determine that the zrulicats suffered from starvation and their blood isn’t coagulating normally.
Zrulicat pelts are so glossy and thick that they’re actually quite valuable as components for making armor.
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As the last feline falls Chorizal gives it another poke with his pike. These things had a habit of keeping on their feet after they should have, after all. Can't be too careful.
Sure that they're dead, he slings his pike then retraces his steps, picking up his arsenal - doshko then laser - along the way.
With that done, he returns to the carcasses and starts harvesting the pelts.
"Now there are a few ways that you can do this..." he comments as he gets started.
You take ten minutes to rest up, reload, and reorganise.
With a bunch of new pelts you are otherwise able to head off.
After realising the shortfall of not having a good combat first aider around, you set off.
Eventually, the tracks you have been following merge to join with multiple sets of hooved footprints, all leading to a single location.
The forest gives way to a patchwork of tree-dotted fields, some fallow and some lush with dark-green grass. The fields encircle a cluster of mobile
prefabricated modules that form a small settlement. A river runs through the ring of buildings, and a rope and plank bridge provides a path across the swift waters below. Dozens of hooved footprints flatten the grass throughout the meadow, but at first glance, the village appears deserted.
You notice eyes peeking out from shuttered windows, some accompanied by thebarrels of guns.
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J'Shun, takes cover behind a large tree at the edge of the forrest and signals with his hands for the other so do so also. Removing his binoculars from a pouch attached to his armor, he then peers through them at the village.
Whispering into his comm unit he says, "No movement in the village, seems deserted."
He continues observing with his binoculars, making adjustments to the viewfinder and the magnification by manipulating the controls on the device.
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Vyviane takes a good look at the village, curious as two what kind of people were living here, and hoping to not find a group of dromada bodies with cat bite marks on them.
She gives a small start and then opens a comms channel to the rest of the party. "Look alive people. This town is not as abandoned as you might initially think. See the third window from the right? There's someone there, with a gun pointed our direction. Same for a good 5 other windows I can see from here. We should probably move into town looking unthreatening and see if we can't talk them down. J'Shun, take the point and I'll be right behind you. Bodo, hang back and provide covering fire if things go south. Everyone else stay a pace or two behind us and try not to be threatening. Chorizal, I mean you especially."
She cuts off her comms drops her cane and pistol in the bush behind her and then looks over to J'Shun to screen her. She walks up a step or two behind the military minded fellow and then takes up a position in the center of the square.
"I know you're hiding, we are Starfinders and mean you no harm. We're looking for Colrid, his ship crash landed near here, and is broadcasting an emergency message. would you please put your weapons down and come out to talk with us, or allow us inside?"
Vyviane's voice cracks part way through her first sentence and she can barely manage to whisper the rest of her speech.
There is a slight pause, then a few noises of bodies shuffling about, then a dromada appears out of one of the buildings - Colrid.
He invites you inside the prefab building, which resembles a cinder block on wheels. Colrid looks a bit exasperated and slightly concerned "I'm glad our message got out, and answered by Starfinders no less! The herd normally roams the meadow freely, but the recent string of unusual zrulicat attacks disrupted our routines. To make matters worse, some of the other dromadas have gone missing without a trace over the past weeks.
I have deeply traumatic memories of my own capture by poachers several years ago and I'm afraid the missing herd members have fallen victim to a similar fate. I long to fight back against the danger menacing my people, but what if something happens and I get more of them killed or lost? My fear and uncertainty cloud my thoughts" he sighs, deeply troubled.
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Rastar makes a show of holstering his weapons, including clicking his assault hammer back into place on his back.
"Yes, the Starfinders got your message and sent us to aid you. We ran into some of those zriulicat things on our way here. That's 3 less to bother you and your friends there. If there are poachers about, perhaps we can find them and convince them to leave your herd alone. We can be very convincing when we try, and our arguments tend to be settled permanently."
"Can you tell us where the missing were last seen?"
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"Uh...I'll do what I can..." Chorizal says. The nice thing about being a vesk is that a vesk is never unarmed.
He shucks his laser, doshko and pike just in time for Colrid to come out. With a sigh, he picks back up and reattaches each weapon to their harnesses on his armor.
"Don't worry, Colrid. That's why we're here. You won't get us killed, we'll get ourselves killed," he says when after the dromada tells them the situation.
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"You have nothing to fear Colrid because, is here to save you. We will find the rest of your missing herd and deliver them safely back to you. Captain Chorizal, Private Mars, secure a defensive perimeter around the village."
Taking out his binoculars again he peers into the forrest. "Once we've gathered more intelligence on the zrulicats we'll commence our rescue mission.". He then looks at Colrid. "Tell us more about these zrulicats."
"Can you tell us where the missing were last seen?"
“At first we thought Tansid got lost—he’s young and hasn’t mastered the art of navigation yet. Then, a few days later another was taken. Five members of our herd have disappeared over the past two weeks. The witnesses refuse to speak of what they saw, and my attempts to track the missing have failed.”
"Tell us more about these zrulicats."
“The wildlife attacks started a few months ago, and it’s only getting worse. Animals claw or peck at us wherever we go—it’s as if the entire planet is on edge. The zrulicats are the worst. They rarely troubled us before and were easy to avoid, but now they hunt us. Stranger still, when the zrulicats attack their prey, they no longer eat their kills. They just leave the corpses laying there to rot. I don’t understand it.”
“Soorid, Trisu, and Mulrid all say they saw something strange. You should talk to them about what they witnessed, but you’ll need to earn their trust first. You can spend the night at their camp and begin their investigation in the morning - you look like you had an adventurous journey" he looks at the state of you - clearly having walked a long way and in some kind of combat at some point.
He looks astounded "Zrulicats don't hunt in packs, they are solitary predators and only ever hunt alone. They only come together to mate, but not to hunt in pairs let alone a pack. It's like they are abandoning their natural habits - they kill, but don't seem to eat their prey - they seem to be hunting as some sort of angry sport"
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Vyviane takes a moment to grab her gear she dropped and then heads into the building, taking a back seat to the conversation happening between Colrid and the others.
She nods at the information being shared and then pauses as if to verify something. "you mentioned people going missing, but also corpses. I take it they are separate things? How many people total have gone missing, and how many people have been confirmed killed? Are the zrulicats leaving other kills alone too or just dromada ones?"
"The Zrulicats have attacked us but not managed to kill any Dromada, however we have seen several other kills they have made, all sorts of species, and all left uneaten. Our missing people are just missing"
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"Working in packs to hunt things for sport. Sounds like the zrulicats have been taking lessons from humans. I agree, this is a dangerous precedent, and we should try and handle that while we are here. But the missing Dromada should be our primary mission. Wildlife attacks can be fought, but something actually successfully killing or abducting intelligent beings should not be allowed to stand."
"Let us camp for the night with the Dromada, earn their trust, and hopefully set out in the morning to find out what happened to the missing."
You set up camp for the night and quickly understand why Colrid suggested it, as that afternoon and well into the next morning there is nobody around. The dromadas stay indoors until the sun is clearly visible in the sky, then gradually trickle out to graze and begin their daily tasks.
They stay close to the cluster of buildings and seem to be trying to avoid you all at first, stealing glances at you but startling when you approach.
With the name and descriptions of the witnesses, you move off and find the first one to question.
Mulrid kneels in one of the fallow fields sowing seeds, "I'll never get this planting done before dusk!" they moan to themself with concern.
Mulrid visibly cowers at the whole presentation of a loudly speaking armed to the teeth Kasatha and in a fit of panic drops their seeds all over the soil, adding a second layer of panic as they try work out whether to flee from the shouty-alien, or try and salvage the seeds they have now dropped.
They sit there blinking, looking back and forth at the seeds and the ground and the Starfinders.
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Chorizal probably doesn't help anything, being heavily armed and armored as well. He shakes his head dismissively and approaches the cowering Dramada then squats down.
He scoops up a handful of the seeds and dirt, shaking them in his hand before examining them.
"Hmm...broad leaf and wide, shallow roots. These are going to need room to grow but don't need to be buried deep. At least two hand spans between but you can alternate rows. No more than claw depth. Like this."
He pokes a talon into the dirt, drops in a seed, moves over several inches and does the same then moves in another direction, making a triangle between the seeds.
He keeps going, not realizing he's actually doing the planting instead of just demonstrating. When the handful of seeds is gone, he comes back, tamping dirt back over the ones he's already planted with his boot before scooping up another fistful.
Chorizals calm planting and quiet explanation draws Mulrid over, who watches and listens to the guidance and then starts calming planting alongside Chorizal. After a while of quiet planting, Mulrid opens up "I was out collecting these seeds on the day of Tansid’s disappearance. I had
wandered far from the encampment when they heard screams coming from a cave but I was too frightened to investigate" they begin to shake at the recalled memory, but push on and draw Chorizal a map to the cave in the dirt with a small hand spade.
Chorizal appears to have made a new friend.
***
You find Soorid relaxing near the river, nearby a fresh bit of earthwork suggests she has been maintaining the irrigation system. She’s an elderly dromada with gray fur who appears to be unafraid as you come closer, she looks up at the group casting her eyes across you all, "Is one of you a space-wizard?"
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Seeing the map being drawn by Mulrid, J'Shun orders Private Mars to take a picture of it for future reference before moving on.
Upon meeting Soorid he quickly approaches her. "Soorid, I am Space Admiral J'Shun Kay, first son of Clan Summersword, House Davion, line of Atsu, born in fire! My team and I are here to save your herd from the depravations of this planet. Tell us now, what happened to the other dromadas that were kidnapped."
"Born in fire? So you are a Space-wizard? Do something magical" she asks enthusiastically.