Beran, DCI's page

"Why did I agree to this!?" Beran wails, looking out at the choppy waters. "A shoot out, in choppy waters, with insane cultists who want to end the world!" The ysoki hireling hunkers down between Benny and Vecro. "When I get back, I am gonna kiss my desk!"

Meanwhile Beran turns to Vecro and signs, This is how you sign 'yadayada'. He shapes his hand like a puppet that is endlessly opening and closing its mouth, then points to Dani and signs, 'yadayada' again.

Beran signs to Dani, You know what one of the good things about sign is? It's concise. WHAT WAS THAT? Could you have crammed any more words in there?

Then Beran turns to the CPBN folks. "You need help with setting up? I can also help with some of the tech info, but I'm happy to help you get your recording equipment together."

"Yeah, you should go visit the Shatori. Friendly people." Beran does not say, 'Unlike you', which for Beran is a huge diplomatic leap forward. "They've got an awesome telescope, and they let me look through it. If you want a good picture of the phenomena, they'd be the people to see."

Then Beran asks, "Er... what sort of stories have you heard about us, anyway?"

Beran takes out some gum, chews it, and then spits it out and hands the sticky gooey mass to the elf. "Makeshift ear plugs. They won't keep out Dani, but they might help with the worse of Guli's volume."

Beran looks up at Vecro. "Make! Sure! That! I! Don't! Blow! Away!" Then the ysoki pitches in, helping the loud dwarf and others set up.

Engineering, Aid Another: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (13) + 4 = 17

Over the storm noise, Beran signs to Dani.

In sign language
Dani, can you broadcast over the storm noise that I'd be willing to help them set them up their gear?

"Shall we set up our equipment now and park the Pegasus. or should I let you socialites keep schmoozing? I vote to set up equipment while we still can." Beran looks at the map. "I'd rather not drown or fall off a cliff face, or get eaten by sea monsters, or whatever other horrid things with teeth are waiting to consume an ysoki-sized snack."

Beran / Dani vote to set up equipment on A5.

Beran's whiskers twitch as she takes in the huge and well-constructed observatory. She turns to Vecro. "I hope that they let us look through the telescope! It looks like they have all the best toys!"

"Wait... So if we leave our equipment there.... They'll just come and take it?"

Beran is horrified. Who raised those bozos?

Beran looks up at Scrimshaw's magnificent tusks as she hauls astronomical equipment out of the Pegasus. "Hey bud, if I got told not to stare hard into the woo-woo water, I'd try to avoid doing that. But hey... I'm just a rat with work to do. You wanna get yourself hexed or whatever, that won't twist my whiskers. Just help Guli and me set up this equipment first. Then you can go stare at the woo-woo water all you want."

Beran's Aid Another Engineering: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (14) + 4 = 18

"Hey... Beran needs a rest and I have no desire to go down to my drowning doom yet. So... can we help the Ibrans fix their equipment?"

Beran just puts her face in her hands.

"Why would you want to poison an ooze?" Beran asks Cavaler. "Aren't most constructs and machines are immune to poison? Though you could be right that it is more gooey and oozy than constructed, so I suppose anything is possible."

Beran considers Cavaler's question.

Beran's Physical Science: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (11) + 4 = 15

"You know what you should do? REVERSE THE POLARITY!" Beran shouts, waving her furry arms. "No, I have no idea what that means, but I've always wanted to say that. On the vids it's the answer to everything!"

"Animated ferrofluid?" Beran's head pops up and her whiskers twitch with excitement at the thought of the academic paper she could write on this. "Fascinating. They did not cover this in my engineering classes at Solar University! We should totally study and document this important scientific phenomenon."

And then it occurs to her that the ship's Captain had talked of the fluids running amok... What if they turned out to have large metallic claws and a taste for ysoki?

"So... here's my plan. Vecro smashes whatever they are, and the rest of us analyze their properties later. From a safe distance. Preferably another room." She dodges behind Vecro, tail twitching. "You can do this, buddy! Remember that it's for SCIENCE!"

Still, Beran tries to consider what she knows about the properties of ferrofluid, in case she can remember anything that might help Vecro smash things.
Beran's Engineering: 1d20 + 4 ⇒ (13) + 4 = 17

Beran just sticks her head in her hands. Here we go again...

"Look. I'm all for convenient rescuing. But we've gotta get down to the surface before all the good spots are taken, or we're gonna be setting up in the drink!"

Seriously, the player votes for answering the distress signal, no matter what the hireling boon requests!

Ouch! Double 19's nice, but that usually means that a couple of 1's is just around the corner. Vecro will keep some safe social distance from Dani Merta ;)

"Me too. I'll be hiding right behind you."

Beran listens to all the talk with increasing alarm.

"Solar flares? Storms? Azlanti? Death cults?!" Beran asks the Venture Captain, "Geez. What does the society provide for life insurance and body recovery?"

I feel so stupid. Beran does the little spin, awkwardly, then mutters to Vecro, "Was that the hokey-pokey? It felt like the hokey-pokey."

Turning back to Agatio, Beran adds, "Even if you do mind, she'll ask you lots of questions. You can't get her to shut up, really."

"Wait. Is excited that feeling when you think you're going to crap your pants because you're gonna die on some alien world?" Beran asks, agitatedly going through their equipment one more time. "Because if that is excited, then yeah, I guess I'm excited."

The ysoki looks up at Vecro. "Tall, aren't you? Can you stand between me and anything big with lots of teeth on this mission? I'd appreciate that." Then Beran looks up at Vecro. "I'm also from the DCI, and yes, Dani always talks in your HEAD. You'd think she was a barathu or something."

Beran's whiskers twitch with anxiety. "At least we'll be in comfort when we burn up in a crash."

"How can I look at the equipment? It's in crates." Beran the ysoki grumps as she hauls some equipment of her own. "And it's not like you'll be using that astronomical gear, anyway. Or keeping track of the calculations. If it's not mystical woo-woo, you don't give a damn about any of the research!'

A small ysoki follows along behind Dani, hauling equipment. "Right. We're all going to drown on an alien world, and I'm stuck here playing sidekick to a psychic prima donna," she states, feeling horribly sorry for herself. "Does it get any better than this?"

Beran is a gloomy research student from the DCI who resents that she's the one who always has to do the practical work while Dani takes credit as lead researcher.

She's also Dani's Amateur Hireling Boon.