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Sleestack checks for countermeasures and starts working on extracting anything use from the device. She notices that a red light starts blinking on the side of the device, and the screen flashes a word on the screen that is not immediately recognized before it vanishes. This is followed by an electrical discharge! DC 12 Ref Save for half of . Afterward the device is a charred, melted brick.
Otosh moves in to investigate as his teammates cover him. Flipping the body over, it is immediately obvious it is a damaya lashunta. They has been severely mangled, with three vicious claw marks across much of the face. The right antennae as been completely severed. There is dried blood on the face and neck, soaked into the lab coat. There is an access card clipped to the waistband and a personal compute device on the left wrist.
Between the emergency lights and your low-light vision you are able to see pretty well, the immobile form is laying face down, head towards the door your just entered from, they have purple hair, and there is a dried redish brown spot on the floor around the head and chest area. Most likely blood.
Sleestack makes short work of the second door after the cleaning cycle is completed. The doors unlatch, hiss, and slowly slide open... Beyond the doors the corridor continues another 7 meters, and then branches to the left (north). The corridor is dimly lit by the emergency lighting set at regular intervals in the walls, and the smell of decay immediately assaults your nostrils. There is a humanoid form laying face down on the floor just beyond the doors, wearing a white lab coat.
Apologies for the extended absence. I will return to a regular posting schedule on the 26th. :)
The mighty vesk warriors inhale deeply and press on through the thickening cloud of smoke. Or gas. Whatever it may be. The chamber fills for about 45 seconds and then the sound stops. After what seems like the longest 60 seconds of any of your lives the voice speaks again, "Nano-decontamination sequence complete." There is a click and a whoosh as the white cloud is vented back out of the room. Otosh finds that his sight return almost immediately! Sleestack is pretty sure she can make short work of the other control panel, which has a green light above it now with a little plaque that reads "Clean".
Moving cautiously into the tunnel, the team gets to the midway point and the double doors slide closed. The lights dim along the walls, and a soothing computerized voice says "Beginning decontamination sequence." Along the floor on both sides of the tunnel there is a brief hiss and white smoke beings to pour out of concealed vents.
Checking out the panel, it does appear to be the same type of control station as the outside panel. At the far end of the tunnel the panel looks the same as far as you can tell from 10m. There is recessed lighting running along the top of the tunnel on both sides. Everything is quite and still.
Initially Sleestack is unable to notice anything obviously wrong with the setup. Then she realizes that the thing that looks like a brick next to the drum is actually a yasoki liquid vacuum inverter, and it has been damaged. Spending some time reviewing a maintenance howto video, Sleestack feels pretty confident in her repair and passes the keycard over the sensor again. The system cycles and the huge double doors hiss and slide gently open. Beyond the doors is a 3m wide tunnel that goes about 10m back to another set of double doors like the ones you are standing in front of. There is a control panel at the far end, as well as a second control panel just on the inside of the tunnel to operate these doors from inside the tunnel. The tunnel surfaces appear to be smooth, reenforced nano-metal composites, pretty standard stuff. There is a faint scent of chemical cleaner.
Otosh tries to pry the doors open, with the help of the others but is unable to get enough purchase to effect any sort of leverage against the heavy, metal doors. Sleestack notices a maintenance access panel near the floor about a meter away from the control panel and doors. Opening it reveals access to a hydraulic drum that is part of the door tract.
How would you guys like to proceed?
The screen shows "An unexpected error occurred (-34521268)."
New post tomorrow, sorry for the delay. Hang in there folks :)
So unless there are any objections...
After an additional examination for structural integrity and traps, Sleestack raises the lift via the control panel and lowers the vesk crew down into the shaft. She then approaches the keycard station next to the very heavy, very sealed looking double doors and slots it. The display flips from red to green and you hear this hiss and release of pistons and locks. After 3 seconds you then hear a painfully loud screech of metal on metal. The doors do not move. The control display switches from green to orange, blinking 4 times in long, slow pulses (about 4 seconds each) and then returns to solid red.
The lift controls appear to be on a locally isolated system, Sleestack makes easy work of the system though, and unlocks and opens the metal doors. There is a 5m deep shaft with a rising floor/lift at the bottom. There is also a sealed set of double doors at the bottom of the lift that go east, with a keycard reader set into the wall next to the doors.
Sleestack finds a undamaged keycard in the rubble. Otherwise all the other office and research equipment looks to be useless. On a hunch, Sleestack tries the keycard on the reader attached to the sealed metal doors. The foldout interface screen displays the messages "Security Lockout in place. Unable to access lift controls." Otosh is having a very difficult time seeing much of anything.
Katarasi moves in first to secure and clear the area, looking for more information. You second skin armor will protect you from incidental radiation exposure, and has a visual indicator if you find your way into a radiation field, going from darker to lighter as the intensity of the radiation increases. At present, nothing out of normal tolerances.
The team is able to make a 5 minute sweep (based on the rolls above), and find two things of interest. There is an area that may have been a workstation space, as there are some badly melted computer interfaces and circuit boards that Sleestack is able to identify as probably coming from 2-4 different machines in a small area. The other thing is a sealed metal door installed in the ground, which is next to an part of the building that looks like it may have been a loading dock type area. The doors are closed, and about 3m square. There is a fold up access panel with a biometric and keycard interface.
Deciding to press on, the vesk squad moves quickly ever closer to their target. Suspicions that something is wrong continue to grow with each passing minute. Faint smoke can be seen in the vicinity. Finally rounding a small hill about 200 meters to the research site, you get a clear view at the smoldering ruins of what should be a building. The facility appears to have no major wall structures left intact, there are a few crumbled half walls, but nothing larger. No roof structure is left, and there are a few wisps of smoke rising up into the peaceful blue sky. What now?
GM Stuff:
Katarasi presses on, keeping a quick pace while the rest of the team makes its way though a massive patch of razorvine. Coming from a different approach, Katarasi is able to meet up with his team shortly after they pass the patch. You are now approximately 2 km from the research facility, and Vralakosh is the first to notice a faint trail of dark smoke in the direction of your goal. Otosh: About 15 minutes after clearing the razorvines, you notice that you are having trouble seeing on the edges of your vision. A sort of tunnel vision, as a deep green creeps into your vision. You estimate that if this continues you will be unable to see at all within the hour.
Sleestack and Vralakosh make it look easy and manage to find ways through the razorvine with a minimum of cuts and scrapes. Otosh is doing quite well himself, until he misjudges where he plants his right foot and shifts his weight suddenly to compensate only to lose his balance completely, pitching forward and sidways at once scratching part of his head and neck in a thick patch of the sharp vines! It immediately stings and throbs painfully! Please give me a Fort Save.
Katarasi:
You are making good time trying to catch up to your team. The plains you are moving across are light work, with few shrubs and tree clusters. Remembering your briefings, you do not expect any large predators. Further off in the distance you can see small hills and a decent mountain range. After about 30 minutes you notice a bit more in the way of trees and they look to be following a winding river nearby, which you follow. About 20 meters ahead of you, you notice a metallic glint as the sunlight reflects off of something. You slow your approach, ready your weapon, and take caution as you approach to investigate. Closing to about 10 meters ahead, you see the unmoving form of a humanoid laying on its stomach, the metallic glint appears to be coming off a thermal wrap that is caught in a shrub next to the body. Squad: Sleestack and Otosh get slightly distracted in a bit of back and forth about Katarasi’s failures as a pilot, the key features and bugs in the latest vOS update and how it changes the dropsled interface, and suddenly come to realize that Sleestack has wandered you all into a dense patch of razorvine. You can try and go around it, but it will take you about an hour or you can try and press through with an Acrobatics check (or I’m open to substitutions if you’d like to suggest a different approach).
A solid, reasonable plan in place, the vesk set off to the tasks at hand. Sleestack and the others practice open terrain coverage and movement tactics. They made some forward progress, intentionally lagging back so that Katarasi can catch up. Sleestack can make a Survival check, and include an additional 1d6 results. Vralakosh and Otosh may Aid the check. Katarasi, on the other hand, moves at a much quicker pace in an attempt to close the distance missed by his drop-sled. Please make a Survival check, and include an additional 1d6 result.
Everyone sets to programming the dropsleds, performing pre-drop diagnostics, and preparing to leave the ship ready for combat! You all check your personal comm units and make sure you are able to talk to each other.
Prayers are given to Damoritosh, everyone climbs into their sled, and after a short countdown, the sleds are launched toward the planet! The ride is bumpy, and warm, but short. The interior of the sled suddenly fills with impact foam, and the sleds come to an abrupt stop. Each of you extract yourselves from your sled and take in the immediate area. You immediately notice that there are 3 sleds, instead of 4, having landed within a pretty tight 100 meter radius. Otosh, Sleestack, and Vralakosh all emerge from their pods in an open plain. Katarasi and his pod are nowhere to be seen. You are able to establish communications with each other on your StarSlack channel, using the orbiting Jioh's Spine as a comms relay. Katarasi's position is about an hour north of the rest of the team, and the team is about an hour north of the research facility. You are able to communicate, plan, and coordinate activities as you see fit from here. How would you like to proceed?
Captain Zumanka smiles and rubs his hands together excitedly. "It is time, mighty warriors! Time to take the next step in your Journey and decend to the planet! Achieve your objectives and I will return you to the ship!" Zumanka touches a sequences of keys on his wrist computer. "May you serve the will of Damoritosh! For the glory of the Veskarium!"
I'll get a post up tomorrow, work really took it out of me this week.
The last log entry seems to match the approximate profile of the other 17 day-cycle messages in duration and transmission time.
As the closes in on the planet, in preparation for establishing an orbit, Sleestack sets to work trying to get useful information from the communication satellite. It appears to primarily perform message relay functions. While she is unable to gain full administrative control over the satellite, she is able to compromise an account that gives access to read and copy the communications logs. She carefully transfers the logs for review. The logs do not contain the transmissions, only the relevant data about when they occurred. The logs go back approximately 240 day-cycles. Near the beginning of the logs there are some inbound messages in addition to the outbound message traffic. The log is largely comprised of outbound message relays that occur every 17 day-cycles. The last such message was relayed 9 days ago.
Otosh performs a standard sweep of the surrounding space as the Jioh's Spine approaches the planet. Otosh finds no energy signatures for other space craft, there is no planetary communication satellite or defensive grid. There is a single satellite in a geo-sync orbit of the planet. The satellite does not have a very strong power signature. Captain Zumanka asks, "Well, warriors, how shall we proceed?"
Without much fanfare, the Drift travel passes without incident. The ship exits the Drift at the beacon near the outer edge of the solar system and Captain Zumanka sets in a course for the planet that will put you in senor range after about 2 hours of travel. Someone can make a sensor scan (Computers) using the ship computer bonus of +2 to see what you learn on your approach.
That all sounds lovely Katarasi. Thanks!
Sleestack and Otosh spend some time going over the dropslead interface. GM Stuff:
Captain Zumanka informs you the trip through the Drift will take 21 days. Plenty of time for training, drills, research, and recovery. An uneasy edge starts to settle in as star travel generally, and Drift travel specifically, has a troublesome way of making the passage of time seem meaningless. After the evening meal on day cycle 11 Zumanka says, "Each of you already know a version of the Legend of Jioh. Our traditions and our stories make us who we are, and they bring honor to the Veskarium. Our differences bring strength to the Veskarium! I will now share with you House Vaskren's Legend of Jioh." "As you know, hundreds and hundreds of years ago, before Jioh became the legendary warrior we all know her to be she served her first assignments aboard the VHS Starlight. Many glorious campaigns were fought by the well trained crew. This is the story of the final mission of the Starlight. The ship had been heavily damaged and gotten off course in a massive fleet battle and ended up in a previously uncharted close space system. The captain brought the ship into orbit around a planet in the system where surface conditions were favorable for survival, and the crew began in orbit repairs." "The Starlight was attacked by scavengers, and the hull was breached. The crew took to their dropsleads, forced to abandon the Starlight. Seventeen warriors made it to the surface of the planet. As we know, only Jioh returned to the stars. Praise be to Damoritosh!" "Seeking to humiliate the might vesk warriors, the scavengers followed them to the planet. Scattered, many of the warriors were picked off alone or in pairs. Jioh had managed to rally the Six and setup an ambush. Ultimately it was only Jioh that survived the ensuing battle. She was able to use gear from the wreckage of the scavenger ship to contact the support ship that came to aid the Starlight." Zumanka smiles, "And thus began the career of one of the greatest warriors to ever lead vesk into battle in the name of Damoritosh! Honor to the House! Glory to the Veskarkium! Conquest to Damoritosh! The Captain raises his mug in salute, and drains it.
No problem Katarasi! I am trying to get another chunk of text written this weekend to get things moving to the action! Converting something I've run in person several times to pbp has been interesting so far. I realized I hadn't give you guys the backstory legend of Jioh's Journey, that'll fill some of the time while you travel in the Drift. :)
"Lethal force is authorized." the Captain smiles, his eyes narrowing as he does. "Memory cores are easier to transport, feed, and interrogate. Once the core is removed, the rest is of little value."
Sleestack skillfully navigates the ship out of the hanger and clears the Diaspora! Returning control of the ship back to Captain Zumanka, he checks his wrist computer, enters new coordinates into the navigational system, the drift engines pulse with a growing thrum, and you feel the lurch as Jioh's Spine enters into driftspace. Zumanka motions you all to come closer. “Damoritosh be praised! The fine folks at Field Ops Command have this mission briefing package.” He gestures his right hand over his wrist computer swiping toward each of you in turn, a data transfer to your own devices. He then touches a few buttons, pivots toward the main bridge display wall and swipes again. The display comes to life with a star system map, orbital scan, and several shipping manifests. “A data analyst over in IntOps has flagged something interesting and Field Ops has assigned us to follow up. This little slice of raskha is designated as Leshto Vesk four two six, located in the near space system Zeta Radii. It is a pretty nice planet, if these scans are accurate. Long range scans picked up a single communication satellite in orbit a few months ago. No defense grid. No indiginious sapients No predators larger than klaven warbeasts. But there is this…” he spreads his index finger and thumb several times in a reverse pinch motion as the orbital scan display zooms into the planet, showing an aerial view of a building in an otherwise open area. “This is a prefab research slab. Suitable for orbital drop deployment. These images are from a follow-up probe that was deployed a few weeks ago. IntOps dug into some Abadar Corp. affiliates and flagged some interesting materials orders being placed over the last 7-14 months. Looks like our scientist friends have significant interest in gen-mod materials. Field Ops has designated this a Jioh’s Journey operation, with clear and secure research workstation or server memory cores to be your primary goal. Whatever they are cooking up down there, the MilSci group would love for you to collect it and share it with them.” “After we take up orbit around the planet, you will each program your individual drop sleds and begin your Journey. Once planetside, you will travel a short distance to the research facility and assault it. Once you recover the objectives, I’ll be happy to send down a recovery rocket and bring you all back up to the Spine.” the Captain smiles. “Questions?”
The evening winds down, there is more drinking, a few tests of strength and dexterity, eventually there is food. Stories abound. Zumanka has served a long and colorful career, and seems to genuinely enjoy training First Field soldiers such as yourselves. Eventually it is time for sleep, and the morning launch comes way, way too soon. Everyone takes their positions and readies the ship for departure. Sleestak has the honor of piloting the ship out of the hanger, and out of the Diaspora into open space if she chooses.
Katarasi definitely hits something. Sleestack uses her wrist computer to create a strobe light pattern directed at the Captain as she moves over to control panel for the massive overhead claw. She selects a grid point on the display and hits the 'emergency release' override button. The claw moves swiftly over the Captain's location and then slams down into the floor below! Captain Zumanka is knocked over and pinned under the weight of the massive cargo claw! From under the claw you here a short grown and cough, which then turns into a raucous laughter. "Well done. Very well done! Zumanka continues to laugh, clearly pleased with the performance of Sleestack and Katarasi. "Now let me out of this contraption, we've a keg to finish!
Katarasi punches Zumanka right in the face with a thud! The Captain gets a sort of wild-eyed look an grins. He then steps forward and tries to connect his forehead with Katarasi's face!
There is a thud and a crack as the bony ridges of Zumanka's face solidly connects with the bride of Katarasi's nose. The pain centers of his face scream as fluids begin to freely flow everywhere. Snot, tears, blood. The poor house solider is unable to see clearly! Round 4
PCs are up!
The gender of the pregen is mutable as needed. There is no wrong answer here, whatever you are comfortable with. Thanks! :)
vs 18 Stealth *flat-footed* Busy with Katarasi, the Captain does not notice Sleestack's stealthy approach! She moves in and tries to grab the Captain, trying to immobilize his right arm without success.
Captain Zumanka uses Sleestack's momentum against her and tries to trip the trixy operative! Zumanka roars with laughter as Sleestack easily dodges his clumsy leg sweep. vs. 24 Round 3
PCs are up!
Sleestack, what pronouns would you like to use for this character? You've got SonOf in your name, but F listed in your status bar. Thanks :)
Before moving on to the wrestling, the Captain acknowledges Otosh and cheerfully invites him to join in the fun! Katarasi drunkenly telegraphs his moves as he charges Zumanka, hoping to grab and pin the experienced warrior. Zumanka is able to easily sidestep the clumsy attempt though. vs. 20 (KAC 14+8-2 for charge) As the Captain moves aside, his fist slams into Katarasi's stomach like a hammer causing the fledgling warrior to throw up a little in his mouth! Combat
Katarasi is up!
Sleestack feels the gaze of disappointment from Captain Zumanka burn into her.
As the rest of the crew completes their tasks, Otosh begins an ancient work-chant to Damoritosh which helps him power through the rest of his task. Going back and forth between the cargo hold and the hanger, Otosh can see the other three have started their celebrations... Zumanka's promised keg of vrahana has been tapped and mugs of the fermented berries from Vesk-4 are being enjoyed as the captain recounts a space battle between a scout ship he was assigned to previously and a drow weapons merchant ship. "...so I says to the captain, 'I can fix the torpedo launcher, sir!' The captain nodded the briefest of confirmations and I ran down three desks to the torpedo launch bay. It had already taken a direct hit from those sneaky drow. I had to manually reconnect the secondary fire control circuits to the bridge. The weapons officer was able to lock on and fire two torpedos at close range as the drow craft swept in to finish us off!" Captain Zumanka holds up his mug and bellows, "For the glory of the Veskarium!" he then quickly drains the mug, refilling it from the keg.
GM Dice:
"Now, my First Field crew, who will wrestle me for the honor of piloting the ship out of the Diaspora tomorrow?" the Captain sets his full mug down next to the keg, and rolls his head to the side, his neck making a cracking noise as he does. He takes a few steps away from the keg to a more open area of the hanger bay.
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