"We REALLY need to know more about where he's coming from. 'Cos him holding back in the situation he's in is strange as heck." Mercy scowls through the glass and then readies to head on inside.
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"So we split into people who are better at reading him and people who are better at talking then? With the first group out here?" Mercy looks at the others on the team "I'll go in." She gazes at the man through the window, thinking over how best to convince him to spill the details he's been withholding.
He turns to face Mercy, noticing her state for the first time, concern furrowing his brow. "You okay?" Mercy nods to the Major, satisfied for now and ready to go talk to Lanzio directly. As the group steps out and waits to be admitted to talk to Lanzio she answers Reynar's earlier question "Head is pounding something fierce. Probably got knocked a little hard in that bout yesterday. But nothing a little adventuring and a couple cans of Slurm won't fix." She grins at Kyzin "Maybe Lanzio's just a little shy. We'll get on his good side and he'll spill everything to us."
"Do you think maybe he's under some kind of magical control to stop him from leaking information?"
"Hey, no worries." Mercy hands over her weapons "How long do we have with him? He say anything interesting recently to your own people? Anything else we should know?"
"Alright, sounds like something we can handle. We'll tease a little more out of Lanzio and find out what they're cooking." Mercy looks to the others as she takes the storage device and tucks it into a compartment on her armor "You all satisfied?"
Mercy arrives late, wild red hair even more unruly and messy than usual. From her bloodshot eyes she's not exactly in prime physical shape. Some of you might've heard that her last exhibition match didn't go that well. She massages her forehead as Historia-7 speaks. "So Lanzio. What else have you got him to cough up so far? What do you think he might know? And, hey Reynar's right, how much do we press him?" She grumbles "Real bad vibes if his employers were willing to attack Strawberry Machine Cake and their fans. Anyone who survived that attack would've been on the warpath against the people who dared attack SMC." "What else you got on Arch Energy? Anything they've been behind that we know about?"
I had to look up my old records from back when I was playing more SFS - looks like it was 4 ACP per completed scenario, which means we would be able to pick up a basic hireling comfortably after clearing the first adventure. Sounds like Attenuate will probably be able to tackle many skills we'll need in this next adventure, but if you're willing GM, I think we'd be well served with a Tech Support hireling to back him up. I'll be leveling Mercy up to 4th shortly and should be ready to dive in tomorrow.
That sounds good to me Thom. Mercy definitely has no tech skills, nor are any of them class skills for her, such that I could pick one up on this level up and at least be OK-ish at it. As a result I'd be relying on others to look at tech. Sounds like Reynar at least is in a similar position. In normal SFS, I vaguely recall being able to "borrow" an NPC that could do a specific skill for you if your group or character had a blind spot. I think it cost AcP or fame or something along those lines. Anyone remember that? Or am I thinking of PF2e?
We're back! Looking upthread I see we have potentially three or four missions for the proteges. Should be go straight to 5th level like previously suggested or go to 4th first? Or is this a mission for the main cast? Mercy is not all that good at tech, but Harlan certainly is.
That sounds good. Many Minds is one that was interesting to me, but I could do it with either character.
Welcome back. Jan 10th sounds like a plan. Holiday season is always busy. What's next on the docket scenario wise?
With the Open Collective unmasked, Mercy returns to Zigvigix with some concerns "We saw that some of these slimes had already escaped into Absalom Station. They could be hiding anywhere, or within anyone." She slaps her fist "How are we gonna track them down and teach them a lesson?" She volunteers for any further searching for the remaining bodysnatchers. As for Hurondo, she's rather indifferent. The fellow was certainly a strange one, capable of getting a bunch of people on his side easily. But he was also not particularly responsible. She figures Jiwalla could be as good of a job if not better. She stops in to make sure everything is back to normal at the Respite. Now that she's not the in the middle of a job she joins for some exercises among the people going through rehab.
"Heh. We got 'em." Mercy shakes goop off her hand, glad that the photon energy burned much of it off. "Kyzin, you're just fine. That ooze is not going to be doing much of anything any more. Just wash out your ears extra good tonight." While Attenuate checks Kyzin's status, she looks around in case any more oozes are sneaking up on the group.
Mercy steps in to get adjacent to get adjacent to Kyzin and then does her best to clobber the hell out of the surviving ooze.
"Get off 'im!"
Mercy rips the goopy sac off her face with a scowl. Getting covered in a goopy corpse officially qualifies as a bad day. She spits slime to the side and scrambles around the boxes to position herself south west of the remaining ooze. "You asked for it!" She calls out to the remaining ooze before striking a martial pose. Flames erupt around her.
(photon 2) Mercy gives the ooze next to her the old one-two punch, swinging with an explosive and loud burst from her boomknuckles before following with a burning fist.
"Yowch, get off me you slime bag!" Mercy bats the slime away.
Mercy skirts around the goopy puddles to approach the ooze Attenuate just shot. Rather than try to climb up, she readies to throw out a magical cone of flame upon the ooze when it starts approaching.
"Hey I could do all that smart stuff too, y'know. If I put my mind to it." Mercy comments defensively. When Attenuate returns with his verdict on the contents of the computer she adds "No big surprise that they're not flush with medical supplies. The whole thing's a front after all. Question now is where the rest of the oozes went." If no oozes make themselves known, she leads the way deeper in to seek them out.
Little heads up that I'll be traveling for work the next couple of weeks. Posting will likely be intermittent.
Without any good help to be found on this side, Mercy leads the way toward the warehouse half of the building. On the way she addresses the people in the lobby "Just stay where you are. We're sorting this out. We found the lady that went to investigate earlier. She's fine." She waves off any questions and continues eastward.
Mercy stands on guard while someone else takes a look at the computer terminal. She comments "There's our sugar. They were really stockpiling." She keeps an eye out for any oozes or other hazards.
"Sugar? They've got a bit of a sweet tooth, huh?" Mercy smirks "Shame it doesn't work like salt on snails, but maybe it could be a distraction." Sobering up a bit she adds "Punchin' seemed to do the trick to get the one in Quadrant-2 out, as rough as it was. But if they leave when spooked, if someone had some spooky magic we could get them out." "I like the idea of a suit to block 'em, and it doesn't seem out of place for a doctor's place like this. Lets do a quick sweep. If we find something that might work, we try it. If not we go to the other side of the building before the oozes start hunting for hosts on their own."
"You investigated bravely and you're in one piece now. We'll take it from here." Mercy flexes for the half-orc, grinning. "If there's two more oozes on the other side, its past time for us to go take them out. Question is, is there a way to work out where the rest of the staff went. We don't want a whole bunch of bodysnatchers wandering around on the station."
Mercy holds the half-orc's shoulders firmly "No ooze's gonna make you serve a higher will today. How did it all happen?" She also asks "Do you know where its "friend" is?"
Mercy looks expectantly at the half-orc she addressed. "Well?" If the half orc looks too shaken up to talk, she heads over to the android and sees if they're aware of themselves and their surroundings now that the ooze is gone.
"Easy." Mercy glares at the oozy remains "More or less." She looks over at the ooze's previous host and next victim "What was going on here? What happened? We heard this place was good for cheap medical treatment, but we come here and there's... this!" She stabs a finger at the ooze.
With the ooze out Mercy stomps flashily before flinging herself at the goo. Her solar gauntlets blaze bright as she swings in.
But her enthusiasm is not matched by her accuracy.
Mercy assesses that the infested android (probably) doesn't have much fight left in him and rushes right back in, ready to deliver a slightly softer uppercut to take him out. She taps her affinity for fire to guide her swing.
Mercy growls as the knife cuts in once more "That's enough." She focuses on her burning heritage to guide another powerful but carefully placed punch.
"Guh. This isn't working. Lets lure 'im out and surround him." She backs off with a guarded step again.
Mercy winds up, but then holds back a little as she swings in with a massive haymaker. She's cognizant that if she hits too hard, it's the android puppet that's going to take the brunt of the hurt.
She takes a step back.
"Vile." Mercy grimaces as Attenuate explains the situation.
"Not the chatty type? Works for me." Mercy repositions, then blasts like a rocket toward the uncanny android, launching herself with a blast from her knuckles. Gauntlets of light encase themselves around her fists as she flies and she drives one straight into the android's chest as she arrives.
"Heh. I think you're leaking. How 'bout you let that woman go? She clearly doesn't want to be treated."
Mercy runs her fingers along the scratch marks "Hey. These aren't your usual thing for a medical facility, right Attentuate? It's like some beast was bein' restrained here and was thrashing around. Not the kind of thing you'd expect for a medical facility focused on helping people with their mental trauma." She scowls "Bad vibes." She awaits any trouble that might have started from Attentuate's attempt to open the north door. Her cracking knuckles are audible in the quiet hallway.
Mercy eyes the push bar, internally debating the merits of causing a big ruckus now or later. Eventually she shrugs and heads back over to the doorway to the computer room "How's it looking in there? They logged Hurondo's patients, huh. So they did end up coming here. Not a particularly professional establishment if they can't even spell anything right." She neglects to mention her own over-reliance on spell checkers. "Does it say what the outcomes were for his patients? You'd think if everything was all good, they'd be back home." As she speaks, she keeps an eye out for any doctors or nurses leaving the other rooms.
Mercy shrugs at the eerily quiet building "Makes sense Reynar." She heads down the corridor to check the door to the outside. If this some elaborate scam, it makes sense that they might've bailed out the back door. She looks in particular for any sign that the door was used recently, such as footprints or objects dropped in haste.
Mercy steps through the doorway into the western hall while keeping the door open "Hellooo-ooo? Anyone here? Receptionists? Doctors? ... Victims?" She looks to see if there's any indication of a door being left ajar or any obvious footprints or other indication of where the two from the lobby would have gone.
Mercy starts by knocking and listening for any response.
Following Attenuate's lead, Mercy activates her armor's environmental protections as well. Though the stories are always clear that the really harmful stuff laughs in the face of ordinary suit barriers. She shrugs to the crowd "This operation's more and more of a mess by the minute. How about we go knock on a few doors and let you all know whether there's any doctors left in the building." She turns to the rest of the party "Want to follow the receptionist and see what's going on?"
Mercy raises one golden eyebrow "Have any visitors even been treated since you all started waiting here? Makes you wonder what's holding them up. Maybe some particularly tricky procedure." She almost ends up putting air quotes around the word tricky. To the party she suggests more quietly "Seems they just got whatever they wanted here done and packed up already. Would explain why they ghosted the Uniters. But we might need to poke around a little to find out where the patients ended up and why they didn't go back to the Respite."
Mercy strides right into the lobby after a skeptical look at the sign and the rather run-down building. She heads to the back of the line and strikes up a conversation with the last person to arrive before the party. "You all got the flyer too? It's not quite what I imagined it'd look like. How long have you lot been waiting? They must be running a real tight ship if they can't even afford a receptionist."
Finally remembering that Jiwalla prepared the group for this eventuality (conveniently), Mercy fishes out the whole credstick and slaps it into Bargai's hand. "Straight from Hurondo's pocket to yours. More or less. Now I'm sure he's going to insist on giving you some more help somewhere or other, while we handle investigating the Open Collective." She smirks "We'll start by jumping through a window and starting to punch any staff we see." She looks to Daria "Sounds like that's all the lead we have, so take us away." Along the way to the Open Collective, Mercy will ask people to see if there are any other worthwhile rumors about the place.
"Right, this Open Collective comes first. What else you got on them?"
Mercy's a stocky sort of woman, so she's very used to people looming over her both in the ring and outside it. "Wow, sucks to be you. And these Uniters are out of a job too, huh?"
Mercy gives an exasperated shake of the head "Really Hurondo? You really punched a bunch of these people for no reason? Wow... how about you pay out of your own pocket rather than begging." With one hand on her hip she stabs the other at Bargai and the other Uniters "Sorry I didn't believe you. I was SURE he'd know better." Looking at the party she says "I think we're done here. He's in no real danger and just needs to make amends. More importantly, it sounds like the missing patients never got tracked all the way down." She eyes Hurondo "I reckon its better we take over from you. What kind of leads were you following?"
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