Mothership Solo Campaign // Overview & Opening Sessions
#Mothership Solo Campaign
Intro.
Okay, so this is actually just all my notes for the sessions. It's how the sausage is made, sort of!
Solo games, at least for me, were a little confusing at first. The idea, in theory, sounded great. No scheduling! (I have since learned, in reality, it's just less scheduling, and solo sessions still fall victim to last-minute cancellation and burnout. Still easier.) Play whatever I want because I only have to cater to one person's preference! And I know that person pretty well!
But I was a little unclear on how you actually played, in concrete terms. Especially since there's nobody else to bounce ideas off. Just cards, dice, and rules. So I wanted to throw out this out there in "actual play" form, on the off chance it's helpful for someone else.
Everything after #OVERVIEW been formatted for clarity, but is unedited except for a few [editor's notes] to clarify where I left things out, and some headings that got bumped around. There's some inconsistency as a result, where forgot stuff, changed things, and left stuff out, but I wanted to leave that in because 1) it's less effort, and 2) it's how the game works for real!
A little bit about process, below:
Equipment.
- Small, spiral bound notebook.
- Handmade deck of Alfred Valley's Semiotic Standard oracle from Thousand Empty Light.
- Overloaded encounter deck using a heavily-modified version of the Necropraxis Productions Hazard System v0.3 (2017).
- Quarter-size plaintext character sheets.
- Dice!
Methodology.
- I use my phone to reference rules .pdfs when relevant.
- Listening to music helps a ton to create tone and immersion.
- I draw from both oracle decks when entering new areas or anytime I feel stuck.
- Playing without a map key means I don't actually know what's there ahead of time, which creates a sense of discovery.
- I've been writing fiction for years, so third-person narrative + occasional mechanical notes is what works naturally for me.
Obvious (but I think necessary?) disclaimer: The process here is what works for me. I'm not everybody! Take what you like, leave what you don't, find your own way, hope this helps, etc. etc.
The characters, to start:
[I didn't take note of this originally, and should have.]
Kelby Raza (Scientist). Xenoesotericist. Pod-born. Shaved head and BLACKOUT tattoos. Fresh out of training and loaded up with student debt.
Grafftick (Contractor: Scientist).
Without further ado, prep, notes, and logs!
#Overview
Style: Episodic
Frame: Corporate Investigators
“Bump in the Night”
—Working through the UCR [Unconfirmed Contact Reports by Tuesday Knight Games.]
—Employed by BLACKOUT corp.
—Eliminate and exploit anomalous phenomenon (ANPH). Maintain sense of safety. Clean up mysteries. Solve problems. Simple. Clean. See things nobody else should. That kind of thing.
—Later tansferred to Reliquary, ailing megacorp on its last legs and about to go belly-up.
#Hadal Cluster
KB-19. Gas giant. Once a comms hub, now a huge orbital junkyard.
Longshore Gardens. Glittering tax shelter paradise cylinder, ingrown.
Control 30. Cramped relay station.
Roja Citymoon. Near boiling. Pits.
Dolor. Bubbled silos. Austere culture. Yeast vats and acid rain. Infighting.
Wald 39a. Dark xenoforest, toxic. Scattered outposts. Howling wind.
TK-103. Ecological collapse. C-level citadel hoarding food. Ring forts on breadbasket.
#Factions
BLACKOUT
- Uncontrolled disclosure prevention.
- Decentralized contract network
VIPs: BLANKHEAD, handler
LOC: field office on Longshore Gardens
GOAL: gain new client base OOO
The Broken Seal
- Accelerationist new religious movement (NRM)
- Working to carve power with anomalous assets
VIPS: Dr. Morrison (alias), face of the religion
LOC: Monastery on Wald 39a. Temple on Longshore Gardens.
GOAL: Major disclosure of ANPH. OOOOO
Reliquary
- Decaying traditionalist megacorp
- C-levels vying for power as it disintegrates
VIPS:
Valentine, VP of Operations
M.T. Moloch, CEO, on life-support
LOC: HQ on TK-103, in collapse.
GOAL: Prop up operations OOOO
#Session 1 Prep
Lowside Prison Complex on Rosa Citymoon
Survive: Greys, flooding, security
Solve: How did they get in
Save: Prisoners, Warden Karmilla, asst. Walter, prevent breach into city
#OPERATION 1: BLOODFLOW.
Dripping oxide-stained pillars, the long limbs of a comms array, extend beneath the landing pad. Vectored exhausted of the drop ship blowing particulate and mist off the thin scum o industrial runoff on the deck grate.Tail drops. Kelby and co. debark wrapped in raincoats, here to chase ghosts — errant flickers in the LOWSIDE PRISON COMPLEX (LPC) central security system.
That means accessing the admin officers, along the penitentiary’s intestine. The client is a Reliquary subsidiary, in charge of C&R. High picture? Prevent unrest. Little picture? Get paid, crash in a cushy hotel, order lots of sparking alcohol and hot food before next transit.
>WILDLIFE. The LPC has been dealing with an infestation of grease worms in interstitial structures.
>ALIEN FORMS. Prisoners here trade time in bioaugmentation labs for sentence commutation, warped into new and exquisite shapes.
>DEBRIS. Kelby hooked up with Grafftick (scientist partner) last night. Unremarkable liaison, bored and drunk, trying to get over new job nerves. Fresh out of a sponsored doctoral program. Now working off the student workdebt.
>The job pays 2kcr after remediation.
>OMEN
>ALIEN FORMS. Prisoners here trade time in bioaugmentation labs for sentence commutation, warped into new and exquisite shapes.
>DEBRIS. Kelby hooked up with Grafftick (scientist partner) last night. Unremarkable liaison, bored and drunk, trying to get over new job nerves. Fresh out of a sponsored doctoral program. Now working off the student workdebt.
>The job pays 2kcr after remediation.
>OMEN
Security guard that meets them looks jittery. Checks the dark gape of the main hatch.
“This way.”
In PROCESSING narrow corridors drenched in decontamination foam instantly. The stink of bodies. Dry, condition air. Lines of yellow-suited prisoners, shuffling between burly guards.
>DISASTER + COMPRESSION
Sirens blare. Gates and fences slide down from pockets as the prison goes into rapid lockdown. Sudden commotion between prisoners and guards.
>PANIC 17 (pass)
>+1 Stress
>+1 Stress
There is shouting, a few shots. Teller finds a path to the checkpoint. Guard presses a gun into his chest. Kelby uses the PCTerminal to get contact/clearance from the Warden. Heart pounding.
The scrap and shove of boots and chains as prisoners are forced back toward the cell block. Voice scrapes over the PA.
“Remain calm. Facility now in lockdown. Remain calm. Estimated lift 9hrs 37 minutes. Report all suspicious activity. Remember! Good behavior gets you Perks!”
They pick up a two-man escort and push to the emptying mess hall. Vomit-slick corridor.
>REST + CRYO
The mess becomes dead silent. Trays and food abandoned, staff sealed behind security panels.
>OMEN + RADIATION
They move through another corridor towards the showers.
“The fuck is going on?”
“Let’s just hope it’s an enforcement issue.”
Grafftick’s geiger counter begins to tick. He notes it idly. The prison complex creaks uneasily overhead, dribbles of rusty water coming down the walls.
The shower is slimy with residue. Soap? Or something else? Kelby knees. Something else. It’s like plasma or mucus. Stretches between her fingers like egg white. Smells sharp.
“We’ll need to clean this.”
“What is it?”
“Gunk. Mucosal. A lot of it though.”
And bones. A skeleton laid out like a whale on the sea floor. Totally clean and steaming.
“Sample that.”
Kelby takes the jawbone, steps over the ribcage.
“Let’s not stick around.
Click, click click click click.
“The fuck is going on?”
“Let’s just hope it’s an enforcement issue.”
Grafftick’s geiger counter begins to tick. He notes it idly. The prison complex creaks uneasily overhead, dribbles of rusty water coming down the walls.
The shower is slimy with residue. Soap? Or something else? Kelby knees. Something else. It’s like plasma or mucus. Stretches between her fingers like egg white. Smells sharp.
“We’ll need to clean this.”
“What is it?”
“Gunk. Mucosal. A lot of it though.”
And bones. A skeleton laid out like a whale on the sea floor. Totally clean and steaming.
“Sample that.”
Kelby takes the jawbone, steps over the ribcage.
“Let’s not stick around.
Click, click click click click.
[There's some movement here I didn't take note of. They move from the Shower to the Garden.]
The lights go. The PA system begins to stutter, then speak in strange language. A flow of clicks and choked exhalation.
Kelby clicks on her flashlight, swathes of garden plants dangle from the vaulted ceiling. The room arranged in a cross. The foliage pushed to permanent ripeness by genetic modification and a steady supply of fertilizer. Fruit rots on the floor grates. Unkempt. At the center — a guard post. Light cuts through to Kelby.
“Stop!”
They stop.
“Identify!”
“Independent contractors! Official business!”
Fritz and Aranoff (the guards) hold up badges.
“Where you going?”
“Admin.”
“The fuck is going on?”
“Auto quarantine. Some unknown substance.”
“Don’t know more yet.”
Kelby. “This happen often?”
“All the fucking time. System’s jumpy. Everything’s chemo-logged, cross-checked, whatever to screen for drugs.”
“There’s a body in the shower.”
“Bones.”
“I’m logging the jawbone.” Kelby says. “Standard procedure.”
“That’s our crime scene.”
“Not tonight. You’re gonna want to see as little as possible.”
The guard moves for a radio. No connection. Just gulping chatter.
“We need to go to admin.”
“They’re cleared.” Fritz, the escort.
“Go, if you can get in.”
“I just need a computer with footage access. We’re here to review an incident. Standard inspection. Prevent unnecessary disclosure, that kind of thing.”
Breathing hard now.
“I can’t let you. No outside access.”
“Hey, look, we’re here on contract. We’re supposed to have access.”
“Talk to admin, but I can’t let you.”
“Alright."
The door to admin is locked but cracked.
The radiation climbs. Through the crack, in Kelby’s flashlight, curled hands, wide eyes, a mouth gaping open and shut, open and shut. Song of static in her ears.
“Get this open.”
Fritz and Aranoff push. It’s still a squeeze. The air is damp.
>DISASTER + COMPUTER TERMINAL
The lights go. The PA system begins to stutter, then speak in strange language. A flow of clicks and choked exhalation.
>FEAR SAVE 04 (PASS)
Kelby clicks on her flashlight, swathes of garden plants dangle from the vaulted ceiling. The room arranged in a cross. The foliage pushed to permanent ripeness by genetic modification and a steady supply of fertilizer. Fruit rots on the floor grates. Unkempt. At the center — a guard post. Light cuts through to Kelby.
“Stop!”
They stop.
“Identify!”
“Independent contractors! Official business!”
Fritz and Aranoff (the guards) hold up badges.
“Where you going?”
“Admin.”
“The fuck is going on?”
“Auto quarantine. Some unknown substance.”
“Don’t know more yet.”
Kelby. “This happen often?”
“All the fucking time. System’s jumpy. Everything’s chemo-logged, cross-checked, whatever to screen for drugs.”
“There’s a body in the shower.”
“Bones.”
“I’m logging the jawbone.” Kelby says. “Standard procedure.”
“That’s our crime scene.”
“Not tonight. You’re gonna want to see as little as possible.”
The guard moves for a radio. No connection. Just gulping chatter.
“We need to go to admin.”
“They’re cleared.” Fritz, the escort.
“Go, if you can get in.”
“I just need a computer with footage access. We’re here to review an incident. Standard inspection. Prevent unnecessary disclosure, that kind of thing.”
Breathing hard now.
“I can’t let you. No outside access.”
“Hey, look, we’re here on contract. We’re supposed to have access.”
“Talk to admin, but I can’t let you.”
“Alright."
>YES BUT
[Again, movement I didn't note. They move from the Garden to Admin.]
The door to admin is locked but cracked.
The radiation climbs. Through the crack, in Kelby’s flashlight, curled hands, wide eyes, a mouth gaping open and shut, open and shut. Song of static in her ears.
>FEAR SAVE 27 (FAIL +1 STRESS)
“Get this open.”
Fritz and Aranoff push. It’s still a squeeze. The air is damp.
> REST + BIOLOGICAL HAZARD
Single administrator spread on the floor, palms up, mouthing for help. Help.
Puttylike holes in the forearm. Sleeves torn up. Service androids slumped at desks, pseudo flesh melting off in small rivers.
Kelby puts a finger to her lips. The administrator chokes and sobs. Still sightless and unresponsive.
Grafftick gloves up. No pupil response. Elevated HR and RR. High muscle tension. Seems shock-y.
“The Warden’s not here.”
“Quiet.”
>Does the computer system work?
>YES. HAZMAT SUIT. It’s in an emergency lockdown, and something else is in there.
>YES. HAZMAT SUIT. It’s in an emergency lockdown, and something else is in there.
Kelby hooks up but fails (85>50 INT) finds the footage immediately. Floods the screen. Then every screen, crinkling pixels; lanky distended figures stripping a body in the shower. Popping in and out of presence. A struggle. Limbs in the garden. Reach into the eye sockets. Bright flashes in the admin office and the terminal clicks. The system sends an offside backup, then terminates, but strangely, patterns appearing in the black screen like heat maps, etched currents. Deep eyes. Kelby steps back from the terminal, and then clubs it repeatedly with her stun baton. Turns up the output and burns the circuits.
“Something got in.” She turns to the escort. “When this is over, you’ll be offered a very tight NDA or a ticket to somewhere very far away.”
“We needed that data.” Grafftick.
“Not with whatever else is on here. Can we get in touch with offside control?”
“Maybe. But its unauthorized, and if the system’s down, maybe not at all. Channels are really limited.”
“Would the warden have access?”
“Yeah.”
“But they’re normally here.”
Screams from somewhere in the facility.
> HAZARD + FLOODING
Partway down the stairway, a waterfall, bubbling and metallic, rushing down the steps.
“We’re losing this thing.”
“Relax, Graf. Ready for a swim?”
“No?”
Kelby ducks under. Cold.
Another 30ft and there’s a doorway, totally sunken.
“Think there’s a pocket?”
“No.”
“It’s coming up.”
“Yeah. Something must have burst. Incursion through the pipes?”
“We need to go back. It’s gonna get away from us if we don’t lock down soon.”
“Look, the facility sealed, we’ve got time.”
“Sealed like that?” Gloved gesture at the waterfall.
> ENCOUNTER
Something scuttles at the top of the stairs. Sounds of dragging, choking, earsplitting crack and ozone smell, rendered human ooze leaks down the stairs. A gurgling scream is cut off.
>3 Greys
>FEAR SAVE 15 (FAIL + 1 STRESS)
>FEAR SAVE 15 (FAIL + 1 STRESS)
Kelby dives through the doorway.
>Is there a pocket?
>NO BUT. BREACH. (Surprise!)
>NO BUT. BREACH. (Surprise!)
No air pocket, and instead a current, dragging down into the disposal complex through a chute mouth.
>BODY SAVE vs 2d10 DMG 75 (FAIL)
>8 DMG + PANIC 2 (FAIL, Nervous +1 STRESS)
>8 DMG + PANIC 2 (FAIL, Nervous +1 STRESS)
Kelby surfaces, scraped and bruised in a filthy, grinding channel. Catches hold of an access ladder in the flood. Holds in vomit. Teller surfaces shortly after, spluttering. Spits. Wipes grime from his eyes. They cling on the side of the channel. The cascade continues to thunder into the massive waste basin. A scum of plastic trash floats at the surface.
“Where’s Grafftick?”
“Don’t know!”
“Fuck!”
>TREASURE + INFRARED (Obscurity)
“Do you think they’ll find us?”
“They would be fucking stupid to try.”
Kelby heaves, trying to laugh.
“How the fuck do we get out of here? This place is sealed, and if the system failed who knows how long it’s going to take. Or if it’ll open back up at all. Blankbox protocols and stuff.”
“I’m NOT dying down here.”
“You hope.”
“We need tools.”
#SESSION BREAK
[This Operation was I think three, maybe four sessions. This was the only break I took note of.]
They climb out of the channel onto a fetid embankment. Heavy crablike disposal units shove piled garbage into sputtering half-drowned incinerators. The smell of rot, brine, and shit is nearly overwhelming.
Kelby heaves again, doubling over, spits up water, gritty against her teeth. They don’t belong down here.
She searches for something — anything — useful. Finds a bent crowbar and a couple chemlights. Pulls a soiled prison jumpsuit over her tattered blackout casuals, for insulation.
“Onward and upward.”
Takes a deep breath against the possibility of dying in here.
They move into an access tunnel, shin-flooded catwalk sloping into the prison’s restricted sewer. Rising smell of filth. Walls slick with reddened slurry. A huge overflowing down-pipe, meshed over with razor-grate.
Squirm of a huge GASWORM on the rim, disgorging eggs from polyps on its sides, feathering ring of filiments near its mouthparts, swivel and flicker.
Kelby stops at the access passage mouth, flattens against the wall.
On the far side, an access lift into ISOLATION — spidery scaffold.
The gate barred with an access lock. Water pours from the disposal channel. Sewage ports in the ceiling are clammed up with the lockdown. Green bio-lights glow up there.
Kelby hurls one of the chemlights into the sewer, flashing past the undulating flank of the gasworm. It’s caught in an upswell for a moment, then sucked into the pipe.
Kelby checks her shoelaces, grits her teeth, makes a run for the lift.
Halfway there, she slips. The worm jerks its head in her direction.
She comes down hard on the embankment and one leg dunks into the overflowing pipe mouth. Teller scrambles along the bank, grabs Kelby.
Hauls her over his shoulders and runs for the lift, while the worm begins to surge towards them.
Kelby jams the crowbar into the elevator gate and wrenches it open. She and teller pile inside as the worm presses against the gate, mouth chattering. It begins to vent fumigating gas.
Kelby chokes, lungs and throat burning. Teller’s eyes and mouth foam. As the elevator clatters up, he slumps against the wall.
“Hey, no no no. Shit. Hang on there. Fuck. Fuck.”
It’s a long ride up.
Kelby reluctantly strips off Teller’s vest and takes the folding-stock SMG from his shoulder harness. His fingers continue to twitch.
Ding.
Kelby drags the body into the cramped hall. Dark as shit. Fumbles with the still-warm limbs. Dead weight.
Here in isolation, prisoners scream for light and food. Someone half-sobs in a strange language. Water sloshes ankle deep. Kelby falls to her knees beside Teller’s limp frame. Spits up foul-tasting saliva.
Eyes burning. She tries to wipe some of the slurry out of her face, but her hands are equally foul. Cracks the second chemlight, stands.
“Hey, get us out! You can’t let us die down here! It’s gonna come up! Don’t let them do this!”
“I can’t! I don’t have access”
“Please! Get us out!”
“Shut up! Shut up and die!”
Kelby stumbles forward. The exit from isolation is sealed off.
Something moves behind the safety glass beside the reinforced door. Fingers extend beside the frame, tapping, tapping.
Kelby wrenches back. Many joints. Knobbed knuckles, suckered pads. The door glows briefly incandescent and then bursts as Kelby bolts.
The thing steps through the steam.
They climb out of the channel onto a fetid embankment. Heavy crablike disposal units shove piled garbage into sputtering half-drowned incinerators. The smell of rot, brine, and shit is nearly overwhelming.
>BODY SAVE 47 (FAIL +1 STRESS)
Kelby heaves again, doubling over, spits up water, gritty against her teeth. They don’t belong down here.
She searches for something — anything — useful. Finds a bent crowbar and a couple chemlights. Pulls a soiled prison jumpsuit over her tattered blackout casuals, for insulation.
“Onward and upward.”
Takes a deep breath against the possibility of dying in here.
>PANIC CHECK 16 PASS!
>ENCOUNTER + GAS STORAGE
>ENCOUNTER + GAS STORAGE
They move into an access tunnel, shin-flooded catwalk sloping into the prison’s restricted sewer. Rising smell of filth. Walls slick with reddened slurry. A huge overflowing down-pipe, meshed over with razor-grate.
Squirm of a huge GASWORM on the rim, disgorging eggs from polyps on its sides, feathering ring of filiments near its mouthparts, swivel and flicker.
Kelby stops at the access passage mouth, flattens against the wall.
On the far side, an access lift into ISOLATION — spidery scaffold.
The gate barred with an access lock. Water pours from the disposal channel. Sewage ports in the ceiling are clammed up with the lockdown. Green bio-lights glow up there.
Kelby hurls one of the chemlights into the sewer, flashing past the undulating flank of the gasworm. It’s caught in an upswell for a moment, then sucked into the pipe.
>GASWORM C:20 3D10 BITE. I:20 W: 1(40) Special: Explosive
Kelby checks her shoelaces, grits her teeth, makes a run for the lift.
>SPEED 82 (FAIL +1 STRESS)
Halfway there, she slips. The worm jerks its head in her direction.
She comes down hard on the embankment and one leg dunks into the overflowing pipe mouth. Teller scrambles along the bank, grabs Kelby.
>STRENGTH 22 CRIT SUCCESS!
Hauls her over his shoulders and runs for the lift, while the worm begins to surge towards them.
>STRENGTH 26 SUCCESS!
Kelby jams the crowbar into the elevator gate and wrenches it open. She and teller pile inside as the worm presses against the gate, mouth chattering. It begins to vent fumigating gas.
>BODY 63 FAIL (1D5 = 4 DMG)
>BODY 67 FAIL 1 WOUND
>BODY 67 FAIL 1 WOUND
Kelby chokes, lungs and throat burning. Teller’s eyes and mouth foam. As the elevator clatters up, he slumps against the wall.
“Hey, no no no. Shit. Hang on there. Fuck. Fuck.”
It’s a long ride up.
Kelby reluctantly strips off Teller’s vest and takes the folding-stock SMG from his shoulder harness. His fingers continue to twitch.
Ding.
Kelby drags the body into the cramped hall. Dark as shit. Fumbles with the still-warm limbs. Dead weight.
Here in isolation, prisoners scream for light and food. Someone half-sobs in a strange language. Water sloshes ankle deep. Kelby falls to her knees beside Teller’s limp frame. Spits up foul-tasting saliva.
>PANIC 9 FAIL! Deflated.
Eyes burning. She tries to wipe some of the slurry out of her face, but her hands are equally foul. Cracks the second chemlight, stands.
“Hey, get us out! You can’t let us die down here! It’s gonna come up! Don’t let them do this!”
“I can’t! I don’t have access”
“Please! Get us out!”
“Shut up! Shut up and die!”
(Mem. Grafftick lost, and footage sent offsite.)
Kelby stumbles forward. The exit from isolation is sealed off.
>Guards still there? NO BUT
Something moves behind the safety glass beside the reinforced door. Fingers extend beside the frame, tapping, tapping.
Kelby wrenches back. Many joints. Knobbed knuckles, suckered pads. The door glows briefly incandescent and then bursts as Kelby bolts.
The thing steps through the steam.
>SPEED 99 CRIT FAIL +1 STRESS
>PANIC 10 FAIL
>PANIC 10 FAIL
Kelby trips, exhausted and uncoordinated. And the last she remembers is fingers reaching for? Through? Into? her head. Then a great burning emptiness, a haloed monolith above a dying star, a wreath of systems, chained and tense, the chattering grind of static beneath it all, limbs fuzzy, memories running in ecstatic detail, being read — taken.
XENOESOTERICISM: A meeting of minds. Something grasping through neurons, fact-gathering — feels a great unquenchable malevolence out in the distance of this psychic shock, as if across an ocean; it has found her — mere data-point — to know her and through her every fact, every touch, mapping deeper even than Kelby’s daily consciousness.
And the ocean closes overhead. It is a long slow sink to the bottom. Years. A thousand miles of creaking, chattering void.
Kelby awakes, six years older, in a medpod, packed with tubes, and hooked to several drip feeds. Fragile. But awake.
XENOESOTERICISM: A meeting of minds. Something grasping through neurons, fact-gathering — feels a great unquenchable malevolence out in the distance of this psychic shock, as if across an ocean; it has found her — mere data-point — to know her and through her every fact, every touch, mapping deeper even than Kelby’s daily consciousness.
And the ocean closes overhead. It is a long slow sink to the bottom. Years. A thousand miles of creaking, chattering void.
>4 STRESS
Kelby awakes, six years older, in a medpod, packed with tubes, and hooked to several drip feeds. Fragile. But awake.
#Session 2 Prep
Kelby wakes in a small outpost on Dolor. Saddled with a pile of medical debt to Reliquary, whose facility she was shipped to for rehab.
They’re losing control of the colony there, and junior execs vie for power as the CEOs life ebbs away, blood drained and refreshed hourly.
#NPCs
Rattenbery. Rarefied and fading. Current Head of Development.
Alek. Quartermaster. Slick and bossy. Smokes.
Vich. Security Chief. Metal faceplate. No nonsense.
Alvaro. Shift Lead. Angling for safer conditions — or escape.
Aesch. Medical Assistant Android
They’re losing control of the colony there, and junior execs vie for power as the CEOs life ebbs away, blood drained and refreshed hourly.
#NPCs
Rattenbery. Rarefied and fading. Current Head of Development.
Alek. Quartermaster. Slick and bossy. Smokes.
Vich. Security Chief. Metal faceplate. No nonsense.
Alvaro. Shift Lead. Angling for safer conditions — or escape.
Aesch. Medical Assistant Android
Survive: Sea of silence, infighting, flooding
Solve: How did the sea get here?
Save: Alvaro, other work crews, prevent spread
JOB: Recover samples from the shore; analyze and assess.
Dropship evac 6hrs out. Subject to administrator authorization.
Outpost Population 36
LRRV-996 “St. Sebastian” in orbit. (Exploration Vessel)
#OPERATION 2: WAKE UP CALL.
Solve: How did the sea get here?
Save: Alvaro, other work crews, prevent spread
JOB: Recover samples from the shore; analyze and assess.
Dropship evac 6hrs out. Subject to administrator authorization.
Outpost Population 36
LRRV-996 “St. Sebastian” in orbit. (Exploration Vessel)
RIPTIDE PREDATOR C:65 Hypodermic Fangs 2D10 DMG. I:70 W:3(20) Special: Body save or grabbed. Sightless. Goes by feel.
SECURITY OFFICER: C:30 SMG 2D10 DMG or Baton 1D5 DMG. I:15 W:2(15)
WORKERS C:15 Assorted Tools 1D5 DMG) I:20 W:2
SECURITY OFFICER: C:30 SMG 2D10 DMG or Baton 1D5 DMG. I:15 W:2(15)
WORKERS C:15 Assorted Tools 1D5 DMG) I:20 W:2
#OPERATION 2: WAKE UP CALL.
#Session 1
Lights up on a wretched spit of land against the expanse of a milky alkaline ocean — hushed against the beach.
Kelby Raza and Jack Oshea hit something with the shovel. A pod. Inscrutable and heavy, thickly barnacles. 6km from Desolation Bravo, the slow breath of its inflated habitat. They keep one eye on the Sea at all times.
Lights up on a wretched spit of land against the expanse of a milky alkaline ocean — hushed against the beach.
>TREASURE + DEBRIS
Kelby Raza and Jack Oshea hit something with the shovel. A pod. Inscrutable and heavy, thickly barnacles. 6km from Desolation Bravo, the slow breath of its inflated habitat. They keep one eye on the Sea at all times.
[Jack's another scientist -- a planetologist -- and a full character this time, rolled up to give Kelby some backup and someone to talk to.]
This pod is something new. Looks almost organic. Reminds Jack of a coconut — reminds Kelby of colony seeds, of the emperor’s eggs, of a power source. Or one of the food pellets for her parent’s cat. Had her parents ever had a cat? She tries to remember and neurology slips, contracting with the memory of the touch — wracked with visions: FALLING INTO HUGE PUPILS as they swell under her.
>SAN or PANIC 51 > 50 (Ouch. Fail.)
>Panic. Loss of Confidence: Art.
>Panic. Loss of Confidence: Art.
On the beach, she nearly collapses, head swimming against the vicious clarity of the pseudo memory. What was there to do against such vastness?
“Hey. You good?”
“Little sick. Still adjusting to atmo.”
Not a complete lie. Dolor’s atmosphere is breathable, but barely. Jack offers mild painkillers out of the first aid kit.
“Keep me in the loop.”
“Mhm. This thing’s weird.”
“Yeah. Whatdya make of it?”
“Doesn’t belong here. Not really.”
“Join the club.” Jack coughs.
“Seems inert, or very slow.”
They get it unburied fully. About 1m long, surface prickled with small holes. The color of seashell — or bone.
“Listen.”
It hisses. Jack backs off. “In or out?”
“Can’t tell.” Kelby holds her hand to it.
“Maybe don’t get too close.”
‘
Kelby shrugs. “Already exposed. Live a little.”
Her body aches. She was so weak when she first got out of the pod. It’s getting better, but slowly.
“Let’s get this back to the lab, huh?”
***
Long slow process of hauling, clearing, checking for known contagions, cataloging, loading. Finally it’s loaded on an exam table. Kelby and Jack, scrubbed up, examine the surface with multi-spectrum optics, scrape it for chem analysis, and so on.
>OMEN + INTERCOM
PLANETOLOGY (Jack): Not a local formation.
CHEMISTRY (Kelby): Calcified primarily, formed in layers. Very, very old.
She isn’t sure, but she thinks it makes her nauseous to be near. Notes it, says nothing. She nauseous so often. The lab ceiling ripples in the night wind.
XENOESOTERICISM (Kelby): Like a message in a bottle. A stone from David’s sling. There are stony seed-forms like this one documented all through the literature but the purpose remains unknown. May be as much as a world seed or a navigational beacon or as little as a coprolite or a concretion. Academics are divided. Unsurprising.
Kelby dreams there’s something inside, but they took X-rays. Hard to image deeply, the holes burrow and wind inward. She imagines the slosh of fluid.
The tide has come up and hangs around the padded stilts of the outpost. Wind screams around the communications array. LRRV-996 St. Sebastian sleeps in orbit, stationed for the months-long outpost operation. It travelled widely once, but has been pulled back to shore up gaining Reliquary operations in the region.
Kelby and Jack compile initial findings, then hit the racks. The low green glow of off-hour lulls Jack right to sleep. But Kelby is restless.
>REST + HAZMAT
She returns to the lab, alone. Sits contemplating the pod they found. The report plays in her head on loop. Considers drilling in. Resists. The pod may not have much value outside of being an odd collectible, able to be traded up the Great Ladder for reassignment, if it catches the right imagination.
Kelby is nauseous again — caught thinking about the miserable, carnivorous trading games being played higher in the Org. Chart. Misses her work at BLACKOUT, almost. Transferred off to reliquary and kept alive ONLY because of her value as an “asset.”
Podborn. Made to work, but still very human. Enjoyed her time in training — amid the usual academic drudgery. Student debt, now medical debt.
If the pod on the cold surface of the lab table is a communicator of some kind, Kelby wishes it would talk.
> REST SAVE 00 (!!) Stress 15 —> 5.
Kelby breathes, her mind uncoiling. For the first time in years, finds her way back to her body. Settles. A vent fan whirs and clatters. The wind continues its steady mourning. The Outpost is slow, lonely, smells sharp and chemical, but Kelby is — for the moment — alive.
She returns to her rack, calmer, and sleeps without nightmares.
***
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