GM: Stras Acimovic
Players: Jory Bowers, Andi Carrison, and Sean Nittner
System: Scum & Villainy
After fleeing House Malclaith, the station officials, the Ashen Knives, and some other unknown faction with our cargo under guise of cloaking device, the Stardancer crew was happy to dock at the oasis to recoup, recover, and get our bearings (not to mention another job). We also learned the name of our new friend, Kor, the personal bodyguard of Ritam al’Malklaith, and a consummate bad ass.
Payoff
Cred: Donut – Nada – Nothin’ but an ole box.
Heat: 2 (in the Rin System)
Entanglements: Ship Trouble (Engines strained, -1)
Faction Changes: Ashen Knives -1, Cult of the Seekers +1 (folks who sent us to do the job)
Upkeep: Not paid, but nothing went wrong (Fortune Roll. Result: 1-3. Phew!)
Not sleeping well
The scene opened with Faye’s nightmare. Running down the halls of the Stardancer, pursued by the relentless Kor, cutting through any barriers she put in his path. Faye’s nightmare ended as she hid in a cramped bathroom and looked into the mirror. There she saw a red sigil forming on her forehead. She reached for it and then woke, falling out of the pilots chair she had fallen asleep in. Woken by the proximity alarms indicating that we were coming out of Hyperwave.
We transitioned out of Hyperspace back into real time through the giant Hyperspace ring and then fired our ships thrustsers to dock at Oasis 64.
On the comms, Lauren called over, announcing that dinner was ready!
Downtime
We landed on Oasis 64 but before docking, Lauren had a surprise for us. Wearing an apron, he presented an array of glistening roasted meats, sauteed vegetables, and other provincial delights. Faye enjoyed the food…avidly. Lauren helped her with a bit of etiquette. That napkin was by her plate for a reason. Bhaz practiced defensive eating. She first secured her food (she did grow with seven siblings) and then ate it slowly.
After the meal we discussed plans for docking. We’d pay for the ship to get fixed up… or not. “We just ate our ship repair? Is that right Lauren? What are you doing?” “I just thought we could all have a nice meal together…” and the fight between Lauren and Bhaz broke out! [Indulge vice: Home cooking. Bhaz overindulged and started a fight. +1 Stress for all of us]. She threw a platter of food and Lauren and stomped off.
Once on the station we saw it was a buzz with activity. Vendors hawking wares, shrines to the Church of the Stellar Flame surrounded by people with dockers loading ships into bays, and holo H&N News blasting through the air:
- The Vorron ambassador has entered the Rin system and house Malklaith hopes to open negotiations with them soon. There was image of them shaking hands with Ritam al’Malklaith:
- Strikes continue with the Cobalt syndicate.
- A guild shipment was hit by pirates and the Legion is positioning their battleships to address the issue.
- It is fire season in Iota… recommend that you don’t fly between the stars.
- The Holt gate appears to be unstable. Deliveries may delayed by several hours.
Faye set off to check her messages…and find out if she could get us a paying job. Firing finger guns the whole way.
Lauren was keenly aware of the Vorron ambassador’s visit but decided she’d first reach out to contacts who might be able to tell her more about the box! She didn’t have an mystic friends, but he did know Church of the Stellar Flame people that might help…her old friend the ex-heretic Theron, the right hand to Elana (also an ex-heretic who converted, and the current leader of the Church in the sector). An old friend, a good one at that! [Acquire asset. Result: Crew Quality +1. One Space Church Mystic]. Theron, blessed in the light, offered to look at the pre-cursor artifact for his old friend… and some atrocious fish eggs as well.
Lauren then went to the “showers” and found some space sex workers and used his charm and good looks (and some luxury items!) in place of cred. [Indulge Vice]. They rented a hourly motel coffin pod…but it had a mattress!
Bhaz checked her comms and found there were a couple of messages. One from Aya that said “Call me.” We flashed back to a younger Bhaz learning martial forms from Aya, and being smitten with her along the way. While Bhaz was admiring her, that’s when Aya would flip her on the ground beat her in another match. The others were photos from the family posing in front of a new engine. She spent some pocket change to print these out so they could be pinned up later! She enjoyed the family pictures for a good long while… thought about Aya for a while and decided to close her session and go back to the Stardancer to practice some of those martial forms [Train: Prowess]
Down an dark rusted chrome ally a courier whispered a password through a door and then was admitted into a smoke den, where they dropped off a message that changed hands several times until it came to Faye, who was busy cheating at cards with her friend Jax, the ship mechanic. [Acquire Asset. Result: Crew Quality]. He comes out sooner than she would have expected and said the damage wasn’t as bad as he thought it might by [Fortune roll made by Stras to have him actually repair the ship]
On her cracked and way outdated data pad, Faye pulled up the job and found it. We flashed to Faye speaking on the comms with Citani to ask for the job. But first… Citani wanted to know what we should tell the person who gave us our last job (to deliver the box) and Faye asked her to lie. “Tell them you haven’t been able to get a hold of us… now tell me about this new job!” A client who needs an extraction from the ice planet Lithios!
Faye then went drinking with Jax…her drink of choice being a Startini. She spend the night socializing [Train: Resolve].
Bhaz reached out to Aya (who picked up instantly!) to find out just how bad things were with her. Aya was peeved about being put in a lurch, but she did say she though that Bhaz’ new crew looked good on her. Aya told her that this only a missed opportunity, not a responsibility, but still, she was in trouble for failing. “Do you even know what you are carrying? Some big players moved really fast and really hard to get that thing.” And nobody was really sure exactly what it was. Our pictures were posted in the star port, which means the Janus syndicate saw them…who are probably now looking for us as well. [Gather information]
Bhaz then practiced moving through the crowd of people and attuning to the energy of the people around her [Train: Resolve].
We got a job…or lets go to Space Church
Let’s go to Lithios and pull someone off planet. Easy money.
Or, we could go talk to Lauren’s friend and find out more about the box… let’s go find out more about the box. To Space Church we go!
And thus we found out that Faye’s father was a preacher who said something that was out of line with Church doctrine and disappeared for a week because of it. When he came back, he would never talk about it but he changed his sermons.
Bhaz knew that the Ashen Knives use artifacts to get an advantage on their jobs and when one of them used an artifact that was causing major disruption, Battlesister Diana (all clad in her exoskeletal armor) came after them to seize the artifact with violent effect.
But that wasn’t going to stop us. We set off…
…and just as we did a Malklaith ship arrived. Three people stepped out and began asking questions about our ship. When the dock master was reluctant to be forthcoming with ship records, he suddenly was unable to move, as blood began running from his nose. The system cop that was with Kor, walked over to the panel and said “Drat, I think we just missed them.”
When dropped out of Hyperwave, we arrived incredibly close to the star (we were all blinded in the cockpit) and then docked on the giant battle cruiser that was parked there, The Way of Light. In his chambers was say Laren meditating covered in a pure ray of light. His star medallion of the Church now visibly hanging around his neck.
When we docked we were met by Theron, who of course was branded by the “kiss of light”, and he warmly greeted all of us. He offered us food and time to lounge, but Faye, who was super uncomfortable, pushed them to get the point… and tell us what this artifact was! (Faye making no friends here).
In Theron’s chamber he performed ablutions before attuning to the star and then focusing his energy on the box we began to see the star map appear on the box and the light of a star in his eyes. While he attuned to it, Faye approached the box and studied it herself, becoming fascinated with the cube [Risky Study. Devils Bargain: Obsessed with the cube: The Voice of the Box 2/6. Full Success]. What they both discovered (though Faye discovered it better, hah!) was that it’s a star map…and what Faye realized is that it’s a treasure map!
While this was going on Bhaz was studying him. [Attune. Bad outcome]. Bhaz realized that he was not attuning to the way but to the light within the star. She couldn’t learn more though, because it was so alien to her.
Fancy Theron brought over his fancy safe to put the box in…I guess our lunchbox wasn’t good enough. 😛
Lauren thanked Theron profusely and they got all chummy again as we walked to our dock, Bhaz carrying the safe because it was heavy.
On her way out Theron tried to give Faye a word of warning “Stay away of temptation.” Faye tried to convince Theron that he had completely cowed her into fearing the faith, which he believed but also thought he should keep an eye on her lest she slip in the future [Risky Sway. Partial Success]
As we parted Lauren passed off a small gift to Theron. As we took off and he opened the box, it was red velvet coated and included a handmade cupcake inside [Luxury item!]
Stardancer on Air
What Rocked
Lauren taking our one cred and spending it on food without asking anyone! So good.
Bhaz’s family. Oh my goodness, so adorable. Also, her pining for Aya…. loved it so much.
“Faye flounders in such a exquisite and sparkly way, it’s fantastic.” – Kind words from Andi
Our complicated relationships with people are so good. I just love that we all have such strong feelings about our contacts, friends and the factions we’re connected with. Space jail!
“He’s with the Church!” … “And that’s supposed to make me feel better?” I love that Lauren and Faye are so at odds about the Church of the Stellar Flame.
Bhaz thanking the ur-bot who cleaned up after us. So good.
Our little metal lunchbox for the treasure map cube!
So fun being so jealous in the most petty ways.
I love this crew!
What could have improved
I totally didn’t catch that Stras said that Lithios had a Yaru installation on it. So Faye’s reaction to the job wasn’t quite what I would have liked, but hey, I pass it off as Faye wasn’t paying enough attention either!
