Thanks to Alex for this session summary.
Ariona Cassyon returns from vacation at the behest of her boss, Rudolph Bernstein. She returns to the lab in the evening of Wednesday, June 7th, 2299. Just as she is about to enter the building, an extremely strange creature appears next to her. She instantly identifies him as Devon Merridith, as she has heard of his research, and his accident, and no one else could possibly be this distinctively deformed. She attempts to keep him out, but he claims that Dr. Bernstein contacted him because he is in grave danger at this moment. They run inside together, and as they enter the lab facility they discover that someone else has arrived first.
A strange young man dressed in grey is curiously studying the various pieces of equipment in Bernstein’s private lab. Just as Ariona demands to know who he is and what he’s doing there, and where Dr. Bernstein is, a distinguished-looking older gentleman appears at the doorway behind them. He introduces himself as Ian Thorpe, and claims to have had an evening meeting with the ever-popular scientist. As the accusations fly and everyone else begins to look around the lab, the unnamed young man begins to answer a few questions.
While cowering behind a desk to get away from the creature, he claims that he had just arrived, that he doesn’t know how he got there, and that the girl took the guy. He describes “the girl” as being around Ariona’s height (5’2”), “Tannish pants, white shirt, denim jacket, had the guy, was carrying him around, ski mask, long black hair.” Helpful as this is, the group turns to other clues to attempt to determine what has happened to Dr. Bernstein.
Thorpe takes a sample of the blood and does something mysterious with it, the strange man in grey drains the rest of the contents of a hypospray, and the creature scans some blood. The young man claims that the hypospray has something like Forterol in it, only it’s way more powerful. He and Ariona also note that it smells faintly like pine. The young man mutters, very quietly, that he thinks he could make more of it, too.
Thorpe starts trying to access the computer system, but the computer seems to have been wiped completely. Ariona takes over and attempts to restore the hard drive, but it will probably take at least three hours to even get to the point where it’s possible to find out if the important data can be restored.
Meanwhile, Thorpe uses his vision of the woman to attempt to find a match in the VR systems. Ariona questions the young man some more, and finally gets the name “Nikolai” out of him. His last name, apparently, is unimportant.
Thorpe internally identifies the woman as Jasmine Devide, of France, age 26. Of course, he declines to share this information with anyone. He asks for a time estimate on the completion of the data retrieval, and is ignored.
Nikolai claims to see something in the doorway, but no one else senses anything odd. Then he says he thinks he knows where the doctor is, and after a bit of argument everyone ends up following him. He doesn’t think he can explain how he knows, though.
The party takes Thorpe’s sedan in the directions Nikolai indicates, and ends up in front of the University Clinic. They walk in, past the information desk, and into the bowels of the clinic. As they walk down the corridor, Nikolai’s Bernstein-sense starts to rise. The woman bursts out of the stairwell, runs around a corner, and is immediately chased by three burly, metallic-sheening men. One of them yells in a deep bass voice, “Stop!”
She doesn’t, of course, and the party moves onto initiative. The woman runs around a corner and out an exit, nearly knocking over a scrawny-looking kid in the process. The cyborgs chase her, as Nikolai floats up and over the staircase outside. The cyborgs fire plasma bolts at the woman, and while two miss, one looks like it ‘‘should’’ have hit her, but instead slides around her. Nikolai and the scrawny kid seem to see a spherical flash around her as it does so.
Thorpe decides to check out the basement instead of following the woman, so we will ignore him for the time being. Merridith runs around the corner and out the door, and leaps over the stair railing. The kid attempts to follow as well, slowly, and Ariona runs to the top of the stairs and halts.
At this point, everyone outside except the scrawny kid notices that a bunch of mist seems to be swirling around itself and coalescing into a personish form. Simultaneously, a piercing scream begins to rise in volume from the direction of the mist. Nikolai perceives this and makes a quick reverse into the building. This return leap is obviously unnatural, as he tops 8 feet on the way back up. He hides behind the wall around the corner from Ariona.
The woman keeps running, as do the guards. The issue is, the guards are running one second, and gone the next. The woman continues to head away. The kid yells, “What’s going on here?!” and continues to hobble towards the threshold where the guards disappeared. He feels like his head got rung inside a gong, and Nikolai sees the “disk” disappear. Merridith chases her as best he can, but is unable to catch up with her. Ariona decides to give up on the apparently futile chase, and suggests that Nikolai come with her to look for the doctor downstairs.
Thorpe, meanwhile, starts investigating all the doors in the basement. He comes to room 101 (in the basement?) and finds the door ajar. Inside, there is another scrawny man strapped to a table. While he does seem to be tall, he is extremely gaunt, to the point of emaciation. He is unconscious, but Thorpe shaking him wakes him up. He begins to scream, and Thorpe tries to get him to quiet down.
The scrawny kid is approached by the strange transparent man, and the latter asks some questions of the former. He seems to be under the impression that his appearance is what caused the disappearance, and later unconscious reappearance, of the cybernetic guards. The scrawny kid seems to think the two are unrelated.
Back in the clinic’s basement, the man strapped to the operating table continues to scream and lashes out mentally, causing all the lights in the hallway to explode. Merridith simply begins to glow, and Ariona and Nikolai appear to be unaffected by the relative darkness. Thorpe attempts to calm the man down, and the man ceases screaming. He moans, “Too bright! Too bright!”
Meanwhile, the transparent man and the sickly man continue to chat about what just happened. The kid didn’t seem to notice anything odd, but the ‘‘extremely’’ odd questions the other guy starts asking kind of tip him off to something weird going on. The transparent man manifests in order to help the younger man inside, and attracts the attention of an orderly inside. The employee claims to have no acquaintance with the cyborgs, and appears to be quite concerned. The transparent man convinces the orderly not to call the police, and then “leaves.” He actually goes invisible and starts exploring.
Downstairs, Ariona and Nikolai enter the room, with Merridith not far behind. Thorpe is poking around, greatly agitating the man on the table. Meanwhile, Nikolai suggests letting the guy out, and Ariona slowly begins to do so. His heart rate is in the “panic” range, so after soothing him for a bit she releases one arm, then the other arm, then a leg. At this point, he leans to the other side and vomits violently. When he is done, Ariona unstraps his other leg. He mumbles about still having limbs, and starts to wander down off the table.
Thorpe starts to leave, just as the transparent guy floats down through the ceiling. This causes some consternation among those who don’t recognize him as a spirit, and really, among those who do as well. Many questions are asked of him, and few are answered. Even his name, he doesn’t know. The only thing he remembers is a vague impression of being called “Boss.”
He asks to know what is happening, and doesn’t get a lot of help. Ariona refuses to call him “Boss,” but offers some ghostly synonyms. He refuses them all. The ghost then decides to ask the test subject what ‘‘his’’ name is, and is rewarded with “Zee.” Zee remembers very little about why he’s here.
Nikolai quietly tells Ariona that he can still sense the woman, but it’s fading. They decide to follow quickly, since Bernstein is not here. Ariona asks Zee to come with them. He agrees that safety in numbers is a good idea, but is very dubious about the creature. The creature corrects Ariona when she introduces him as Devon Merridith, and claims that he is Meechum. “Meechum has always been Meechum.”
Thorpe comes back, and says that all the other rooms are locked. When everyone leaves room 101, it’s not there anymore. Not just the door; when Ghost checks between the two rooms to either side, there’s just a wall in between. No room 101. Everyone feels pretty weirded out by this, and decide to leave quickly.
Ariona, Zee, Nikolai, and Meechum take a taxi, and Ghost goes with Thorpe in Thorpe’s car. The cars follow the woman’s traces, until they reach the arboretum. Cars are not allowed inside, so everyone piles out and begins to head inside. Nikolai cringes, and when Ariona asks why, he claims that last time he was in a park it exploded – er, well, it wasn’t there anymore. Zee stops and has the dry heaves as Nikolai and Ariona pull away, everyone else on their heels.
The session ends here, with the woman inside the park, and the party valiantly attempting to follow her.