Wednesday15

[[Wed 15]:

Jason will not be present for this session. Figure out how to handle this – Write out the character? Kill him? Have the bounty hunters abduct him?

Celestia

When Noun opens the celestial door, he encounters Abaddon coming up the stairs. After that, should he ascend to the top, he feels his body being deconstructed, and his soul being torn away. It is excruciating. Hopefully he screams. (If not, then he loses his divine essence, and is Russell Miner while in Celestia – he remembers the time as Noun, but it is beyond his comprehension and makes no sense. Should he leave again, the divine essence returns to him, and he is Noun again, remembering nothing of his time in Celestia.) If so, then he finds himself in Celestia and realizes that none of it is real. But before his eyes, the words he shouted twist and morph, spreading outward from his body, infusing life into everything they touch, until the place has become real after all.

The celestials there are all stunned and shocked as they are overcome by the wave. After the transformation is complete, Celestia occupies a newly created plane, the celestial plane. Unfortunately, the celestials have been severed from the Caretaker. From their perspective, they have lost their connection to God, no longer feeling his presence. One of them asks him brokenly, "Who are you? What have you done?" Another replies, "The Lord has abandoned us, because of him!" They begin casting stones, and bid him to leave this place at once.

There are some interesting ramifications. First, the celestials are now no longer restricted from leaving Celestia. They can all travel down the staircase (which still works). Secondly, their memories can now never be synced with Malcolm’s. So if Malcolm encounters the "real" Saint Barnabas or Sister Assisi, they recall that he left for Earth, but do not remember any of their subsequent conversations with him.

Arcadia (2006 Apr 30)

See Wednesday14 for an overview of the Arcadia situation. Note, however, that Fey and Bullettrain have not responded to recent emails (within the past 10 days). The last email received from them simply stated that they had reached Arcadia, and that it had moved.

Bullettrain and Fey begin to poke around looking for clues. Fey gets kidnapped by the space pirates [[actually Hernando – see below], who are currently docked (they took the Supernova, but Scorpio is back on Boneyard 47). The lieutenant (often acting captain of the Supernova) is a big, burly pirate named Arson Paine covered in animated tattoos – a space battle going on on the right side of his face, and a naked woman dancing on the left side, with a ship occasionally flying across his forehead.

Bullettrain, dedicated to rescuing his "sidekick," scours the city looking for Fey, beating up the "bad guys" and delving deeper and deeper into the mysteries of Arcadia. Generally, he makes a very large nuisance of himself, and the residents of Arcadia decide that enough is enough. The Baron von Petrol takes it upon himself to stop Bullettrain from rampaging about on his private grounds – a 25 acre estate nestled in the northwest corner of the settlement.

The Baron is "old money" left over from the time of the oil tycoons in the 20th and 21st centuries. He is 6’ 4", average build (for that height), dresses ornately in expensive, sometimes froofy (sometimes more practical, such as for an African safari), clothing. He often wears a monocle, that provides various scanning functions and visual analysis, including detection of mystics and non-humans, aura analysis (how strong someone’s soul is, how much of a threat they are, etc.) – all technological.

The Baron holds Bullettrain there for a time, but begins to wonder – where did this guy come from? What should he do with him? He asks the underground community: "Anybody care if I kill this guy?" Strife hears about the commotion, and responds to the query, saying she does. She offers him money in exchange for Bullettrain, and the Baron accepts (after some haggling).

The party arrives before Strife shows up to pick up her brother. Thus, they hear of his captivity (assuming they do well enough on their research and information gathering) at the estate of the Baron von Petrol.

Meanwhile, Fey has been kept alive but in stasis? Why would they keep her alive? What about the fact that she was wild shaped into a machine to conceal herself from threats?

Arcadia (2006 May 02)

Arcadia is kind of like Switzerland – extremely clean. There’s really no trash to be found on the streets, and anything that ends up in the gutter is sensed and dealt with in a prompt manner. Cleaning bots of all sizes are commonplace, and go fairly unnoticed – an ideal thing for Fey to wild shape into. Of course, many cleaning bots have been programmed to be spies in the past, so the more paranoid people do notice them.

It might be that Fey got too close to something juicy, and she was captured by one of these paranoid individuals. The person shot her, she fell unconscious, and reverted to her natural shape. At that point, she was imprisoned, and Bullettrain went on a kind of rampage to rescue his "sidekick."

What did she find out?

I’m thinking that first of all, she hasn’t been being held for parts so much as she’s been held by the person who shot her – they don’t want to release her because she knows too much, but don’t want to kill her because they’re actually very nice people, and squeamish about killing. Err, no. Maybe they want to trade her (for Blacksoul or Dorian?). Maybe they’re robots, and their LORE chips prevent them from harming her because she’s a sentient being. They’re waiting on their boss to show up and take care of her.

All right, Dorian has a brother, who has captured Fey, and who is involved in Pandora’s Children. He recognized Fey as one of Dorian’s targets (since Pandora’s Children is the group that sicced the pirates on them in the first place). His name is Hernando. Hernando Dorian. Not Gunner Diesel. Gunner Diesel Dorian. He wears a hat which constantly shades his eyes. He has a very obvious gun slung across his back, and a big choppin’ knife at his hip. Over everything, he wears a spotless white apron (nanoweave and stainproof). He’s a butcher by trade, and is an expert at chopping things up. His shop is a front for the graft business. He’s got a whole slew of stasis chambers.

Fey was in his shop when a customer walked in and started hinting not-too-subtly about wanting to buy rather exotic parts. As Hernando leaned in close to close the deal, he noticed that the cleaning bot wasn’t cleaning up the pools of blood and gore that were on the floor of the shop. He hurled his big choppin’ knife, and everything went black for Fey. She woke up dead. Err, in stasis. Err…

Speaking of Diesel, you could name your kid 6n. And encourage him to start fires. And to only give oranges to the very prettiest orphans.

So, what the hell is the party going to do? They need to rescue Bullettrain from the evil clutches of Baron Von Petrol, but first they’ll probably want to rescue Fey from Hernando, who will send the party an email (tortured out of Fey?) offering to trade her for Ponce. The email could say "If you’re unable to supply my brother, then I’ll just have to keep the pixie." Hernando didn’t know about the nanite plot or anything, but he arranged for his brother to get a better graft (forest troll skin) and didn’t tell anyone about it because he’s completely paranoid and extremely cautious.

Presumably they rescue Fey and deal with Hernando somehow.

Then there’s the portion with the Baron Von Petrol, who has Bullet Train chained up in an otherwise empty shed on his (comparatively) vast estate. New paragraph.

The Baron Von Petrol has also sent out inquiries about what the hell he should do with Bullettrain (would anyone mind if I were to kill this chap?), and received a response from Strife, who has offered him a significant sum to hold him for her. If they contact the Baron, he’ll be extremely reasonable, but will say that Bullettrain has already been paid for by someone else. If they try to sneak onto his estate, there are robotic guard dogs. The BEST robotic guard dogs EVER. They have lasers. On their heads. And they shoot bees.

If they actually break into wherever Bullettrain is, then very shortly afterward the Baron will walk in with Strife, and everyone will be all surprised. And there will be a big confrontation. If anyone questions the possibility of the timing working out so perfectly, it can be explained that Bullet Train has an aura of camp, which bends probability in ways that make reality more "pulp fictiony". I mean, the guy is named Bullettrain. And he has a sister who’s a supervillain. She won’t necessarily attack them, though she will certainly not hesitate to defend herself. Rather, she will give in to the quintesssential villain impulse, and monologue. More accurately, she’ll have a confrontation with her brother (and the party, Trenton in particular). If they push her too hard, she’ll use her cape and run away. Don’t forget the bleeding eyes. The Baron will probably be unimpressed by the whole supervillain schtick, and chastise her for being a lightweight.

The Baron will want to get paid, but might be convinced that Strife is a loony and wasn’t going to pay him. Alternatively, Bullettrain might apologize and pay him for his own freedom (he’ll be a lot more rational and cooperative once the party arrives). And he’ll go on afterward about how he gave an obviously evil man a large sum of money. It’ll tear him up inside.

The party might be able to meet with Boris – the Baron answered a few of Bullettrain’s questions in trade for answers from Bullettrain. Similarly, he might offer to trade information to the party in return for information about Strife (if she runs away). This is largely to satisfy the Baron’s curiosity.

The Baron specializes in hostile takeovers. And venture capitalism. And bootylicious babes. How the hell do you lose your body? Or your Netherworld?

Curtis thinks we’re done. I think the party needs to go to Lupus. If there’s resolution, they should get a UNF transmission asking for help right at the end of the session. It should order them to return to the space station at once to prepare for military dispatch. Oh! Cliffhangered! If time, they return, and learn about the technofearful. "Laboro has already been devastated by a previously unknown alien race. The wave of attacking ships is now advancing on Lupus. Perseverance, I choose you! GooooooO!"

Random thoughts (largely obsolete)

Fey and Bullettrain could have hooked up with Josef, who wishes to overthrow his brother’s regime. But of course Boris is keeping close tabs on Josef, making it difficult for him to actually plot against him. Josef could use a secured bunker as his base of operations, but even then, Boris might be able to spy on him. Could he induce others to establish a telepathic bond with him? Would he think to do that? Would even ‘‘that’’ be enough to prevent Boris from learning of his plans? (Probably not, with divination.) Perhaps Josef must leave Arcadia in order to plot his revenge. Or maybe Josef does not want revenge at all. That doesn’t mean he would be comfortable serving his brother forever, either, though. He might decide to become his own man, once he has visited his brother. Or maybe he just wants to die? Who knows.

Alternately, Fey and Bullettrain might be being held in custody by Boris. However, that is not really his style. He would probably be willing to answer their questions, if he did not think there would be retribution against him. However, he would certainly not allow recording devices or anything of that nature (which is difficult in the age of neural jacks). So it actually seems unlikely that he would be completely straight with them.

Perhaps Tira and Arthin got their hands on Fey and Bullettrain. They could hold them hostage, hoping that Laiden comes looking for them. Or it could be Strife that has taken them captive, and is holding them in the city somewhere. But to what end?