Session 31: Fracas in the Farmhouse Report

General Summary

Introduction

Aris “They’re here…”   The red-tinted sky seems to hang low over the empty, abandoned New Avon farmhouse. The clouds above turn grey and writhe as the edge of a storm slowly rolls forward over the farmhouse. The jovial atmosphere of reconnection gains a heavy weight as the Ein Sof Survivors hear the echoing thud of the massive mechanical armor slam into the ground outside of the wooden structure. The distant crack of thunder sounds like a bell ringing as an arena crowd falls silent. As the distant rumbling thunder resounds with the echoing thud of metal on gravel, reunion turns to panic. How did they find us? Why are they here? All great questions left for those that survive.   The Titan is visible from the front window and seems to be standing just behind the stolen Krasian APC. The Dropship can faintly be seen through the window hovering around 50-100 feet above the ground level. The Farmhouse itself seems to be made of wood, the walls unlikely to stop the large rotary cannon hanging off of the Dropship or the arm-cannon of the Titan.   The faint drone of the Dropship hovering in the sky towards the front of the building is canceled out by a sharp, piercing speaker in a posh Krasian accent.   “This is the Krasian Mandate. To the 7 Insurgents and unworthy traitors alike, we offer you one opportunity graciously insisted upon by New Avon’s Provincial Commander Larson. Throw down your weapons, come out with your hands up, and your blood will not be shed here today. You have 10 seconds to comply.”

Game Start

As the battle began, everyone took a moment to prepare themselves for the assault. Aris hid behind the table knocked over by Chiara when the Krasian APC came (prior to knowing it was the rest of the crew) and threw up a Jamming pylon and began trying to flood static over the areas to mess with targeting systems. Jason and Dash ran outside to confront the massive titan head-on. Li ran into a back hallway, opened a window, then embraced the Blessing of Night granted by Leliel to fly out the window into the sky using her wings. Kyra ran and hid in a cabinet, Rose opened a window and tried to rig up a mirror to shine a light into the Dropship Pilot's eyes, and Chiara stood at the ready to guard Rose, Kyra, and Aris.   As the three guys ran and/or flew outside, they spotted the Scout with his 3 drones surrounding and imaging the building, the Breacher and Vanguard dropping towards the rear entrance, and the Guardian dropping down next to the Titan towards the front. Dash attempted to hack into the Titan to crack open the back panel while the Guardian attempted to counter that. Jason intervened and ended up in a desperate fight with the Guardian, the obvious CO of the Krasian Fist, as the Titan slammed forward through the front of the building to get away from Dash's hacking and charge the women still inside.   Meanwhile, Rose shifted her strategy to using her Hologram to make it look like she ran out the back. This distracted the Vanguard, who chased it down and shot "her" in the back. This split up the team so the Breacher could then be ambushed by Chiara. She held it off as he fought her with his blade while firing into the room. His blast almost hit Aris and she ran back into the hallway sobbing, desperately continuing her efforts to jam the signals. He then clipped Rose with his shot once, but she countered by distracting him with a hologram of a bird flapping in his face. Kyra threw a pot at the head of the Breacher to try and distract him but hid under the cabinet again and began aiding Aris by boosting her Jamming signal.   Up above, the cloudy skies turned into a true downpour. The dropship had spun around the building and destroyed the Gator ATV at the back of the building that Aris, Chiara, and Rose arrived in (seemingly to prevent their escape). He then turned and began to destroy the master bedroom at the back of the house, desolating the room where they had no boots on the ground. Li had flown up and around to engage and distract the Sniper. He took a single swipe at it before continuing his ascent towards the dropship. Milli-seconds before the dropship's rear doors closed, Li spiraled through with a legendary feat of athleticism and landed inside. He saw the 6 seats facing each other, the hatch off the side allowing entry into the Titan, and the pilot with the cockpit doors open. The pilot turned and fired at him, but Li easily dodged out of the way and ended the pilot with a single swipe of his Tanto.    The sniper harassed Jason as Jason fought off the Guardian and the turret the guardian deployed. Alexa provided him aid, along with the targeting system jamming, and he barely dodged a few shots from the sniper rifle that would have decapitated anyone else. Inside, Dash managed to fully disable the Titan's power supply and drain it of power after it got its blade stuck into the low ceiling rafters. The back hatch opened and Rose managed to mock the pilot into a humiliating defeat with her ridicule (and the ever-present threat of death from the others). The Vanguard fired grenade after grenade into the room, attempting to flash them, blind them, and simply damage them all. Right before the Titan's defense systems powered off, he fired a rocket to try and destroy it to prevent its capture. Through a stroke of fate, the Titan barely survived complete destruction. Rose was directly in the line of fire and almost killed but Jason swooped in at the last moment to save her from the explosion yet again by throwing his body in front of hers.   In the skies above, Tumerian grabbed control of the dropship, spun towards the sniper, blocked their communications by screaming constantly into them, and fired on the sniper. He severely damaged the sniper's leg and the sniper tried to recall his drones and retreat. Tumerian chased him down and blew him out of the sky. Li spun around and turned it on the ground targets. The Guardian had since deployed a shield generator and powered it with a Utopia shard. The Vanguard moved through the building to stand beside the Guardian. As the Scout and Breacher fell, the Crew tried to offer surrender. The Vanguard ran and started the Krasian APC with the keys still left in the ignition. Li opened fire and drilled the dropship, nearly destroying it. Dash ran forward and plunged the Soul Blade generated purely from his will and hatred into the Vanguard's neck, snapping it cleanly and bloodlessly. The Guardian pulled the pin on a grenade, shouted "I deny you your victory" and threw it at the Titan to destroy it, knowing he was doomed, but Jason miraculously severed the grenade cleanly in the middle as it flew. Jason ran forward to finish off the Guardian. The Commander, the defeated Guardian, stepped into the blade as Jason swung, seeking a clean death. Jason pulled his punch and knocked him out, denying him his death beside his mean.   Inside, the Breacher had been killed by Chiara after the same spot in the armor she'd kept hitting with no effect breached open allowing her knife to get plunged up into the Breacher's head. She fell to the ground slamming her blade into his body repeatedly in a bloody mess. Something seemed to snap as her yellow eyes glowed brighter and she seemed feral for some time. Rose moved to calm her and managed to get her pulled away, pulled into a hug, and with her knife on the ground. As the other fighters finished the battle at the front of the building, Rose walked Chiara out the back into the rain to wash the blood off of her body and hands. They saw a vehicle approaching in the distance, another Gator ATV with 3 figures on it, and stood watching until it arrived.

The Underground Arrives

Nathaniel Scoxand and two guards, Martin and Kalina, pulled up outside of the Anderson Farm. The battle had been won and the crew had begun scavenging, stripping bodies, and binding up the two enemy survivors. Dash and Aris had moved the titan outside using a Maintenance control, walking behind it with their datapad connected, until the biocoding on it could be broken and it could be freely used. Nathaniel ran through, momentarily hesitated when he saw Dash until Dash seemed to understand and demonstrate his lack of desire to kill Nathaniel, and ran to embrace his daughter.   They quickly helped scavenge, load up on the Dropship, and flew with Aris' instructions inside of the rim of a Volcano. She led them to fly through a series of tubes to hide the dropship. They had already began removing transponders and disabling them as they flew to try and avoid detection. After they landed, they took a little while to debrief and relax.

Dash's Desires

Dash split off from the group after the rest discussed with Nathaniel the Underground, what they had been doing, and the chance of them negotiating with Nathaniel's off-world contacts. Dash headed down to the erected pseudo-jail where the Guardian CO, Conner Koerner, and the Titan Pilot, Finn, were stripped to their underwear and bound. Dash tried to quickly press the CO for information but was greeted with mockery and personal attacks on Dash as a traitor, oathbreaker, murderer, and terrorist. Dash tried to drag the man out of the cell with a door erected and cemented into the natural stone to throw him into the Lava. The two guards from before, Martin and Kalina, stepped forward to try and prevent Dash. He sized them up and prepared to fight but allowed them to call Nathaniel.   Nathaniel arrived and discussed back and forward with Dash keeping the prisoners alive. He explained second chances and that he knew Dash had empathy in him as Nathaniel wouldn't be standing there today if he didn't. After serious discussion hinging on Dash breaking and killing them all to finish off this CO, he relented and he and Nathaniel went to Nathaniel's humble tent in the middle of the crowded section of the Underground to share the remnants of an old bottle of whiskey. Dash headed off to find his allies from there.

The Sex Talk

Meanwhile, Li had taken the opportunity to press Rose about taking the chance and having sex with Jason. She'd stormed off and he'd tried explaining to Jason how to romance Rose. After some deliberation, Jason approached Chiara who was returning with bowls of the "Spacer's Slop" they had available to eat. She gave out the bowls and tried to explain to Jason that he should just ask Rose how she like the food and talk to her. Dash walked up while Jason was asking Chiara this and turned to walk off towards the ship to work futilely on the Titan.   Jason went off and gave the bowl to Rose. He asked how she liked her food then immediately walked off again. They comedically went back and forth a little as Li pressed the situation for them to just fuck, Chiara said she would only sleep with Li if she was extremely drunk or desperate (inadvertently giving him hope), and Jason ended up stopping all talk of it after Alexa got involved with asking questions and offering information from the datahub in his mind.   Chiara wandered off to sit beside Dash on the ship (away from awkward conversations) as he ineffectively messed with the biocoding. He offered her a U-Pen and she smoked as they sat in silence. After a quick rest and some time, the rest of the crew eventually joined up around them, repairing the ship, unlocking the Bio-Coding (with Aris' help) to allow Dash and Li to operate it, and deciding to go to this meeting to see if they could negotiate their way off-world.

The Meeting

The group headed out with Nathaniel, Aris, Martin, and Kalina (pushing hovercrates) down a long winding volcanic tube, over a few mountain ranges, and eventually reaching a valley clearing with flat land.

Description

The debris of the twin rings sparkle far above with reflected starlight as you await in the shadows of the valley’s clearing. Seconds pass to minutes turn to what feels like hours as you await the arrival of your potential saviors. With only silence and baited breath to keep you company for some time, the droning hum of a darkly descending Dropship feels like a warm relief when you hear it approaching far before making visual contact.   The ship seems to drop rapidly with no external lights guiding its way. One of the guards, Kalina, rushes forward with a pair of powerful flashlights. She holds her arms akimbo, straight out to either side, once near the clearing, casting the bright beams as a strong horizontal line to mark ground level. The pilot of the ship seems to take the cue and descends 50 feet in front of the line of light, settling to a heavy halt in the darkness ahead.   The rear of the ship cracks and the back panel of the vessel descends. The dim light cast from inside gives you your first glimpse at the size and model of the ship. Most of you recognize the type as a Chariot, a common ship used by Spacers due to their low profile, speed, long term habitability, and cost-effectiveness.   3 silhouettes stand outlined against the dim light of the ship’s interior. Two immediately stride forward as the ramp settles against the ground. A faint metallic jingle can be heard as they descend rapidly, their hands filled with the outlines of rifles held chest-high ready for immediate use. Each bears the outline of a hilt extending over their left shoulders.   The third form descends the ramp slowly and methodically behind them. Her outline is an obviously feminine form and strides with grace and purpose. The fainted outline of a top-bun can be made out as she descends and you see her head turn back and forth towards your positions.   Feminine Voice of the Shadow Secretary “Well Gentlemen, if we are secure, let us begin. Nathaniel?”

Rewards Granted

[Significant Consequence]