Freak-a-Lympics
it's like "Rush Week" but for a cybernetic biker gang
General Summary
A biker gang from Chicago has been exploring the back roads of the northeastern United States since November 1999, and doing it with gusto. They went from no mention in local news to front page headlines in one day. They have popped up sporadically since then, more and more often in eastern Ohio and across Pennsylvania.
Obviously some skirmishes against local gangs have occurred, but these punks act more interested in causing general chaos than in actual takeover of territory or business interests.
For the most part, they are limiting their assaults to poorer neighborhoods and out-of-the-way rural extremes ... but for how long will that last? By November 2001, every punk in a motorcycle jacket and chains who sports a brightly colored or unnatural hair style is suspected by the public of being Freakshow. This results in hundreds of panicked 911 calls in the New York City areas of Soho and Times Square.
The heroes who protect the public -- including the non-cybernetic-biker punk society -- are going to have to clear this chaos up!
Round 1
Starring: Knight Thrasher
Monday, November 5th, the day after the 2001 run of the New York City Marathon, Marvin Weintraub of the NYPD Forensics team contacted Knight Thrasher for some off-the-books support.
Freakshow have been rampaging from business office to business office nonstop today! They are terrorizing everyone inside. Here's the strange part: the Freaks are organized into half a dozen different raiding parties. When the Freaks show this much organization -- my contacts in Chicago OC tell us that the Freakshow are normally a chaotic swarm -- I get worried.
I have got resports of a new attack in an office belonging to LexCorp, which won't let us in "for the police's own safety, due to CDC regs" unless we are accompanied by Team Luthor ... who are busy down in New Jersey, putting down an assault at the Gotham City HQ. My informant hints that this building here in New York is only an office, the labs being dormant and sealed ever since September.
However, people are in danger right now, and the next office down is STAR Labs!
We are stretched too thin right now. We don't have the resources for a metahuman incident. Hell, we're not recovered from the attack on the towers, either.
I need you to go stop the rampages, Thrasher! And see if you can find some clue what the Freaks are up to, will you?
With this appeal for assistance, Mr. Weintraub is able to include the FDNY copy of a building blueprint -- but it's seven years old. This place is a four story office building, not much in Manhattan prestige and certainly not the highlight of LexCorp properties. It has a mirrored glass exterior. It offers no entry except on the ground floor -- the fire escape is internal and connects to the tunnels under Rockefeller Center that feed into Grand Central Station. No helipad, no Gotham-style skylight, not really inviting to the capes and cowls lifestyle.
Encounters and Evidence
Cast:
- assorted Slicers
- assorted Slammers
- 2 Stunner Chiefs
- assorted Choppers
- assorted Gunners
- Team Lead: Tanker Joe
Overheard Dialogue:
Mad Freak Chopper: Okay, we hit here, then what?
Mad Freak Gunner: I think we're hitting that science dork habitat next door, and then we'll go after the book publisher. I hate books!
We're running out of time. The Meat Freedom team is going to beat us on points!
Defeat the hero! That'll even our score!
Puzzle Pieces
Tanker Joe turned out to be carrying a Score Sheet. This crumpled piece of paper chronicles the recent attacks made by the group of Freaks defeated here at LexCorp. It lists the attacks' locations and times, as well as an estimate of the damage done to the buildings. At the bottom of the list is the scribbled comment:
The other groups are racking up a lot of points. We gotta step up the pace!
Captured Freaks can be interrogated for about three questions apiece before they conk out -- they experience a drug-induced crash that leads to a long, long nap.
Round 2
Wednesday, November 7th, 2001, Marvin Weintraub of the NYPD Forensics team followed up via instant message on Knight Thrasher's masked community forum. This thing seems to be getting more widespread with every few hours, so he pulls in two likely-seeming area heroes to join Knight Thrasher.
I have talked to several other heroes who have been fighting the Freakshow recently. Now I'm talking to you guys. Some of your "colleagues" have also discovered score sheets like what Thrasher handed me, listing recent attacks.
I think this might be part of some competition among the Freakshow factions. A huge undertaking.
From some little mentions I was able to pick out of several different interviews in several jurisdictions, I suspect that the next competition isto steal anything alcoholic that the Freaks can get their hands on. This could include hits on bars and liquor stores. That's trouble enough. What worries me is that some bright joyboy might think to hit the distribution system. Or -- worse! -- Fraunces Tavern. Imagine the cost to taxpayers, to history, if that historic building and its contents were damaged!
You know what? Never mind! Don't imagine it. Go prevent it!
Encounters and Evidence
Cast:
Four teams are in action at this location:
- Freeforall
- Radiophonic
- Enviro-Life
- Mass Tech
Puzzle Pieces
- Heroes are able to gather some preliminary information from the website for the Fraunces Tavern Museum before they spring into action, and that's great news!
- It is located not far from the intersection of Pearl Street and Broad Street. Let's go!
- The location contains priceless artifacts. ((GM warns ahead of time of the high stakes: half a standard award lost for every antique that the Freaks damage in their quest for points.))
- At the end of this episode, Thrasher, Trickshot, and Master Thespian have exchanged direct contact information. They are trying to find the Freakshow website for this contest, where they plan to post their own "team scores" as a competitor gorup called the "Spoilsports". Brilliant!
Round 3
Late in the afternoon of Friday, November 9th, 2001, Marvin Weintraub of the NYPD Forensics team uses his most urgent emergencies-only contact for Knight Thrasher, figuring he will forward it to his colleagues.
A group of Freakshow kidnapped several city councilmen. Then 1st group attacked by another team of Freaks.
First group retreated into a semi-underground mall in Staten Island. Mall was shut down for major renovations, minimal security onsite. Second team chased them in. Building is heavily vertical, intended to be 6 stories. Should have very little merchandise but also no functional elevators/escalators, very few stairwells which are easily secured.
Nat Guard fully occupied by border security and UN support.
Richmond County end of Staten Island Ferry is St. George Terminal. Not locked down, but tightly patrolled right now to keep further Freak teams from quick access.
We are assembling SWAT as fast as we can ... but the Feds are sticking their thumbs in due to gov't link in victims. So are Secret Service.
Situation is shaping into a huge mess. Poor prospects of resolution. Just heard Luthor News Network has the story.
Can you get in, rescue all 5 city councilmen, and get out before things get any worse?
Preserving evidence this time NOT repeat NOT a priority. (But would be nice to have.)
Encounters and Evidence
Cast:
Three teams are in action at this location:
- Upstart Faction did the initial kidnapping. They are upset because their leader Upstart is in prison today -- arrested during previous round by Iron Man at Russian restaurant Pravda in Soho.
- Meat Freedom faction are the team spotted by witnesses attacking Upstart Faction.
- RaveTribe were not spotted by witnesses pursuing Upstart Faction into the shuttered mall, but are responsible for some of the glimpses of light/motion and for blocking the entrances on the south and east sides.
Five city councilmen taken for points in the Politics Round:
- Councilwoman Mandisa
- Councilwoman Savitari
- Councilman MacLaughlin
- Councilman Camden
- COuncilman Kendall
- Bootsquad Faction all wear strange, gizmoed-up boots. Said boots have built-in mini jets, or wallclimbing Gadgets powered by the static electricity from their Freaky implants.
- the Spoilsports: Knight Thrasher, Trickshot, Master Thespian
- Trenchcoat Brigade: Kitsune, Litmus, The Shadow
- @Nd +h@+z $+r@i+3 phr0M Dr3c
- Trickshot was disguised, at first, as Dr. Jean-Claude Gironde and later as Bruce Campbell
- Experienced superspy Nathan Bourne is not impressed with Trickshot's acting, spotting the false "Dr. Gironde" right away.
- Surveillance allows the heroes to pick up snippets of information:
- (assorted complex discussion of the Bootsquad Faction and other teams' standings in the Freak-a-Lympics
- Mistah Static will be emcee at the award ceremony!
- Mistah Static is driving into town soon.
- At one point during the investigation, a bomb prematurely activates in these deep sewers -- dropping everybody into a pit. Very old steel walls carrying a constant charge promptly seal the heroes into a trap ... an old trap ... a trap designed to doom The original Shadow, all the way back in the late 1930s! **
- Two members of "the Spoilsports" and several Freakshow are at various stages of consciousness on a granite floor in their ever-so-faintly damp prison -- a giant metal box -- with sides and top made from smoothly electrified, solid sheets of steel. The Master Thespian and the Shadow have available to them some of their own gear; waterlogged and broken parts of a century-old radio and pre-World War I era mantle clock, and long dangly bits of unknown devices that look a little like Great War stethoscopes.Those last are still attached to edges where one electrified wall meets another, though, and there's no hint as to whether they are ALSO electrified.
- Above, on a rooftop of a small skyscraper, the sole free member of the Spoilsports and his solitary prisoner meet with the Trenchcoat Brigade, sent by Captain America who is currently busy "with the team" in someplace that might or might not be Afghanistan. Not just fellow heroes are in danger, but citizens right in this area! Somebody said something about lunatics and explosives!
- Clamor Boi
- Mistah Static
- Radiophonic
- Freeforall
- Mass Tech
- Enviro-Life
- Boot is accepting the Bronze Medal on behalf of Bootstrap Faction
- Meat Freedom
Overheard Dialogue:
I hate getting kidnapped by supervillains!
I'm convinced! I'm going to vote in favor of more law enforcement funds!
They're madmen! Mad cyborgs. Madborgs. I'm just glad to be out of here!
Round 4
Saturday, November 17th, 2001:
The Spoilsports, "banninated from the Freak Forum" because they "lack h4XX0R SKILLZ" and are accused of being "tr0LLz", have not heard anything about the Freakshow for over a week. Just when they were beginning to think the problem under control, however, a message comes from Clamor Boi via customized trojan virus.
The flash animation payload for the computer virus explains that Upstart Faction and RaveTribe are "teh sucks". Round Four is underway, and Clamor Boi thinks RaveTribe is cheating: they have Kerner - the Freak scheduling the events - going along on THEIR raid this round! They are scavenging stuff from the HE SEKRET BASE LOLOL at this address:
N 40° 42.696
W 073° 54.668
Surely this is not a trap. Right?
Grover Cleveland Park consists of over five acres of trees and fountains and tennis court.
Is that ... is that really a Freakshow raid on a Hammer Empire secret base??
Round 5
Thursday, November 22nd, 2001:
Three paths cross on a chilly winter day on Metropolis' mass transit system. It is Thanksgiving morning, just before sunrise, and the train cars are half-deserted; indeed, some of the regular routes have been shut down completely for the holiday, cuasing travelers to pick more circuitous paths.
The Shadow is on his way home from following up on a lead, now wearing the mask of "unremarkable citizen" Andru Vandevik. Agent Chameleon of SAFEGUARD travels as mild-mannered courier Nathan Bourne, transporting a sealed packet meant to serve a SAFEGUARD drop house.
The quarter moon overhead reflects off the Lackawanna River as the automated subway train comes to an unexplained dead stop ... and all lights shut off.
The few nervous passengers then succumb to knockout gas
-- but what about the heroes?
[h3R5EaE]Encounters and Evidence
Cast:
One Freakshow team is in action at this location: Radiophonic. They are "practicing" for an upcoming theft in NYC.
Overheard Dialogue:
Mad Freak Slicer: This sucks.
Mad Freak Slammer: I know. Keep working, bro.
Mad Freak Slicer: No, really, this is teh SUXORS!
Mad Freak Slammer: Look. Shut up and drag a turkey. Whine about Kusachu Tribe later.
Mad Freak Slicer: Why didn't we get the school computer theft? Stealing turkeys is STOOPIT
Mad Freak Slammer: Look at it this way. We're stealing the Excelsior, not the meat.
Puzzle Pieces
The Freakshow are, indeed, "practicing" for an upcoming theft in the Freak-a-Lympics, scheduled for Monday, November 26th* This group, team "Radiophonic", are somewhat disgruntled to have their "l33t skillz" shunted into the "paltry theft" of several kilograms of their favorite drugs. Called Excelsior, the drug is packed into fifty frozen name-brand turkeys in the "engine car" at the back of this particular train. Meanwhile, Kusachu Tribe won the assigned task to steal a warehouse full of computers intended for one of the public schools in the Red Hill neighborhood.
It should not take the heroes terribly long to save the train and stop the Freakshow. If they focus on the turkeys, they get information about Excelsior (given below) and a 25 HP episode award. Good work, heroes!
If the Trenchcoat Brigade picks up on the minions' grumbling earlier, or make a deal with a Freak to let him escape in return for intel, they can go to the Red Hill warehouse and halt the theft of the school computers! That will bring this episode's award up to 45 HP.
Round 6
Thursday, November 29th, 2001:
Clamor Boi has sent another flash animation to "teh 5p01!sp0R+s", this time using the big screen in Times Square. The message is fuzzy and nearly impossible to understand, except for a rooftop where Knight Thrasher stops -- by the billboard for "Badguys" at Scheherazade -- a spot where all three team members received urgent instructions to visit.
You didn't catch that cheating punk Kernel good enuff, and now it's Round 6 and that's teh RSUN contest. The Upstarts are doing theirs in 3 spots that all lead under sleeve-n-nifty Park Row. Bootsquad trying to shush 'em but you better get in there dot-NOW!"
If this information is good
and if that "RSUN" thing in fact means "arson"
and if the tip about three spots leading under a specific location in Park Row in fact refers to the sewers that lead under 150 Park Row
...
... that is a lot of "if".
But it would reasonably point to three sewers under the Metropolitan Correctional Center, a Federal prison. Heroes with connections to particularly closely-held old facts about the city will find that three such sewers do exist deep under the street level. They would be the most likely spots for a serious attempt to bomb the prison, especially if they are trying to destroy it or set fire to it in a dramatic fashion!
Meanwhile:
Captain America got an urgent coded message through to Trenchcoat Brigade member Litmus via the new "geek phones" provided by SAFEGUARD. It made perfect sense to Litmus, of course, and the rest of the team took his word for it. Agent Chameleon and The Shadow join Litmus on an urgent trip to the Big Apple.
Encounters and Evidence
Cast:
One Freakshow team and two heroic teams are in action this round:
Overheard Dialogue:
uP$+@r+ @iN'+ n3v@h g3++iN' 0u+ -
Puzzle Pieces
Clean Sweep
Sunday, December 2nd, 2001:
The Spoilsports and the Trenchcoat Brigade have spent the last three days trailing the leader of Bootsquad Faction. Boot is a Tank with gigantic boots. It looks like they have got built-in lifts -- but the footprints left appear to be giant rat feet.
It has been a long and tedious three days of checking out basement electronics labs and hazy LAN-and-bong parties.
Just twenty minutes ago, however, Boot's track headed across the border into New Jersey....
Encounters and Evidence
Cast:
So many teams of Freakshow are in action at this location:
Puzzle Pieces
The heroes on duty follow the track westward through the Holland Tunnel, then north less than a minute away to the historic Lackawanna Warehouse at 629 Grove Street in Jersey City. It is a huge, two-block-long brick building constructed between 1929 and 1930. It still has an inactive loading platform next to the elevated tracks on the 16th Street facade. It is not on the New Jersey register of Historic places because the owners are busy using it; they do not want the hassle. But it has been lsited as qualified since 1981 by the New Jersey State Historic Preservation Officer.
And now the Freakshow endanger this well-known place!
It is an eight-story building, hosting many different companies.
The roof is long and flat. It has its own water tower at the northwestern end. It has no skylights, but there are very large, rooved air conditioning units and a few small roof accesses for the discerning masked mystery man to investigate. It also has freight elevators, interior loading bays, and it contains a total of 1.3 million square feet of space. There are even some manufacturing companies located within this building!
Fortunately! the hero doing the tracking, if he makes his check against an OV/RV of 11/11 for interference, can trace Boot's progress down to a comparatively small twenty-five-thousand square foot space located on part of the fourth and fifth floors.
Now to safely shut down the chaotic award ceremony meant to celebrate Freakshow destruction, and arrest every member at large of the biker gang. It's the heroes versus the nihilists, the grand prize being awarded for a Clean Sweep!
Created Content
- Excelsior is not related to Steel Breath, but does share a few mutagenic properties. It seems to be based on a discontinued LexLabs research line, all stock officially destroyed after the unfortunate "Clayface Incident".
* "Cyber Monday" won't be a USA Shopping Event until 2005. Maybe the Freakshow invented it?
** Foreshadowing: a rapidly upcoming Trenchcoat Brigade Adventure called The Silent Seven will be a sequel to (and rely heavily on) the adventure described in the real world's original pulp novel The Silent Seven originally written by William B. Gibson and published in Shadow Magazine Vol 1 Issue 7 in February, 1932. It predated the radio show by five years! I was surprised by how much of it fit neatly (if fuzzily, and with significant timeline adjustments) into our continuity.
Adventure inspired by the Freaklympics adventure arc in the best MMO we ever played, City of Heroes by Cryptic Studios. We probably first played it around early 2005 as we remember the {5th Column/The Council} story happening right around that same time frame.
Marvin Weintraub (and pieces of his dialogue), the Freakshow in this adventure arc as groups and as individuals, the names of the Councilmen being rescued in Round 3, and assorted specific Clues were all originally created by Cryptic Studios for CoH. We included them within our tabletop adventure in homage. No infringement is intended or implied!
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