Driftwood/Session 3

How is it possible we were able to reach our target a day ahead of schedule? Huggins had warned of a current in the aether that could swell to a riptide, so that might have played a role. Regardless, we find three cargo vessels before our designated point of contact. Each of them seems to be between one-third and one-half the size of the Carcosa. On closer inspection, they appear to be Shantine refugee ships, disoriented by the shifting currents.
Georg orders the boarding crew to get armed. Job wants to turn this into a leadership exercise, so he sizes up the mooks assigned to join us. He finds them disappointing: only here because the captains ordered them, and not enough into the killing spirit. Job gets their names: Tal'Fel and Mirthas. They seem to be bored of attacking unarmed refugees (God forbid) and would rather round them up and sell them off. Job dislikes this immensely.
To set an example, Job sets up a SAW (Squad Auto Weapon) on a crate, asking the two grunts if they've ever used one. When they say no, Job insists they shoot it to see how it feels. Despite being poor shots, they're swayed by Job's motivational speech and look forward to using the SAW to hit something. Darius prays we don't kill too many civilians. Georg is vaguely disgruntled about the whole situation.
Argob the one-eyed pilot sets up for launch at our targets: The Solemn Grace, the Splendid, and the Fugitive. The latter is the most heavily armed and appears to be guiding the others. As we launch toward it, the Fugitive fires on us. Tog, Darius, and Fritz are hit by shrapnel. Georg then tasks Job to hail the Fugitive before we destroy everything (good luck with that). Otherwise, we could disable it with our autocannon.
Job hails the Fugitive, contacting a Shantine officer. He asks why they're shooting at us, to which he gets an obvious answer. Job threatens the officer with destruction unless they immediately surrender. The officer agrees and asks to speak to the commanding officer. Georg further assures that no civilians will be harmed. Seems we'll have peace after all…? Nope. Another officer screams that they'll never surrender, then they kill the captain. Time for plan B.
Plan B involves an impromptu landing at one of the openings of the ship. We opt to board through the hangar. Job enters the ship first, followed by the grunts. Job is on such a high from his earlier command performance that he fails to notice the tripwire he set off. In the resulting explosion, Job sustains significant cognitive damage (becoming 3 times more racist than he was before).
Georg boards next. The grunts are firing indiscriminately throughout the hangar, Georg telling them not to destroy the fighter craft that were all set to launch. Job foregoes the plan and runs ahead in rage. Darius boards to clear the area, but stumbles on a second tripwire. The autocannons on the fighter craft activate, hitting Georg and Darius and peppering the boarding craft.
Meanwhile, a situation is brewing within the Fugitive's hold, as we cut to Zeta (Mary Kathryn) and Fulton (Nathaniel) in their own attempts to escape the ship. Zeta hears the squabbling and fire from within the hold. The captain is dead, and the mutinous soldiers are in disarray. Zeta, having been a forced Shantine convert, tries to kill a few of them on her way to join up with the boarding party. Fulton is farther from the hold, stuck in a brig, and doesn't hear the chaos. Zeta slits a soldier's throat with a knife, stealing his weapons and stealthing away.
Fulton watches the guards begin to take defensive positions. He and his fellow fugitives are looking to make a move to get out of the brig but aren't sure how. He managed to smuggle in a lockpick, using it to free himself and his neighbors. He convinces them to overrun the guards, then runs a distraction. On asking why the guards aren't trying to defend the prisoners, one (Agamemnon) decides to go out and check, but is stopped by the other (Achilles). Achilles decides to use the prisoners as human shields. Fulton gives his signal for the others to move, and they're pelted by fire from the guards as they try to overtake them. Fulton tries to escape but can't get around a desk that's blocking his exit. While this is happening, Job is approaching the brig…
The crew of the boarding craft are shredded by the autocannons. Argob, the pilot, is crushed by the collapsing gunners. The SAW is disabled. The ship is about to blow up. Fritz manages to find a path out without catching cannon fire, Tog following closely behind. All the party has escaped, but the crew will not be so lucky.
Georg and Darius move up to secure the Fugitive's engine room. Georg is hit with more cannon fire, blowing his arm off. Darius does a better job of avoiding cannon fire and making it to the engine room. Fritz yells out to everyone to "close the fucking doors." Job, battered by cannon fire, stumbles toward the Shantine with his laser whip in hand, mumbling some sort of prayer or possibly arguing with his god. The Shantine guards find this intimidating enough to flee.
Job heads toward the bridge, ignoring and skipping past the gunfire in the brig. He does notice Georg, who's taking combat stimulants to keep himself from dying. Fritz applies a salve to stabilize him. Job runs up to him, spitting everywhere, clearly mentally frayed. Georg orders Job to "do what you can" while they secure the engine room. Job somehow listens to this despite everything.
Fulton hears Job coming back down the corridor and pounds on the brig's door to get attention. Tog readies a shot for the first person to pop their head out of the door. When Fulton gets out, he immediately gets shot in the head, knocking him unconscious and losing his left ear and eye. Tog readies another shot. Agamemnon and Achilles ask us in Shantine if it's safe to come out. Darius says yes, and after an argument, Achilles steps out. He's auto fired on by Tog and killed instantly, falling back into Agamemnon's arms. Using Achilles as a shield, Agamemnon fires back with a shotgun, hitting Job in the stomach. The organ damage drives Job completely insane.
Job stands ready to prove how unkillable he really is, as his insides are now on the outside. Everyone seriously dislikes this except for Tog, who develops an obsession with this display and a nagging fear of his guts being taken from him. The display is so disturbing Agamemnon begs Kirva for forgiveness and shoots himself. It's at this point Zeta finally steps out of the shadows to join the party.
There's a short argument over who should drag Fulton's body. Fritz throws a combat stimulant at Job to stabilize him. Fritz and Darius drag Fulton down the hall to the engine room. Job hobbles behind, his intestines still hanging out. As we enter the engine room, the terrified crew beg for their lives. Job shuts off the engine. Fritz tends to Fulton. The crew decides not to resist the boarding party and agrees to let Zeta and Darius tie them up.
Fulton regains consciousness. As soon as he wakes up and asks what happened, Georg holds a gun to the back of his head. They have a tense back and forth, Georg demanding Fulton tell him where he's from, and Fulton refusing to do so because he has no idea who we are. Fritz is annoyed with Georg wasting his medical supplies by killing someone he just healed up, so he psionically pushes the gun wide as Georg fires it. The shot hits another prisoner in the back. Fulton finally (supposedly) gives Georg what he wants to know, and Georg believes him.
With a moment to breathe, Fritz goes around to do doctor things: he sews Job's intestines back up in his own body, heals the bystander that got shot, and doses Tog with an antipsychotic. The Shantine guards approach the engine room door and threaten to blow it up. At this point, the boarding craft explodes. They then assure us if we don't surrender and turn the engines on, we'll all be blown to hell with C4. Fulton thinks they're bluffing and only have enough to blow the door open.
We plan to fake a surrender, then shake the ship using the engines to knock them off balance, throw out grenades, then close the door again. Zeta relays this to the crew. Job tries to turn on the engines, nearly blowing them up. Darius stops him and takes over but does the same thing. Fulton stops him before he can blow it up and despite missing an ear and an eye, turns on the engines successfully.
As the door opens slightly, a guard throws three grenades into the room. Tog and Job parry two of them back, and Fritz psionically pushes the third. Before the grenades can go off, the soldier says his last words: "May Kirva roast you eternally, you son of a bitch." After the explosions, we open the door again to try to mow down the 6 of them remaining. Tog auto fires into the corridor, killing 3. Zeta follows Tog down the corridor, opening fire with her shotgun, killing another. Georg readies a shot at anyone who might approach from the ladder to the bridge. Darius shoots at the 2 survivors but misses both. Fritz and Fulton take cover. Job swings his laser whip, knocking one of the survivors unconscious. The other one tries to flee, but Job restrains him, and he's mowed down by gunfire.
As the fight ends, we see two new figures enter the corridor. It's QS and SQ, here to congratulate us for a job well done. They spent this time combing through the Solemn Grace and the Splendid while we drew all the fire. Now it's time to get back to the Carcosa with our spoils and heal up…
Category:Session Summaries