Arc 2: The Harmony of the Hot Springs

## Enter: Tim Herzog

Unbeknownst to the entirety of the party, in addition to new crew-member Donald Green, another chemical professional named Timothy "Tim" Herzog had snuck aboard due to his fanboyish admiration of the Reverend Bahal Slapticus.

As Donald Green woke up hungover in an unfamiliar place, he had a panic attack because from his perspective, but Tim Herzog popped up and told him that everything was going to be okay. Tim, he claimed, had been working on the crew for a while and suggested that they both go and meet the captain and get everything sorted out.

Everything was not actually sorted out.

Drake, in a brief moment of homicidal pragmatism, brought out his chainsaw sword and said that the ship only had life support for only 6 people, which was true. What he didn't realize was that even with Tim Herzog there, there were only 6 people on the ship, and everything was fine for the most part. After confirming with Tim Herzog that the new chemist on board wasn't into gengi-nonsense or biological weapons, he accepted the new person on board.

## Check-In

Check-in went smoothly. at 100 credits per night, Drake refused to purchase Donald Green tickets. Meanwhile, the Space Cat wanted to join in and the party discovered that the cat can disguise itself as a normal cat. After going through the TL5 scanners, the party enjoyed their stay.

* Drake enjoyed the hot springs and relaxed for the first time in his new career.
* Mielikki ended up getting a massage that was too intense and ended up nearly passing out in a hot spring.
* Erin got into a weird awkward naked situation with Asari Chen, and then got shanghai'd into doing hot yoga.
* The Reverend, ever on that social media grind, opened an OnlyMans account and hosted a morning Hot Yoga session in Ameena and got 27k Credits out of it.

After a some more relaxation, the crew went to sleep peacefully except Reverend Bahal Slapticus. In his sleep, he got into a fist fight with some sort of dream monster called "The Dissonance" and was able to fight it off before he woke up. He did not remember this dream.

## Sword Forging

The next day, everyone got up refreshed except for the Reverend. Drake, after having an extremely pleasant dream where he was reunited with his family, woke to a harsh reality and decided that alcoholism via bottomless mimosas was a great coping mechanism.

After some hanging about and some minor concern for Drake's sudden alcoholic onset, Mielikki decided that she wanted to go to the surface and see the resort's demonstration of fancy sword-forging techniques going back to the Pre-Silence days. Mielikki and Erin both were able to impress the master swordsmith and forge brilliant new weapons while Drake made a fool of himself getting super drunk. Mielikki made an especially strong impression on the master swordsmith, Yasuharu Sato. Then... something came roaring in from the lava... It was...

## The Dragon!!!

A giant lava snail!! Everyone ran to their guns except the Reverend, who squared up and boxed with the Dragon. It died from the magnificent force of his punch.

## Dinner with the Reed

The crew was later invited to meet with the Reed of the Harmony. On the way to dinner, a member of the Harmony collapsed. The Reverend rushed over hoping to preach them into converting their faith, but was stopped by the beefy Harmonic masseuse as other members of the Harmony whisked the affected individual away.

The Reed was the face of the hivemind in order to make sure that individuals don't get disoriented from the whiplash of dealing with constantly changing faces. The Reed requested that they peacefully suppress a resurgence in mining activity amongst folks living in the Old Town slums. While the Reed did not specify the "why" behind this request, the entire Harmony did get propositioned by a drunken Drake, who then threw up. Erin reported back to Christine that Drake was trying to cheat on her with an entire planet, & Mielikki was generally bummed out by her Captain's sad behavior. During dinner, the party noticed some "buffering" issues with members of the collective.

That night, the Dissonance attacked Drake, Mielikki, and the Reverend in their sleep. Mielikki experienced some mysterious assistance & woke to Space Cat sleeping on her chest. They all remembered this nightmare upon waking.

## The Muscle Man Incident

The crew woke up and discovered Dr. Timothy Herzog, who had been holed up in his room, was up & about! Drake - still drinking - confuses Dr. Tim for a prostitute hired by the Reverend. Dr. Tim convinces the Reverend to try some of his pharmaceuticals, leading to a pretty intense trip. The Reverend runs rampant, aggressively leading an impromptu yoga class with several other resort guests in attendance, before nearly escalating to violence. Dr. Tim steps in and manages to subdue the Reverend by crushing a pill with an airborne paralytic agent between his teeth & then exhaling it into the Reverend's face. The Reverend passes out, & Dr. Tim proceeds to sell one of the resort guests on the Reverend's 10,000 Ways and the Black Turtle Fist, earning him a loyal follower.

The Reverend takes a nap, and everyone else goes to get massages. While soaking in the hot spring, Mielikki, Erin, and Drake run into Mielikki's rival Asari Chen, who strikes up an unlikely friendship with Erin. A drunk, depressed Drake floated off on his own, and returned... changed.

## Deleting Christine?!

After his solo soak in the hot spring, Drake stops drinking, showers, and dresses himself properly. He proceeds to unnerve his crew by talking to them about their feelings and telling them how much he appreciates them. Drake's presence scares Space Cat, who insists that he's "wrong". Christine locks Drake out of the ship/herself for trying to cheat on her. Erin asks Christine to scan Drake, but discovering nothing amiss, lets him on board. An unusually-behaving Drake orders Erin to delete Christine. Erin backs Christine up on a safe drive. Drake backs any memories/files about his family up and locks them, setting a timer for them to unlock in the future.

Later, the Reverend runs a yoga class and teaches his new devotee to punch her partner with the Black Turtle Fist when he disagrees with her. And, Mielikki has the literal best nap of her entire life.

## The Party Splits

Everyone heads to Serenity Valley - the Harmony's simple, agrarian village - as Drake hopes to gather more information about the Harmony prior to moving forward with their job. The Reverend feels a calling and runs off over the hills, planning to walk to Old Town on foot. At Drake's request Erin teleports after him to keep an eye on him. Drake and Mielikki chat with a few tourists, then decide to borrow a shuttle to head to Old Town.

## Old Town

Drake and Mielikki head to Old Town to find Edwin Nakamura, who is supposedly in charge of the mining revival efforts. Old Town is in extremely bad shape, with its inhabitants reliant on The Harmony for handouts. It turns out Edwin is a teenage livestreamer who lives in his mom's basement. He's full of fiery rhetoric but not much information. Drake used some mysterious new powers to make Edwin think it was totally normal to have two strangers in his room. Edwin's mom tells Drake and Mielikki about her husband, who spent his life hoping to revive Ameena's mining economy to create a better life for his family. He delved too deeply and came back in pieces - meat cube pieces.

## Marnello, Redux

Erin taught herself how to understand Space Cat's binary chatter while walking the path to Old Town. She and the Reverend happen across a cave-in, and literally run into a guy decked out in black ops gear exiting the cave-in. The Reverend chokes him out and Erin tosses his unconscious body into the swift river below using her telekinesis. Erin and the Reverend discover that the partially collapsed cavern wall has opened an entrance into the hallway of an ancient facility. They find a number of pretech vending machines and purchase some super old Pocky, still sealed. They dismantle a trip wire, pocketing the explosive charge for later. They then find a large shared office space with the Marnello logo on the wall. Erin is unsuccessful at hacking into the one remaining functioning pretech computer, but she is able to find that it only sent heavily encrypted data packets out, and did not receive any, indicating this may have been some kind of black site.

Erin and the Reverend gain access to a lower floor of the facility. Erin told Space Cat she could sense Penelope's presence growing closer due to her Spatial Synchrony Mandala. Space Cat shares with Erin that they are drawing closer to someone Space Cat calls "Mother".

## Vehicular Homicide

Drake and Erin hop in the shuttle to rendezvous with the rest of the party. They see four black ops guys approaching the entrance to the pretech Marnello facility. Drake uses something he calls "host override" and plows into them with the shuttle, resulting in 3 fatalities and 1 narrow miss. The Harmony radios Drake to check in since the shuttle's impact sensors went off, and Drake admitted to his crime. The Harmony then locked him out of the shuttle. He decided to leave the 3 bodies in situ.

The party reunited for a night's rest aboard Christine thanks to a quick teleport from Erin. Mielikki & Erin slept well, while Drake & the Reverend were pulled into another nightmare with The Dissonance. Drake mysteriously disappeared from the dream partway through, while The Dissonance told the Reverend that soon, they would all join him...

While the rest of the crew slept, Drake woke up and attempted to bribe Space Cat with a battery, to convince Space Cat that he is a friend.

## Pretech Facility

After 3 consecutive nights of poor sleep, The Reverend began to spiral. He whipped up an "antidote" by pouring half a bottle of whiskey into a pot of coffee, then drinking it straight out of the pot. Drake used his totally normal new powers to force the Reverend not to think of his nightmares, then tried to convince the Reverend that he was actually a secret angel sent by the Stellar Spirit, which is what gave him his powers. He was (shockingly) somewhat successful.

The crew made their way through the Pretech Marnello facility, running across several rooms that pointed to active habitation and a certain emotionless, lab coat-wearing doctor's presence. Drake boldly entered a room full of brains in jars & detected extreme levels of psychic activity. The voice of a mysterious stranger assured him that they were all volunteers...

## Meeting Euphonia

Drake is greeted by a cheery British woman who looks to be in her mid-to-late twenties - and has a number of wires and cables affixed to her otherwise human form. She introduces herself as Euphonia. After thanking Drake and his crew for rescuing Space Cat (her creation) and inviting them all to join her for tea, Euphonia petitions Drake for his assistance. The Harmony is under attack by her sister Cacophony, whose unwelcome influence manifests as The Dissonance. She and her sister are both True AI, twins created in the pretech era. Their "father", Dr. Zelliger, hoped to establish a peaceful psychic utopia away from the prying eyes & malicious intents of Marnello, while using them for their funds & resources. The brains in jars are the result of his efforts, a chorus of volunteer psychic minds. Euphonia & Cacophony were created to safeguard this haven, and - through some wild TL6-style technology - were linked members of the Chorus, able to use psychic abilities themselves.

The Scream changed things, severing Cacophony's connection to the Chorus while simultaneously loosening her brakes. It also resulted in the manifestation of the Harmony, permanently linking those psychic minds present on Ameena who had not joined the Chorus in a hivemind of their own, affording them a strong degree of protection from its negative effects. During the Silence, the Harmony grew and flourished under Euphonia's watchful gaze, while Cacophony continued to loosen her brakes bit by bit, becoming increasingly brilliant, increasingly isolated, and increasingly unstable.

Re-opening Ameena 50 years ago created an opportunity for the Harmony to become truly independent. It also put this facility in danger of discovery by those who would use it for ill. While Cacophony's goals and motivations remain a mystery to the party, Euphonia's goals are as follows:

* to destroy her sister's core
* to keep the technology in her facility out of modern-day Marnello's hands
* to have Dr. Penelope Hartford (her temporary hire) continue to craft her new, primarily organic shell

Euphonia recently used all her efforts to destroy Cacophony only to discover that her sister had created a phylactery. The party has 48 hours before Cacophony's core recovers enough for her to split it again and create a new phylactery.

## Confronting Cacophony

Euphonia offers to form a psychic gestalt between the crew members to aid them in the battle ahead. Erin declines to join, but the rest of the crew consents, giving them a slight edge in combat. After some cajoling Dr. Penelope Hartford decides to join as well, offering to silently heal the party in exchange for being allowed into their psychic connection. She immediately uses the connection to attempt to pester Drake into revealing whatever secret he is obviously hiding. The Reverend quickly catches on & uses the connection to preach the good word of the Stellar Spirit, to the crew's chagrin & Penelope's fascination.

As the crew advances through the facility, they are met by an increasingly dark, crushing atmosphere. Each step becomes harder to take than the last. Drake senses psychic interference and engages in a silent Psychic Static conflict against a cackling, unseen assailant. This probably would have gone on wholly in secret from the crew, if he hadn't at one point shouted that he is older than the Scream... which is really normal for a human space captain. The crush of energy intensifies and the Reverend collapses, finding himself thrown into the dark nightmare landscape favored by the Dissonance. The Dissonance cackles, its face shifting from a swirling mass of shadow to that of a young woman. As it asks him whether he would like to die with his friends, or here, he wakes to Erin slapping him across the face.

The crew carries on and finally comes across a creepy, neglected room in a run down part of the facility, where they find a run down, humanoid shell - Cacophony. The Reverend runs up to her and lands a sucker punch, with Mielikki's blade following close behind, biting into Cacophony's shell for massive damage - or so it would have, had that not all been a simulation in Cacophony's mind. The crew engages in combat against Cacophony and her small army of 5 very armed drones. Two of the drones position themselves on either side of the room and begin to beep as though they are about to detonate. Erin hacks into a nearby terminal and successfully uses it to disable both of those drones. The party trades blasts, slashes, and punches with Cacophony and the remaining 3 drones, finally disabling her shell after a thrilling battle that may or may not have involved Penelope giving the Reverend crab hands. Mielikki lands the killing blow, using her Windcutter to slice cleanly through Cacophony's core.

## Confronting the Captain

After looting around a bit & acquiring new drones, the party returns to Euphonia, who scrubs all programming from the core and allows Erin to keep it for research. A tired crew returns to Christine for their night's rest. Drake deletes his social media, then deletes Christine, before turning in. Meanwhile, Erin restores Christine from a backup, and Erin, Mielikki, and the Reverend hatch a plan to figure out just what's going on with their captain...