Session #2: Sertai Doom

Cast Notes:
Freedom Ranger was not present for this session, so his character was MIA, presumably getting into unrelated trouble.

Choice Quotes:
Doris: I think we've picked up a tail.
Don: What? We shouldn't be mutating! The radiation on this world is..."
Doris: I meant that someone is following us!
__

(Doris suddenly develops rift energy powers of some sort.)

Don: Excuse me, don't use rift energy near...
Sergei's player: Point away from face!
__


Sidrophael is possessing a deer:

Sidrophael: I don't have a human name in this host.
Don's player: My deer name is "(bleating noises)"
__

Sidrophael (in deer form): Do you sense me?
Doris: Are you hitting on me?
__

Sergei: What do young people do for fun where you are from?
Kay: Mostly TV and video games.
Sergei: Television caught on somewhere? This makes me somehow sad.
___

(A  group of soldiers in powered armor aim rifles at Kay.)

Kay: Pfft. Please, if I wanted to kill you all, you'd already be dead.
Colonel Vunot: She is likely correct. Stand down.
___

Losora: You need more reliable friends!

Don: To be fair, I only just met her. At a bar, no less!

___

Kay: Are you, like, okay?
Sidrophael: I am ambulatory. What we -
Kay: I'm okay too!

Corrections:

I had Sergei down as "Ivanov," but it's "Ivankov." This is corrected in the prior log.


Events:

Location: Tunguska Parallel, outskirts of Seattle

Sergei and Jack remained behind at Cosmic Coffee. Sergei began to work on the Lemurian artifact recovered from the Caverns of Yel'Em'Ver. Unfortunately, all he had to work with was his scanner, which was pre-digital. No other tests were possible without causing damage to the artifact. He could tell that the artifact contained some kind of complex pattern of energy, but couldn't decipher it.

As he worked, Jack kept watch.

Sergei began to explain his findings to Jack, but as he moved the scanner over the artifact a second time, energy readings in it spiked 30-40%, and one of the coffee machines began to beep. Then, all the lights in Cosmic Coffee flickered off.

Sergei pointed his scanner around, hoping to get a clue as to what was going on, but as he aimed it out the window, it caught fire. Completely unfazed, he produced a small brass fire extinguisher from his voluminous coat and began to deal with it.

While Sergei did that, Jack noticed a man across the busy highway with what looked like a sniper rifle pointed at the coffee shop. He pointed it out.

Sergei dropped the broken scanner, opened the window and dashed across the busy highway to confront the stranger, with no concern for his personal safety. He made it to the other side and saw that the attacker was in some kind of strange full body suit (resembling a zentai suit), and that he had what looked like a blunderbuss, except that the end of the device housed a piece of refined Element-X instead of a barrel.

Sergei demanded to know why the man was pointing a gun at Cosmic Coffee. The man retorted that he didn't have a gun... but his two friends did. Two more figures with weapons appeared from thin air, flanking Sergei. They demanded he get on his knees, hands behind his head, and began to restrain him with futuristic zip ties. The first man fired a green energy beam at Cosmic Coffee, and although there was no outward effect, he seemed satisfied.

Across the street, Jack grabbed a coffee pot. He threw it at the windshield of a passing car, causing the car to spin out of control. The driver was thrown clear of the highway, and knocked unconscious. The car landed in the ditch containing Sergei and his assailants, striking two of them and rendering the third speechless.

Undeterred, Sergei produced his stunner and demanded that the remaining tech ninja surrender instead. The guy dropped his gun and accompanied Sergei back to Cosmic Coffee, but he protested that Sergei was "making a big mistake."

Sergei questioned him. The man was extremely cryptic, but he believed that Cosmic Coffee and her pilot were dangerous, possibly even responsible for the whole mess. He also scoffed at Sergei wanting to fight monsters.

Eventually, Sergei convinced the soldier that neither he nor Don were responsible for the monster incursions. The man said he could talk his people into just letting the lead drop if Sergei let him go.

Sergei did so, and the man left in peace.


Location: Tunguska Parallel, the Docks (then transit to Overrun Seattle Parallel #13)

Don and Doris had half the shopping list. They needed, among other things, non-vulcanized rubber, fish oil and extremely pure copper. Don reasoned that the best way to go about this would be to hit a chemist's shop near the docks, so that's where they went.

While Don asked a local for directions, and got a confusing set of instructions for finding a nearby shop, Doris noticed that they were being followed. Their tail was a woman in local clothing, and quite skilled.

Doris attempted to tell Don surreptitiously, but it didn't go well, and he proceeded to the shop anyway.

As they neared the shop, both of them noticed someone scanning them with an active energy beam, something Rift derived. The next thing they knew, Doris' powers flared up, transporting her, Don and their pursuer to an alternate reality. In the new environment, Seattle was still there, right down to the same chemist's shop, but the shop was on fire.

The street was filled with military personnel fighting one of the giant hulking chitinous beasts as seen previously. The monster was in the middle of the street, atop an overturned armored battle vehicle of local design.

Additionally, Doris' hands glowed with crackling red Rift energy, haloed black. Her touch reduced the portion of the shop door she was touching to ash. Fascinated by this, she turned her power on the rest of the door, causing it to crumble to dust.

Don was alarmed by this development, demanding that she not use it so close to the tear in space. Then he wanted to know if their tail was still there. Doris pointed the girl out. Don swept past, heading for their mysterious pursuer.

The soldiers fired on the monster with their old fashioned machine guns, but the bullets had little to no effect. The creature ignored them, instead pouncing on Doris.

Doris shifted through the Rift again to evade the attack. The monster's blow cracked the pavement where she'd been standing.

Don asked their pursuer, "Under the circumstances, do you think a truce might be in order?" He saw that she had cybernetic augmentation

"Yesrightthisway!" the tail agreed, bolting away from the conflict. She produced a flechette pistol and a signalling device as she ran, neither native to the world. She also used some impressive ninja moves: she ran for a tall apartment building, vaulted 10' into the air, caught the railing with her legs, swung upside down and offered Don a hand up.

Atop the rooftop, the woman complained that her signalling device didn't have the necessary power to get a distress call out. Don asked for information. She explained that she was part of a group investigating the rifts, and that her name was Losora. She wanted to know who he was. When he introduced himself, she recognized him as "the volcano guy," referencing a (made up on the spot) prior adventure wherein Don had prevented Mount St. Helens from blowing up.

She also asked how long Don had been traveling with 'it,' referring to Doris as a dangerous object rather than a person after Doris' dimensional shifting and energy projection.

As they spoke, it was clear that the human forces on the world were losing badly. The gunfire moved further off, and the city burned. Losora explained that the same scenario was taking place on numerous worlds now, and pointed at larger creature that exploded up from the earth, flinging cars at the human soldiers.


Don offered to boost the gain on her signalling device, and she agreed. He used the battery from his defunct scanner to power it.After several hours, he was successful.

Losora was able to get a signal out, but mission control informed them that the only place they could open an aperture was at the spot where Doris had traveled away. Unfortunately, the docks had been completely overrun by this point. Losora agreed anyway, as the alternative was inevitable death. She lost the local outfit, beneath which she had the same zentai camouflage worn by the men who had gone after Cosmic Coffee.

Don produced his Rift-closing stapler. She scoffed, but he protested that it was better that high technology be 'disguised as something local." Don spotted a monster near the Rift, so he fired the stapler at a spot between the monster and the Rift to create a temporary 'blind spot' before they risked opening a gate.

That worked, and they were able to leave.

Location: Tunguska Parallel, bad neighborhood

Kay and Sidrophael went looking for a Chinese herbal shop, but Sid's host didn't know where to find one. Instead, he thought to ask his friend Crazy Eddie for help. So they went to a horrible dive bar.

Sid introduced Kay as his 'niece,' but this was dismissed by the bar patrons, who leered at her. Crazy Eddie demanded a quarter for his trouble, then began to give directions to a 'Chinaman's shop' nearby,

At this point, four men in the now familiar camouflage suits turned visible and attacked. One of them fired a razor shuriken at Sidrophael, who ducked.

They fired a net and an sonic blast at Kay, while the fourth team member tried to swat her with a baton. Kay evaded their attacks by jumping to the ceiling, digging her fingers right into the wood. The sonic blast still hit her, leaving her dazed.

Sidrophael attempted to tackle one of the four and shouted for Kay to just leave. Sid and the ninja grappled, the cyborg easily besting his human host.

Kay attempted to punch through the ceiling, but she put her fist right through the ceiling and into a washbasin, soaking her as she scrambled through. The men attacked again, and the sonic weapon streaked past her as she made it upstairs, causing an explosion and a fire.

The ninjas, presuming her dead, just stunned Sidrophael and left the premises.

Much later, they both regained consciousness and returned to Cosmic Coffee, only to learn that the others had yet to return.

Sidrophael left his lumberjack host and told everyone else to wait while he tried to track them down.

Location: Task Force Starbase

Don was immediately recognized and detained by the Sertai authorities, over Losora's vocal objections. The soldier leading the squad that took him into holding was a cyborg named Sovor. Don recognized their equipment as belonging to perhaps a dozen different cultures from neighboring alternate realities.

He was taken through a weapons scanner and bioscan, but they didn't bother to remove his basic tools.

Later, he was interviewed by Colonel Vunot, who had questions about a previous occasion wherein Don had destroyed a Sertai starbase in the Thotep Sector about sixty years earlier.

Don explained that the starbase had become infested with a sentient hive minded bacteria called the Galorax, capable of possessing humanoid hosts (such as the Sertai), and that the only way to deal with them in the end had been the base self-destruct.

Colonel Vunot believed him, and had him brought a cup of tea, promising a briefing later.

Some time passed, after which Don was released from his holding cell. Don asked if they could recover Cosmic Coffee, to which Vunot explained that the ship had been tagged for easy transit.


Location: Uninhabited Ice Age Parallel #465

Doris found herself in a snowy field after transit, no sign of civilization in sight. Her hands were no longer glowing, but strange power still coursed through her body. She felt the continued power to transport herself between alternate worlds, but had no idea how to target it.

She began to walk toward a nearby tree line, cautiously looking for anybody else. Eventually, she decided no one else was there and tried to make a fire. Experimenting with her powers, she was able to disintegrate snow. Unfortunately, the wood she tried to light on fire with her power didn't last any longer than the snow... but she was able to heat rocks up by almost disintegrating them.

Sidrophael came upon her in incorporeal form. He recognized the one as a world where human life never evolved, so he was forced to take a deer host.

He got to Doris and explained the situation, then used his secret knowledge to create a path that she could 'follow' with her dimensional transit powers back to the Tunguska Parallel, where she'd originally left.

He took a newsboy host ("Jimmy Pape! It's like 'paper,' but without the r!"), and the two of them walked back to where Cosmic Coffee had been, but the shop was now missing.


Sid told Doris to wait 'here,' meaning that world, and that he would track it down. He released his host, and departed.


Location: Task Force Starbase, interior

Cosmic Coffee was brought aboard with Kay, Sergei and Jack inside. Sovor asked who they were, and tried to get Don to confirm if they were supposed to be there, but Don protested, "I didn't get all their names!"

So instead, he was brought to the transit room to check. Meanwhile, they were brought out of Cosmic Coffee, with the only hitch being Kay. They scanned her, recognized the Akashic Amplifier, and raised their weapons.

Kay rolled her eyes and explained that if she wanted them dead, they would be already.

Colonel Vunot arrived with Don in tow and told them she was probably right, and ordered them to stand down.

The group went to a conference room to share information. The group related what they knew. Don placed particular emphasis on finding Freedom Ranger, siting just how odd it was to meet someone from a universe that should be fictitious.

Vunot explained that the Sertai were now part of an alliance of high tech worlds, collaborating across universal boundaries. The monster attacks had begun 22 days ago, and 11 planets had fallen in that time. The creatures were getting into human space via existing interdimensional gateways and older Raxomacrux rifts.



Location: Task Force Starbase, exterior

Sidrophael experienced rough transit following the path Cosmic Coffee had taken. He got a host outside of a starbase, but it occurred abruptly, and he accidentally let go of the base, drifting into space.

(This was due to a badly botched roll.)

He was secured and brought back inside, where he claimed to be an extradimensional entity possessing his host, needing to speak to Colonel Vunot about Don. He was unable to persuade his coworkers and was, instead, taken to sick bay for oxygen deprivation or consumption of narcotics.

Sidrophael left the host. Now that he had his bearings, he was able to find Don and take one of the guards in the conference room.

Location: Task Force Starbase, interior


Don recognized Sidrophael's appearance, and warned Colonel Vunot about the upcoming unpleasant surprise.

As expected, Vunot was not happy about Sid taking one of the security team for a host. He requested that Sid vacate so they could get him another, but Sid (out of Fate points) said he was 'stretched to thin' to do so immediately.

Vunot told him that he couldn't take the host off base. Sid agreed readily.

Kay had a couple of questions. To begin with, she wanted to know 'just what the heck an Akashic Amplifier is anyway?' Sidrophael explained that it was a weapon supposedly forged by pagan gods for their champions, one of many, and that it was attracted to a host based on willpower. Vunot added that they had been looking for it to help in their war efforts.

Kay also wanted to know if they had ever seen one of the monsters run, as had occurred after they arrived in Meteor Apocalypse #173 Parallel at Oliver's. Vunot said that they'd never seen one of the beasts run. Don believed that Freedom Ranger had scared it off, but Kay was dubious.

Vunot proposed an alliance, offering Task Force resources, and the group was all too happy to agree.

Don pointed out that they should also pick up Doris, as she was now a danger to herself and others.

Location: Tunguska Parallel, Seattle outskirts
Doris didn't have any money or food, so she wandered away from the former location of Cosmic Coffee to look for a job. (queue Incredible Hulk theme song.)


Character Updates:

• Don earned the Aspect "Oblivious." (And an honorary award for 'Best Dr. Who impersonation.')
• Doris gained the Extra "Energy Blast: Rift Energy."

Notes:

Fate's metagame remains intriguing. Most systems I've run or played worked from the governing principle that players are responsible for only their single protagonist. Fate takes the stance that players should have some control over the narrative itself.

I am very impressed with the results so far. It requires a certain flexibility as a game master/storyteller (you need to be willing to roll with the whims of the players), but the manner in which the players are constrained seems to keep things from being too wild and unpredictable.

The only thing I remain concerned by is Fate's combat system, which is not very robust. (Fights seem to be extremely low consequence until the end, where they ramp up sharply. I may want to do... something?)

Also, apologies if I flubbed anything, doing this log a day later than usual since I was pretty wrecked yesterday night. Hopefully I got the order mostly correct, and didn't miss any important details.