Ernest (Carlos Juan Victor Sanchez) is called off to engage in human kindness and charity on behalf of an ill friend. Tim (Christophe Joseph Pépin) calls up to point out that he must work. Work work work work. And that this goal is made rather harder by the fact that his clutch pedal failed yesterday. Thus our rather diminished group includes only Paul (Smith), Chuck (Quent Lawrence), Chris (Dmitri Baranov) and Bruce, all of whom solemnly vow to never allow kindness or responsibility to interfere with gaming.
Paul instructs everyone else that the key to both the shifter and the warforged is in the feats. Chris nods his head seriously as he muses, "Mmm... all in the feats... aaall in the feats..."
The session opens with the characters, Gabriel "The Egyptian" Houde, and a collection of gukin-lugal laborers from the Lemdok Tauba Gek-Ashkadek clustered around the base of the Tower Alone, smaller of the two Wailing Towers. The characters look down at the four-foot-diameter hole where the wounded tuau-gekgek fled. They hold a brief discussion on hunting tuau-gekgeks by using natives to flush them out. Dmitri Baranov summarizes the conversation with the comment, "I'm really glad I'm white, and not a native."
Quent Lawrence asks him, "Aren't Russians actually Asian?"
Baranov responds, "That's a dead lie and you know it!"
Smith suggests, "I say we get a shovel and go after the tuau-gekgek!"
Baranov asks, "Hey, Quent! How hard are those things to kill with guns?"
Quent muses, "Well, it's not that hard to kill them, but I'm not convinced that it's a good idea to go hunting them underground." He tells the others that tuau-gekgeks are like prairie dogs: they tend to cluster together across animal migration paths.
Baranov corrects him, "Yes, but prairie dogs don't kill and eat people!" They decide that they are not going to go crawling through old tuau-gekgek tunnels looking for toothy death.
The debate then turns to the question of where to place their camp. The Egyptian refuses to allow the characters to place a camp within the walls of the Emperor Tower or in the Garden. The characters refuse to place the camp on the high scrub near the Tower Alone. They eventually decide to put the camp in the far end of the Empress Shadow. The characters set up markers and move around looking for other tuau-gekgek lairs. Quent knows that throwing stones rarely draws tuau-gekgek out, as they have excellent vibration sense. The proposed solution is to use native Xea-Osk laborers as decoys. The characters ask for volunteers. They are disappointed to find that none of the natives are willing to act as bait, so Smith volunteers. Baranov estimates that Smith weights at least 350 lb. He tells the others, "We'll need a dozen men to pull him back in case he falls in a hole!" This time, they get volunteers.
Smith leads the group around the area. He notes that he is walking around with a rifle, a cavalry saber and a knife. He has no other possessions. Baranov comments, "So, first thing we're going to do is fit you out with a loincloth to cover your obvious lack of anatomy. And then I'm going to tie a rope to this thing on your ass that looks like a trailer hitch."
The characters run a perimeter around their campsite. The only excitement occurs when an imperceptive native yells out, "Tuau-gekgek! Tuau-gekgek!" It's just a rock, but it sucks up several bullets anyway.
Baranov, desperately reloading his rifle, gasps out, "It's made of stone! Smith! We need you to hunt it down!"
The characters find no more tuau-gekgeks within a fifty-meter safety zone around the Tower Alone, nor around the camp, nor in a marked safe path between the two, though they suspect there are more around.
The characters also try stuffing the old tuau-gekgek hole with dry brush and setting it on fire to try and smoke the creature out. They notice that this plan doesn't work all that well: the smoke still tends to drift upwards. Quent asks, "So, Smith. Do you know what s'mores are?"
The Egyptian has the native laborers mark out a grid and start digging. He suggests to the characters that they take a look at the tower. Baranov exclaims, "That sounds great! I'm puttin' on my looting boots!"
Quent adds, "Maybe we can find Smith a new brain!"
Baranov leads with his eternal lantern. The interior of the Tower Alone is very dark. The lantern sheds only a feeble beam that nerves constrict down into a claustrophobic spot. The sound of dripping water echoes from the far corners of the tower. The whole place is in very poor shape.
There is a rustle of wings and a razoring squawk. Baranov throws himself to the ground as something flaps past. Smith stands there, and watches curiously as the creature slashes him across the shoulder, inflicting no actual damage. Baranov looks up to yell, "What the hell was that?"
Quent rather calmly responds, "Luki-ektok. About like a turkey buzzard. Don't do much but eat dead things, but you can spook 'em real good if you walk into their lair. And they're not very good eating. They can fly, but not real well."
Smith perks up, "Look at the shiny bit on my shoulder! I think it has sharp claws!"
The characters continue on into the tower. They find that the sound of water is coming from a small pool. It looks like it might have been dug by a tuau-gekgek who hit water. Baranov thinks back to the shallow well that Quent dug at the campsite and guesses that the tuau-gekgek probably accomplished the same thing, probably without meaning to. Quent assures him, "Another way to kill tuau-gekgek. Their own stupidity."
Satisfied that nothing more was likely to fly at them right away, the characters turn to looting. Quent manages to find a rotten stone chest worth maybe 5.5 Lv. Baranov comments, "I think the ektok was nesting in it."
Smith comes over to the others with a shattered disturbing case. He makes an effort to reassemble it, then chirps to the others, "Look at this! The angles are all wrong!"
Then Smith finds a delicate broken vase worth 8 Lv. He tells the others, "I could put a beautiful flower in it! Or a severed human arm!"
Baranov offers, "Let me give you a hint. Stop talking about severed limbs!"
Smith tries to climb the stairs first. They collapse on him. He cheerfully tells the others, "I need to be repaired!"
Baranov comments, "Let's go make ourselves a ladder. Actually, let's make a couple of them." Baranov and Quent climb up, and then haul Smith up with ropes. Baranov reminds the mechanical man, "Remember what we said: no fuckin' dancing."
The second floor turns out to be a veritable trove of artifacts. Smith proves to be the most adept artifact-hunter of the group. He comes up with two items: a fascinating buried case worth 540 Lv and a buried faceted vase worth 100 Lv.
Baranov announces, "I found a Martian toothbrush! And a spitting cup!" The first is a stained faceted cup worth 2 Lv. The second is a chewed faceted statue worth 19 Lv.
Quent manages to find only a shattered mirrored cup worth maybe half a Livre. He enthuses, "I can see myself!"
Baranov looks at the characters' haul thus far and tells the others, "Oh god. I hope there's more valuable things upstairs."
Quent concurs, "I hope I find them to redeem myself."
Baranov looks at his statue and asks, "What kind of fucking animal chews on a statue?"
Quent answers him, "Rock weevil."
"Do they chew on people?"
"Only if they're hungry."
The characters follow a different strategy to reach the third floor: they go through a hole in the ceiling, using Smith as a ladder (+4 Climb bonus). Quent makes it up like a gazelle, making it look easy. Baranov finds out that Quent only made the climb look easy: it actually takes him a lot of work to make it up. Then they pull up Smith.
The third floor is high enough that the storms have blown in a layer of sand between one and three feet deep. All of the windows are clogged with drifts of sand. Quent spots some rekel-chucul tracks across the surface of the sand. He tells the others, "The rekel-chucul is like a spider. It's aggressive and fantastically poisonous."
Baranov groans, "Oh god."
Smith reassures his human companions, "I am unworried. Hey, they can jump up to twelve feet! Look, I have one on my face!" He crushes the thing.
Baranov gasps, "Good job, Smith."
The characters resume the search for artifacts with gloves and sticks. They find nine items over a five-hour search.
Smith finds four items: a buried aqueous clockwork worth 65 Lv, a chewed intricate scroll worth 16 Lv, a stained opaline plate worth 40 Lv, and a stained gurgling case worth 6 Lv. Smith spends some time examining the clockwork and eventually concludes that he has no idea what it does, even after a Mechanic roll.
Baranov finds only a powerful cracked plate that he estimates will bring in 8 Lv.
Quent does much better than he did down on the second floor. He comes up with four items: a large rusted scepter worth 11 Lv, a broken iridescent scroll worth 41 Lv, a stained fragile book worth 10 Lv, and a buried large statue worth 40 Lv.
By the time the characters finish, it is dark outside. The characters climb back down and head off to the camp. Nobody gets hurt. The laborers have set up a couple of campfires near their tents. The Egyptian has dozens of artifacts laid out on a huge tarp. Smith shows him the fascinating case worth 540 Lv; he is appropriately impressed. Quent suggests giving the rusted scepter to the Lemdok, telling him that the rust is actually huu-man blood.
The next morning the characters decide to go talk to the local Xea-Shvet tribesmen. They head off towards the Lagan Hesst along the curve of the Long Wall. Suddenly, Smith realizes that he is flat on his face because he's being dragged back to a hole in the ground by a huge paralytic tongue. He struggles silently against the tuau-gekgek.
It takes a moment for the others to even realize something is wrong. They ready their weapons as Smith evades being swallowed and shoots the creature in the head. Noting that it is still alive, Quent shoots it as well. The creature continues to thrash about. Quent bawls out, "Baranov! It's up to you! Next round it'll retreat into the ground!"
Baranov replies, "That's fine by me!"
The tuau-gekgek retreats into the ground.
Baranov asks the others, "Want to go after it?"
Smith clatters back, "No!" as he reloads his rifle. The instant his rifle is primed, he changes his mind, "Okay! I'm ready to follow it now!"
Quent looks at the mechanical man and asks, "Are you nucking futz?"
"Yes!"
The characters carefully proceed into the tuau-gekgek's tunnels, with Smith in the lead. They follow the blood trail down a narrow passage until they reach a larger chamber with the wounded tuau-gekgek inside. Smith shoots it, narrowly avoiding deafening Baranov and Quent. The creature dies.
Baranov asks Quent, "are these things good to eat?"
Quent replies, "Why yes!"
The characters cut off the creature's tongue and one leg, and then carry them out for breakfast. Smith carries the tongue; anyone else who touches it starts to feel disturbingly numb.
The characters are just departing when Quent sees something in the flash of the eternal lantern, just beyond the dead tuau-gekgek. In better light, it turns out to be the body of a large biped with a hard exoskeleton. Baranov reacts instantly, "It's urgu-subur! There are millions of those things! They're underground everywhere! We're doomed!" The body looks fairly fresh, so the characters pull it along and take it back to camp.
The Egyptian sees the characters returning. He is surprised, as he had thought the characters were going to talk to the tribesmen. He asks, "Back so soon? And what was up with all the shooting?"
Quent grimly responds, "Mole attack."
The characters leave the leg for a native to cook, the tongue for the Sot to analyze, and the bug for either the Egyptian or the Sot to examine. Then they head off to see the natives.
The characters finally make it into the Lagan Hesst. It doesn't take them long to find a fairly established-looking Xea-Shvet encampment. Quite a number of natives are around, and most of them don't seem to think that the characters are supposed to be there.
The characters eventually manage to strike up a conversation with three important-looking natives. The fact that all of them (except Smith) can speak the Xea-Shvet language helps to no end. Quent figures out that the three natives are:
The characters eventually manage to convince the Xea-Shvet that they are only interested in looting the Wailing Towers for artifacts, a project that the nomads have no interest in at all. The nomads are notably uninterested in Baranov's claim that they have a safe-passage from the Lemdok Tauba Gek-Ashkadek.
The characters stay in the native encampment until evening. Baranov talks the three leaders into a drinking contest. He contributes a bottle of vodka; they contribute skins of a much less potent local beverage. Baranov is the last man standing.
In the course of the evening, Pangonkrulman tells the characters that he will allow them to do what they want at the Wailing Towers if they perform a deed for him. Apparently just before the storms came in a group of Europeans landed in the Legion Hills and took over a stream site that the Xea-Shvet considered to be their territory. There are lizard-eye opals in the sands of the streambed, and the Europeans are forcing their green-skin slaves to find them. Pangonkrulman wants the Europeans and their slaves gone.
Quent listens carefully to Pangonkrulman's description of the European leader and determines that he is probably his enemy One-Eyed Jack, an English pirate with lusty habits.
Ganag-Taka shows the characters a rifle he took from one European that is German made. He says that there are about a dozen Europeans and maybe fifty slaves. All of the Europeans are armed with rifles, blades and knives. Baranov speculates that the smugglers are dealing with the German colony on Mars.
The characters agree to help the Xea-Shvet by eliminating the European smugglers. They speculate that they will need to fight only the dozen smugglers: the ssaug workers will probably not fight.
The characters bid farewell to the Xea-Shvet and make a quick trip back to the Tower Alone. They quickly search through the fourth floor, uncovering five artifacts:
With the fourth floor mined out, they head up to the fifth floor, using ladders made by the Xea-Osk laborers to make the ascent easier. They suffer some trouble getting up to the fifth floor: they choose an unstable wall section to brace the ladder. When Smith puts his full weight upon it, the wall collapses and sends him plummeting to the ground. He takes 17 points of damage.
Quent peers over the shattered wall to shout, "Smith? Are you still switched to Good?"
Baranov adds, "Is the ladder still okay?"
Smith admits that the ladder broke his fall, and was in turn broken into splinters. He is looking quite damaged, but is still able to clatter his way back up and join the others on the fifth floor.
The characters discover that the wall collapse opened up a sealed chamber containing a mysterious glowing orb two feet across supported by a pedestal filled with clockworks. The Old Xea-Osk runes on the side suggest that the thing is the Taug-eft-Utau, which translates to "Reservoir of Fire". Smith manages to figure out that the thing is a phlogiston reservoir, and served as a power supply for the Emperor Tower. He is not particularly sure how the thing works, if it can be recharged, or why the original builders of the tower felt that they needed to place their power supply so far away. Baranov suggests that it might be because the thing was judged an explosion risk. Though that would be pretty bad for all the folks living in the Tower Alone.
The session ends with the characters up at the top of the Tower Alone, admiring the Taug-eft-Utau. Each character gains three experience points.