Most of the usual suspects showed up, and selected the following characters:
Player |
Character |
Description |
|---|---|---|
| Tim | Jarvis McRanie | Shifty Docker |
| Nick | Sika Vinh Nuoc | Unbalanced Psionic |
| Big Chris | Charles Batanga | Union Organizer ("dangerous radical") |
| Little Chris | Isaac Kerezosky | Station Brawler |
| Other Chris | Ezekiel Patisse | Corrupt Businessman |
As part of the initial setup, several additional personal details not reflected upon the pregen character sheets were revealed. In particular, Isaac Kerezosky had recently broken his leg, and was still wearing a pressure cast (though through the miracles of TL8 medicine, he was walking normally). Charles Batanga had been captured while spreading COTWU union propaganda, and had been forced to swallow a datacube holding a list of union sympathizers on stations orbiting Chenoir. Finally, Jarvis McRanie had managed to hide a money card bearing 100 Marks in his sock and smuggle it into the detention facility.
Of the characters, both Jarvis McRanie and Isaac Kerezosky are recent arrivals, while Sika Vinh Nuoc, Charles Batanga and Ezekiel Patisse have all been incarcerated for several months. Just before he was brought to the Holding Area, Kerezosky learned that Area B-03 is due for re-education in two days. He tells the other characters this information after he makes their acquaintence.
The characters are asleep when the collision alarms go off. Once most of them have recovered from their initial surprise (except for Sika, who is still in cy'apopa withdrawl), they discover that Isaac Kerezosky is suffering some kind of seizure. He has torn his pressure cast off, and his tearing at the skin of his leg. It swiftly develops that there is a keycard and a retractable ceramic knife hidden in the flesh of his leg. He makes several Will rolls, and manages to pull them free.
Once Kerezosky has the keycard, he swiftly learns that it will open the doors of the cells, and frees all the characters. Moments after everyone is freed, the two guards assigned to the characters' holding area rush in, armed with stunsticks and plated in armor. While Kerezosky and Sika loot the Property Room, the remaining characters fight the guards. Several of them are badly wounded (in particular, Jarvis takes a blow to the ribs and is shocked by a guard's stunstick), but in the end they win. Once it is clear that the guards have been defeated, the characters beat them savagely, first killing them and then mutilating the bodies.
Charles Batanga and Isaac Kerezosky proceed to loot the guards, taking their helmets, armor vests, and stunsticks. Jarvis ensures that the guards still in the Security Station will not have a good view of the proceedings by smashing all of the cameras in the holding area.
Once the characters secure the holding area, Batanga pokes his head out into the corridor to determine if the way to the Security Station is clear. He sees two guards, one armed with a needler, and swiftly ducks back into the holding area, narrowly avoiding a fusillade of needles.
Moments later, the entire station shudders, as if a small but fast-moving object had hit near the station axis. Most of the characters manage to brace themselves and avoid damage, but Kerezosky falls half the length of the common room. The needler-armed guard in the corridor is less lucky, and falls the entire length of the corridor.
Seconds after the impact, all the lights in the holding area go out. Jarvis searches one of the guards and finds a flashlight. He and Kerezosky then venture into the now-cleared corridor to retrieve the needler from the fallen guard's body. They learn that the needler still works, but is damaged (-2 to hit rolls). Jarvis equips himself with the needler, the guard's helmet, and the guard's armor.
The characters determine that though the pressure door to the Security Station is secured, Kerezosky's keycard will open it. He does so and rushes through while Jarvis fires his newly-acquired needler through the doorway. Unfortunately, these efforts do not prevent the guards emplaced at the end of the corridor from shooting him twice. Jarvis moves through the doorway into the office area afterwards, and continues to provide cover fire until the gun jams. The other characters rush through the doorway under Jarvis' cover. Batanga manages to get through intact, but Patisse is shot twice and the unarmored Sika Vinh Nuoc is slain by a single well-placed shot.
The group reassembles within the office area and binds its wounds while Batanga sneaks over to the armory door to learn that Kerezosky's keycard does not open it. He also learns that there are two guards armed with stunsticks in the office area. He sneaks over to them and attacks, quickly backed up by the other characters. The assault is successful, and the guards are massacred.
With the office area secure, McRanie uses Batanga's security descrambler (retrieved from the Property Room some time ago) to open the armory door. The characters break in, then liberate needlers, stunsticks (which McRanie refers to as "twinkle sticks") and armor for everyone.
Batanga and Kerezosky proceed from the armory into the infirmary. While Kerezosky has strange visions telling him to go through the Auxiliary Access lock, Batanga manufactures a simple explosive device from an oxygen tank and a bottle of anaesthetic, "just in case."
Whilethe characters are busy in the office area and the armory, they are joined by Lyndon Mreke, the Deep-Range FTL Pilot, who replaces Nick's previous character.
The characters escape into the auxiliary access corridor, then try to determine the best next route. Kerezosky insists that he must, "Get the Man to the drop boat dock", but can't say exactly where it is. To provide that answer, Ezekiel Patisse uses his palmtop to link to a nearby network port and pull up a station map. He determines that there is a drop boat dock about a quarter of the way around the ring, and sketches out a route to reach it through the maintenance passages.
The characters get halfway to the boat dock when they are blocked by a sealed section, apparently breached by the accident that shook the station some minutes ago. Patisse determines that there are three possible routes through: go into the main corridors of the station and approach the boat dock through a normal route, go through maintenance corridors in a nearby nonvolatile storage tank, or go EVA and walk along the exterior of the station. The characters elect to try a spacewalk.
As soon as the characters get out onto the surface of the station, they can see exactly what hit the station. Half of the station's rings are covered by a huge sheet of crumpled ultrathin aluminum, apparently a lightsail that was originally attached to the shattered object that created the crater in the station's central axis. Pieces of debris float all around the station.
The trip across the surface of the station is interrupted by a piece of antenna that strikes McRanie and Patisse, holing both their suits. Patisse is stunned by the impact, but Batanga moves to seal his suit back with an emergency seal. McRanie, unfazed by the loss of pressure, seals his suit without aid.
Shortly before the characters reach the lock to the drop boat dock, two figures in pressure suits approach them, bearing needlers. McRanie decides that they are hostile, and engages in a brief firefight against them while the other characters escape into the lock. By the end of it, McRanie is still standing, but the two guards are not.
Inside the drop boat dock, the characters find twelve drop pods and one technician, Fred Donner. After a short conversation, Batanga shoots him and dumps his body into one of the drop pods. A argument breaks out among the characters over who is and who is not a psychopath. McRanie's final conclusion is that while Batanga is definitely a psychopath, he is a good shot and he's on the characters' side.
Mreke rigs two other pods to launch at the same time as the pod the characters occupy. Meanwhile, Batanga rigs his bomb to set off the fuel cell in a third pod several seconds after the characters' pod launches.
The characters climb into the chosen drop pod, and Mreke guides them safely to the surface of Chenoir, where several of Batanga's associates greet the group. The one-shot ends with the charactes boarding an interface craft with Batanga's unionists.