Dragonstar: Ancient Empires

[Viktyr Gehrig]

Well, folks, here we go again. Hopefully this lasts longer than my ill-fated Planescape/Star*Drive crossover.

My players are doing fairly extensive character backgrounds and sketches, and these should be available fairly soon.

Our heroes:
P.J. Donovan (Male Night-Adapted Human Bounty Hunter): A decorated veteran of the Legion's special forces. Donovan's unit was assigned to a deep-insertion mission into the Dark Zone seven years ago, but only Donovan returned... and he did not come back whole. He's been working as an enforcer and assassin for the Black Hole Syndicate on Cielun...

Captain John Merrick (Male Human Smuggler): A former Imperial pilot turned smuggler, Merrick's charm and piloting skills have gotten him out of more tight scrapes than most people have gotten into in their lives. He wields a strange power over others that not even he understands...

Clarice Logan (Female Human Bodyguard): Once a member of House Osurus' "Guardians of Paradise" counter-terrorism unit, a training accident forced Clarice into an early retirement and a career as a bodyguard that eventually led her to be stranded on Cielun...

Father Drake Saravos (Male Human Priest): A myserious holyman, Father Saravos seeks to atone for the crimes of his family, and for his crimes against them. As the draconic power in his blood grows stronger, however, he finds it more and more difficult to resist its call...

Novia Sunstrider (Female Elf Mage): A child prodigy of the arcane arts, Novia rebelled against her parents' prohibition on the study of magic, and eventually fled to seek out further instruction. Her blind ambition sucked her into the seedy underworld of Cielun, where a cruel master uses the false promise of training to manipulate her...

 

[Viktyr Gehrig]

Act I: Shadows Over Cielun

Our dubious heroes are trapped on the shadowy, urban world of CIELUN as the whole system drifts closer and closer to the forbidden DARK ZONE. As the clock ticks on their plans to escape the doomed planet, the heroes must avoid the schemes of Cielun's crime lords, the BLACK HOLE SYNDICATE-- until the situation goes from desperate to hopeless.
As the claws of the DRAGON EMPIRE tighten around our heroes, they must escape the Syndicate, the Empire, and the horrors of the Dark Zone itself.

***

Merrick groaned; the early morning daylight and the tortured shriek of grinding metal made last night's hangover unbearable. He rolled over in bed and dragged himself to his feet. "I need another drink," Merrick thought, "before I kill Claire for making that much noise." He dressed himself and threw on his bomber jacket before heading downstairs to face the day.

As he reached the ground floor, he found Donovan and Saravos in a heated argument over whether or not to seek employment from Vilius, a petty gangster with connections to the Black Hole Syndicate.

"Look, I've worked for him before," Donovan explained. "He's trustworthy, as gangsters go, and he's not as bad as some of the other scum on this planet."

The priest shook his head angrily. "He is still scum. If we work for him, we will be helping him hurt inno--"

Their conversation was abruptly ended by a large, humanoid shape crashing through their front window. With the exception of Clarice, who focused single-mindedly (with the aid of the piercing whine of her tools) on her work, the small band of adventurers turned their attention to the intruder. The stench of rotting flesh permeated the room.

"Ghouls." Donovan's face twisted into a half-grin, half-sneer as more undead crawled into the house; he considered the infrequent attacks by flesh-eating corpses a perk of living in the Alien District. He taunted the first intruder, mockingly dragging his nasty shiv against his own throat.

Obligingly, the ghoul rushed him, only to find itself a split second later hurtling through the window towards Cielun's surface, miles below. A second ghoul lunged at Clarice, interrupting her work, scattering her tools, and gouging shallow grooves into the surface of her armor. Too angry to be startled, she tore into the undead monster with her circular saw, spraying clotted blood across the room.

Saravos intercepted a third ghoul, pinning its arms behind its back before it could sink its claws into Merrick. The two inhuman combatants circled, each trying to tear into the other with his claws, and the ghoul snapping its teeth viciously at Saravos' neck. Luckily for the priest, his thick, scaly flesh kept the cannibal from doing any serious damage.

Keeping an eye on the two remaining undead, Merrick drew his blaster and levelled it at the one Saravos had grappled; he figured that, with the priest holding it still, he'd be less likely to hit an ally instead. Unfortunately, their struggling kept Merrick from getting a clean shot, and Merrick was forced to wait for a better opportunity.

Seeing that Merrick and Saravos had one of the ghouls contained, Donovan stepped carefully around the other side of Clarice's workbench, where he could distract the ghoul that was flailing uselessly at the mechanist. To get the ghoul's attention and provide Clarice a chance to draw her pistols, Donovan plunged his hand-made dagger in between the ghoul's ribs and into its lung-- a fatal blow to a living opponent, but a minor irritation to a walking corpse. As the ghoul flailed around to get to Donovan, Clarice stepped back, drew her blasters, and burned two clean holes in her impaled opponent, destroying it.

Saravos and the other ghoul continued struggling, but finally the mystic got the upper hand, pinning the ghoul with its claws and teeth out of reach. With the ghoul immobilized, Merrick and Clarice carefully placed their blasters against it and fired until it stopped struggling.

Donovan grinned. "Great way to start the morning; I get to kill something and we get free breakfast." The others shook their heads in disgust.

As the adventurers gathered their wits about them and started cleaning their temporary home, a large, well-dressed orc stepped into the room. "Youse is late wit' yer protection money, Merrick. Vilius don't like it when you're late."