Whizbang Dustyboots
Gnometown Hero
This thread is not a casualty of Lucasfilm. March has just been incredibly busy.
Hoping to post the next turn soon.
Hoping to post the next turn soon.
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NOW LIVE! Into the Woods--new character species, eerie monsters, and haunting villains to populate the woodlands of your D&D games.
Notorious: Rendezvous on Storix
- Thread starter Whizbang Dustyboots
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Whizbang Dustyboots
Gnometown Hero
The sky overhead blazed with light. Red and blue beams streaked across the heavens, illuminating the clouds below. Nimble starfighters and heavy gunships exchanged fire, weaving around a mishmash of ungainly other ships of all sorts. From the ground, it was impossible to tell if this was a battle between the Old Empire and the New Uprising, the Red Moon Syndicate and the Targ Cartel, or someone else.
Not that Facula Albedo was actually on the ground.
A generation ago, engineers wanted a simple way to get ore from Gur the Targ's Spice Mines to the Nuuka Spaceport as cheaply and efficiently as possible.
With the sort of ruthless logic that only an engineer who would never have to use it daily could employ, they built a five mile long bridge, the width of two hovertrucks, running from mountaintop to mountaintop, 2,000 meters above the ground.
And with chunks of flaming starships falling all around him, Albedo was halfway across.
"Nass!" Albedo roared, struggling to be heard over the sound of the carnage. "We don't need to fight over this! We're friends!"
Albedo couldn't hear the snort that Nass G'rassk made at this, but he knew the Talok well enough to read the sneer on his scaly face. They were friends, to the extent that G'rassk had any, but he had been so scarred by his time in the Mystic Order's temple as a young child that everything, including friendship, had to fight its way out through layer upon layer of rage.
"Just fulfilling my contract!" G'rassk yelled, voice crackling through the translator mask he wore. His instructors had forbidden their students to speak Galactic Standard as children, to better indoctrinate them into the teachings of their order. G'rassk could understand it well enough, but still could not bring himself to speak it himself, even years after he'd fled his masters.
"Me too," Albedo muttered, hands hovering over the pistols at his waist.
G'rassk abandoned the Mystic Order before learning all of the powers of a full initiate and refused to use a plasma sword. He was dangerous at close range, where his electrostaff was both an impenetrable wall and a deadly threat. And at range ...
Albedo felt his pistols jerk slightly away from his grip and the brush of what felt like fingertips across his forehead.
"Knock it off," Albedo growled, snatching at his pistols. That touch in his mind meant that G'rassk was listening to his thoughts, so he didn't need to yell. "You toss them over the side and you're buying me new pistols."
Don't interfere with Itsuki Itch, G'rassk's voice rumbled in his mind.
"I know, you've been hired to protect him from me."
I would do it for free, G'rassk rumbled. He's trying to do something great.
"'Don't Get Attached!' Does no one care about the Guild Code but me?"
Albedo could feel the ghost of G'rassk's chuckle in his mind and he inched closer, lifting his hands slowly away from his pistols, fingers spread open.
Djed Kebay never believed in honor or anyone else's rules.
"No, he didn't. Not sure anyone in the galaxy is upset that he's dead. Not the way they would be if you or I don't make it off this bridge."
Albedo kept inching closer to G'rassk, keeping his mind on all the good times they'd had. They had both joined the Nomad Guild at the same time, two runaways looking for a new start and needing someone to watch their back. They'd each saved the other's life more than once, fighting off agents of both the Admiral and Master Vacuus until each realized they'd have to wait to have their vengeance.
Another step closer. A huge chunk of ship -- Condor class, part of Albedo's mind automatically recognized -- tumbled past them into the ravine, glowing with the heat of reentry.
Enough, Facula. I don't want to hurt you, but I will toss your weapons and bike over the side and and leave you defenseless and walking out of here. What do you know about Itsuki's whereabouts and mission?
Albedo felt the fingertips brushing across his forehead again, more insistent now as G'rassk probed deeper, although without the skill of a Master or Grandmaster.
"That he's headed to Nuuka and that you're assigned to make sure he's able to get off the planet safely." He was close enough for G'rassk to hear him normally now.
"He's not there yet," the speaker crackled. "Just securing the site."
"Which hangar? I'm not interested in hurting him. They just want him to stand trial or something."
Another snarling laugh from G'rassk.
"That's as good as killing him," came the voice from the speaker. "He's too dangerous to the Order to let him live."
"Because of his skill with the plasma sword?"
"Because of his ideas ... what?"
Albedo was atop the Talok now, knocking his electrostaff out of reach, G'rassk's tattered robes flapping around them, as Albedo tried to pin his wrists to the ground.
"'Don't Get Attached!'"
The electrostaff leapt to Gr'assk's hands, glancing off Albedo's stun baton, which he got up just in time. Albedo, rolling back onto his feet, swung at G'rassk's face, ripping away the translator mask.
Just walk away, Facula! This is bigger than the Nomad's Guild!
G'rassk swung his staff two-handed, faster than seemed possible unless one knew he was using his mystic arts to speed the blow. But Albedo did know and was expecting it. He sidestepped the blow and then stepped up to his friend, wrapping him in a bear hug.
"'Finish The Job!'" he quoted, headbutting Nass G'rassk into unconsciousness.
He stood swaying over his friend a moment, wiping the blood from his forehead. The sound of exploding starcraft competed with the ringing in his head, conspiring to drive him into unconsciousness.
"And the Nomad's Guild is all I have left," he muttered.
Albedo tied G'rassk to the other Nomad's hoverbike and then searched through his datapad, using the Talok's limb hand to bypass the biometrics. He scanned through the few conversations with Itsuki Itch that hadn't already been deleted. Still, it was enough.
He reached over and activated the emergency features on G'rassk's bike, indicating he had been in a serious accident and needed medical help immediately. The hoverbike took a moment to locate the nearest medical facility and raced off to deliver its rider there.
Albedo staggered back to his bike and sat on it a moment, waiting for his head to clear.
Assuming G'rassk's information was correct, he had several hours before Itsuki would be at the spaceport. He needed to get cleaned up and rest up before confronting this Mystic that everyone seemed to agree was incredibly dangerous.
The Real Deal -- "Limitless Products With Limitless Potential!" a flickering sign announced, despite all the evidence to the contrary -- was a ramshackle trading post, patronized by a variety of Lek'tok, Murians and Ghols. Nothing for sale looked new or even slightly used. But there was the smell of food cooking and the patrons looked happy to eat it. Good enough.
Albedo's head had stopped bleeding and the ringing was gone from his ears. The space battle overhead was ending as someone was winning.
The patrons of the Real Deal stood outside, drinks in hand, oohing and aahing as plasma beams and explosions lit up the sky.
Albedo picked his way through them, spotting an empty stool he could drop into and order something to eat.
"Listen, you little worm -- you're going to pay for my meal, and my man's too!"
A hulking Ghol stood before him, looming over a petrified Murian. She shoved the littler figure back, blocking Albedo's route to the stool.
"Can you two just settle this peacefully?" Albedo sighed. "I've had a long day and I just want to eat."
The Ghol snarled without looking at Albedo.
"This dwang-for-brains knocked into us, spilling all our dinner over the ground. And now he's going to pay for it!"
The Murian's terrified squeak suggested he wasn't going to be able to do any such thing.
"I'll pay for your dinner," Albedo said. "Just let me get mine."
"No," the Ghol said, gripping the Murian's lapel. "He made me lose face. So now I'm going to mess up his."
"Look, lady, I've had a really bad day," Albedo growled and for the first time, the two Ghols and the Murian looked at him.
He was armed, bloody, bruised but defiant. It had clearly been a bad day for him, but worse for other people.
The Ghol let go of the Murian, who made brief eye contact with Albedo and raced off when Albedo jerked his head, telling the little man to go.
The Ghol woman straightened up now, smiling broadly.
"A Nomad! I've always thought about joining the Guild! What's the work like?"
"Hungry," Albedo said, elbowing past her to the stool, just ahead of a Lek'tok hoping to claim it. "It's very hungry work."
Not that Facula Albedo was actually on the ground.
A generation ago, engineers wanted a simple way to get ore from Gur the Targ's Spice Mines to the Nuuka Spaceport as cheaply and efficiently as possible.
With the sort of ruthless logic that only an engineer who would never have to use it daily could employ, they built a five mile long bridge, the width of two hovertrucks, running from mountaintop to mountaintop, 2,000 meters above the ground.
And with chunks of flaming starships falling all around him, Albedo was halfway across.
"Nass!" Albedo roared, struggling to be heard over the sound of the carnage. "We don't need to fight over this! We're friends!"
Albedo couldn't hear the snort that Nass G'rassk made at this, but he knew the Talok well enough to read the sneer on his scaly face. They were friends, to the extent that G'rassk had any, but he had been so scarred by his time in the Mystic Order's temple as a young child that everything, including friendship, had to fight its way out through layer upon layer of rage.
"Just fulfilling my contract!" G'rassk yelled, voice crackling through the translator mask he wore. His instructors had forbidden their students to speak Galactic Standard as children, to better indoctrinate them into the teachings of their order. G'rassk could understand it well enough, but still could not bring himself to speak it himself, even years after he'd fled his masters.
"Me too," Albedo muttered, hands hovering over the pistols at his waist.
G'rassk abandoned the Mystic Order before learning all of the powers of a full initiate and refused to use a plasma sword. He was dangerous at close range, where his electrostaff was both an impenetrable wall and a deadly threat. And at range ...
Albedo felt his pistols jerk slightly away from his grip and the brush of what felt like fingertips across his forehead.
"Knock it off," Albedo growled, snatching at his pistols. That touch in his mind meant that G'rassk was listening to his thoughts, so he didn't need to yell. "You toss them over the side and you're buying me new pistols."
Don't interfere with Itsuki Itch, G'rassk's voice rumbled in his mind.
"I know, you've been hired to protect him from me."
I would do it for free, G'rassk rumbled. He's trying to do something great.
"'Don't Get Attached!' Does no one care about the Guild Code but me?"
Albedo could feel the ghost of G'rassk's chuckle in his mind and he inched closer, lifting his hands slowly away from his pistols, fingers spread open.
Djed Kebay never believed in honor or anyone else's rules.
"No, he didn't. Not sure anyone in the galaxy is upset that he's dead. Not the way they would be if you or I don't make it off this bridge."
Albedo kept inching closer to G'rassk, keeping his mind on all the good times they'd had. They had both joined the Nomad Guild at the same time, two runaways looking for a new start and needing someone to watch their back. They'd each saved the other's life more than once, fighting off agents of both the Admiral and Master Vacuus until each realized they'd have to wait to have their vengeance.
Another step closer. A huge chunk of ship -- Condor class, part of Albedo's mind automatically recognized -- tumbled past them into the ravine, glowing with the heat of reentry.
Enough, Facula. I don't want to hurt you, but I will toss your weapons and bike over the side and and leave you defenseless and walking out of here. What do you know about Itsuki's whereabouts and mission?
Albedo felt the fingertips brushing across his forehead again, more insistent now as G'rassk probed deeper, although without the skill of a Master or Grandmaster.
"That he's headed to Nuuka and that you're assigned to make sure he's able to get off the planet safely." He was close enough for G'rassk to hear him normally now.
"He's not there yet," the speaker crackled. "Just securing the site."
"Which hangar? I'm not interested in hurting him. They just want him to stand trial or something."
Another snarling laugh from G'rassk.
"That's as good as killing him," came the voice from the speaker. "He's too dangerous to the Order to let him live."
"Because of his skill with the plasma sword?"
"Because of his ideas ... what?"
Albedo was atop the Talok now, knocking his electrostaff out of reach, G'rassk's tattered robes flapping around them, as Albedo tried to pin his wrists to the ground.
"'Don't Get Attached!'"
The electrostaff leapt to Gr'assk's hands, glancing off Albedo's stun baton, which he got up just in time. Albedo, rolling back onto his feet, swung at G'rassk's face, ripping away the translator mask.
Just walk away, Facula! This is bigger than the Nomad's Guild!
G'rassk swung his staff two-handed, faster than seemed possible unless one knew he was using his mystic arts to speed the blow. But Albedo did know and was expecting it. He sidestepped the blow and then stepped up to his friend, wrapping him in a bear hug.
"'Finish The Job!'" he quoted, headbutting Nass G'rassk into unconsciousness.
He stood swaying over his friend a moment, wiping the blood from his forehead. The sound of exploding starcraft competed with the ringing in his head, conspiring to drive him into unconsciousness.
"And the Nomad's Guild is all I have left," he muttered.
Albedo tied G'rassk to the other Nomad's hoverbike and then searched through his datapad, using the Talok's limb hand to bypass the biometrics. He scanned through the few conversations with Itsuki Itch that hadn't already been deleted. Still, it was enough.
He reached over and activated the emergency features on G'rassk's bike, indicating he had been in a serious accident and needed medical help immediately. The hoverbike took a moment to locate the nearest medical facility and raced off to deliver its rider there.
Albedo staggered back to his bike and sat on it a moment, waiting for his head to clear.
Assuming G'rassk's information was correct, he had several hours before Itsuki would be at the spaceport. He needed to get cleaned up and rest up before confronting this Mystic that everyone seemed to agree was incredibly dangerous.
The Real Deal -- "Limitless Products With Limitless Potential!" a flickering sign announced, despite all the evidence to the contrary -- was a ramshackle trading post, patronized by a variety of Lek'tok, Murians and Ghols. Nothing for sale looked new or even slightly used. But there was the smell of food cooking and the patrons looked happy to eat it. Good enough.
Albedo's head had stopped bleeding and the ringing was gone from his ears. The space battle overhead was ending as someone was winning.
The patrons of the Real Deal stood outside, drinks in hand, oohing and aahing as plasma beams and explosions lit up the sky.
Albedo picked his way through them, spotting an empty stool he could drop into and order something to eat.
"Listen, you little worm -- you're going to pay for my meal, and my man's too!"
A hulking Ghol stood before him, looming over a petrified Murian. She shoved the littler figure back, blocking Albedo's route to the stool.
"Can you two just settle this peacefully?" Albedo sighed. "I've had a long day and I just want to eat."
The Ghol snarled without looking at Albedo.
"This dwang-for-brains knocked into us, spilling all our dinner over the ground. And now he's going to pay for it!"
The Murian's terrified squeak suggested he wasn't going to be able to do any such thing.
"I'll pay for your dinner," Albedo said. "Just let me get mine."
"No," the Ghol said, gripping the Murian's lapel. "He made me lose face. So now I'm going to mess up his."
"Look, lady, I've had a really bad day," Albedo growled and for the first time, the two Ghols and the Murian looked at him.
He was armed, bloody, bruised but defiant. It had clearly been a bad day for him, but worse for other people.
The Ghol let go of the Murian, who made brief eye contact with Albedo and raced off when Albedo jerked his head, telling the little man to go.
The Ghol woman straightened up now, smiling broadly.
"A Nomad! I've always thought about joining the Guild! What's the work like?"
"Hungry," Albedo said, elbowing past her to the stool, just ahead of a Lek'tok hoping to claim it. "It's very hungry work."
Rolled a 2 on Exploration: "If your Notoriety is 6 or higher, you encounter a Lead." Things are starting to happen faster now, as expected.
I roll a 5 on the Leads table: "They're a Rival Nomad, vying to get to the Target first to capture or protect them. Roll for their Nomad profile. Resolve all: What connection does this Nomad have to your Origin? Speak with them. They Attack you, using the Loadout on their profile. Lose 2 Favour and gain 1 Notoriety if you kill them." I only have 2 Favour, so this would be a bad idea.
Rolling up the Nomad:
They're an Uncanny: "Your unusual look and esoteric techniques hide a unique talent, belief or genetic trait that gives you an edge." They left the oppressive Mystic Order cult they were born into to explore the galaxy. They only speak through a rare or ancient language, translated through crackling speakers. They did not understand their powers as a child and hurt someone. They're a reptilian Talok named Nass G'rassk, with an angry personality.
For showdowns, I roll a 2 for the Site: "You meet on a precarious bridge or platform, high above a canyon or river." I roll a 6 for Setting: "A starfighter battle breaks out int he sky above, bombarding the area with debris and stray laser fire." These generators are cinematic as hell.
OK, time for combat. G'rassk has +2 at ranged with his mystic powers or +2 in melee with his electrostaff. He has a +1 on defense.
Albedo rolls a 6 + 2 for an eight on the first melee attack. G'rassk rolls a 5 + 2, for a 7. His 1 defense allows him to block his first lost attack.
Albedo rolls a 6 + 1 on his next attack for a 7. G'rassk rolls a 5 + 2, for a 7. A friend pointed out to me that the language of the rule in the book says that if the PC beats a roll he wins, implying that ties are a loss. Oops!
Time to burn some of Albedo's 3 motivation points, forcing G'rassk to reroll. This time, he gets a 2 + 2 for a 4. And with his Defense gone, he's down.
Since Albedo spares his friend's life, obviously, he gets +1 Favour, for a total of 4. He's getting a reputation as a tough guy, but not a bad guy.
Rolled a 3 for Destination: "You arrive at a bustling market or travelling scrap crawler run by Locals." I have to choose between a Destination Events roll or speaking with a Local to gain Motivation. I'll go with a Destination Event, and roll a 2 and then a 6: "You see an unaffiliated mercenary or rebellious citizen being intimidated by a Hostile soldier or guard." I roll a 6: "If you successfully get rid of the Hostile, you may try to Recruit the Asset. How do they help you take down or scare off their tormentor?"
Details of the trading post are rolled up, as always using the Game Master's Sci-Fi Toolkit.
Threaten roll against the Ghol: 4 + 3 (half of Notoriety, rounded up), for a 7. There's no way a mundane Hostile can beat that, so the Ghol backs down.
A 4 on the results roll: "Their anger turns to genuine curiosity about the life of a Nomad."
We're near the end of the game and Albedo's in no mood to recruit the Murian.
I roll a 5 on the Leads table: "They're a Rival Nomad, vying to get to the Target first to capture or protect them. Roll for their Nomad profile. Resolve all: What connection does this Nomad have to your Origin? Speak with them. They Attack you, using the Loadout on their profile. Lose 2 Favour and gain 1 Notoriety if you kill them." I only have 2 Favour, so this would be a bad idea.
Rolling up the Nomad:
They're an Uncanny: "Your unusual look and esoteric techniques hide a unique talent, belief or genetic trait that gives you an edge." They left the oppressive Mystic Order cult they were born into to explore the galaxy. They only speak through a rare or ancient language, translated through crackling speakers. They did not understand their powers as a child and hurt someone. They're a reptilian Talok named Nass G'rassk, with an angry personality.
For showdowns, I roll a 2 for the Site: "You meet on a precarious bridge or platform, high above a canyon or river." I roll a 6 for Setting: "A starfighter battle breaks out int he sky above, bombarding the area with debris and stray laser fire." These generators are cinematic as hell.
OK, time for combat. G'rassk has +2 at ranged with his mystic powers or +2 in melee with his electrostaff. He has a +1 on defense.
Albedo rolls a 6 + 2 for an eight on the first melee attack. G'rassk rolls a 5 + 2, for a 7. His 1 defense allows him to block his first lost attack.
Albedo rolls a 6 + 1 on his next attack for a 7. G'rassk rolls a 5 + 2, for a 7. A friend pointed out to me that the language of the rule in the book says that if the PC beats a roll he wins, implying that ties are a loss. Oops!
Time to burn some of Albedo's 3 motivation points, forcing G'rassk to reroll. This time, he gets a 2 + 2 for a 4. And with his Defense gone, he's down.
Since Albedo spares his friend's life, obviously, he gets +1 Favour, for a total of 4. He's getting a reputation as a tough guy, but not a bad guy.
Rolled a 3 for Destination: "You arrive at a bustling market or travelling scrap crawler run by Locals." I have to choose between a Destination Events roll or speaking with a Local to gain Motivation. I'll go with a Destination Event, and roll a 2 and then a 6: "You see an unaffiliated mercenary or rebellious citizen being intimidated by a Hostile soldier or guard." I roll a 6: "If you successfully get rid of the Hostile, you may try to Recruit the Asset. How do they help you take down or scare off their tormentor?"
Details of the trading post are rolled up, as always using the Game Master's Sci-Fi Toolkit.
Threaten roll against the Ghol: 4 + 3 (half of Notoriety, rounded up), for a 7. There's no way a mundane Hostile can beat that, so the Ghol backs down.
A 4 on the results roll: "Their anger turns to genuine curiosity about the life of a Nomad."
We're near the end of the game and Albedo's in no mood to recruit the Murian.
Whizbang Dustyboots
Gnometown Hero
Facula Albedo
Human Scoundrel
Favour: 4/6
Notoriety: 6/6
Motivation: 2/6
Human Scoundrel
Favour: 4/6
Notoriety: 6/6
Motivation: 2/6
Joshua Randall
Legend
Red and blue beams streaked across the heavens, illuminating the clouds below.
The red are the bad guys and the blue are the good guys, right?
—
They left the oppressive Mystic Order cult they were born into to explore the galaxy. They only speak through a rare or ancient language, translated through crackling speakers. They did not understand their powers as a child and hurt someone.
Is all of that from the prompts / generator?
—
These generators are cinematic as hell.
That they are!
—
Albedo's in no mood to recruit the Murian.
But what about the inevitable sequel in which the nervous, high strung Murian is the key to the plot, using his leet financial accounting skills?
The red are the bad guys and the blue are the good guys, right?
—
They left the oppressive Mystic Order cult they were born into to explore the galaxy. They only speak through a rare or ancient language, translated through crackling speakers. They did not understand their powers as a child and hurt someone.
Is all of that from the prompts / generator?
—
These generators are cinematic as hell.
That they are!
—
Albedo's in no mood to recruit the Murian.
But what about the inevitable sequel in which the nervous, high strung Murian is the key to the plot, using his leet financial accounting skills?
Whizbang Dustyboots
Gnometown Hero
Man, can you imagine color-coding the heroes and villains that way? That would be so weird.The red are the bad guys and the blue are the good guys, right?
That's all from the Uncanny Nomad prompts on page 35 of the rulebook. These are really good prompts.
Well, first he appears in a paperback anthology when we find out that he's actually an important member of the New Uprising. After that, there's the action figure only available to members of a subscription club. Then he appears in a manga-style anthology show but not yet in canon. Then reddit yells about the character for years. And then he shows up and has a major role in an upcoming episode.
So any day now!
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Whizbang Dustyboots
Gnometown Hero
Nuuka Spaceport was a sprawling complex, occupying every part of a massive, artificially created plain. But it ran according to the workday. Although there were parts of the port ran all hours of the day and night, operated by droids or criminals.
At this hour, whole wings of the spaceport were dark, except for security lighting spaced far enough away from each other to make the spaces in between very dark and very unsafe.
Facula Albedo walked quietly down a broad corridor toward Hangar 66, hugging the wall in an attempt to see anyone else in the corridor silhouetted by the intermittent security lighting, but waiting at any moment for the sinister sizzle of a plasma sword unsheathing. Even after all this time, the sound could still make him flinch.
Anthem Starkiller was the best pilot at the Imperial Naval Academy. Which made sense: She had grown up rich, an admiral's daughter. While Facula had to learning piloting through hours of playing Peregrine Fighter at Underslum 4's Grand Arcade, Anthem had grown up flying a military surplus Peregrine her family owned.
They had grown up only a few clicks apart, but light years away in experience.
Where Albedo was shy, nervous that his Underslum accent and manners would give him away in any interaction, Anthem had grown up rubbing elbows with senators and ambassadors. She was beautiful, smart and talented. And she was cruel, surrounded by similarly privileged cronies who saw the academy not as a way to decent life for themselves and their family but as the first rung on a ladder that led to the Imperial Senate, the governor's palace of Veltari or Orceron, or an admiral's flagship.
Albedo being as good as he was, good enough to potentially keep some of Anthem's associates from graduating near the top of their flight class, didn't set well with them.
"Watch yourself, gutter rat," the voice crackled over comm channels as Albedo desperately twisted his fighter to the side, tumbling off course to avoid the twin fighters that had just dropped down in front of his ship, forcing him to choose between crashing and successfully completing the course.
If he wrecked a starfighter, the cost of it would be charged to him and his family, meaning they would all spend their lives in a debtor's prison on Utov.
But for members of Anthem's clique, there would be no such consequence: Money would change hands, some calls would be made, and for them, it would be written off as the fault of the maintenance droids or a software glitch.
When Albedo and others from the underclass and lower class spent their off-hours using fine brushes to clean the starfighters of those who'd performed best each week, Anthem's clique found other ways to fill their time, including private dueling clubs, where they'd fence with delicate plasma swords, with the ultimate goal of giving each other harmless but impressive scars on their faces and hands, adding to their legend as fierce warriors of the Old Empire, even if their weapons were the size of a finger and were more suited to carving dinner than to hand to hand combat.
And there were even worse ways they spent their time.
Albedo stopped in the corridor, water dripping from the ceiling beams above him. The moon was hidden behind black clouds tonight. The four figures before him were visible only by the security light behind them. A massive hover crate floated between them.
"We good, friend?" one of them, a Ghol by his silhouette, called out, slowly pulling out his sidearm, as had his compatriots. They could not see Albedo or if anyone was with him, but they'd heard him step into a puddle.
"We're good," Albedo called out, keeping his voice steady. "Just making my way to Hangar 66. Not interested in anything else."
The figures conferred quietly and then the Ghol nodded. They moved off with their cargo into the darkness. Albedo waited for the sound of their footfalls to fall away and then waited some more.
At first, the cadets didn't know why they were being grilled. Their movements, their interactions, questions about their finances and interactions with those outside the Academy, probing questions about possible New Uprising sympathies -- it was all just a rush of questions from interrogation droids and the Office of Investigation.
Only once the cadets gathered again in their barracks after questioning were they able to piece together what had happened: Someone was suspected of stealing starfighters parts and ammunition and selling it to the Red Moon Syndicate.
Albedo was baffled. Not only was arranging such a scheme incredibly difficult, but the penalty for doing so was death. He couldn't imagine being so reckless.
The Bravery Dawn was a modified Condor class heavy fighter, capable of hyperspace travel with room for a small crew or comfortable living for one. The ship was mostly in darkness, lit by distant spaceport lights and the interior lights pouring down the open boarding ramp.
Itsuki Itch, apparently finishing his pre-flight inspection of the interior, was walking toward the ramp when something made him pause, and he turned toward Albedo in the darkness.
"The one-eyed bounty hunter arrives at last."
Even half-visible in the limited light of the hangar, he was beautiful, the light from the Bravery Dawn forming a halo around him, showing off robes whiter than snow and thick black hair that flowed like a waterfall around his head.
"A lot of people didn't want me to find you," Albedo said, circling a little to make sure he could still get a shot off if the Mystic Order master retreated up the ramp. "Also, it takes twice as long to look with just the one eye."
"Those people were right," Itch said, lingering at the bottom of the ramp. He didn't reach for the hilt of his plasma sword, but he left it clearly visible. It wasn't a toy like some swords Albedo had encountered in the past; this was a weapon that had seen daily use against some of the best warriors in the galaxy. The polished finger marks on the hilt were visible from across the hangar. "I'm doing something important."
"I don't care," Albedo said, feeling the ghostly brush of fingertips across his forehead penetrating through the skull, into his brain.
"Yes, 'Finish the Job,'" Itch said. "You believe in something. Would you like to hear what I believe in?"
"Not really," Albedo said, slowly pulling his pistols from their holsters, but not raising them. "Unless it's that you believe in coming without a fight."
Itch laughed silently at this. Even across the hangar, his beautiful white smile was clearly visible in the darkness, like a beam of moonlight had penetrated the clouds just for that purpose.
"The Mystic Order follow a philosophy we refer to as the Path. We walk it, tending to the Garden we dwell in, the galaxy as large. We seek to prevent it from being thrown into disharmony by letting anything overgrow it or having the plants cut back too severely."
"You're doing a bang-up job. No disharmony in this galaxy."
"Yes," Itch said darkly. "In time, the Masters and Grandmasters came to see our job as preserving the current order of things, the status quo, without questioning whether that was the way the galaxy was intended to be, if we were embracing and supporting a state of disharmony. For centuries, we have prevented the Old Empire from ever truly crushing dissent and stopped the various rebellions and resistances from ever overthrowing the imperial order. And we told ourselves we were serving the needs of the galaxy's residents in doing so. Things never got worse but we also never allowed things to get better."
Despite himself, Albedo felt himself lowering his pistols slightly.
"Go on."
"I knew I could not be the only member of the Mystic Order to have questioned the current interpretation of the Path," Itch said. "I sought out the records of our order. The ones from before we chose our current direction seemed to have all been lost to history. But here, on Storix, there was said to be a deep archive, collecting our records going back millennia. And I found myself thwarted. The records have been removed or destroyed. And the Masters and Grandmasters I had confronted in my search, worried that I might sway others to my cause, have taken to hiring armed killers to stop me."
In the darkness, Albedo felt his cheeks burning in shame.
"But it doesn't matter," Itch said, throwing back his head, his beautiful hair falling back like a wave. He unsheathed his plasma sword, illuminating his form in violet light. "I will overthrow the leadership of the Mystic Order. And when I'm Emperor ..."
"Ah, there it is," Albedo growled, raising his pistols again. A blinding wave of pain, the fingertips inside his head suddenly clenching into a fist, almost dropped him to his knees.
"Disrespectful," Itch snarled.
There was a blur and suddenly the Mystic Order Master had closed the space between them. His plasma sword crackled loudly, pulses of heat coming off it. Up close, the blade wasn't violet, but was revealed to actually be patches of swirling red and blue, consuming each other and splitting apart again, endlessly. The presence of a naked plasma sword so close to his face made Albedo's mouth go dry and he felt icy sweat coating his skin.
"Attempting to stop me, so selfish and short-sighted."
"Do you know what you've done?" Anthem Starkiller screamed.
They were alone in the barracks, the first two back after hours of questioning by the Office of Investigation. Anthem and her clique had been pulled into conference rooms for interrogation on the way back from their dueling club and she was still dressed in her black fencing gear.
"I told them the truth -- that I saw you three selling crates of missiles to the Red Moon!"
"Grow up!" Anthem snarled, hurling her fencing mask at Albedo's head. "You think we're the only ones doing it?"
"I don't care!" Albedo snapped, more bravely than he felt, backing away as Anthem stalked toward him. "They just assumed someone from the Underslums must have been responsible. I'm not going to a prison planet for you!"
"They lost their commissions!" Anthem snarled. "You selfish, short-sighted gutter rat!"
She pulled her plasma sword hilt from her wrist sheath. It was a small thing, only about as big as a finger, gleaming with decorative chrome. She pressed a button on it and the hissing blade slid out, the red plasma wreathed in wisps of smoke.
"You don't deserve to be here," Anthem snarled, slashing at him. Albedo had to fight the impulse to raise a hand in defense, which would just get it amputated. "Everyone knows it. And no one will miss you when you're gone."
The dueling club weren't serious swordfighters in the way that the Mystic Order was. But their sporting plasma swords were still weapons. Even the armor the duelists wore could only save them from a glancing blow. And against an unarmed and unarmored Albedo, the swords were deadly.
But as dangerous as the weapons were, Anthem and her friends had been play-acting. They wanted scars that would look impressive in holo-portraits and on the news. This was the first time she had ever tried to truly hurt someone with a plasma sword.
In contrast, Albedo had been fighting for his life, handfuls of credits or a few rations, since he was a small boy. He hadn't preyed upon others in the Underslum, but people had tried to prey upon him many times. He could anticipate Anthem's blows and not be where the blade would be by the time she sunk it into a wall or a bed or a wardrobe in the barracks.
"Think!" Albedo shouted, gasping for air. "What's going to happen to you if you kill me, Anthem?"
"Nothing," she snarled. "You're no one. The academy will be happy to paper it over for my mother. No one wants a grubby rat like you as the face of the Imperial Navy."
That was true. And it stung. He'd known he was expendable and vaguely embarrassed with his presence. He felt a cool seep through him, giving him clarity even as Anthem's swings got wilder and more crazed. He side-stepped another slash and aimed a blow at her solar plexus, hoping to stun her. But it was just a glancing blow and it drove her even crazier with rage.
Suddenly, the plasma sword was flashing in his face and things went dark for a moment and he smelled meat burning. His meat. A burning, sizzling line crossed his brow and into his cheekbone, destroying his eye along the way.
Anthem grinned mirthlessly.
"You pulled back too fast. I was trying to take your head off."
This time, Albedo's fist struck her square in the chest, driving the air from her lungs. She clutched at him with her free hand as she tumbled backwards. With his other hand, he flailed for her wrist, trying to keep the plasma sword from being turned on him again. As he fell onto her, he was panicked that he couldn't find the weapon, even as they slammed against the floor together in a grotesque intimate embrace, her eyes staring at the scorched remains of his left eye socket.
A voice from the barracks door: "What are you doing?"
Albedo looked up. An officer from the Office of Investigation. He looked back down at Anthem, climbing off her, wanting to tell her the fight was over. As he got to his knees, he saw the chrome hilt of her plasma sword, buried in the side of her ribcage, even as he smelled the scent of her own burning organs on her final breaths.
The arrogance made Itch's beautiful face ugly now.
"You're not facing some spoiled child with a toy sword this time." Albedo could feel the mystic retreating from the deeper corners of his mind, preparing for the fight ahead.
Itch raised his free left hand and jerked it to the side. Albedo's pistols ripped from his grasp, almost breaking his wrists. The guns clattered as they landed somewhere in the darkness. He quickly grabbed for his stun baton, which made Itch almost laugh.
"You've come so far just to die on behalf of people who won't even remember your name."
Albedo knew enough not to worry about the words; they were meant to be a distraction from the blade that came up far faster than he would have believed possible.
Albedo slammed his baton into Itch's fingers on the hilt of his sword, the kind of dirty trick kids used in the Underslums, but weren't likely to have learned in Mystic Order fencing academies. Itch snarled, pushing Albedo back and away from him with both muscles and the mystical powers. Albedo slid for a moment, feet having a hard time finding traction in an puddle, and then Itch was on him again.
The swirling red and blue plasma sword flashed through the darkness, wide arcs to either side of Albedo, herding him into a tight ball, unable to do anything other than to retreat backwards. Itch took several rapid steps toward him, intending to plunge his blade into Albedo's chest when, like Albedo's had, his lead foot slipped in an unseen puddle. It was just a moment, but it was enough for Albedo to smash the hilt of his baton into Itch's perfect teeth, allowing him the momentary satisfaction of seeing blood and shock on the other man's face.
"You ... dare?"
Itch was furious now. It had been years, maybe decades, since someone had dared to strike Master Itsuki Itch in such a way. He yanked his left hand again and this time, Albedo heard something in his shoulder pop as the baton was ripped away, banging off the gangplank leading into the Bravery Dawn.
"Time to die," Itch said, spitting out a mouthful of bright blood.
Albedo slide his hand into his left sleeve, to the black leather fencing cuff he'd worn since fleeing the flight academy. His right hand emerged with a chrome cylinder, the size of a finger. He thumbed the button he'd played with a thousand times, thinking over everything that had happened to him and a sizzling red blade slid out of the plasma sword's sheath.
Itch laughed now, teeth red with blood, his face lit by shifting patches of blue and red. He struck a classic fighting pose, the kind immortalized in images of Mystic Order fighting masters for thousands of years. He would batter at Albedo's puny sword until the mechanism broke or Albedo was too exhausted to hold it up. Then he would change grips and, with a backhand stroke, take the Nomad's head. It was a dance as old as the Order and familiar to people throughout the galaxy.
But that wasn't how people fought in Underslum 3. The chrome cylinder changed hands in midair and Albedo slashed sideways, not at Itch's blade like Mystic Order Masters were supposed to fight, nor at his face or torso like a dueling club champion would. Instead, he severed the mystic's hands at the wrist. They and the plasma sword bounced off to the side, boiling the water from a nearby puddle in the hangar.
"'Always Finish the Job,'" Albedo panted pointing his skinny plasma blade at the shocked mystic. "You can try and sway your order with your grand vision for the galaxy, or you can be a martyr ..."
And then it was Albedo whose eyes flew open in shock. Itch suddenly blurred once again, lunging at him, clasping him in an intimate embrace, the tip of Albedo's red blade fizzing out his back, having gone straight through his heart.
At this hour, whole wings of the spaceport were dark, except for security lighting spaced far enough away from each other to make the spaces in between very dark and very unsafe.
Facula Albedo walked quietly down a broad corridor toward Hangar 66, hugging the wall in an attempt to see anyone else in the corridor silhouetted by the intermittent security lighting, but waiting at any moment for the sinister sizzle of a plasma sword unsheathing. Even after all this time, the sound could still make him flinch.
Anthem Starkiller was the best pilot at the Imperial Naval Academy. Which made sense: She had grown up rich, an admiral's daughter. While Facula had to learning piloting through hours of playing Peregrine Fighter at Underslum 4's Grand Arcade, Anthem had grown up flying a military surplus Peregrine her family owned.
They had grown up only a few clicks apart, but light years away in experience.
Where Albedo was shy, nervous that his Underslum accent and manners would give him away in any interaction, Anthem had grown up rubbing elbows with senators and ambassadors. She was beautiful, smart and talented. And she was cruel, surrounded by similarly privileged cronies who saw the academy not as a way to decent life for themselves and their family but as the first rung on a ladder that led to the Imperial Senate, the governor's palace of Veltari or Orceron, or an admiral's flagship.
Albedo being as good as he was, good enough to potentially keep some of Anthem's associates from graduating near the top of their flight class, didn't set well with them.
"Watch yourself, gutter rat," the voice crackled over comm channels as Albedo desperately twisted his fighter to the side, tumbling off course to avoid the twin fighters that had just dropped down in front of his ship, forcing him to choose between crashing and successfully completing the course.
If he wrecked a starfighter, the cost of it would be charged to him and his family, meaning they would all spend their lives in a debtor's prison on Utov.
But for members of Anthem's clique, there would be no such consequence: Money would change hands, some calls would be made, and for them, it would be written off as the fault of the maintenance droids or a software glitch.
When Albedo and others from the underclass and lower class spent their off-hours using fine brushes to clean the starfighters of those who'd performed best each week, Anthem's clique found other ways to fill their time, including private dueling clubs, where they'd fence with delicate plasma swords, with the ultimate goal of giving each other harmless but impressive scars on their faces and hands, adding to their legend as fierce warriors of the Old Empire, even if their weapons were the size of a finger and were more suited to carving dinner than to hand to hand combat.
And there were even worse ways they spent their time.
Albedo stopped in the corridor, water dripping from the ceiling beams above him. The moon was hidden behind black clouds tonight. The four figures before him were visible only by the security light behind them. A massive hover crate floated between them.
"We good, friend?" one of them, a Ghol by his silhouette, called out, slowly pulling out his sidearm, as had his compatriots. They could not see Albedo or if anyone was with him, but they'd heard him step into a puddle.
"We're good," Albedo called out, keeping his voice steady. "Just making my way to Hangar 66. Not interested in anything else."
The figures conferred quietly and then the Ghol nodded. They moved off with their cargo into the darkness. Albedo waited for the sound of their footfalls to fall away and then waited some more.
At first, the cadets didn't know why they were being grilled. Their movements, their interactions, questions about their finances and interactions with those outside the Academy, probing questions about possible New Uprising sympathies -- it was all just a rush of questions from interrogation droids and the Office of Investigation.
Only once the cadets gathered again in their barracks after questioning were they able to piece together what had happened: Someone was suspected of stealing starfighters parts and ammunition and selling it to the Red Moon Syndicate.
Albedo was baffled. Not only was arranging such a scheme incredibly difficult, but the penalty for doing so was death. He couldn't imagine being so reckless.
The Bravery Dawn was a modified Condor class heavy fighter, capable of hyperspace travel with room for a small crew or comfortable living for one. The ship was mostly in darkness, lit by distant spaceport lights and the interior lights pouring down the open boarding ramp.
Itsuki Itch, apparently finishing his pre-flight inspection of the interior, was walking toward the ramp when something made him pause, and he turned toward Albedo in the darkness.
"The one-eyed bounty hunter arrives at last."
Even half-visible in the limited light of the hangar, he was beautiful, the light from the Bravery Dawn forming a halo around him, showing off robes whiter than snow and thick black hair that flowed like a waterfall around his head.
"A lot of people didn't want me to find you," Albedo said, circling a little to make sure he could still get a shot off if the Mystic Order master retreated up the ramp. "Also, it takes twice as long to look with just the one eye."
"Those people were right," Itch said, lingering at the bottom of the ramp. He didn't reach for the hilt of his plasma sword, but he left it clearly visible. It wasn't a toy like some swords Albedo had encountered in the past; this was a weapon that had seen daily use against some of the best warriors in the galaxy. The polished finger marks on the hilt were visible from across the hangar. "I'm doing something important."
"I don't care," Albedo said, feeling the ghostly brush of fingertips across his forehead penetrating through the skull, into his brain.
"Yes, 'Finish the Job,'" Itch said. "You believe in something. Would you like to hear what I believe in?"
"Not really," Albedo said, slowly pulling his pistols from their holsters, but not raising them. "Unless it's that you believe in coming without a fight."
Itch laughed silently at this. Even across the hangar, his beautiful white smile was clearly visible in the darkness, like a beam of moonlight had penetrated the clouds just for that purpose.
"The Mystic Order follow a philosophy we refer to as the Path. We walk it, tending to the Garden we dwell in, the galaxy as large. We seek to prevent it from being thrown into disharmony by letting anything overgrow it or having the plants cut back too severely."
"You're doing a bang-up job. No disharmony in this galaxy."
"Yes," Itch said darkly. "In time, the Masters and Grandmasters came to see our job as preserving the current order of things, the status quo, without questioning whether that was the way the galaxy was intended to be, if we were embracing and supporting a state of disharmony. For centuries, we have prevented the Old Empire from ever truly crushing dissent and stopped the various rebellions and resistances from ever overthrowing the imperial order. And we told ourselves we were serving the needs of the galaxy's residents in doing so. Things never got worse but we also never allowed things to get better."
Despite himself, Albedo felt himself lowering his pistols slightly.
"Go on."
"I knew I could not be the only member of the Mystic Order to have questioned the current interpretation of the Path," Itch said. "I sought out the records of our order. The ones from before we chose our current direction seemed to have all been lost to history. But here, on Storix, there was said to be a deep archive, collecting our records going back millennia. And I found myself thwarted. The records have been removed or destroyed. And the Masters and Grandmasters I had confronted in my search, worried that I might sway others to my cause, have taken to hiring armed killers to stop me."
In the darkness, Albedo felt his cheeks burning in shame.
"But it doesn't matter," Itch said, throwing back his head, his beautiful hair falling back like a wave. He unsheathed his plasma sword, illuminating his form in violet light. "I will overthrow the leadership of the Mystic Order. And when I'm Emperor ..."
"Ah, there it is," Albedo growled, raising his pistols again. A blinding wave of pain, the fingertips inside his head suddenly clenching into a fist, almost dropped him to his knees.
"Disrespectful," Itch snarled.
There was a blur and suddenly the Mystic Order Master had closed the space between them. His plasma sword crackled loudly, pulses of heat coming off it. Up close, the blade wasn't violet, but was revealed to actually be patches of swirling red and blue, consuming each other and splitting apart again, endlessly. The presence of a naked plasma sword so close to his face made Albedo's mouth go dry and he felt icy sweat coating his skin.
"Attempting to stop me, so selfish and short-sighted."
"Do you know what you've done?" Anthem Starkiller screamed.
They were alone in the barracks, the first two back after hours of questioning by the Office of Investigation. Anthem and her clique had been pulled into conference rooms for interrogation on the way back from their dueling club and she was still dressed in her black fencing gear.
"I told them the truth -- that I saw you three selling crates of missiles to the Red Moon!"
"Grow up!" Anthem snarled, hurling her fencing mask at Albedo's head. "You think we're the only ones doing it?"
"I don't care!" Albedo snapped, more bravely than he felt, backing away as Anthem stalked toward him. "They just assumed someone from the Underslums must have been responsible. I'm not going to a prison planet for you!"
"They lost their commissions!" Anthem snarled. "You selfish, short-sighted gutter rat!"
She pulled her plasma sword hilt from her wrist sheath. It was a small thing, only about as big as a finger, gleaming with decorative chrome. She pressed a button on it and the hissing blade slid out, the red plasma wreathed in wisps of smoke.
"You don't deserve to be here," Anthem snarled, slashing at him. Albedo had to fight the impulse to raise a hand in defense, which would just get it amputated. "Everyone knows it. And no one will miss you when you're gone."
The dueling club weren't serious swordfighters in the way that the Mystic Order was. But their sporting plasma swords were still weapons. Even the armor the duelists wore could only save them from a glancing blow. And against an unarmed and unarmored Albedo, the swords were deadly.
But as dangerous as the weapons were, Anthem and her friends had been play-acting. They wanted scars that would look impressive in holo-portraits and on the news. This was the first time she had ever tried to truly hurt someone with a plasma sword.
In contrast, Albedo had been fighting for his life, handfuls of credits or a few rations, since he was a small boy. He hadn't preyed upon others in the Underslum, but people had tried to prey upon him many times. He could anticipate Anthem's blows and not be where the blade would be by the time she sunk it into a wall or a bed or a wardrobe in the barracks.
"Think!" Albedo shouted, gasping for air. "What's going to happen to you if you kill me, Anthem?"
"Nothing," she snarled. "You're no one. The academy will be happy to paper it over for my mother. No one wants a grubby rat like you as the face of the Imperial Navy."
That was true. And it stung. He'd known he was expendable and vaguely embarrassed with his presence. He felt a cool seep through him, giving him clarity even as Anthem's swings got wilder and more crazed. He side-stepped another slash and aimed a blow at her solar plexus, hoping to stun her. But it was just a glancing blow and it drove her even crazier with rage.
Suddenly, the plasma sword was flashing in his face and things went dark for a moment and he smelled meat burning. His meat. A burning, sizzling line crossed his brow and into his cheekbone, destroying his eye along the way.
Anthem grinned mirthlessly.
"You pulled back too fast. I was trying to take your head off."
This time, Albedo's fist struck her square in the chest, driving the air from her lungs. She clutched at him with her free hand as she tumbled backwards. With his other hand, he flailed for her wrist, trying to keep the plasma sword from being turned on him again. As he fell onto her, he was panicked that he couldn't find the weapon, even as they slammed against the floor together in a grotesque intimate embrace, her eyes staring at the scorched remains of his left eye socket.
A voice from the barracks door: "What are you doing?"
Albedo looked up. An officer from the Office of Investigation. He looked back down at Anthem, climbing off her, wanting to tell her the fight was over. As he got to his knees, he saw the chrome hilt of her plasma sword, buried in the side of her ribcage, even as he smelled the scent of her own burning organs on her final breaths.
The arrogance made Itch's beautiful face ugly now.
"You're not facing some spoiled child with a toy sword this time." Albedo could feel the mystic retreating from the deeper corners of his mind, preparing for the fight ahead.
Itch raised his free left hand and jerked it to the side. Albedo's pistols ripped from his grasp, almost breaking his wrists. The guns clattered as they landed somewhere in the darkness. He quickly grabbed for his stun baton, which made Itch almost laugh.
"You've come so far just to die on behalf of people who won't even remember your name."
Albedo knew enough not to worry about the words; they were meant to be a distraction from the blade that came up far faster than he would have believed possible.
Albedo slammed his baton into Itch's fingers on the hilt of his sword, the kind of dirty trick kids used in the Underslums, but weren't likely to have learned in Mystic Order fencing academies. Itch snarled, pushing Albedo back and away from him with both muscles and the mystical powers. Albedo slid for a moment, feet having a hard time finding traction in an puddle, and then Itch was on him again.
The swirling red and blue plasma sword flashed through the darkness, wide arcs to either side of Albedo, herding him into a tight ball, unable to do anything other than to retreat backwards. Itch took several rapid steps toward him, intending to plunge his blade into Albedo's chest when, like Albedo's had, his lead foot slipped in an unseen puddle. It was just a moment, but it was enough for Albedo to smash the hilt of his baton into Itch's perfect teeth, allowing him the momentary satisfaction of seeing blood and shock on the other man's face.
"You ... dare?"
Itch was furious now. It had been years, maybe decades, since someone had dared to strike Master Itsuki Itch in such a way. He yanked his left hand again and this time, Albedo heard something in his shoulder pop as the baton was ripped away, banging off the gangplank leading into the Bravery Dawn.
"Time to die," Itch said, spitting out a mouthful of bright blood.
Albedo slide his hand into his left sleeve, to the black leather fencing cuff he'd worn since fleeing the flight academy. His right hand emerged with a chrome cylinder, the size of a finger. He thumbed the button he'd played with a thousand times, thinking over everything that had happened to him and a sizzling red blade slid out of the plasma sword's sheath.
Itch laughed now, teeth red with blood, his face lit by shifting patches of blue and red. He struck a classic fighting pose, the kind immortalized in images of Mystic Order fighting masters for thousands of years. He would batter at Albedo's puny sword until the mechanism broke or Albedo was too exhausted to hold it up. Then he would change grips and, with a backhand stroke, take the Nomad's head. It was a dance as old as the Order and familiar to people throughout the galaxy.
But that wasn't how people fought in Underslum 3. The chrome cylinder changed hands in midair and Albedo slashed sideways, not at Itch's blade like Mystic Order Masters were supposed to fight, nor at his face or torso like a dueling club champion would. Instead, he severed the mystic's hands at the wrist. They and the plasma sword bounced off to the side, boiling the water from a nearby puddle in the hangar.
"'Always Finish the Job,'" Albedo panted pointing his skinny plasma blade at the shocked mystic. "You can try and sway your order with your grand vision for the galaxy, or you can be a martyr ..."
And then it was Albedo whose eyes flew open in shock. Itch suddenly blurred once again, lunging at him, clasping him in an intimate embrace, the tip of Albedo's red blade fizzing out his back, having gone straight through his heart.
Rolled a 5: "If your Notoriety is 3 or higher, you encounter a lead." Having encountered two leads before, this becomes encountering the Target.
Roll first for the Showdown site. I roll a 6: "You catch p to them at their starship, just as they're preparing to board and leave." Which works out great, since that's the way this story has been headed.
Now a roll for the Setting, which flavors the site. I roll a 3: "It's night time, and you're both only lit by the moon or artificial light sources."
Now we roll for some more details on the mysterious Itsuki Itch. I roll a 6 on the Target table: "Bathed in light or shrouded in shadow, they wear the robes of the Mystic Order. They appear calm, despite the situation. Resolve all: What is the Order trying to achieve by maintaining a presence here? Speak with them. They Attack you in Melee with a distinct, glowing weapon (+2 attack, +3 defense)."
Once the story and flashbacks are over, the final fight begins. Albedo still hasn't replaced his armor, which means all he has for defense are his two motivation rolls to reroll attacks.
Albedo rolls a 5+2 for the first use of his stun baton, for a 7. Itch rolls a 6+2, for an 8. So we burn a Motivation point and force Itch to reroll. He gets a 3+2 for a total of five. Itch loses his first of three Defense points.
Albedo rolls a 2+1 for a 3 with his stun baton. Itch rolls a 2+2 for a 4. Using the second (and last) Motivation points to reroll Albedo's roll. This is a 4+1 for a 5. Itch loses his second Defense point.
Albedo rolls a 6+1 for a 7 with his stun baton. Itch rolls a 3+2 for a 5 with his plasma sword. That's it for Itch's Defense points.
Switching to Anthem Starkiller's plasma sword for narrative reasons, but using the same stats as the stun baton.
Albedo rolls a 5+1 for a 6. Itch rolls a 1+2 for a 3.
"If you manage to defeat them, choose to capture them to gain 2 Favour, kill them to gain 1 Favour or let them go and lose 2 Favour. Then move to the Epilogue."
I don't see a defeated Itch going quietly, so death it is. +1 Favour for Albedo.
Next up: The final turn, the Epilogue.
Roll first for the Showdown site. I roll a 6: "You catch p to them at their starship, just as they're preparing to board and leave." Which works out great, since that's the way this story has been headed.
Now a roll for the Setting, which flavors the site. I roll a 3: "It's night time, and you're both only lit by the moon or artificial light sources."
Now we roll for some more details on the mysterious Itsuki Itch. I roll a 6 on the Target table: "Bathed in light or shrouded in shadow, they wear the robes of the Mystic Order. They appear calm, despite the situation. Resolve all: What is the Order trying to achieve by maintaining a presence here? Speak with them. They Attack you in Melee with a distinct, glowing weapon (+2 attack, +3 defense)."
Once the story and flashbacks are over, the final fight begins. Albedo still hasn't replaced his armor, which means all he has for defense are his two motivation rolls to reroll attacks.
Albedo rolls a 5+2 for the first use of his stun baton, for a 7. Itch rolls a 6+2, for an 8. So we burn a Motivation point and force Itch to reroll. He gets a 3+2 for a total of five. Itch loses his first of three Defense points.
Albedo rolls a 2+1 for a 3 with his stun baton. Itch rolls a 2+2 for a 4. Using the second (and last) Motivation points to reroll Albedo's roll. This is a 4+1 for a 5. Itch loses his second Defense point.
Albedo rolls a 6+1 for a 7 with his stun baton. Itch rolls a 3+2 for a 5 with his plasma sword. That's it for Itch's Defense points.
Switching to Anthem Starkiller's plasma sword for narrative reasons, but using the same stats as the stun baton.
Albedo rolls a 5+1 for a 6. Itch rolls a 1+2 for a 3.
"If you manage to defeat them, choose to capture them to gain 2 Favour, kill them to gain 1 Favour or let them go and lose 2 Favour. Then move to the Epilogue."
I don't see a defeated Itch going quietly, so death it is. +1 Favour for Albedo.
Next up: The final turn, the Epilogue.
Last edited:
Whizbang Dustyboots
Gnometown Hero
This one took a little longer than most to finish. Once I got through two days of backstory, the rolls came together pretty fast.At last!
I had checked this thread a few days ago to make sure the notification system hadn't forgotten to tell me of updates here!
The epilogue should be done quicker and sooner, I think. (Haven't looked at that section yet.)
Whizbang Dustyboots
Gnometown Hero
Facula Albedo
Human Scoundrel
Favour: 5/6
Notoriety: 6/6
Motivation: 0/6
Human Scoundrel
Favour: 5/6
Notoriety: 6/6
Motivation: 0/6
Whizbang Dustyboots
Gnometown Hero
The Sorcerer was right where Facula Albedo had left it, although he spent about half an hour doing a perimeter check, looking for signs that someone might have been waiting for him there.
Once satisfied, Albedo stepped gratefully inside, shedding his hat and his now-ruined poncho. But a meal, a shower and a sleep -- not necessarily in that order -- could wait until he was off-planet.
As he slipped behind the worn controls of the ship, he decided that off-planet wasn't far enough away. A long hyperspace jump would keep him safe and let him recharge without worrying about any of Itch's fellow revolutionaries.
He hadn't been conscious of the smog that encircled Storix and when the Sorcerer cleared that layer of the atmosphere and suddenly the stars blazed at him in the black sky, he felt a weight being lifted off him. The nap suddenly jumped ahead of a meal and a shower, once he was in hyperspace.
Clearing orbit and the debris from the space battle earlier in the evening, Albedo smiled slightly as he pulled the trigger and he and his ship made the leap to hyperspace.
"And you're sure you're able to follow him?" the voice crackled.
"I'd rather you bring him back alive rather than dead. But just bring him back -- no disintegrations. No body, no pay."
Anathema Starkiller's holographic image gave him a curt nod and then vanished. Nass G'rassk pushed the keyboard away, no longer needing to type his reply into the VoGen.
There was a tone and an indicator light illuminated the cockpit of the Heretic. A moment later, his ship flung itself into hyperspace, in pursuit of his former friend.
Once satisfied, Albedo stepped gratefully inside, shedding his hat and his now-ruined poncho. But a meal, a shower and a sleep -- not necessarily in that order -- could wait until he was off-planet.
As he slipped behind the worn controls of the ship, he decided that off-planet wasn't far enough away. A long hyperspace jump would keep him safe and let him recharge without worrying about any of Itch's fellow revolutionaries.
He hadn't been conscious of the smog that encircled Storix and when the Sorcerer cleared that layer of the atmosphere and suddenly the stars blazed at him in the black sky, he felt a weight being lifted off him. The nap suddenly jumped ahead of a meal and a shower, once he was in hyperspace.
Clearing orbit and the debris from the space battle earlier in the evening, Albedo smiled slightly as he pulled the trigger and he and his ship made the leap to hyperspace.
"And you're sure you're able to follow him?" the voice crackled.
Yes. I know the [I]Sorcerer [/I]well. I was able to hack into its systems. The [I]Heretic [/I]is receiving navigational equipment directly from Facula Albedo's ship."I'd rather you bring him back alive rather than dead. But just bring him back -- no disintegrations. No body, no pay."
Don't worry, Admiral Starkiller. He's not going to outrun what he's got coming -- from both of us.Anathema Starkiller's holographic image gave him a curt nod and then vanished. Nass G'rassk pushed the keyboard away, no longer needing to type his reply into the VoGen.
There was a tone and an indicator light illuminated the cockpit of the Heretic. A moment later, his ship flung itself into hyperspace, in pursuit of his former friend.
FACULA ALBEDO WILL RETURN
Time for the Epilogue, the last section in the rule book.
"To determine your Epilogue and finish the game, multiply your Motivation by 2 and add it to your Favour."
(0 x 2) + 5 = 5
"Your actions have caused harm to the population of this Planet, either directly or indirectly."
Uh oh.
"You've become a Trigger in someone else's story now. What is their defining memory of your time here. If you continue your story with the same Nomad, start your next game with 0 Notoriety, 1 Favour and 3 Motivation.
"To determine your Epilogue and finish the game, multiply your Motivation by 2 and add it to your Favour."
(0 x 2) + 5 = 5
"Your actions have caused harm to the population of this Planet, either directly or indirectly."
Uh oh.
"You've become a Trigger in someone else's story now. What is their defining memory of your time here. If you continue your story with the same Nomad, start your next game with 0 Notoriety, 1 Favour and 3 Motivation.
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