Olympus RPG Blog

Cloak and Dagger

After Sam alerted the rest of the Crew to the presence of the intruders in the lower hold, they all sprang into action, fetching their personal weapons in expectation of combat. They had no idea what it might be that the intruders were looking for, except for the knowledge that the ship might have been involved in military operations during the Fifth Frontier War, and could easily have something hidden away. Ella headed for the bridge, to contact port security, but immediately saw telltale signs of computer-hacking underway on one of the terminal screens—all systems were locked down. At the same time, Haank used the intercom, and in a calm, diplomatic manner, asked the intruders to identify themselves and state their business, even offering to help find whatever-it-was; the intruders responded that the Crew should remain where they are and, “Don’t do anything stupid,” as they had taken control of the ship. The Crew then called port security via personal communicator; the message was received, but earned them an intercom-delivered scolding by the intruders. Some moments later, they heard approaching sirens, and saw the flashing lights of port-security officers en-route. They arrived to find no intruders on the ship—they had vacated. With nothing really to be done about it after-the-fact, statements were taken, and assurances given that it would be looked into.

Haank and Abe spent a good deal of the day researching what could be learned about their new ship’s past on the planetary info network. They dug up quite a lot of records; manifests, flight-plans, and heavily-censored accounts of missions on behalf of the Imperium during the War, to places unknown, for purposes unknown. From what they gathered, the crew that was buried next to the ship, on Kegena, was the same crew that conducted these clandestine operations—they would not be revealing any secrets now—and that some of the ship’s upgrades were paid for, covertly, by the military. Cross-referencing manifests and logs left them with a reasonable assumption that those black-missions were based out of Jae Tellona and/or Porozlo, probably into a number of systems in the Rhylanor sector that were under Zhodani occupation at the time. Ella was unable to reach Cpt. Gloval for any assistance on that account, still away on Navy business.

Sometime during the research process, the port-security investigator assigned to their break-in case came by the ship to let the Crew know that there was no camera-footage available, and that they wouldn’t be able to do much of anything to resolve their case. A few of the Crew were not convinced he was giving them the truth; Abe turned on the smooth-talk, and convinced the guy to, very-reluctantly, admit to the fact that some “Navy” suits came in and confiscated all their data, and told them to forget the whole thing.

The Crew decided, for a number of reasons that included the ship’s connection to operations there, that they would go to Porozlo next. Haank set about getting some freight and passengers for the trip, and spent the rest of the day dealing with the particulars, and getting it all loaded. They also decided that it would be a good idea to get a security system installed on the ship; Abe and Buck would see to its acquisition during the freight-loading. Later, during the freight-loading process, Haank was approached by a port security runner who handed him an OSD on behalf of parties unknown. Haank checked it on his datapad, and it contained camera footage and stills from the break-in, featuring the masked intruders, including the unmasked face of the one assumed to be their leader, at the gate to a Navy logistics center at the docks. Haank relayed the information the others before getting back to work.

Abe and Buck went to check out the logistics center, surveilling it from a safe distance; they saw nothing of interest, except to note that security there was rather inadequate, enough to allow a covert team to easily operate without notice. The two left their brief stakeout to purchase the security system for the ship, and they were soon able to determine that they were being followed by someone they presumed to be one of the “Navy” men—they led the guy around a bit, in a successful attempt to prove he was following them. They went to a public terminal, as if to make a call, and left their tail a note with their contact information and a message to, “Call us.” A few hours before scheduled departure, after Abe and Buck had returned to the ship, the call came; it was put on speaker-mode for the whole Crew to hear. Ella, in her new official role as Captain, spoke for the Crew, and offered to allow the agents to come search the ship providing they display proper Navy credentials, although there was a limited time-window before departure, and a full load of freight had already been loaded, so it would be tight quarters. The voice demanded to be allowed to search freely, and insisted that they were not “Navy.” Ella would not back down from her demand for Navy credentials, and ended the call, though the voice warned that this was not over.

The Crew neverminded the warning and finished prepping the ship, departing on schedule outbound for Porozlo, and jumped out without incident.

During the jump, Abe was exercising his new duties as Steward, and attracted the interest of one of the passengers, a secretive woman of unstated profession. She inquired about the cargo hold, and how she might retrieve some of her belongings stowed there…

Notes

• Ella’s player was out for vacation, so the character was run by Herodian in her stead
• The lead commando having been revealed as Keanu Reeves resulted in some inevitable remarks about him being back at the base, eating a sandwich, alone (for those unfamiliar with that meme)
• The “OSD” term comes from Mass Effect—I’m not sure what the canonical storage device is for Traveller; I just like that term

Market Value

Six days after the arrival at Rhylanor-Prime, the Rhylanor Capital Protection Service made contact with the Team, and set up a meeting to discuss ownership of the Proud Mary. All of the members of the former-crew of the Titanic VII would attend the meeting, dressed in their finest—which, for some, had to be purchased locally, and for Sam, consisted of “the usual” (Hawaiian shirt & spacer-boots). Some of the Team hadn’t been to Rhylanor before, and were rather impressed with the lavish offices of the Turuump Tower, in the finance district of the sector-capitol. They appeared to make a good enough impression with the RCPS representative (in spite of Sam’s casual dress); Ella elected to let Haank do most of the talking, as he had the most training and experience in business and finance matters. Haank happened to notice the representative’s cuff-links indicating nobility, and made a point of his proper address so the other Team-members would be aware. The meeting seemed to go well. RCPS had already taken a loss on the ship and were looking to recover what they could, but were willing to hand over ownership of the ship for five million credits, or buy it back for half the original purchase cost of 49 million credits. Haank enlisted Buck’s expert opinion on the ship’s condition, but was unable to convince the company to lower the offered amount. Both sides being satisfied with the negotiations, the meeting was ended so that the Team could confer and return an answer to the RCPS offer, which would remain open for a week.

After some serious discussion, the Team decided it would be better and/or easier to keep the ship, as-is, than to take the near-25 million and attempt to buy a new one. Over the next three days, they worked together to build a solid business plan to present to a bank for a business-capital loan. Having decided to keep her, Buck finalized the arrangements, and sent her off to have the annual maintenance done, and everyone checked into a local hotel for the duration. At the summit of the mountain of paperwork, they would form a limited-liability partnership under the name, Spinward Star, LLP; Smith and Jones would be officially hired on as employees. Roughly a week after registering their new partnership with the Imperial offices, they easily secured a bank loan for 7.5 million credits against the ship. After paying the 5 million to RCPS, as negotiated, ownership of the Proud Mary was officially transferred to the new company.

The ship now belonged to the Team, and they, to the ship. And the ship’s cat.

Four days hence, the ship was returned from its annual maintenance, and after a thorough checking-over by her new crew, given a clean bill-of-health. It was unanimously decided to spend a tiny amount of the remaining capital on a christening-party aboardships—officially christened Spinward Star. That evening, there was much celebratory drinking (though Sam made himself rather annoying, especially to those that were not drinking to excess), and near-half the Crew passed out in their beds.

Some hours before sunrise, Sam was awakened by the cat, for reasons his drink-and-sleep-addled mind couldn’t process. As he stumbled into the crew lounge, he heard some shuffling noise from below, and so, made his way to the central hatchway, to descend into the lower cargo hold to see who these intruders might be. He keyed the ship’s intercom and demanded the occupants of the lower hold identify themselves, to no response. He then opened the hatch, and began to descend, but was greeted from below by a handful of gun-wielding commandos, pulling wall-panels in the hold, obviously looking for something left there long ago. The commandos demanded he quietly continue to descend, and to “not do anything stupid.” However, he instead lept back up the access ladder, pulled his feet clear of the expected gunfire (which did not occur), and reflexively slapped the close-switch for the iris-hatch, locking it down.

Notes

• Though Ella’s Contact was available the previous session, when the ship arrived, he was not available for this one; we determined he had been called away on official business, and couldn’t hang around
• I had designed Haank’s character with just this sort of thing in mind, so it was nice to get some use out of all those “business” skills
• As one might expect, the bookkeeping took up quite a bit of time. First time using the “Finance” section of Traveller: Far Trader, wasn’t so bad
• Ended up with the $7.5M at 2% interest for 10 years; having the ship as collateral meant we could get away with the bare-minimums without any problem. Our expectation is that we can make that up pretty easily
• Sam rolled an 18 on his Carousing check at the christening party; the second time he’s failed so spectacularly at carousing, something he’s supposed to be good at

Under Way

Ella and Abe headed over to the traffic-control office to speak to the director about helping the Proud Mary get clear of the expected attack by the Vargr Corsair, Ella’s nemesis. They knocked on the back door, marked “staff only,” and were eventually greeted by a traffic-control officer. The two informed the officer of their desire to speak to the director, who had earlier sent a runner to warn them; the officer let them in and fetched the director. The director was sympathetic to their situation, but there was little he could do but delay their departure—helpful, yes, but not a solution. After some discussion, it was decided to pay the usual fee to the Scout Service for an escort; the director made the call, and set up the escort. All they could provide was a single 100-ton Scout—not much, but maybe enough. Ella also asked to submit her flight-plan in person, to eliminate the need to broadcast it where the Vargr could intercept; this was not an unusual request, and the director agreed to take the flight-plan on paper. Ella gave the director her thanks, and the two returned to the ship to finish prepping for departure.

Back aboard the Proud Mary, Haank noticed that their Vargr observer a few pads down at the Corsair had fallen asleep at his post, and advised they rush their pre-flight to get more of a head-start; the Vargr were later observed frantically trying to catch up. Meanwhile, Ella coordinated their departure with the the Scout Service escort, the ISS Athinea, on a secure channel. The Proud Mary was cleared for takeoff, and Sam put her into orbit in record time; just after, the scout vessel joined them in orbit as well. The Vargr tried to follow, but were delayed by the tower—eventually, illegally breaking out of traffic to pursue. Buck overloaded the Proud Mary’s drives to squeeze out more power, doubling her acceleration. The Vargr Corsair did the same, and was easily able to keep up, and would beat them to the jump point, but the scout vessel demanded they heave-to, and when ignored, launched missiles. The Vargr dropped back to deal with the scout vessel, giving the Proud Mary the chance to escape. (The fate of the ISS Athinea is unknown.)

The rest of the voyage went without incident. The Proud Mary jumped to Belizo and unloaded her cargo and passengers. Neither freight nor passengers were available bound for Jae Tellona. After three days in transit, the ship was refueled at the nearest gas-giant, and jumped out to Jae Tellona. At the mainworld, they took on freight and passengers bound for Rhylanor, and after four days in transit, refueled at the nearest gas-giant, and jumped out for Rhylanor. At the mainworld, the Proud Mary was cleared, landed, and the passengers and cargo were unloaded.

On arrival, Buck got started arranging for the ship’s long-delayed annual maintenance, while Ella got in touch with Cpt Henry Gloval, and old friend of her father. He was surprised and delighted to hear from her, and agreed to meet her for lunch, where Ella told him her story, from asteroid strike to Vargr encounter. He confessed that there wasn’t a whole lot he could do to help with her salvage claim on the Proud Mary, but he did recognize the ship’s name, and recalled she may have a history with the Imperial military…

Notes

• Abe’s player was out, due to illness; it had already been decided that Abe would go along to talk to the traffic-control guys, but he didn’t contribute much (not that it would likely have affected the results)
• While doing pre-flight, the GM called for a Perception check to see what had been observed regarding the other ship’s preparations; Haank rolled 4; the Vargr rolled 18 😛
• The escape took up a lot of session-time; combined with a delay getting started, it was decided to fast-forward through the voyage
• Used the new freight/passenger generation spreadsheet for the first time; worked well enough, but determined it would still be optimal to handle it all beforehand, when possible—still a lot of bookkeeping, just to record the results. We were in a rush at that point, though, to get through three stops. More testing needed

Bad News

The Proud Mary was cleared to land, after doing the usual bureaucratic tango that preceded doing anything at all on the chilly, crowded, desert-world of Bevey. During the process, Ella explained the apprehension on her countenance to the others; the Vargr ship docked below belonged to an old enemy crew from her Navy days, and she expected to be harassed. Given their presence, and the iron-fisted state of things on Bevey, the Team all agreed that they should remain within the startown limits for the duration of their hopefully-brief stay here. Once landed, Haank immediately saw to the unloading process, while the passengers were disembarked; farewells were said to Kella, while former-Ensigns Smith and Jones were invited to join the current crew—they accepted (though Jones admitted his new wife would undoubtedly be furious at his delayed return). To celebrate, Smith insisted they go for drinks at a local establishment; expecting trouble, everyone went along anyway.

Trouble didn’t wait. The Vargr crew intercepted Ella on the street, greeting her with feigned rapport and expressing their surprise at this chance-encounter; Ella kept her distance, and made no attempt to hide the fact that she had no desire to speak to them, ending the “conversation” abruptly, before continuing to the bar.

The bar was a dive, a menagerie of species. Sam’s attempts to carouse with the other patrons fell flat; Ella chatted up the bartender for the latest news; Haank kept to himself at a booth, and watched some golf-related programming while sipping at some bourbon; Abe’s and Buck’s attentions were drawn to the alien females present, and Buck ended up chatting up a table-full of blue-skinned humanoids (three of the four were female), crew of another Free-Trader looking for new work. Otherwise, the Team left after a few hours, without incident. In the morning, the Team went together to the warehouse-offices of Neverfail Freight, LLC, their soon-to-be former employers. On the way out, Haank spotted one of the Vargr Corsair’s crew keeping an eye on their comings and goings from their berth a few pads down the dock, and alerted the others.

At the office, the Team found the boss at his office, and sat him down to give him the bad news. Ella told the story of the loss of the Titanic VII, and the rest of her crew, though she left out the pertinent details of the Astro-Core unpleasantness. The boss was saddened to hear of it; he then asked if the Team were looking to be assigned to another ship. Ella informed him of their desire to leave the company to form their own opportunity with the ship they had recovered. The boss was understanding, thanked the Team for their contributions to the company, and wished them well (to the Team’s collective surprise, having expected legal hearings, at least). After collecting their final pay, the Team returned to the Proud Mary, now free to seek their fortunes wherever they liked.

Some time after they arrived at the ship, a runner for traffic control came over to give the Team a heads-up; the Vargr crew had been asking about their departure schedule. Abe tipped the guy twenty credits for the info.

The Team gathered in the crew lounge to discuss what to do next, and decided a few things: they would continue, as previously discussed, to Rhylanor, to report the salvage of the Proud Mary; they didn’t want to hang around Bevey any longer than they had to, and would depart as soon as possible; they wouldn’t go through a great deal of trouble over maintenance, nor spend a great deal of money, until they knew the ship was “theirs”; they were convinced the Vargr Corsair would attempt to jump them at some point after they left—initially they didn’t want to spend the money for fuel, but skimming for fuel at a gas-giant would leave them vulnerable to ambush, so in the end, they decided to fork over the money.

Haank hit the network and found plenty of freight lots and passengers bound for Belizo, the next stop toward Rhylanor; he signed up enough to fill the available space, and got it, and the fuel, all loaded. Ella filed the flight-plan, and Sam got the ship prepped for departure. In the final hour or so before takeoff, though, the Team tried to come up with some potential solutions to avoid the Corsair’s inevitable attack. Among the ideas discussed: delay departure to coincide with other traffic, to provide some friendly cover; sabotage their ship or their flight plans; talk local authorities into providing escort. In the end, Ella decided to take Abe with her to go see if the traffic control guys might be willing to extend a bit more help…

Notes

• The session was cut a bit short, so we didn’t accomplish as much as we would’ve liked. We were also delayed a bit by the usual lookup process that normally accompanies finding new freight & passengers; this prompted me to work on a spreadsheet/die-roller to handle the workload, which will be field-tested soon

Desperate Measures

The arrival of the Albatross in the local evening was cause for celebration amongst the Team—their ticket off this snowball, in the form of a [coupling] to repair the broken jump-drive. Listening in to ATC radio traffic, they heard their captain declare they were looking for the Titanic VII and wanting to know what happened; the colony director took the comm himself, and told them “It’s complicated,” and that they should look up the surviving crew once on the ground.

The Albatross set down next to the Proud Mary on the clearing that served as the colony’s landing pad. The Team went out to meet her crew, and invited them aboard to go over the situation. Seated in the passenger lounge on the top deck, drinking Buck’s coffee, Ella told the whole story, from the asteroid-strike to the final showdown with Astro-Core. The captain of the Albatross, Stannis, explained that they were chartered by the company to determine the condition of the Titanic and get it running again, if necessary, and were not prepared for a total loss of the ship, nor authorized to render aid to its survivors. It was apparent that their captain didn’t really trust the Titanic’s survivors, but Ella successfully convinced him to give their claims a serious look anyway. However, as she followed up with an attempt to guilt-trip him into giving up the jump-drive parts, he took offense and insisted the meeting was over. The crew of the Albatross was escorted off the ship, and were thereafter observed being intercepted and picked up by an Astro-Core roller on the way into the colony. Afterward, the Team spent some time discussing their limited options, in the event the Albatross refused to help.

The next morning, the Albatross was observed taking off, heading in the general direction of the wreck of the Titanic, and returning some time later. Haank commed over to see what they had found; they reported that they had only found a little debris at the site, the rest presumably having sunk into the depths, but that was good enough to corroborate the report of the accident.

The Team was bereft of ideas on how to repair the situation, and by proxy, the jump-drive. Sam suggested they smooth over any raw nerves with copious amounts of adult-beverages; it might be a stretch, but the others agreed to give it a shot, taking the opportunity to do whatever it took to convince the Albatross’ crew that they were worthy of a second chance. Almost-surprisingly, given the earlier encounter, the scout’s crew agreed to come over. Over the next hours, Sam engaged their XO, Luke, in some lively drinking games (specifically, Battle-Shots), while Haank and Buck cheered them on (Haank capitalized on Luke’s inebriation to find out how their encounter with Astro-Core had gone; Luke admitted Astro-Core had tried to strong-arm them into not helping get the Proud Mary off the planet); Abe schmoozed up to Kaalii, their engineer, eventually following her back to her ship to spend the night; Ella took Cpt. Stannis to the bridge to talk, one-on-one.

In the morning, Abe returned with a smile, to tend to the formerly-drunk (Luke had passed out in one of the passenger cabins), giving Ella a knowing high-five—although her meeting had resulted in capitulation, with regard to the jump-drive parts, Ella would never actually reveal what it had cost her. Some time later, Kaalii returned with an old, spare [coupling] that should do the trick, and assisted Buck in installing it; with Buck’s expert touch (or good luck), they figured it might last quite a while.

So, finally, the survivors of the Titanic VII were free to leave Kegena-Prime.

Haank immediately hit the network to pick up some freight and/or passengers bound for Bevey. He found enough of both to fill the ship to capacity. Three cabins were spoken for already: Kella paid the standard-rate for a cabin (covered by her grant money), and Smith and Jones had already been offered a ride out of here. He avoided the Astro-Core freight, and put the leftover passenger cabins to auction, getting considerably more than the average—a lot of folk were also desperate to get anywhere-but-here. It was decided to take on jump-fuel from the sea—as Kegena was 90% water. Once the fees were taken care of, and everything/everyone stowed, the Proud Mary took to the Black once more, to leave Kegena-Prime in her wake; some hours later, without incident, she made the transition to jump-space, Bevey-bound. The Team took advantage of the week in jump-space to discuss their options, but they were all in general agreement that staying headquartered at Bevey would be less than desirable—thanks to the iron-fisted government—and that continuing in the employ of Neverfail, LLC (headquartered in Bevey), which would undoubtedly mean returning to Kegena, was also right out. There was also the matter of the ownership of the Proud Mary, registered at Rhylanor; after some plotting, they determined it might be best to take her to Rhylanor and declare for salvage in-person, taking a bit of cargo on the way—a chance to make some money first, in the event someone laid claim to her.

Otherwise, the trip was uneventful, and the ship exited jump-space in the Bevey system, and was cleared to land at the starport. As the Team gathered to see somewhere-other-than-Kegena outside the window, they didn’t notice the smile fade from Ella’s face at the sight of a familiar (to her) Vargr Corsair at dock…

Notes

• Ella had some help, and success, with her initial Diplomacy check, but when she made a Fast-Talk attempt to get the parts “now”—must’ve come across as desperate—it backfired. The dice are a fickle mistress. There was some real concern, afterward, that we might have to resort to either theft, or waiting another two weeks (minimum)
• The Carousing plan was one of many unsavory ideas—perhaps the least unsavory—involving someone sleeping with someone over there, to get in their good graces
• Captain Stannis—who was randomly determined to be less than attractive—actually failed at a Sex Appeal attempt against Ella, by two, but she had decided to play along and “take one for the team,” though in the end, it was never decided whether or not that involved…more than words 😉
• Buck rolled a Crit on the coupling installation—the GM decided that, rather than last a single jump as originally intended, it would last a few
• The decision to forego any Astro-Core freight wasn’t solely an “F-U” to the corporation, but a paranoia extending from our experiences in the previous Traveller game, with the Emerald Monarch (which involved explosives and cargo containers)
• The Vargr ship is Ella’s “Enemy”—which nobody else on the crew knows anything about