The Volunteers (AKA The Dirty Half-Dozen, The Six Wanderers)

Bob Perce (Herodian)
Colt Riffle (Gigermann)
Dr. J. Turk (CommJunkee)
Lance Bennett (Ronnke)
Lenny Leonardo (Melissa)
Romeo Sylvester (Rigil Kent)

The One Where They Killed Gizmo

5 Jan 2161

Continued… The would-be assassin’s shots failed to strike their target, Killian, and the Volunteers reacted quickly; Sly tackled Killian to the floor, while Bob and Colt produced their sidearms and returned fire on the unwelcome guest, dropping him quickly. The attacker had not yet fully perished, and Turk demanded to be allowed to bandage his wounds out of “decency,” rather than let him bleed out on the floor as those assaulted would have preferred. After first-aid was administered, Killian’s late-arriving troops removed the man from the area to be held who-knows-where—likely never to be seen again. Thankful for the timely rescue, Killian offered to fix the hydro-controller for free. At the vault-dwellers’ question, he explained that he and the more lawful folk in town have had a long-standing feud with Don Gizmo, proprietor of the local gambling hall that bears his name, for rigging his games, fostering lawlessness and crime, and being a general thug about it all. However, Killian had thus far been unable to run him out of town for lack of direct evidence and enough able manpower.

The Volunteers took their leave and prepared to pass a couple of days in town. Lance, Sly and Turk rounded the corner to the adjoining Crash House, the local hotel/brothel, to secure lodgings and look over the available “furnishings.” Meanwhile, upon hearing about a “casino,” Lenny defied all warnings and made a beeline to go get his gamble on, followed by Bob and Colt—mostly out of morbid curiosity.

At Gizmo’s, Bob people-watched and Colt got a drink. Some time later, Bob spotted Lenny cheating, around the same time he spotted Gizmo’s thugs spotting Lenny cheating. Lenny was informed that Gizmo wanted to talk to him, and he was escorted to the proprietor’s office at the back of the establishment. Bob and Colt presumed he was to be taken “out back” and worked over, in typical wize-guy fashion. Bob followed Lenny’s escort to the back area but was stopped there by the door guards; he attempted to play the drunk about to vomit, but they were having none of it, and pointed him to the front door instead—outside, Bob ran around to the back of the building to find the back door, took cover around the corner and pulled his pistol, waiting for the party to emerge. Colt finished his drink and followed Lenny a bit later, unwilling to let his fellow vault-dweller suffer alone, and tried to talk his way past the guards, or at least, get a view of the proceedings. Gizmo, however, saw an opportunity; after having a couple of his guys shove Lenny into a side-room and lock him in, he called for Colt instead. Gizmo told Colt that he should go and kill Killian or he would break all of Lenny’s fingers. Colt played it cool, and agreed to the thug-in-chief’s terms, before being escorted out.

Colt had no intention of doing as bidden, of course. He rounded the building to get Bob, and they went to the Crash House to find the others. Colt explained the situation, and after some discussion of rescue tactics and resources, Colt suggested they go to Killian with the matter, just to let him know, in case he wanted to help. Back at Darkwaters, Killian was almost excited at the chance to go after Gizmo, and offered five of his best to go along. As the day was drawing to a close, they wanted to get it done in a hurry while some daylight remained, before Gizmo had a chance to suspect a double-cross (assuming he didn’t already).

The plan: Sly would lead Killian’s people in an assault on the front doors, to draw Gizmo’s thugs away from the back; the rest would take up positions behind the building, and on the go-signal, detonate one of their pilfered sticks of dynamite at the establishment’s back door—it was believed the blast would be enough to remove the door without killing everyone in the building—and make entry there. Bob and Turk positioned themselves around a corner, while Colt took up an elevated position with a reasonable field-of-view on some containers some 15 yards out. Lance handled the dynamite, to the others’ justifiable concern, as he miscalculated the fuse, such that he was barely able to get clear of the blast before it went off—fortunately he was not injured.

Chaos ensued.

Sly was planning to give the signal to begin, and was a bit surprised at the sudden change of plans; he led Killian’s team against the front door, keeping half of Gizmo’s men pinned down there. Bob charged madly through the wall-breach, caring not for his own safety, amidst the choking cloud of dust and smoke, and started shooting at anything not wearing a vault uniform—he dropped one dead, at least, before taking a round or two himself and diving to the floor, where he remained, clinging to consciousness. Turk was just behind Bob at the former-door and fired into the room in support, dropping one enemy before retreating to reload his PPK—he saw Bob fall, and was trying to find a way to get to him. Lenny was being guarded by two thugs before it started, one of which decided to kill the hostage after the assault started; Lenny wasn’t too keen on dying just yet, and struggled against his captors. From the floor, Bob managed to drop one more going after Turk, then spotted Gizmo hiding crouched behind his desk, firing Lenny’s .44 through the wall in an attempt to hit Turk outside; still struggling to remain conscious, Bob put a few rounds into Gizmo’s sizable frame, killing him. Reloaded, Turk approached the breach and fired in support of Lenny, who took a bullet but managed to keep going and wriggle free of his captors, making a beeline for the outside, only to be shot in the back and fall at Turk’s and Bob’s feet. Around that time, Sly had finally worked his way up from the front and flanked the remaining thugs, at which point the fight was basically over—all of Gizmo’s crew were dead or greatly wounded, totaling ten plus their boss. None of them made it out of the building where Colt could pick them off. As usual, Lance hid behind the corner of an adjacent building for the duration, frozen with fear and indecision. Lenny and Bob were both in really bad shape at the end of it; Turk administered stimpacks and treated them for shock—they would live, anyway, though they would need to take it easy for a while.

Notes

• The dynamite was found in the first session, in the Brahmin’s pack, four sticks; we (the players) were a bit unsure whether or not it would be too much, and blow up the whole building, not having used it before. Killian offered some grenades instead, but we opted to take the chance. It worked out anyway
• The GM decided to gloss over the fighting at the front of the casino to concentrate on the action at the back—not big enough to justify using Mass Combat, though
• Bob ended up staying at 0HP for much of the fight; Lenny ended up at -17HP and managed to not die before the fight was over and Turk could get to him—closest I can recall to a PC death since I started playing with this group
• Colt still hasn’t fired his rifle >:(