1×07: Day Seven

• At about the same time that John realizes there is a flying saucer in the sky, multiple characters also recognize that little grey aliens are near them as well. Closer to the plane, Chandler sees one of these creatures and is psionically stunned, while Wells finds himself puppeted and sent toward the plane to retrieve something. Eventually, the two will manage to struggle free of this alien’s control, likely due to its decision to bug out following the events that surround his ally below.
• Simultaneously near the truck, Robert (who was going off to take a leak) cries out in shock and dismay when another grey alien mentally dominates him. Multiple people converge upon them – John with the squad automatic weapon (SAW); Reece with his pistol; Shane with a rifle – and the alien (who is keeping Robert between him and them) mentally attacks them. Heinlein responds with a burst of gunfire that misses the alien … but tears into Robert, killing him instantly. Reece opens up with his pistol, but finds it to be not very effective against this thing, and as Shane gets into position, John opens up again with the SAW and cripples the little grey bugger by mostly blowing off a foot. As it starts to crawl away, Shane will take a shot with his rifle and cripple one of the thing’s arms. To their surprise, it then vanishes (much like the one that Chandler and Wells are dealing with does as well.)
• Unfortunately for the alien, John visually follows a trail of ammonia-like blood and fires a short burst that miraculously catches the grievously injured alien and kills him instantly. Later, when they rejoin one another and discuss options, they decide to take the Grey with them for further study, but have to wrap it up in a tarp due to the acrid smell of its blood. Robert is also wrapped in a tarp for the time being, until they can figure out what to do with his body. The saucer itself has departed and the second Grey has vanished, so at the plane, they discover that there are numerous crates within, though there is a suspiciously blank space where one should be, indicating these aliens got what they were looking for.
• As an extremely ominous storm front races toward them, the team press onto the town of Ten Sleep where they quickly determine to hold up at the nearby school to ride out the storm. This proves to be a little more difficult than expected as the precipitation and wind are brutal, tearing open roofs and flooding the streets. They emerge on the other side a little worse for the wear, and opt to shelter in place overnight rather than press onto Buffalo.
• In the morning, John and Reece bury Robert in the nearby cemetery while James watches; Wells conducts a rudimentary autopsy of the Grey alien with a little bit of assistance from Chandler while they’re doing this and learns some things. They briefly consider ditching the alien here, but decide to hand it off to the Buffalo authorities once they arrive as proof of what just happened.
• Arriving in Buffalo soon after, the crew promptly split up, with Damien heading straight to his home while the rest coordinate in their usual manner with local officials who are hesitant to take the alien corpse off their hands but do so. When they track down Chandler at his home, they find that he has already located the photos he came for. They begin plotting their next step: travel to Cheyenne Mountain while steering clear of Denver. A circuitous route is hammered out…
• Later that evening, as Damien is gathering supplies, he hears someone using a key to unlock the back door. To his surprise, it is his ex-wife, Valerie! She expresses surprise to find him here and they exchange cool pleasantries before she asks about their wedding photos. Damien pretends that he has no idea about them, and the two basically circle one another like hunting cats. Valerie notes the presence of others and abruptly notes that she brought friends as well. She gestures to the back door…
• And Damien sees soldier bugs outside!

Player Notes:

• John shooting Robert was absolutely hysterical. In any other game, I would never have taken that shot because there was an ally in the immediate vicinity … but John is Impulsive so I decided, what the hell? Missed the alien, then Gigermann had me roll again, capped at 9 and I rolled a critical success. One of the rounds that hit Robert nailed him in the skull and that weapon does 5d pi so … oof. John has already convinced himself that it was the alien’s fault and, luckily for him I suppose, all three of the other PCs got mind-whammied at least once during the fight so it isn’t entirely unbelievable.
• Killing the alien was also an instance of unexpected critical success. Once again, I probably wouldn’t have taken a blind shot with most characters, but the Impulsiveness gave me an excuse.
• Wells conducted an autopsy of the dead Grey and the GM declared that he’ll know “some things” should it actually come up later.
• As soon as “Boomer” showed up, absolutely everyone jumped to the conclusion that she was a cylon.

See the Daniverse Blog for the GM’s post-game debrief.