Game 7: Echoes Beneath the Sea.

Hello, this is going to be Game 7 of Sparks of the Past, our Traveler game.

Last time, the session opened when the Parley had gotten their newly raised ship, the Volante.

They had finished dealing with all the water issues and all the pieces kind of getting upon it.

They decided to sell the damaged cargo to deal with the repairs.

And by getting Mercer basically rescued to this point,

they were given the code for Mercer's locked pad,

and they were able to open that up.

It greets the user as Senator Mercer,

and it leads you to a government AI with different silent accounts

for political figures.

They're able to read different pieces,

and they're able to find out that There was a draft of Mercer's committee speech

that was sent to a plan at Providence that Mercer was going to go to and speak

to them about certain things.

But instead of him going himself, he had sent one of his staff.

The day that the staff arrived was the day that Mercer was killed.

This person's name is the person we're going to go see is Mark Duncan.

And the woman's name was Camille Dufour.

There also is members of Social Solidarity that are trying to kind of get this information.

It seemed that Mercer was working with SolSec and that there was some kind

of conflict between them.

There also is now a greater understanding of the psychic element of what was going on.

MRSA's research connects changes that they were able to make psychic clones,

but it seems to create aspects that make them not genetically pure enough

to be leaders and political kind of people involved.

It also seems that there were finding methods to alter the DNA of either

the children of political figures or the political figures themselves.

So if a situation came up where they had to defend their genetics, they could not.

The players then decide to go to Mercer's house.

While they're there, there is a strong...

A group of home guard that starts fighting multiple members of the players.

They're able to eventually best them even though some of the players are nearly dead.

They're able to find five physical genetic comparison examples proving the changes

that are happening to them.

Some photos of suspected social solidarity opposition figures,

a hidden communicator, a laser pistol, and about 200,000 credits.

The team gets back to Transcar in their shredded uniforms and they decide

to do surgery on the wounded characters on the kitchen table of the apartment

that they have.

They have incredibly lucky successes,

but realizing that they can't just ditch Transcar right now and they have to go back

to work on Monday,

they patch up everyone else and make it to the docks to get back onto

the TSS profunder.

Any questions or concerns before we continue?

That was on our weekend, right?

Like, we didn't take time off of work.

Yeah, we just had a weekend bender of crime.

Yep.

Check, Jabber Jabber.

I've requested the link because I had to delete my cache and bookmarks.

The link for what?

The game?

Yes.

Oh, okay.

Yeah.

The link for the foundry, as I just wanted to clarify, not the wiki?

Correct, correct.

Okay, there's the foundry.

Thank you so much.

You're welcome.

So you guys go back.

You guys get on a transport boat that's going to take you out to meet the Profondor.

Takes you about an hour and a half.

You guys are still a little wheezy,

especially, I would say, Victor Mendez, who was well-ventilated yesterday.

That actually was going to be the question.

We did Is surgery enough to heal me?

Is there, like,

it feels to me like being shot in the chest and having surgery on

a kid table doesn't have me showing up the next day bright-eyed and bushy-tailed

at work.

Is there any kind of lasting injury or lasting status?

So I would say I wouldn't run too fast.

You literally have like medical foam in your wounds that are healing you.

I would say that you are currently wrapped up.

You have made a point that you don't have any pressure containment that

if you actually go under pressure, your body's going to explode.

But I think the best example would be like you Like, let's say you just had dental surgery.

Are you going to die tomorrow?

No, but you're not the happiest of campers.

You just had 45th century chest surgery.

So you all arrive at the boat and the TSS profunder rises out of the water

and opens up the hatch.

Captain Valancourt is on the top hatch and he's not looking like a happy guy.

Like he's unhappy at us or he's just unhappy?

Like is he giving us the parental stare down?

I think the parental stare down is a very exact way to say it.

It's not like he wants you dead, but he's disappointed.

I'm really disappointed in you.

So...

Morning, Captain.

He's like, we'll tackle in private.

Because he doesn't want... You guys are still there with the transport boat.

He doesn't want his... Teardown of you guys to be public.

So after everyone gets all their stuff on board and you are all aboard

the Profondor,

he gradually takes you to the crew's mess and he's there and all the other members

of the crew are still kind of keeping things running.

And he's like, so we need to have a little bit of a clarifying conversation.

Let's start with the amount of liberties that you feel you have with Transdar.

And it's not that you guys don't have some liberties.

Let's just start a list.

And he stands up and he goes to a whiteboard.

Oh my gosh, what is this guy up to?

You kidnapped Slash...

Rescued, it's all perspective, you know, a genetic replication of a killed

political figure.

You

liberated slash stole

a undersea cargo vessel,

sold all the parts that you needed to and are currently have it repaired,

In Transtar Docs, you,

while being wanted criminals,

decide to go kill a group of Home Guard units

and then come back here to

a Transtar day.

It was a Sunday.

It was a Saturday.

But, I mean, they shot us first.

So, you are wanted criminals.

We are retrieving data from the gentleman who asked us to transport him when we were attacked.

You notice I'm not putting on the whiteboard you randomly hiding a political

clone on my ship.

He's a refugee.

Refugee.

We did save him.

Now that we have all these problems,

let's talk about how we're going to have a trans to our day.

Now, Transtar is very understanding that people need to let off a little steam and

a few quarts of blood.

But people are allowed to have their

excesses with results.

And I've been sent communication of,

well, these particular events These members of my crew are doing.

What have they brought forth to Transtar?

And I have to say, I'll get back

to you.

And it doesn't look good for me.

So

we've been asked to do something in the

greater term of asked

to basically convince Transtar you're valuable enough to keep on as employees.

And not having to do Jarderian

military right away.

Hey, I always look forward to having a Transtar day.

I'm glad.

I'm glad you're looking for a Transtar day because I want us all to have a Transtar day.

So while you were gone, they have placed a mini sub Inside the Profondor.

And this mini-sub has

greater reinforcement and less displaced pressure to be able

to go deeper than the Profondor can.

TransStar administrators would like you to investigate and find If not eliminate

the terrorist cells that are currently hiding in the chasm.

The Profounder cannot get deep enough to where their bases are, but you guys going, yes.

In the crushed trench?

Yes.

Or in the kelp forest?

Okay.

The trench.

Okay.

Love that.

The other problem is All of you will have to do your own piloting navigation

because we need to man the profondor.

But it also means any successes you get will be directly awarded to you

and thus make

them forget the whiteboard.

I understand.

Does anyone have any difficulties with this plan?

Great.

On the lower deck in the observation nose, there is the attached travel sub.

When we get close enough to The chasm, you can all go there.

And from there, there is radio controls that will flood and open up that area for you to go out.

I do have an added character question.

How did he know this when we weren't exactly telling anyone we were doing any things?

Well, you guys did tell him that you're hiding this guy on board.

Right, that's one thing out of the, like, ten we did.

Well, he was there when he dropped you off to go pick up the ship.

He was there for that.

Yeah, those two parts, like, clearly understand how they would know.

The only thing that he basically got from Home Guard is

when you guys murdered Home Guard guys who had...

It's the only thing he wasn't at.

I get you.

So, that kind of...

It seems a little crazy, but this guy literally has been all your transportation underwater.

I guess.

Okay.

I just...

I don't know.

I thought we were being a little more...

I don't want to say secretive, but careful.

You trusted him, and he hasn't ratted you guys out or screwed you guys over.

In the grand scheme of things, he's trying to find a way for you guys to

not be in trouble.

Oh, all right.

A teen can be a good guy then.

Yeah.

And if you think about it,

like you guys have done some pretty high jinky stuff

and you guys have no new identities.

You guys don't have veils.

You guys literally dropped the ship off to go get repaired.

It's you guys have been pretty much on the up and up and not underwater criminals

because no one wants to be a criminal.

Let alone an underwater one.

Exactly.

Something applicating.

Yeah.

We're more of on-land criminals, not underwater criminals.

Right?

Exactly.

But... You know, the biggest problem about being an underwater criminal is all the pressure.

Oh my god.

I approve of... How dare...

So I'm sorry.

I'm sorry, Laura.

It just means that your heart sunk there a little.

Oh, sorry, Kat.

Well, and you always like, what are you going to do with bad guys?

You can't have them swim with the fishes.

He is like,

do you guys feel safe enough to enter some type of combat scenario if you are going

to be dealing with these terrorist people?

I know we have the underwater suits.

Are they armored to a point where they could take a shot if we get hit with them?

Or...

Define a shot.

A bullet shot underwater is remarkably not very piercing.

Fair enough.

I guess I'm imagining if we have to go and take them out,

if there is an underwater base,

we would then be fighting underwater but in pressurized air in the base.

Unless, does this have weapons on it?

We have a, the torpedo team has been exhausted.

You guys remember that that was one of the plot points.

No, the sub, the one that we're going to be getting into.

No, it barely has enough space for all of you guys to be in there in suits.

We imagine they have to have some type of resting,

rebuilding location because not everyone who fights is a dolphin.

Well, this will be tough.

But I don't want this relationship wrecked.

Oh my god, why are you joining in?

What is happening?

He smiles at your bit,

and he's like,

I understand that many of your more combative members,

though, are still on chore recuperating or

their batteries didn't activate.

Well, if we find one of their bases and this sub has arms,

why can't we put a little plastique on the outside of their base?

That way it's not missiles, it's alternative solutions.

I could get you a few mining explosives, if that would be helpful.

I know personally,

if I was in something that small,

I wouldn't want to be with something that blows up.

That is an excellent point.

There's also the concern,

you know,

if we take it out of it and we go to plant it and,

you know, we're under incredible pressure, the explosives can be unstable.

What would be the accuracy of dropping these mining explosives from

a DEF that

the larger sub is?

You know, use them as DEF charges.

Zero.

Okay, thank you.

It literally is like trying to drop like a feather from the Empire State Building

and expecting it will land on a cabin.

Because the currents would move it and it's very far down.

There is a drone attached to the micro sub.

So you guys can do some exploring without it necessarily involving you directly.

And because you're going to be under the pressure,

the same thing as the Profunder,

if there is some type of emergency,

you can just attempt to rise out of the chasm and we will be there to rescue you.

So this sounds like this will take several days to be a multi-part

We need to scout the area, recon, find out where they are exactly.

Might take several trips out in the Microsoft.

Exactly.

We know that when we send sonar signals down in the chasm that

There seems to be archways or tunnels inside the chasm that we can't hear or see into.

Oh, exciting.

Tunnels.

Underwater tunnels.

Is there any other gear I could possibly provide to help out?

I can't think of anything at this time.

Nor can I.

From the sub,

you should be able to maintain communication with us as long as you are not

in

a tunnel.

So we will try to maintain any communication we can.

And if you are having difficulties, we will do our best to help out.

One question for you, good captain.

I

understand our goal in the coming days is to show our value to TransStar.

I think everybody at this table is understanding of that.

What's TransStar's value out of the terrorists being eliminated?

Is it just local stability or...

Is there something deeper as well?

Well,

Transtar has made a lot of their money off of these underwater bases where labs

and experiments have been done that the terrorists have destroyed

as you rescued your friend from.

Ah.

We are losing financial aspects in the fact that we cannot maintain these labs and

the transport necessary to them.

If they find such difficulty in being here, maybe they'll start building floating sky bases.

So it is advantageous for us to have them here.

Gotcha.

So we are aggressively protecting financial assets.

Yes.

Great.

Thank you.

I'll let you all kind of sit and organize on who is going to be doing what on the microphone.

And I will start getting us towards the chasm.

So he leaves the room.

That could have gone better.

Could have gone worse.

I suppose it could have gone worse, but definitely could have gone better.

All right, we need a crew for this mini sub.

Is it supposed to be all of us going?

He said each of us have to individually pilot.

He's basically implying that if as many of you can,

should go,

because if you do find this underwater base,

you're all going to want to get off and do whatever you can there.

Well, how many of us can fit into this thing?

Eight.

Okay.

How many of us are here tonight?

All right.

So what is piling this up?

What pilots could require?

I would say, ideally, if you have a small craft, you could do it.

If you don't have small craft,

I will let people do it with a... Well, you should have vehicle underwater.

If you don't have vehicle underwater and you don't have naval,

I'll let people do it with spacecraft small craft with a negative one.

That is not it from me.

You have a spacecraft of one, so...

Yeah, I think it's Alan that has, like, where is he?

There he is.

Yeah, and I have a spacecraft of one as well.

I have a big number in astro navigation, but I doubt that'll help with undersea navigating.

Alan only has a small craft of one as well, I thought.

He has a spacecraft of three, though, so he could fly in space very well.

Um...

Yeah, my biggest naval tactics.

Yeah, I was just about to say I've got naval tactics as well,

but

in the past we've had that as space naval.

It is space naval.

Oh, well, but can the naval tactics inspire someone to be a better underwater pilot?

No, that is leadership.

Right, that's what I'm saying.

Can they do that?

Well, you get a Boone Bane, but it doesn't help the number.

Well, it helps it a little bit

if it's a boon.

They get to roll it twice and take the best.

Great, that's helping.

That's helping.

It's helping.

It never hurts.

Josh, Laura, and...

Mine's the

same as everybody else's,

yeah.

Josh and Laura, I think, are the only people that have spacecraft at all.

I have spacecraft at one.

Okay, so Josh, Laura, Steinbach, all can do it.

So then we're looking at who has the highest intelligence bonus.

Oh, it's intelligence, not dex?

Interesting.

This is intelligence.

You guys have never done it before.

I've got plus two off of int.

I have a plus two.

This is where I really want the plus one chip, because a plus one chip puts me at a plus three.

Yeah, but plus one chips are ludicrously expensive.

A plus two chip was ludicrously expensive, and

a plus one is not so much.

That's all right.

So yeah, all of you guys can roll that basically.

So you could,

the one who has a good leadership should probably

then leadership someone who's going to roll.

You definitely are going to want someone to be checking the sensors

and probably someone to maintain the comm communications because if shit goes down,

you want to be able to still call back home.

Okay, I can do comms.

I maybe can do sensors.

I have a plus one on sensors.

I have a plus one on sensors as well, and I have a two on comms.

I guess I'm doing the boat because I don't have either

of those.

I was going to say,

could maybe cold leadership, Josh, and then Laura and I handle comms and sensors?

Well, why doesn't he do a leadership?

And if he gets enough, he can give leadership to everybody.

No, it's only one person.

Oh, I thought it was her success was her person got a boon.

No, so the way leadership is in the book is you initiate a leadership and you pick

the task you're leadershiping and then you can give that many successes,

that many retries to the person trying that thing.

Now, what you're thinking of, let's say we're all doing the same thing.

One leadership can affect all of us.

Okay.

So we're all fighting when leadership affects all of us.

We're all controlling the ship when leadership affects all of us.

But if one guy is trying to do a weapon console and one guy is trying to do

a flying console, it doesn't affect both of you.

Wow, it's been 28 days since we played.

That's crazy.

That's what Cole said.

Almost a month.

High holidays.

Far too long.

Yes.

All right.

So who, which one shall leadership, shall leadership?

You want to leadership Josh?

Because you crash.

Hopefully he doesn't crash you and kill everybody.

We're going to reroll characters tonight, guys.

Well, Dan,

I know this isn't something that you've,

you've done specifically before, but you have, you know, a lifetime of experience.

And a wealth of knowledge.

And I have faith that you'll do a great job.

Well, yeah, I prefer fixing the ship.

But here's hoping that I can ride.

Here's hoping and drive without needing to fix the ship.

Here's hoping.

The next fly things, the next three, you have boons, Josh.

Okay.

Should I be rolling now?

Yes.

Boom, public.

Those are terrible rolls.

That was a terrible roll, Nick.

You skid up against the side, but you don't have a critical failure.

I'm going to get a hang of it, guys.

Don't worry.

It can only go off from here.

It rolled your dex.

If it's supposed to be intelligence, it rolled your dex.

Oh, you're right.

That was not supposed to be the roll.

You're right.

It should actually roll better.

I mean, it kind of doesn't...

I mean, your intelligence is plus two as well, right?

It's the same as your dex.

Yeah.

Yeah.

No, listen, that's cheating.

It's actually kind of the opposite

of cheating.

So everything has become dusty.

Can someone give me a sensor roll since he scraped the side of the wall

and you guys can't see anymore?

That's Victor.

Yep, I got sensor intelligence as the base.

There we go.

Perfect.

You're able to make a pin coordination,

and you do sense that there is moving targets about,

I'd say, 1,200 feet down.

I

will alert the team that there are

fishes in the water, possible incoming.

Laura, are you going to send this data back right away?

If I do, will the opposition hear it as well?

Only if you fail your roll.

Only if I fail my roll.

Hey, there's Alan, and there's like a picture of Alan.

I will...

It's the Alan show.

I'll roll my comms.

No whammy, no whammy, no whammy.

Yes.

So, yes.

Sorry.

I meant to say that, yes, I was going to send it right away.

Okay.

Because I want to make sure that if we call for help,

that they are understanding of the situation.

Okay.

Now, Josh,

do you wish to,

now that you've regained stable control, do you wish to

hand the pilot to Alex?

It is a good question, right?

Because, like, again, Alan's role is, like, two better on the role, right?

Not for Smallcraft.

No, but I said you mean minus one of Spacecraft.

Oh, yeah, he has three in Spacecraft.

So he's giving me two Spacecraft and one actually they're about even

because he also is losing one on Intelligence.

All right, well, here, bring Alan up at speed.

So we apparently got super busted for all the stuff that we did last session,

like going to the guy's,

well, jailbreaking the guy, going to his house, getting in a firefight.

Transstar somehow, well, not somehow, but they know all of that.

So they are giving us essentially a...

They came at us first.

We tried that argument, but they didn't want to buy it.

So we have to essentially prove ourselves to Transtar that we're valuable.

So they gave us this heavy-duty mini-sub to go down into,

if you're looking at the map, what the heck was it called?

It's the Crush Trench.

To find the terrorists.

Because that's where they've been hiding.

And not only is it super deep.

But there are cave systems underneath here too.

And Dan slash Josh was driving.

Victor is doing sensors.

And then I'm doing comms.

And the vessel can hold up to eight.

So we're all here.

Including you now.

You just kind of.

The math is still probably better for Josh because of the next two leadership roles.

Oh, that's true.

Those aren't transferable.

No.

So Josh should probably roll again.

But the question is, Josh, do you want to go towards the targets or try to lure them away?

Who's the captain?

I don't know.

Is that Laura?

Laura, captain.

What are we doing?

I am not the captain, actually.

Who's the captain?

He's on the profile of Earth.

I mean, listen,

if you all want me to be the captain,

I'm happy to do it, but I always felt like one of you... You're the pilot.

I want to be the pilot.

Okay, we're going towards it.

Let's go.

Nobody has any opinions.

We're doing it.

Roll that bean for this.

Let's fuck them up.

That's my... Intelligence

this time.

And a boom.

There we go.

Wow.

Okay.

Like the polar opposite of last time.

You were able to do two choices, I'll give you, because that was such a great roll.

One, you could spin around them and come from behind.

Or you can get past them with them thinking that you're still in the cloud of the dust you hit.

What weapons do we have?

You have two arms.

We don't have weapons.

We have a bunch of guns inside the ship.

You guys could jump out of the ship.

Wait, wait.

So are we trying to find terrorists within the wind?

Ram them.

Ram them.

Yeah, we're scouting here.

We're scouting.

Yes.

You could ram them.

You are in an object that has mass...

Well, I'm going to say with an 11, you can't do much better ramming someone than with an 11.

Right, but there's more of them than there are of us, and so then they'll just call for backup.

I suggest moving past them.

Now you will have opinions, huh?

Now you will have opinions when I'm about to breach the submarine, huh?

Now they have options.

We should sneak on past them.

Yeah, now that you're getting ready to do something dumb,

then I have a thing.

Oh, you like to breathe air or something?

Okay, okay.

We're mouth breathers.

All of us are mouth breathers.

Because you are the pilot, you are the final choice in this action.

So I wasn't actually going to ram the person,

but I guess we have a consensus on don't do something which could lead

to instantaneously death.

But the important thing is that now that Alan's here, he can re-roll a character also.

It's true.

So I will try and make it so that they think we're still behind them and we got out

and they didn't realize we're there.

Okay, so you're making them think that you're in the dust

cloud while you get passed.

Can I get a sensor roll?

Absolutely.

So you guys can see what you were passing.

Coming right up.

We all don't want to go for Gusto.

Great roll.

Yeah.

I had two good rolls tonight.

That means the rest of it we were going to suck.

Sorry, guys.

No, no, no.

No, this isn't the previous campaign.

You have a brand new luck.

You've been rolling really well this campaign, actually.

Yeah, I'm with him on that.

Like, no, you gotta buy into the positivity.

Well, you did roll great.

And so there are two dolphins and there are three humanoids

in basically jet-powered kind of skiffs.

Which basically let them keep up to the dolphins.

Do they seem to be moving in our direction or are they just kind of on a standard patrol?

They are going directly to where Josh

hit the wall.

Aha.

Because it made a lot of noise.

So they're like, they're going that way.

So you guys got past him.

You guys can successfully kind of keep away.

They're going to keep thinking you guys are hiding in the dust pile.

And you guys keep going down a little farther.

There's some creaking.

And I would say that you're sensing that you see some moisture on some of the bolts.

The last one

was more damaging than I thought.

The Deep Horizon,

whatever those rich people got exploded in and they were driving it with

a PlayStation controller.

Yeah.

It was called Ocean's Gate.

Ocean's Gate.

I couldn't remember if that was the name of the ship or the name of the company.

The name of the company is called Titan.

Oh, guys, where do you think we should go?

Should we go back?

Maybe also because we're mildly leaking?

And also... Can we patch it up?

I mean, if someone else wants to drive, I

can probably

patch

it up.

You are also... We don't need to roleplay it, but all of you guys are talking on helium.

Okay, wait.

This is my favorite part of the game.

Oh my gosh, that's amazing.

Because you guys can't lose oxygen at these places.

Wait, why are we not on oxygen?

So oxygen, when you get to this level of pressure, oxygen can't actually go through your lungs.

Your body can't actually absorb it.

It's too pressurized.

So they cut it with helium.

And helium basically goes in between the oxygen molecules so they stay fluffy,

basically, and your lungs can absorb it.

But yes, everyone does sound like they're on helium.

If you want to look up some conversations about this,

people who actually have to do deep sea welding work, they're this way for months.

We're at the level of no one promised you good life.

And they talk about how they just...

They talk about how their mind begins to actually translate it to sound normal.

Because if all of a sudden everything you heard would be this way,

your body would gradually begin to kind of be like,

that's not the way things should sound.

It would switch.

Are we playing these guys?

What do we decide?

I just want you to know that that's happening.

You guys are not massively knowledgeable of the undersea, so you might note it.

But I don't want people to have to squeak for literally the rest of the game.

Yeah, I'd rather not squeak.

Except for Alan.

Alan has to.

That's one for and one against.

What does it say the rest of the game?

I

know Steinbach obviously wants the opportunity to talk like Helium for the rest of the game.

I mean, I could, but...

I will avoid that.

I'm happy to take over the pilot, Earl.

Josh has one more leadership and then you can definitely.

I was going to say, I don't remember where he is on that.

He has one more.

Okay.

So, um, Josh, it's your choice.

Uh, yes, it's, but you guys are much deeper than the profound dirt can go.

So there's going to be some leaks and some creaks, but, um, do you

want to keep going down?

What do you think guys?

I would like to take a string from one side of the sub to the other so that

as we compress down, we can see the string begin to dip.

Good idea.

What's the advantage to that?

Well, you instantly know.

Can we find one of these caves that's relatively close so that we can take a moment

to pause and see what condition the ship is in?

I can definitely say that a pilot role could try to get you into one of the caves.

Okay.

Okay.

I can't see how this could go poorly.

No, it'll be great.

You have to have faith.

See, look at that.

Boom.

Let's go, Grandstar.

So, Josh, you are in the deep depths.

I do need Laura to see if she can maintain communication before you get under

to give the update of we're going into a cave.

Okay.

I do need...

I'm going to let them...

Sorry.

Go ahead.

So I want Lord roll comms.

I want Steinbeck to roll censors.

I will tell them, though,

that we've taken some damage and we're assessing it so that they're up to date

on what we're doing, not just that.

By the way, we're going to cave BBF.

You also want to tell them that we found criminals?

Yeah, I already did that part.

That was the first message.

Okay.

And perfect.

I'm actually with that perfect roll.

As long as you guys don't go too deep in the caves,

you're placing a repeater at the edge of the first cave you go to.

I'm so good at talking, guys.

Talking over radios.

There are three caves that you're seeing with the sensors.

One of them is about...

The doorway of it is about,

I would say, like a football field goal.

As far as distance?

As far as the width of the hole.

Yeah, okay.

I would say the second hole is about the size of a...

I'd say like a minibus.

And the third hole is about

the size of,

would say like a sliding glass window.

You barely saw it.

Okay.

So that one, maybe our mini sub could go into the big one.

Our whole sub could go into maybe what are the dimensions of our sub versus the second opening?

The thing is, it's more difficult rolls to not hit things on each one.

Right.

OK, I just I want to make sure it was even possible for us to go in.

So the smallest one that's like the double doors,

you're likely to park outside, get in your suits and walk in.

OK, I was thinking that secondary mini sub that they gave us that was attached to

the small sub we're in.

The heavy duty sub we're in.

Right.

You mean the drone?

Oh, the drone.

Are you asking about the drone?

Yes.

Yes, the drone for the smallest was my assumption.

But I figured we could get in the big one.

It was the middle one that I was trying to verify whether we could go in or whether

that would have to be a drone or a walk.

Honestly, the drone is about the size of Bluebell.

Like, you literally can put it anywhere.

Okay.

I love how Bluebell is a unit of measurement now.

Yes.

If you saw Hunt for Red October,

the ship you're in is basically the rescue sub that they connected to

the Red October.

I have remote ops if you'll

need someone to do that.

Here's the big pieces I would like to kind of note, though.

The smallest one,

you guys are definitely parking outside and walking in the hole,

which means you can't really look at the ship.

Like you can't be like, oh, I'm going to go well to repair whatever.

The second one is going to be a difficult role to get to get the ship in.

But when you get the ship in, you might find an air pocket.

You might find something.

You might be able to start working on the ship if you're worried about repairs.

The top one, it's it's a big hole.

Like, honestly,

if you don't get a negative on the role,

you guys are going to be able to pilot it and find.

I think the second option, I'm happy to try it.

I mean, sure.

All right, I support our new pilot.

And, you know, go get in the remote ops chair there, Josh.

Josh to the mute.

Okay, so are you going to want to look at it with the drone first or are you just going

to want to go in?

We should look with the drone first.

Definitely look for it.

So I just want to note that I feel like now that Alan is sober and is driving,

that you will push me to the side a little fast.

Just because I almost killed us doesn't mean I'm not hurt.

We need your drone driving skills

before you've actually been promoted here.

Yeah.

Cass, that's some good leadership right there.

I like it.

I like it a lot.

Okay.

So can you give me a remote ops, Josh?

Is that going to be intelligence?

No, right.

It's already intelligence.

Yeah.

Nobody's going to try and give me any

help here, huh?

You're still on the same scene.

I have remote off.

You're very successful.

You get the thing into there.

It basically,

as you come in,

you go for about 20 feet inside,

and then the floor begins to rise, and you can see above there is air.

That's good.

Okay, so yeah, take us in now.

But also note this, Josh.

You know when you hit the wall, it was very dusty?

Yes.

These walls have no dust.

Uh-oh.

Diamond.

So, guys, you notice how the walls before were so dusty and these aren't?

Which makes me think... Yeah, they're used.

Yeah, this is probably what we're looking for.

Should I make a roll?

Why don't you take the drone up and see if we can see what's in the air?

Well, because then there's no water to push on.

Into the surface of the water.

So, like, when you, like, you just want to bob it at the top?

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

I would say if you bob it at the top, it basically, you see it up ahead and then the cave turns.

Yeah, okay.

But yes, do people want Alan to drive into there?

I can barely see how this would kill us, even if he's successful.

So why not?

Okay.

So, Alan, it is going to be

a spacecraft minus one with an intelligence as the delimiter.

Hey, why don't you coach him?

You did such a good job coaching him, Cass.

I don't think anyone should

do that.

Do I just subtract one at the end?

I don't know.

Josh, how are you doing your minus one?

How was I doing my minus one?

Oh, that's how you are doing it.

You can mess with the... Can you hear me or you can't hear me?

I can hear you.

So on DM, you should have just been able to do minus one, right?

No, you can change it by twos.

Choose.

I just went to DM,

and I typed minus one on Josh,

and I'm going to go intelligence, and I'm going to go roll.

And that's exactly how it should work, yeah.

How do I do it?

You should be able to, you're right clicking your spacecraft.

Yeah.

You left click your spacecraft.

Where it says a dex at the top, you move this to intelligence.

Where it says DM, you type minus one.

And then, so I have roll mode, difficulty, roll type, oh, DM minus one.

Okay.

Why are we all minus one-ing?

Because you aren't piloting a sub.

You're trying to pilot a spacecraft.

You don't want to pilot a spacecraft, not a sub.

Ah, okay.

Ready?

Ready?

Great.

You park

it up there,

you're able to get it floating at the top,

and you literally are able to have the arm hold onto the side

so everyone can walk out easily.

Hey, Steinmoth, did you meet, why does your thing have a minus three on it anyway?

Because I was testing out and that was in fact the way to do it,

or if there was something else to it.

Patrick was right on, and I was just trying to test it out myself as well.

Fair enough.

So, who wants to get out?

Why don't some of you gunny fellows get out first?

I went first last time.

You did

go first last time.

That didn't work out for you.

I'll go first.

I think you want me patching you up.

But sure, I'll go first.

No, no, no.

Guys, let me go out first.

Got ahead.

I'm the stealthy one.

All right.

Okay.

All right.

Yeah, sure.

This is like totally that moment in Aliens where it's like, yeah, let's let the droid go first.

Let's let the monkey go first.

Let's let the monkey go first.

That's a great idea, guys.

All right.

So this is stealth and recon.

I'm fine for stealth.

Okay.

Thanks.

You are very stealthy.

You do think they probably should turn off the engine though of the sub.

It definitely covered the sound of your walking.

Okay.

And I'm going to recon the area.

Do you want to tell us to turn off the engine of the sub though?

Yes, please.

I power down the ship.

Okay.

By the way, Laura,

you are still able to maintain your communication because as long as you're

within basically 500 yards of the repeater, you're going to be able to talk.

Sweet.

All right.

Did you know that it takes two hours to turn back on the submarine?

Really?

Hope you don't need to get out of there for the quick and

a jiffy.

Yeah, I don't think it takes that long.

And am I correct?

I'd like to make a recon roll to see if I could find.

Damn, we're awesome tonight.

You see that

there is a airlock

That is all mechanical.

There is no locks in it is like gears and pulleys.

Interesting.

I let them know I found a Airlock.

It's that crude, no locks on it.

Does it look like it's for humanoids?

Like bipedal?

Okay.

Yeah, it is approximately the size of Dumbledore.

That's good because I don't think we're great at... Dumbledore was pretty tall.

It's probably for those skiffs.

Not as tall as Patrick, though.

So do we want to go in like guns blazing?

Do we want to like try to collapse this tunnel around it?

Do you think we can sabotage both ends of the store?

I don't think guns blazing worked out for us so well,

so I think we should maybe find a different alternative method.

Can we like fire a torpedo into there?

We don't have torpedoes.

Gunsblazing worked out pretty well for everyone except for...

That's why I said I wasn't going in first this time.

Does anyone want to unlock the door?

Like, just break the seal?

How do we do that?

Do we need, like, a specific roll for that?

No.

Turn a wheel.

Well, you need to be outside the ship, though.

Now that he's done the scout, who does not want to get out of the ship?

Maybe everyone should go,

but Alan,

who should stay in the ship,

you know, to turn on the ship, should we be running back with people shooting?

Well, but then he doesn't get to have any of the fun.

That's a meta decision there.

Fair enough.

Outside of the meta, I would stay in the ship while everyone else goes.

Can I fly the ship deep into the tunnel if I have to?

No, there's no water.

Oh, so we're just

parked up

there.

This is why you get a minus one, because it's not a spacecraft.

I will say you guys can take the keys so no one can steal your ship.

Let's all get out.

I'm feeling that a common sense says, fine, let's all get out.

Yeah.

Especially since I can patch someone up if they get shot.

Can I hold the keys, though?

No.

Tinkle, tinkle, this way.

Tinkle, tinkle.

This way.

This way.

I'm on my fucking feet.

Okay.

So, everyone's gotten out.

I imagine that you're all still staying in vac suits, just in case.

Well, yeah.

I mean, it's still pressurized down here.

I don't know.

Does someone want to see if it's just normal pressure oxygenated?

That sounds like a bad idea.

However, I'd like to have, does anyone want to check back suits with me?

Anyone just like for funsies?

Funsies.

I mean, we

already have them on.

No, what he's trying to say is basically check the measurements to see what

the gases are in the room you're in.

Oh, is that?

Okay, I thought he was just saying, because he said that was a bad idea, so.

He doesn't want to take it off.

He wants to see what the back suit says.

I was not saying we should take them off by any stretch of the imagination.

No, no.

What is that?

Is that a back suit roll?

Yes.

I'll do it.

You said you got it?

Okay.

So there is oxygen here, and there is also

little bit of methane and a bit of hydrogen.

You could probably breathe it with an

endurance test.

Excellent.

If our thing gets ruptured, I'll be happy to do that endurance test.

Yeah, or we could just stay on helium and then the bad guys will take us super seriously.

Absolutely.

Well, they're probably on helium

too.

Okay, so who would like to open up the first door?

Ooh, me.

Ooh, me.

I can't see how this could go wrong.

Let me do it.

What's the roll?

There's no roll.

Door opening.

I'm looking for that on my sheet.

Mechanics.

It's drive.

No, that's definitely your tactics, Navel.

Oh, Josh.

Oh, Josh.

So adorable.

So you open the door and you literally see another door within five feet.

Like an airlock system?

Like an airlock system.

Do they have a plane in there?

What?

An underwater plane?

Hydroplane?

Anyone who has a science, I'll happily accept a science roll.

I'll do a science roll.

I have a lot of science.

No, I mean, not a lot.

I have all zeros as opposed to negatives.

Blah, blah, blah.

Oh, wow.

Josh got a great role.

I will say,

well, Laura got the same role.

So you notice that the rock here has been plasticized or had some type

of containment that makes it no longer porous.

Only inside

the vac area.

Interesting.

Can I see it?

Is it like something like the smoothie shiny?

Yeah, there's a perfect way of describing it.

Yeah.

Okay.

Smoothie is a very technical term.

Smoothie.

It's like a strawberry smoothie.

No, you notice that the rocks were wet and kind of musty in the normal area.

You've gone into the first door of the airlock and you realize that to make sure

that it can handle the pressure difference, these rocks have been plasticized.

Okay.

Interesting, interesting, interesting.

Is there any kind of like venting pump system?

Not on this side.

Okay, because my original thought was the tunnel fills with water,

they open the door, it pumps out, they go through the other side.

But maybe it's the other way around.

I think it's going to be fine, guys.

Let's just open it.

Why do you want to die tonight, dude?

Oh my god.

It's been a really hard week.

It's Monday.

It's been a rough holiday, you know.

Alan is on board team, kill ourselves.

No.

But they will die.

Not if we die first.

No, we won't die first.

I mean, I would prefer not to die right now.

Okay, if you'd like to be sensible,

then I'm open to hearing other suggestions that don't,

you know, that don't have us dying immediately.

Sure, I'm listening.

There's no window or anything like that, right?

Like, no people?

Not on either side.

I would even go so far as to say there's not a camera even.

Do we have

Like a tricorder type machine that has a sensor on it that we could put up against

the door to see what's on the other side.

Like an ear, maybe?

Well, no.

Damien, that was the greatest line.

You definitely have a few ears.

Right, but they're inside suits.

But you could,

I don't know,

if anyone has a computer, I could attempt to, you can attempt to use a computer to.

I do.

Yeah, I do too.

Let me do a thing.

Okay.

Excuse me, do your thing.

I'll help him.

I have a high computer, I'll help him.

I'll hand you my computer.

I thought we didn't have good computer people.

We have a bunch of okay computer people.

Okay.

Roll that bean footage.

Okay.

You know that sound travels here.

Okay.

That means it's hollow on the other side then.

Probably hollow.

Sound can travel through water.

Sound travels through almost everything, even

in space.

Not the vacuum of space.

There's no air.

Yeah, so kind of one place I wouldn't travel because I can't vibrate on any material

to keep moving.

Yeah.

Yeah.

As they say, in space, no one can hear you scream.

Although apparently there's a creepy ass.

I don't want to distract us.

My God, what?

There's a creepy sound that astronauts report hearing when they go behind the moon.

Yeah.

I've watched 101 science documentaries in the last two weeks.

But there's also the flash in people's eye,

which may be the quarks actually impacting them from cosmic radiation.

Yeah, that too.

Oh, those quirky quarks.

I think all of you guys are going in the airlock.

Sure.

I love dying.

It's going to be great.

Nice knowing y'all.

Listen, guys,

I was going to stay on the ship so that I could write delightful obituaries

about you all.

But now we're all in it together, guys.

And just to clarify, I am in a pressure suit with the helmet on.

It's not like I'm just opening the door in my skivvies.

I don't know.

Patrick just has that look on his face that means bad news.

Yeah, I get that feeling too, which is why I'm super excited to open the door.

I doubt there will be

bears here.

Just do it.

Turn

off my camera.

Relax, don't do it.

When you want to go do it.

Relax, don't do it.

Someone opening the door.

Yeah.

Yep.

Okay, you guys start swinging the door.

We really did turn off your camera.

As you guys are turning the doorknob, you are hearing a ventilation begin to pressurize inside.

You're feeling a ton of air come actually into the room you're in.

Oh.

And you're all hearing alerts on your vac suit.

So the problem that's happening right now to your back suits is a reverse pressure.

We're getting puffy.

Yes, because you're under high pressure and in there is low pressure.

Oh no.

Can I roll a back suit to know what that will do to us?

Or a science?

I will accept back suits at Bane's.

Does anyone have Profession Spacer?

Belter.

If anyone has a Profession Belter, I'll let you roll that without a bane.

Wow.

Kolb, fucking plus seven on the damn roll.

Fifteen.

So the issue in play is that's...

Normal air oxygenation.

You're in a scenario where your vac suits are currently set for you guys to be in

a pressurized environment of like the subs and the micro subs and

the underwater base.

Yeah, so we're about to get the bends real bad.

You guys could try to gradually vent your vac suits so they don't pop.

And Vaxuit Rolls will basically be the...

And by the way,

a person who got plus seven can actually try to walk everyone through.

Vent, breathe out.

One, two, three.

Vent, breathe out.

One, two, three.

You can start trying to get them through a process.

But you got about 15-20 seconds before some of these Vaxuits get compromised.

Can we also close the door?

You are fighting pressure.

I will walk them through the venting process because it doesn't seem like we can go back.

If you guys had a battle suit, yeah, you definitely could do it.

But with your guys' eventual plus ones and twos of strengths,

you'll be able to pull the door closed right now until everything equalizes.

Okay.

So, Kolb, you two have leadership, don't you?

I do.

I'm going to say... And we're all

doing the same thing.

Right.

And because you got such incredible successes...

What I want you to do is I want you to roll leadership and everyone is going

to get those numbers.

Bam, bam,

bam, bam.

Okay.

We're at the A-team, guys.

I know.

We're doing so good tonight.

Can I ask how we were supposed to deal with the door?

If we, if, like, I was pretty sure something bad behind him.

What were we supposed to do?

What do you mean?

Never mind.

Continue the game.

Did you want to?

There's three other methods I had around it,

but I, I, all of them would have been even weirder in hygiene gear.

Fair enough.

Continue.

Yeah, you could have just, like,

drilled through the wall, and that's a little bit of venting would have come out.

You would have realized what's happening, and you guys could have backed up until it equalized.

You guys could have flooded the entire cave with water,

pump all the air of it out into the ship.

There's a lot of things you could do, but it's...

Okay, so I need everyone to roll vac suits.

You have boons.

We're going to be doing this three times.

You have boons on all three rolls.

I only want to know who fails.

Do you want to roll all three now?

Yeah.

Colb, you get to roll.

I'm mostly going to let you roll a boon because of your experience.

Everyone has a boon?

Everyone has a boon for all three.

Yeah, for three.

And we just roll three times.

Yep.

I

think everyone made it.

I have one more.

My friend...

Plus six.

Wow.

Alan is like the first failure, I think.

Do I roll again after failing or no?

Is that your third?

That was my second.

Yeah, you have to roll again.

Nice.

Okay.

Okay, so everyone has rolled three, right?

Yes.

Okay.

So, Alan, you're going to have a wound of two endurance.

Two endurance?

Okay.

Oh, you already subtracted it.

Okay.

I told you to stay on the ship, Alan.

Okay.

So, Alan starts bleeding out of his nose and his eyes.

Wow.

Can I do a medic roll?

No, because we're in suits.

Right.

And you guys are...

But Alan's suit is also not compromised.

It basically threw the pressure into him.

But through the burping and through the exhale and you guys opening your suits

and closing your suits and opening your suits and closing your suits,

Kolb has basically walked you through at equalized breathing.

Good job, Kolb.

Great job, Ken.

Two damage could have been a lot worse.

And it's not really repairable damage because it is blood vessels just shattering in his body.

It's going to heal.

So it will not return them back?

No, it's healed with time, just not medical.

Okay.

So honestly,

next time you sleep,

you're probably going to regain them back because you have so much endurance

to begin with.

Mm-hmm.

So you guys are able to fully

open the doors now.

And I'm going to paste in chat.

Whoa.

Cool.

That's not good.

What happened in chat?

Oh, wow.

That's amazing.

I bet that the criminals organization that tried to help us is entrenched here.

Oh, undoubtedly.

Can we take a picture?

Yeah.

Just pull up your phone to take a picture.

I would also note,

as you're seeing people walk around in the distance, they're not wearing back

suits.

So we're going to stand out like a solid thumb if we stay here for too long.

Can we now close the door from the other side?

Or you guys can take off your back suits.

But I mean,

but also can we like,

I'm saying can we close the door so that it doesn't keep on venting air?

Oh, it equalizes.

Okay.

By the way, it has also pushed water

out of the hole.

So your sub is now like bobbing on the other side of it.

Do you ever understand what I'm saying or do you want me to draw it?

Yeah, I don't understand what you mean by bobbing on the other side.

Do you mean bobbing, like, outside the cave?

Yeah, let me make a draw.

Because it is a little confusing to think about the way that the pressure kind of works.

But I'll just go create scene.

The water level

has risen or dropped?

Because I imagine it would have dropped.

Yes, but it's in a cave, which means it's pushing.

Yeah.

Okay, so we're on draw.

I'm going to send everyone to this one and go pull everyone.

Okay, and now I'm going to

draw freehand.

Okay, so.

It's all black.

Yeah, that's what I'm saying too.

But I assume that's what I was supposed to say.

There you go.

Okay.

There we go.

Okay, so these two lines are the airlock.

Okay.

Then,

this was basically the little cave area coming, and then this was where your ship was.

Here is the top of the cave, right?

Okay.

So, the problem is, when the pressure comes in, that water goes down.

So it goes all the way over here.

And so now your ship is up here.

Oh, what bullshit is that?

I mean, I think it's terribly scary BS because if the pressure changes again,

the water could hypothetically come back up to the same place and

the sub doesn't have to necessarily come back to where it was.

Right.

But hopefully you guys will have suits to be able to go that last distance.

My actual real life like fear of deep water, nothing below you.

Oh, it's just I hate everything about this.

My character is fine.

But like Laura thinks about having to swim out into the essentially the open water

in the middle of a deep ass trench.

No, thank you.

There must be another way.

I think my general thought is we should leave immediately.

But what do you guys think?

Well, we just got here.

Wasn't our whole purpose to find them?

Didn't we find them?

There was a certain element of neutralizing them.

Yeah, but let's be honest, there's too many people here for us to kill.

Yeah, this is a whole ass city.

I mean, it's underwater.

We could probably...

That sounds really killy for us, I think.

Yeah, I don't really like the idea of just murderating hundreds of people.

Bad guys who are shooting at us are different than people walking around town.

Here's the thing, this might be a way of getting out of TransStar for good.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking too.

Literal sane.

Literally sane.

I'm glad we're all thinking the same thing.

All Transstar has done

for us?

Do you not want to have a good Transstar day anymore, guys?

And I would rather go up with Transstar rather than stay down here.

Because they've got the spaceship that we've got, the ship's boat, they've got that.

I'd rather go out into the universe than stay down here.

This is a long play.

This is a long play here.

I guess the kind of three paths I see is one path you're like, fuck this shit.

Let's get our vac suits back on.

Let's get on the sub.

Let's repressurize.

Get the fuck out of here.

Path two is let's explore it.

And path three is you use your one bomb to destroy this entrance.

I'd like to explore it.

Yeah, I think it's

a good idea.

We might make friends.

You think it's a good idea?

Okay,

sure, okay.

I think it's good.

I've translated Josh's statement there is, it is an idea.

I don't know if it is a good idea.

Yeah.

Okay.

So, um, where, where do you guys want to put your vac suits?

Do you guys want to leave them in the airlock?

Cause you know, the airlock can't get wet.

Do you want to hide them in a bundle in the corner?

Um, what's the vibe?

I'd like to hide them in a bundle.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I like bundling corner.

Agreed, Laura.

Yeah.

I feel like they could be found in the airlock.

Okay.

Quick, quick question.

Quick question.

Um, Do you think they're not going to shoot us,

seeing how we're running around these trans star uniforms?

Wait, do we have uniforms underneath these things?

I imagine you're going to try to steal some clothing.

Yeah.

Oh, jeez.

Also, we were sneaking around.

We were just walking down the main street.

No ticket.

I get naked, and then the boombox starts to play, this is why I'm hot.

No, this seems terrible.

Let me recon the area real quick from what I can see.

How's that, guys?

Okay.

Go for it.

Scouts out.

Great roll.

Okay.

You're kind of scouting ahead in your kind of Transdar uniform.

You Come up to a

refiller for oxygen tanks.

It seems to be powered by some type of crank starter.

And there's a few oxygen tanks that are there already kept for emergencies.

You know how you go to 7-Eleven and you exchange propane?

It's like that.

Mm-hmm.

There is a workman's outfit, like a coveralls near here, if you wanted to take that.

You do see that there is a stairwell kind of going up that is metallic,

and it goes up to kind of a,

the next floor is also metal,

and it looks like there is some type of repair bay,

pulling things apart kind of, Saying, you're not seeing any people yet this close.

Okay, I will put on that repairman's uniform and I will try to stealth my way.

Okay, you can do it at a bane because

people are wondering why,

if they do see you, why is a guy stealthing?

Okay, well in that case I'll just put on the uniform and

start looking around.

Okay, you start walking around.

You see from that repair bay,

there is a,

you know how elderly people have the little,

like I stand on this thing and it takes me up the stairs?

Imagine that where it

almost like skidding the side of a whole bunch of walls

to let people get to different levels faster.

Then they could possibly climb.

So imagine the elderly one, but make it.

15 miles an hour.

Gotcha.

You do see a few kids just kind of poking around.

These kids' clothing looks like they're patchworks

of like ripped up transtar uniforms or lab stuff.

It doesn't look like they were clothing made for children.

I don't like that there are kids.

We don't want to live here anyway.

These pores.

Oh, didn't expect that.

All right, Baron.

Listen, okay.

Noblesse Oblige is a thing.

And don't you want to have good food in good times?

That is so not Noblesse Oblige.

Or maybe it's Space Noblesse Oblige.

By the way, I will let...

There's like a scrounge, right?

There's a wet skill?

Is there like scrounging?

Streetwise.

I will let Damien, if he wants to roll a streetwise, to get uniforms for everybody else.

Okay.

So I hear what you're saying.

Maybe these people need help, but are we the people to help them?

I think we're much more likely to blow up the place and have it collapse

and kill them than help them.

Damien, you definitely find more random workman's uniforms,

but you are seeing people in very worn transtar uniforms.

Okay.

They're not even like,

you can tell the emblems or the name tags are ripped off or things like that.

And the arms and knees might have some unraveling.

So

would it stand out crazy if we have brand new ones or it's like, oh.

I'm saying you guys can dirty them up.

Can someone else do it for us?

Maybe someone who's good at deception?

Well, he did bring back a few workman outfits too.

So people who are unwilling to try a deception roll can use one of those.

I don't

like to lie to people.

I like to let them know that I'm going to blow up their underground.

I don't think I have deception.

So Kolb easily rips up his uniform to look like it's worn and old in a very successful fashion.

Yeah.

Can I use

a uniform?

Because I have a very bad deception.

Like negative three.

Victor Mendez does fine.

Emma does fine.

So I think you can give him one of the outfits since everyone.

Yeah.

Of the players here, almost every person has done it fine.

Right.

So I get one too.

Yes.

I have a negative three in deception.

Yeah.

So there are two extra.

So you guys can start walking.

Okay.

Um, As you guys are walking through the city and taking the little skiff,

one of the first places it drops you off is a cafe.

You guys can keep riding if you want.

There seems to be a place where you guys can, there's like a computer kind of terminal bar.

You can tell that they are having news broadcasts from the surface.

Interesting.

And by the way,

on the kid thing, just because it was very sensitive to you, there's very few kids.

Yeah, but there aren't any kids.

There probably is

one in 60

is probably a child.

Terrorist kids.

And I also will note there are no teenagers.

And I ask a question.

So what's the general vibe like in the group?

Are we loving our Soleimani overlords

or are we like full we don't like fascist people anymore

and we're like super happy freedom fighters?

I'm a freedom fighter.

Interesting.

And the rest of you, like, I mean, like, like.

Are you still like, oh, I'm an undercover person and I kind of want to go back to my life?

Or are we like,

I kind of want to know how things have evolved

because maybe we're still normal citizens who are trying to get back to our lives.

Or maybe we want to be like people who...

I just want to know, last game,

you did ask this and everyone said that they didn't want to be criminals

and they wanted to be pro-Solomarni.

If people have changed their minds since then, I'm happy for people to give that advice.

I just mostly wanted to know, are you roleplaying that?

Because otherwise, how would you know that?

So I was wondering if other people,

because when I'm like,

so we blowing this place up, everyone's like, oh no, that sounds terrible.

I'm like, I don't know, these are criminals, guys.

I don't know.

They're undermining our society.

So what my thing is,

is like when I, because last time I think I asked about role-playing these

elements.

I guess, Josh,

there's also a lot of pieces of information I think you guys are about to get

that would probably answer a lot of these questions for you

about how you should treat them.

A hundred percent.

You've literally been there five minutes.

Oh, no.

So we don't even know who's there.

But, you know,

I think in a society like this,

we tend to jump to conclusions as opposed to giving people a chance to,

you know, talk it out.

So one of the other things you noticed, by the way, very quickly, is there is no monkeys.

Zero.

You also notice that you don't see a fair amount of weapons that are anything more

than a possible sidearm.

And even the sidearms are like one in like 40 people.

You guys were more heavily armored going to the DMV.

These people are living their lives in a theoretical terrorist cell.

So they have a small, tight-knit, peaceful society down here.

Any dolphins?

Um... You haven't seen any water.

Um...

Isn't there...

Wait, when you sent...

When you sent us

the picture,

there's like a huge...

Yeah, there's a lagoon, but like, that's where they're getting drinking water.

Oh, interesting.

Um...

You are, I would say there are probably,

if you guys want to like spin it up like another like five hours,

within five hours you probably see two dolphins.

Walking around in mechs.

In mechs.

Robo dolphins.

Because they don't have legs.

Right.

Because you don't let them, as the storyteller, I can't believe you Patrick.

What?

Robo-dolphin.

Very legist.

Very legist.

You know, I'm bipedal from way back.

You do treat this as a legacy game.

It is a legacy game.

Oh my goodness.

Now, I imagine you guys... By the way, and also, the food smells good.

It definitely smells better than what you've been having in the Transstar sub.

Okay, I'm ready to jump ship.

I'm mostly just like, what is going on?

Like, that's why I'm not like, let's just blow them all up.

I'm like, this is not what we were led to believe it was.

So what's going on?

Laura, you're sounding very reasonable and I'm very against this.

I don't know what to tell you.

Okay.

Um...

There's more to give,

but I

want to let you guys ask some questions before I just drip it to you.

Under the seas.

Under the seas.

You said that we can...

Oh, go ahead.

You go ahead.

So, like,

circling everybody up a little bit,

you know, off into a shadowy corner where we can talk a little bit.

It's like, alright, folks.

So this seems to be their own I wonder if there's some form of negotiation

that could happen here.

Transstar doesn't strike me as a negotiating type, unfortunately.

They let us walk around as wanted criminals.

I mean, if it's good for their bottom line,

I don't think they've got a particular moral problem one way or the other.

You do make a good point there.

I'd like you guys to ask some questions.

Because I don't think you guys are thinking about how this place exists.

And I think some questions... Well,

there's a lot of...

Well, I was going to say... Yeah, where are they getting

their power from?

Where are they getting their food from?

How do they have a connection to the news this far down deep?

That's what I was going to focus on was the news.

Because I'm like, is there a terminal I could try to hack into?

Yes.

I'm happy to accept a computer roll.

Oh, That's a lot of money for people who can't afford clothing.

Okay.

So, Laura,

you start

hacking the computer system,

and you notice it's on some interesting methods.

So first, it is not directly connected to the surface.

Okay.

What it's doing is it's

dealing transmitted signals from the surface

and rebroadcasting them here.

Oh, it's like pirate radio.

Yes.

Now, the most important thing you learn, though, is

all the computer systems here,

There are biological medical terminals that have been repurposed.

That's weird.

That's suspicious.

Interesting.

Okay.

Can I tell how old they are?

All of them are within 20 years.

Some are new, some are old, but none of them are older than 20 years.

Okay.

I'm just trying to get a baseline understanding

of how long this place has potentially been here.

You would guess it couldn't be more than 30 years old,

even with the higher levels of rust from the refiltered air and

the high water content and things like that.

So they've been here a while then, is what you're saying.

30-ish years, probably.

Well, I'm just saying, again,

the impression was they were terrorists that just sprung up out of nowhere

and these people have been here for at least 30 years.

Yes.

Or at least they've repurposed a facility that's been here 30 or 40 years.

I will say with your computer knowledge,

you know that this has been a continuous facility for that time because you can see

the databases of communication on top of each other.

Yeah.

So I'll be hacksoring and then I will turn to the group and say something to

the effect of like, these people have been here for a while.

Like this is not some upstart terrorist group that just came in overnight.

These people have been here minimum 25 years, potentially 30, maybe longer.

Like their hierarchy of databases goes back quite a bit.

This is not something that just popped up overnight.

I think these are old enemies of Transtar.

Do they have any community events, local news slash propaganda they're sending out?

They're teaching people chess and Scrabble.

They're teaching them what?

I'm sorry?

Chess and Scrabble.

Okay.

Now, I would accept every single person to do an investigative role at a Bane.

Even if you have Investigate?

Yes.

I'm confused by the question.

Even if you don't

have it?

Whatever you're rolling, it's out of Bane.

Okay, Investigate.

So roll that beautiful Bane footage.

Awesome.

That's my first real failure tonight.

Oh, it's out of Bane.

No, okay.

Where is Investigate?

It's in the eyes.

It's its own category.

Red bug, Jack of all trades.

Well, considering I had a bane, I don't feel too badly about mice.

No, we've all failed except for you.

Yeah.

I'm supposed to be the investigator of the group, so there you go.

Oh, Colb.

Oh.

Colb.

Do you see someone that looks familiar?

Oh.

I wonder if these are all clones.

Familiar how?

It looks like Judith Dumont, who was with you at the killing.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Interestingly, she doesn't have her gun.

That's probably good for us.

Wait a second.

Are we... Are we the baddies?

Um, what do you mean?

We're amazing and we're trying to make a better world for someone.

We just haven't decided who that person is yet.

But no villain ever.

Anyway, um...

Huh, maybe main chat is not the right place for me to be in.

Oh no, it's jibber jabber.

That's where the silly stuff is supposed to go.

Main chat is for like, main chat is for character stuff like the pictures and such.

Jibber jabber is for our goofy off.

I keep getting out of there by mistake, sorry.

Well, we're going to have to take away your birthday then.

Is it your birthday?

Next month.

No, because we're taking it away.

Yeah.

So, by the way, the classic question is, Damon, do you tell this to people?

Because you're the only one who succeeded.

Damon or Kolb?

Kolb did.

Kolb, do you tell this to people?

I guess the answer is no.

I think maybe he... Yeah, only Colby and Joe... Oh, I guess Joe's got a zero success.

Well, I saw Colby flash.

No, I definitely tell everybody.

Like, I pointed out, but like...

I just feel the least.

I misheard what you said.

Butt off, and then it went silent.

He says he definitely tells everyone.

Yes, but then he said...

But then he said butt off.

So I have to construe that it's all he said, because he's talking now.

Yeah, I tell everyone, but I frame it, I don't jump to the conclusion that it's a clone.

Okay.

Right, like, because Occam's Razor, like the simplest, you know, solution.

Say that again?

So you think it's her who's down here?

Yeah, yeah.

Okay.

So what do we want to do?

You want to go and have a conversation with her?

I got nothing.

I don't know.

If it is her and she's down here, did she frame us to get us down here?

Has she been working with the Underworld the entire time you guys have been working

with Transtar?

Pretty decent question.

I don't think we should all approach her, but someone should.

Alright, well,

I'm a spy and I have deception and carouse,

so I will go and approach her as best I can.

You want to

go alone?

I don't have to go alone, I'm just saying that I will go.

Did you want someone to come with you as the spy?

Wait, I don't think I knew you were a spy.

As a spy, do you want to go alone or do you want someone to come with you?

I don't know how spy things work.

Well, I didn't say I'm a spy.

I just said I would go.

Oh, I'm sorry.

I didn't realize that was out of character.

I apologize.

Yeah.

Well, yeah.

I was excited that I finally learned the secret.

I'm trying to be secret about my secrets.

It makes sense.

I was just excited that I finally learned.

I'm like, I didn't know.

Did everyone else know?

And you're like, actually, you still don't know.

Never mind.

So by the way,

even before you start going over there,

while you guys are still looking at her,

she's talking to the person who recruited Emma

into SoulSec.

Yeah, something weird is going on here.

And that guy, you saw blow up in a car.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Can I go back to the computer and specifically look for reference

admission?

I guess is maybe the best way to put that.

How do you get in here?

People were rescued.

So it may not be a situation,

and I say this part out loud,

so it may not be a situation of clones,

but maybe a situation of

deceit at the time of death.

Like they've already prearranged and it makes it look like they're going to die and

then they leave.

Let's take two steps back.

Okay.

You guys, the Mercer guy you spoke to, what did he say?

He said that they couldn't stay on the planet.

But when you found him, where was he?

Under the water.

In the cloning facility that was being attacked by the quote-unquote terrorists.

They were trying to save him.

And bring him to their city.

Well, it could be that previous clones have gone that route.

And then they get...

The new political leader gets reset to a version

before they learned whatever turned them to support these clones.

So to expand on what Steinbach's saying because of the data Mercer said,

Mercer said they had to come every seven months to get an upload.

And they get rid of the old clone.

But you do know that the quote-unquote terrorists have been attacking clone facilities.

So they would have taken those ones that didn't

get woken up in seven months.

Oh, they're getting more

dystopian as we go along.

I'm confused.

We have the best society possible.

Right, but that also might mean there's six Mercers down here.

You guys rescued the last one.

Yeah.

And now you can understand why there might be children who are under 10.

But there are no kids who are above 10.

Because it's taking a while for them to be able to.

Yeah.

Can we say that again, Michael?

Children of the Clones.

Yep.

Which explains why TransStar wants them destroyed because they are security leaks

and a variety of other political problems.

And they are also...

Sorry, go on.

Transstar,

it was my impression that Transstar cared less about the political ramifications

because they are a multi-stellar, multi-system, spanning corporation.

So Solstack would want them eliminated, I would think, more than Transstar.

I don't disagree with that,

but Transstar is the one who's currently pulling the trigger,

so it doesn't mean that they aren't being...

Funded?

What's the word I'm looking for?

Directed?

Yeah, directed's a better word.

They could be being directed by SoulSec,

but they're still the ones who are actively engaging in the situation.

Like grocery stores, they have to throw away old food.

Who's paying for this?

And when they throw away old food, they can't resell it, even though someone else might buy it.

Right now, Transtar is being paid to make the clones.

And all these people are out there.

Every time the terrorists stop the clones,

it's costing Transtar money because they have to basically reclone the guy

for this guy, let alone what if the guy actually died and they need to recover it.

The terrorists are hurting Transtar's bottom line.

They're hurting soul sex security.

And these people all probably know something noteworthy.

Yeah, I was wondering about that because why is Judith cloned?

And cloned young.

Oh, okay.

Because remember, Judith you saw was old.

Yes.

You hadn't said she was younger.

I said she had dark hair.

Okay.

Her character picture is she has white gray hair.

I get that.

I just hadn't twigged on that.

Yeah.

So, that's kind of the bit.

Now, you guys have more questions.

You guys could try to feed information out of these people.

You could try to be like,

hey, have a trans-sardine and compromise the place and get the fuck out.

No.

Who...

Yeah, I think I want to know who has paid for something like this to exist.

Did they maybe extort someone else who's really rich outside of here?

This is a huge undertaking.

Okay.

Remember, they have the memories of the dead.

Okay?

So they also have the bank accounts of the people who never went and got them.

Oh, haha.

Oh, I was thinking,

you know,

if the other person's still alive and you're like,

give me money so I don't say about the thing that you don't want anyone else

to know.

Or what if you were the last clone?

Let's say the guy died and you were rescued instead of released.

You have your money.

Fair enough.

So I still think I would like to go talk to Judith.

Okay.

You walk on up.

Are we all going?

Are you taking one person with you?

I'm going to go by myself.

I feel like that's the least...

No, I don't disagree.

I just wanted to know.

Sorry, I'm not trying to be confidential.

No, you're good.

Okay, I'm going to go up to her.

Okay.

By the way, the guy who got you in SoulSec is Francis Adams.

All right, let me write this down for journal.

More notes.

Add a page.

So you walk up and Judas looks at you like she's never seen you before.

Almost like she's never seen you before.

And Francis Adams says, Emma?

Hold on, I'm sorry.

I'm writing down my notes.

Looks like he has seen you before.

Well, that would just suggest that this is a clone from after he recruited her at some point.

Yeah.

But again, we don't know that yet.

So are you ready, Laura?

Yeah, I'm sorry.

Thank you very much for being patient.

Yeah, so he says Emma, and I acknowledge him with a Francis.

Yes.

Well, you know, the Watchman comes for all of us.

I am glad, though, that you had risen to a rank that a recloning structure was up your alley.

We've been able to have a few people.

I think the last group we had was about a month ago,

but there's so many of us, I don't get around to see everybody.

I'm still new here, so I'm trying to understand the layout of everything and how it works.

I'm not entirely sure what my next step should be.

Well...

It is a philosophical question.

We lived lives of importance and note in the Selimani Nation

and now we are persona non grata to be seen anywhere in existence.

Some people pass the time writing computer programs.

Others support

criminal networks that can possibly get them out of Sarmani space

or whole new identities in smaller communities.

But I

found the most interesting things here to see and understand what is valuable

in people Even if they don't find it valuable themselves.

Well, what is it that you do?

I am a psychologist.

I try to help people adapt to the changes that they've done and to find purpose in this world.

I just smile at him and I'm like, that seems like something you would do.

We've lost our ability to...

Publicly support the Soleimani Nation,

and we do our utmost to not be a drag upon them,

but it's every Soleimani citizen,

whether they are an echo of their original person or if they're a person

who didn't even know their worth, deserves the support for aiding our great nation.

Would you say that the reason why we're all here is because we are preserving

the Soleimani Nation?

That to have done away with us would have been to sully

the purity of it all?

I hate saying that phrase.

I think it's more the spirit than the purity.

We are all

We are all those who are working on the greater mission.

We, as the first pioneers who left Seoul to explore the universe,

we are those who are exploring the echoes of our own existence.

I understand with a clarity my original form must have been killed

or my other form would not have been generated.

But some people here are even in the odd scenario where while they were created

in case there was an accident,

the accidents never occurred and they just happened to have been rescued

and we bought them off of the terrorists.

Oh, so they're There are terrorists as well.

I'd heard rumor while I was still topside, but I couldn't put anything down about it.

It was too elusive.

There are dolphin extremists still about and certain humanati who believe that

the dolphins should be given an equal citizen nature.

They do wish to Have their voice heard and through the wealth and influence

that we've been able to acquire,

we can pay them to recover

new members of our community.

All right.

And I presume the funding all comes from previous bank accounts.

There's no other...

Alternative source of income.

Well, you did mention some criminal enterprises.

Yes, there are different criminal enterprises that many people have skills

that can still be transmitted at a distance.

Intelligence and analyzing, knowing where

Certain weaknesses are of political gain that things might be smuggled in or imported.

All minor crimes in the grand stabilization of the community.

Nothing to the levels of what we did for the preservation of

our society.

She just nods kind of like if she's taking it all in.

Well, she is taking it all in.

But.

I hope you got your home assignment already.

I know that there are some transitory housing for people who are still trying

to cope with the mental shock.

Oh, yes.

I've been well set up.

I was just trying to get an understanding of the city as a whole.

We did get records that you were...

Part of a political assassination.

I imagine they caught and killed your original form and this is the echo

that was preserved for you due to your rank in Solskjaer.

Yeah, it just,

I don't think that they had an opportunity to scrub it before I was rescued

because I definitely was framed for the murder of someone I did not actually kill.

Quite interesting, you were able to get an upload while on the run.

Certain automations happen even outside of SoulSex purview when they're automated.

But I do feel this may be a dying emprise.

It seems that the...

Ability to do the cloning information I have discovered was found on

a particular planet and there was a resource they had to do

to create these perfect clonings that was an expendable resource.

And the storehouses of it are beginning to get thinner and thinner.

And they have no

other means to gather this resource?

It was found at an...

Old Sarmani site on a moon at Superman.

Sorry, Krypton.

Krypton is a planet that is like four jumps away to the north.

Does Superman live there?

Do they have a red sun?

Exactly.

They do have a red sun.

But yes, there was a Sarmani site there where there was some type of discovery.

I only have certain records of it and the smuggling of it to Jardan to perpetuate

the cloning process.

Is Jardan the only planet that does this cloning technology?

There is probably eight planets in the entire Soleimani Empire.

Different ranks here are done for the experiment to make sure it's perfect

for those they need it.

But there are only probably eight or nine Empire-level jewels of Saramani.

Each of those have a cloning facility.

But as the original resource that's necessary

to create these perfect clonings is fading,

they've been doing greater experiments on trying to have The cloning with less

and less of the material.

And you can tell that there is a stronger and stronger psychological flaws in these people.

Emma feigns concerns saying, well, I hope I'm okay then.

I don't know.

These are people who, from the very beginning, you can tell quite quickly, they return with...

Ticks, seizures, things like that.

Within a week or two, you realize that these clones are a bit faulty.

We have created some chemical aspects to reduce the worst of their symptoms,

but it's nothing that we can cure.

Well, that's unfortunate.

To be rescued and then live that way is going to be a certain level of torture to them.

It depends on the philosophical nature of it.

It is still another breath, it is still another life.

The heart of every Soleimani pioneer is one who wishes to have purpose,

a driving goal, even a limping man can cross a desert.

She nods at this sage's wisdom.

Yes.

Well, I don't want to take up too much of your time,

and I wanted to get more traction around the city to see what all there is.

Would you recommend anything that I should see one's first week here?

Mushroom burgers they have are remarkably tasty, even from my previous phantom memories.

Ha ha.

I'll keep that in mind.

But no facilities?

There's no,

I don't know,

a library or anything like that that would help me understand things better?

There are some computer facility areas where they are teaching people to hack

into consoles to be able to find data patterns.

All of the information here is sent on relay,

so it cannot actually be directly transmitted back to here.

Every six hours, it is transmitted from another location, so you can never return the signal.

That's probably wise.

Well, I know it is wise.

We occasionally do get visitors from different underground groups to Bring supplies

and things that we can't build or produce on our own.

Interesting.

Where do these, like,

are they understanding of what the situation is or do they just know you're a group

that lives underground?

They are normally understanding somewhat of the situation.

They believe that we are remnants of rogue cloning done by Transdar.

It's not too far

of an answer.

I'll keep that in mind, too.

Maybe I can make myself useful around here in some capacity in that regard.

I still have a number of contacts up on the surface.

It is very important, though, that you do not maintain the identity that you have.

We've had certain individuals' identities be transmitted upwards because they wanted

to speak to family members or the like, and it has created...

Large conflicts with social solidarity attempting to track down and find us.

Oh, I can understand that.

Most of my contacts know me under an alias, but those could have been compromised too.

I'll think of something.

Of course.

It's great seeing you.

You're going to find a few other key people here.

Those who had information and contacts were obviously quick to be cloned even

without their permission.

Okay.

Well, SoulSec is nothing else if not thorough.

Yes.

Well, it was great seeing you.

Great seeing you as well.

And Judith is talking to this guy like, wow.

Like, okay, another one of your SoulSec contacts.

Yeah, I don't tell Judith that I knew her because I didn't want to introduce

that complication,

so I just smiled and nodded her politely like,

It was nice to,

you know,

make your pseudo-acquaintance,

even though we weren't introduced, that kind of Minnesota polite type lip smile.

Exactly.

So, okay.

Damn.

All right.

Do you want me to roll anything for all that, or just because we role-played it?

Like, how much...

I don't know.

I don't want to jinx myself, but I don't want to cheat sore either.

I don't think that you...

That was all role-playing.

You weren't trying to convince the guy of something that you weren't able to say.

No, you did fine.

Alright, cool.

Just wanted to put that out into the world.

Alright,

so I'll go back to our little hidey hole and just be like,

situation is very different than what Transtar has portrayed it as.

There are certain elements that are similar to But they're being distorted.

Everyone here is a clone of someone else.

Hands down.

They're being rescued and brought here to live in a society that has cut itself off.

The terrorists are the people who raid the facilities to steal the old clones

before they're destroyed to make a new clone.

They're out here saving lives.

Pardon me?

So they're out here saving lives.

Yeah, pretty much.

I may or may not have told my old recruiter that I was a clone.

Gotta do what you gotta do.

Exactly.

I did, however, notice,

and I look at Zoe, I'm like, there don't seem to be any elevated apes, though.

It does look like they talked about working with some criminal elements

that were dolphins,

and there is a movement to make dolphins of equal status,

but I didn't see anything about chimpanzees or apes or hear anything.

I shouldn't say see.

Aren't the terrorists attacking the shipping and stuff, the dolphins?

The dolphins are, yes.

Like I said,

there's a certain element of truth to Transtar's story,

but it's not just for vandalism's sake

that they're raiding these cloning facilities.

I think...

I'm not sure what I think.

I don't think we should destroy them or anything like that.

And I don't like the fact that Transtar is being duplicitous in that way.

But I also don't blame Transtar because they're Transtar.

Wait, are they being duplicitous?

Because basically it seems like these people are connected to terrorists, right?

Well, define terrorists.

They're literally saving themselves.

Well, they're saving other people.

Transstar may not even understand exactly what's going on.

All they know is that they have very expensive clone assets

which are being attacked,

and they don't necessarily know the purpose behind it, nor do they necessarily care.

I think that they do know.

I can't imagine that somebody hasn't put two and two together.

I mean, I did after talking to someone for five minutes.

Do you tell us about the mineral or the consumable for the clones to make them?

Yeah, I'll go through the explanation really quick about the process itself,

how there are nine other planets that are doing it.

I don't know if there are people from those nine other planets here,

like if they're shuttled here somewhere or if there are alternative cities

in different places.

I did not follow up on that question and I now in hindsight feel like I should have.

But they do believe that the process is going to be winding down as it were because

the resource that is used in the adequate cloning mechanism is dwindling

and they're actually seeing a deprecation of product let's call it in

that people are arriving with mental and physical disabilities.

Well, okay,

connecting a dot that maybe isn't the right dot to connect,

but we also learned that people's DNA markers were changing

over time whenever they'd had medical procedures, etc.

What if part of the push to have a different consumable...

They're trying to compensate by changing the genetics of the person.

That's why we're seeing this genetic drift in the leadership,

which would be the same people that would have the status to get the cloning in

the first place.

That is very viable.

And the psychic powers being unlocked, part of that?

Maybe that was a surprise when it unlocked.

Yeah, byproduct.

Yeah.

Yeah, that's a distinct possibility.

I mean, it's got a lot of traction on it, but that part I don't know.

There is a library,

and the way that they gather material is through essentially an air gap so

that they can't be traced.

We could, well,

everyone but Zoe could go and try to learn some individual data

that we could bring back together.

I don't mean to be exclusionary, Zoe.

I do apologize for that.

But in my heart, not that much.

Because you are a monkey.

I didn't say that part.

That was for Damon's benefit.

What do you think?

Do we want to kind of go see if we can find anything at the library?

Do we want to hack just systems that we come across?

I'd love to go to the library.

I like knowledge.

The clone library?

Yeah.

I definitely would concoct a story if you run...

Apparently there are a couple different...

I mean, we just saw Judith.

I did not introduce myself to Judith.

I did to Francis because he recognized me.

But if you run into anyone you know, you should have a story kind of at the ready.

I came here a week ago,

maybe even fewer days,

and they do have some sort of dormitory system for the newly arrived.

Well, I did a lot of university time.

I came here for research.

I'm continuing my research.

You came here for research?

That's your story?

I came to continue my research.

Right.

I'm just saying you wouldn't have known this was here.

Huh?

They cloned me to continue the research.

If that's the story you want, then okay.

Okay.

Well, then let's try to find this library.

Here's what we're going to do.

I'm going to let everyone just do a 1D6, okay?

Now, if you fail,

like you get low on the 1D6,

I'm just going to tell you something about the greater plot that you discover here.

If you get high in the 1D6, you can ask a question, okay?

Okay.

Okay, so...

Remember, to roll a 1d6, you go to...

Okay, greater plot for who that was.

That was me.

That was you, Steinbach.

I don't know how to roll a 1d6.

Okay, you go to the type box at the bottom, and you type slash...

Oh, yeah.

Slash R space 1d6.

Where?

At the very type bottom.

The text box on the bottom of the...

Okay, so let me start this.

Okay.

Can you do it for me?

Because I can't see it.

Sure, I'll do it for you.

Okay.

No, wait, it's R.

You didn't do the space.

That was the only difference with Laura.

It's R, it's slash R, space 1D6.

And in the enter message?

Yep.

Slash, R. Base, 1D6.

Capital R?

No.

No.

I don't think it matters, honestly.

That's probably actually the

most accurate.

Oh, God.

One.

It's fine.

No, you guys have a lot of stuff that we're all going to learn about the plot.

Okay, I'm going to start at the top of the Steinbach.

Technically, I rolled you one anyway.

Okay.

Transar does not know about these people.

Okay.

Okay.

Transtar believes that the clones were destroyed

because they didn't believe there was enough oxygen and methods

to keep these things alive for any type of distance or whatever,

let alone to have them in these deep depths and survive the transport from there.

Okay.

Damien, you get to ask a question.

What would you like to ask?

Do you want me to come back to you?

Yeah, come back to me.

Colb, what's your question?

I got a question at three?

Okay.

Do you want me to come back to you, too?

Yeah, because right now my current question wouldn't fly.

Okay.

Josh.

The terrorists actually have two factions.

One faction is directly just trying to destroy Transtar and to do other types of things.

Another faction is trying to basically...

You know how you might hack into someone's computer?

They're trying to hack into the memories of all the clones

because no one would be cloned unless they knew something.

So the people who are here who are clones are thinking that someone's paying them

to bring them here.

There's actually a greater conspiracy to place them here,

see what data is important to them,

almost kind of like a Patrick McGuin prisoner vibe.

Then we have our Alan roll for Josh's second.

We'll just do it now.

I

would say you do find out that the original Underworld dolphin that you met at

the very first game is the people feeding resources and stuff down to them.

Okay, Laura, what is your question?

Are there other cities like this on the other planets that the cloning is happening,

and do they talk to them?

They do not talk to them,

and you can presume that there is some aspect of attempting to weed off the clones

and to kind of basically

extract the data from them.

I don't know how to put it.

It's like the SolSec and other political figures feel that cloning is important

for anyone who has important data that we have to perpetuate.

They don't realize that instantly puts a box of people that has important data.

So everywhere they're doing this,

someone is probably bleeding off that important data because If they didn't,

the clones are just going to eventually be killed.

You're at your seven month cycle.

You didn't need that.

They have to kill your clone and build a new one because you need new memories.

Right.

And because you're not allowed to be on the surface as your clone

and you're only allowed to leave the planet if you're the last living of your kind

of identity.

These people don't know if they're the last living of their identity.

They don't know if their people got off-surface.

So they can't risk getting to the surface,

or they'll all be purged in kind of a Blade Runner-esque method.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay, so back to the top to Damien.

I...

I was going to ask, you answered by telling me who was financing the thing.

Um...

I have my question ready.

Okay.

Do they have a network to access getting off world?

No, they don't believe they can.

They believe if they got off world and they went somewhere,

in all likelihood,

they'll probably get caught because someone will find a genetic marker somewhere.

Now, because you had a pointed actual point answer, some people have gotten off.

But they don't believe there's a network they can get off.

Think of it more like Logan's Run or The Village.

Or that one with

Scarlett Johansson.

That one.

Where they're all clones.

The island?

The island.

Yes, the island.

Some people do get away and figure it out and get above board and get away.

But the people here don't think there's ways to get out.

Gotcha.

So no Underground Space Railroad.

They don't think there is.

I'll give an example because I keep kind of dodging it.

I really want to be clear.

Sometimes when the criminals come

down, they kidnap people.

Oh.

That's rude.

But they do give them kind of like probably like a better independent life

than being a mole man.

Are you a mole man if you're underwater though?

Maybe you're a sea urchin man.

You're a beaver.

A sea monkey man.

Sea monkeys.

Okay.

So we're back to Damien for the last question.

Yeah, I'm going to open the floor.

Anyone have any suggestions?

Anything?

I feel like I had another question and now I've forgotten it.

Crap.

I'll give you another plot one better than the others if you want to just give it up.

Oh, please.

Okay.

There are two particular things about the clones that no one seems to realize,

but you've been able to piece together from the data.

All the clones died in 25 years, regardless of how they were.

In the idea that basically, let's say you were 25, you're going to live to 50.

No one's going to think that's kind of weird.

And if you were 16, you live to 85.

No one's guessing that's kind of weird, but they only live 25 years.

That's the maximum.

The second thing is they're, they, how do you put this?

So

when they're quote unquote dreaming, their minds turn off.

When we dream as individuals, Our minds become more active.

When they dream, their minds actually enter almost a hibernation state.

This was a process put into place because they were afraid of wearing out the clones

and things the clones wouldn't realize.

So all of them sleep like a rock,

not realizing that because none of them dream and none

of them have higher brain activity when they're sleeping.

Who enjoyed Dream of Electric Sheep?

Not these.

Not them.

My last piece for you, because you had the best number in the damn list.

You can't tell genetically that

someone is a clone without attempting to age the DNA.

Hmm.

Like if you took a blood sample and you took another person blood sample,

standard RNA matching is going to show it's identical.

If you gradually started building the process of cells and then you start fast aging

the cells and you start increasing the metabolism,

you'll begin to notice some variations.

It's minor enough that someone who wasn't knowing what they're looking

for would think it's their lab mistakes versus it's actually part of

the cloning process.

So now the question comes into play, are you guys going to leave?

I mean, I think we should.

What are we going to tell Transtar?

What if we blow up the sub and stay?

And then what?

Why would we stay?

I'm just brainstorming here.

What if we instead tell them that Transtar is on to them and they need to move

the fuck out of here?

And then we could blow it up and we all get a win.

Oh, we blew it up.

They must not be here anymore.

We destroyed their base.

Well, I was thinking along that lines of I'd asked for some demolition charges.

We set that off not here but near here where it's not going to cause damage to here.

Maybe we tell these folks, hey, you've got to cut it out for a while.

We set it off.

We say, yeah, we blew up their base.

Your seismic readings should have caught the explosion.

And then at the very least they get breathing room.

While we finish up with Transtar and get off planet.

In that theory, you guys could just blow the tunnel.

But then, but here's the thing.

But Transtar knows they're around here and they'll find them.

But if instead... You know Transtar didn't find them.

Know that they're here.

But they know they're in the area, don't they?

Isn't that why they sent us here?

They know there are terrorists.

Oh, not the clones.

So the terrorists are these clones just trying to free other clones.

What if.

OK, I misunderstood that.

OK, there are three groups.

You've seen one of the three groups.

The terrorists are a whole other group that these people think that they're paying

to get the rescues.

But the terrorists are a different group.

They're militarized and they have their dolphin warriors and all that other kind of shit.

This is the remnants of what the terrorists have been stealing.

Okay.

The suggestion I was going to make was would it be possible

Open a line of conversation between this group and TransStar

where this group buys any of the clones that were going to be discarded.

That way TransStar gets a revenue source and is able to recoup some of their loss.

This group gets people without having to go a violence route.

TransStar can't know about these people or the entire business that they're selling

of making clones is

a lie.

Well, the majority of people at TransStar can't know about this.

Well, TransStar are the people who are enforcing the idea that you only can have one

of these clones.

That's why they're destroying them in the lab.

You also have to imagine some TransStar people are getting cloned.

So I can't imagine they are going to be cool with the idea of these clones running around.

Transstar is not going to support the clones' existence.

You guys can choose if they know.

The way that I see it is,

is Transstar,

unless we come up with something that is fairly believable,

Transstar will keep on poking around and eventually they'll find them.

If you guys destroy the cave and you guys say that was terrorists,

but there are lots of cells of terrorists tell them,

you keep the clones safe for at least three to six months and Who's

to say you were wrong?

True, but then we have to tell them.

We need to tell the clones then what's going on so that they can adequately prepare

and they don't just think somebody blew up their tunnel.

I mean, to be honest,

if we blow up the tunnel where it doesn't actually hurt them,

it's irrelevant what they know or not.

The point of us telling them is to save their lives if we're trying to save their lives, right?

Like if we tell them they can move somewhere else,

they can be safe,

and Perhaps also then they don't get raided by,

you know,

one of the other terrorist groups who comes back to get information out

of their heads.

You know, that's my thought.

I'm confused because you said they don't have to know and then in

the next breath said when we tell them.

No, no, sorry.

Here's the thing.

If we don't care what happens to them, we could just blow the thing up.

It doesn't hurt them.

And sure, maybe they'll be a little scared, but...

What I wouldn't want to do is be like, hey, we're going to blow up something.

It's probably not going to hurt you.

What if they just shoot us and don't let us do it?

Why do they trust us?

And if they live, and then they eventually tell someone,

these guys blew this up and they told us they'd be okay.

I hear that.

But if instead we're like,

you need to move the fuck out of here, then we could blow it up and, you know.

Where are they going to go?

I don't know.

We have millions of dollars.

They're super rich.

They'll go where the fuck they want.

I don't know.

That's not...

I don't have to come up with all the answers.

They're like, they can have a clone-free day, just like a trans star did.

Like, I'm sure they can figure it out.

These are some of the smartest people in

the world, probably.

Um...

And as a side note,

we could,

we have the ship boat,

we could offer these people to get their kids off planet to another world

where they would have at least less scrutiny.

But that's just a negotiation.

Those kids with no legal IDs, no legal presence, which weren't reported anywhere.

Yeah, but I will say the kids aren't recorded anywhere, though.

That's a good thing.

They're not going to come up with any genetic code.

Yeah, yeah.

Right, but some of the parents might want their kids to live not in

an underwater base their whole life.

That's all I'm saying.

Okay.

So, we could split the difference.

We could have Emma write a letter and send it to the system to her old pal.

And on our way out, we could

explain what's going on.

And we could blow the entrance.

And we can come back in a couple months to check on them.

You know, see when we're all still alive.

What?

Why would we ever come back here?

I mean, if we care about them, then probably they should move.

But if we don't care about them, then why are we coming back?

How are we going to transport several hundred people?

We're not...

Wait, they got here.

They got here some way.

Right.

And they have access to.

Yeah.

No, they don't have access to ways out.

What is that?

They don't have access to ways out.

Do we know that?

Well, if they had access to ways out and wanted to get out,

they could have done that to Patrick made the comment earlier of they think that

if they went anywhere, they will eventually get caught.

So some of them might not want to leave.

The concept, how many people can fit on that stinky ass boat that we have?

Eight.

Really?

No, no, no.

The one that's being repaired.

The one that's getting repaired.

The actual ship boat that can fly to the planets.

So the thing is, you guys have probably 20 tons of cargo space.

You could I think it's half a ton for low birth, so you can hold 40 people.

Something like that.

And how many people are here?

Several hundred.

Yeah, probably 250, 300.