After an unnecessarily terrifying two minutes, the lights come on and a mechanical voice says.  "The wreckage has been cleared and power has been restored.  Thank you for your patience."

Peter's fire is put out, and others are injured on the floor as the transbot lurches to a halt at another RED-Clearance platform, where a large sign reads "Welcome to SPD Sector."  The Transbot's doors do not open once it has stopped.   The motor, however, coughs twice and halts completely.

You sniff at the air and smell something, something like fire.  You think at first it might be Peter's smoldering body, but then it seems too much, perhaps coming from under the transbot.

The door appears to be stuck.

OOC: I will be out of town until Sunday.  Please be patient.

Ginger says, "I hope it isn't treasonous to shoot the window of the transbot to save fellow Troubleshooters."  She points her pistol at the nearest window and shoots it.

"Pistol ammo comparison, please."  Dexter shows his blaster, with full power reading.

PM

It wasn't me, self-immolation doesn't sound like a good strategy.  By the way, do any of you mind if I smoke?

Gunther stands holding his stomach, now that the lights have come back on. He looks at the floor and realizes that one of the pistol shots landed inches away from his face and neck. Gunther complies with Dexter's request, pulling his pistol from his duffel bag. He reveals the pistol, barreless(SP?), to have full power. At that moment a loud growling noise emanates from Gunther's stomach region and he holds his stomach a bit tighter as he grimaces in pain.

"Hmmmm…" CL points at Vicsis, "What about yours?"

Vicsis is still lying on the floor apprently dead

Dexter tries to check every blaster's power levels.

"Ow, ha, ow, ha, ow, ha!  Here's my (most of a) weapon."

Ginger blasts long and hard through the window.  Unfortunately, laser is light, and the window melts and sags; it doesn't shatter.  Also unfortunately, because it is light, the beam passed through the window and hit a passing maintenance robot, which falls over and begins moving its legs quickly like an upside down potato bug.

Smoke is still coming up from underneath the transbot car.  You begin to think it might not be such a bright idea to start inspecting weapons when the car you are in may blow up at any second.

PM
This message was last edited by the GM at 04:24, Sat 02 Feb 2008.

CL takes out his chainsaw and cuts through the window, "Everyone, grab a wounded person and happily exit through the happy hole in the window."

Ginger begins kicking out the melted window.  "Don't burn yourself...again," she says with a look at Peter.  She stands aghast when everyone starts inspecting weapons, and then she sighs.  "Are you going to trust him to inspect your weapons?  He could be the traitor here!  He could booby trap or sabotage your weapon.  I am the team leader and I say when we inspect weapons, and that is definitely not until we get out of here.  I'm trying to save your lives!"

Once the window is kicked out, she helps the other Troubleshooters out first as a good Team Leader should do.

Gunther decides he should be the first out of the vehicular deathdrap, and so he scrabbles to the window clutching his stomach with one hand and discarding a half-eaten robot hand, his gear with the other. His stomach rumbles louder than it did before, eliciting a grunt of pain from the man.

Vicsis's eyes flutter opean and she puts a hand to her forehead very damsel in distress like. "Oh my...I must have fainted from the pain...why if only a handsome man would help me up I could..." She pauses suddenly her and her eyes go wide."Oww this floors getting hot I think this things on fire!!!" She jumps up suddenly and shoves her way out of the transbot.

CL waits until before Ginger leaves to leave, putting his chain saw away.

Still smoldering, Peter-R carefully replaces his weapon and rises to his feet.  "Where did you get the chainsaw?"

"The holster on my back." he replies and waits.

"Thanks for helping me out of this bot, Ginger." Rob says. "AAaaagggghhhh, my arm! This is so much like the vidshow 'Lost In The ERR Sector' where all the clones are wounded and just trying to get out of ERR sector alive."

Tell me about it...we need to find a med bot, like seriously

Ginger watches Gunther before sighing and shaking her head.  "What did you say your registered mutation is?  Garbage disposal?"

Dexter follows the group out of the transbot to relative safety, and tries to address the team leader.  He waits for the team leader to acknowledge him before speaking.  "Team leader, thank you for ensuring the team's safety.  I did not realize we were in danger from anything other than the traitor.  If you deem it safe now, perhaps we could check the various weapon power reserves to try and find out who was shooting in the dark."

(If Ginger never allows Dexter to speak, he will not speak.)

I agree with out illustrious team leader, checking the power lvls on the guns means nothing. What if someone shot thier gun sometime before the mission, I know I myself went to the practice firing range just this week and I'm not sure if I had time to re-charge my gun. Plus in the dark who knows whose laser was fired...a very sneaky traitor *gives a very subtle little side glance at Dexter* might have stolen someones gun and fired it in the dark and sneakily put it back, and now here you are claming to want to see everyones guns...very suspicious. Now I have faith in my team leader, and the computer, and she alredy said seeing the guns was not important, now I think she would agree with me when I say that to question her logic again would be...somewhat...mmmm trecherous...

"The leader did NOT say it was not important, Mr. Vixcis." Dexter points out with a smile.  "She said that the transbot was not safe and that she should be the one to decide when we do the inspection."

"pffft lets not quibble over details, the fact still remains that the power lvls wouldn't prove anything" Vixcis puts an arm around Dexter "I mean were a team here, we should be working together not tearing each other apart"

Whispers behind her hand to Ginger "Jeeze it's almost like he wants us to fail..."

CL pokes his head inbetween Ginger and Vicsis, "Very strange."

"Yes, Mister Vixcis, we should be a team that trusts each other.  Someone was breaking that trust by firing at us.  Are you trying to cover something up?"

Between the chainsaw and the laser-melted window, you are able to push the glass out and everyone gets themselves out onto the transbot platform.  The smoke and fire under the transbot appears to be a grease fire from poor maintenance and neglect.  That...or it could be sabotage!  In any case, it is very smoky with a thick black smoke that is filling up the transbot.

The maintenance robot accidentally shot by Ginger squirms on the ground.

THE PLATFORM
Tension level 4

Now that you are out of the flaming transbot and have assembled yourselves on the plaform, you see three doors in front of you:

A RED door labeled SPD30/C125
A YELLOW door labeled SPD15/C120
A BLUE door labeled SPD75/C80

You will need to decide which door to enter.

OOC: If I forgot to answer anyone's questions in the last week, please remind me and I will address them.

"mmmm I bet you'd like me to cover something up, I'll cover something up all night...but seriously, why would I be trying to cover something up? Helllllooo who was shot here?"
*points to blast wound*
"Were you shot Miss Dextor?...I didn't think so"

*walks away towards the doors saucily*
"I say we should focus on the task at hand..."
*puzzles over the doors briefly*
"Do you think the red door stands for red lvl clearance?"

CL nods, "Definitly Vicsis, you first."

He becomes very sceptical of Dexter.

"Vicsis first then?" Ginger says with a sigh.

She then says regarding their exchanges, "Wrongly accusing someone of being a traitor is treasonous, right?  So we should just hold off on accusations and investigations for now, I think.  I don't even know how to search one of these guns.  I just know how to fire one, and look how that turned out."  She looks at the robot on the ground and the melted window.  "So can we just forgive and forget?"  She seems unsure of herself.  "At least for now maybe?  A traitor will be exposed.  Maybe it was just our trash eating friend here."  She nods toward Gunther, the registered mutant.  "I hear that registered Muties don't have it all upstairs.  Could have shot himself and others maybe, just by pure accident?"

She sighs again.

Dexter shrugs.  "I'll follow your lead, Team Leader.  It was the happiness bot's idea to check the guns, not mine."  He views the colored doors and points to the red one.  "Shall we?"

"The happiness bot's idea?"  She sighs and repeats, "Shall we?"  She looks over at Vicsis.

"Shaaaaalllll we." He too says it to Vicsis.

"Red, Yellow, Blue, Red, Yellow, Blue" says Rob. "This reminds me of episode 59 of the vidshow 'The Computer is Right!'. I wonder what MCG-U-VER-4 would do in this situation?" he says as he arches his right eyebrow.

Rob then whispers something.


Then after a moment, Rob yells "Aaaa--gghhhh I need some medical attention on my arm, now!!!"

PM

Peter-R looks at his fellow troubleshooters, shrugs, giggles, and decides to be the first lemming.

He grabs Vicsis-R, dips her deeply,  and drops her to the floor.

Peter-R winks conspiratorially at Dexter-R, briefly attempts to straighten the charred remains of his jumpsuit, and then opens the RED door.

oww!...cheeky!!

"Yeah, the happiness bot."  Dexter points at CL-R, then walks through the RED door.

You enter the RED door.

Tension 3

The interiror of SPD30/125 is not large; perhaps four meters by five.  A few low, moderately uncomfortable-looking chairs are set along two of its walls.  A large viewscreen dominates the third wall.  It is currently off.  A small clerk's counter stands against the fourth wall with a RED Clearance door next to it.  The lighting is very low.  You're not sure if the effect is soothingly subdued or unnervingly dim.

Dexter walks and stands next to one of the chairs.  He will sit when the others are seated.

((OOC: This may be my last post until Monday.  As usual, I'll be gone for the weekend.))

Once Gunther managed to exit the transbot, he kept to the fringes of the team. In response to Ginger's question, he replies "I didn't say what my mutation is but yeah, it's something like that." It isn't until the team assembles in the RED room that his stomach (for the most part)stops hurting. But only after he lets out a massive burp. He continues to hold his stomach though, since that was where he was shot. Gunther walks up to the viewscreen and looks into it, nose touching the screen.
This message was last edited by the player at 00:48, Sat 09 Feb 2008.

Vicsis gets up off the floor and follows into the room...She looks around curiously for a moment.
"Wierd what's that noise..."
Vixcis walks towards the counter and looks behind it...

Peter covers his mouth and whispers something to no one in particular.
He then looks behind the counter.

CL squeaks and moves away from the registered mutant.

Behind the counter, you find a huddled, quivering ORANGE Clearance citizen wearing an HPD&MC uniform from Complex Update, one of the News Service firms.

He appears to be in some sort of serious distress, weeping quietly but strongly enough that his whole body shudders.  Suddenly, he notices you looking at him.

Scrambling back further under the counter, he shouts, "Don't eat me!"  It looks like he hasn't slept for awhile.

Dexter ambles over to and around the counter.  "Now why would we eat you?  Bots don't taste very good after all."  Dexter chuckles at his own joke.  "What happened, jackobot?"
This message was last edited by the player at 23:44, Fri 08 Feb 2008.

"Go away!  Please!  Don't eat me.  The mutant are eating people.  PEOPLE, I say!  No clone is safe.  I haven't slept in...in many, many days.  Go away.  Just go away."

Ginger says, "Is that our mission?  Take down the human eating mutants?  Are you supposed to give us our mission briefing?"  She sighs and tilts her head.

CL spins about and points at the registered mutant and says, "What is your mutation mutant?"

Gunther looks appalled and then scared as he hears that mutants are eating citizens. First off, citizens aren't the most moral meal and would result in a quick trip to the nearest happiness reprograming center. Secondly, he's afraid that someone might suspect him of said eatings, what with ginger's accusation and all.

"Why would a mutant want to eat a citizen? There are foods out there that are far more moral and tasty." Says Gunther, still avidly peering into the vidscreen, trying to make out the things that make the pixels.

(NOTE: Gunther's last post is edited, or about to be, to clear up certain confusions. Mainly that I missed one of ginger's posts which accused gunther of the shooting and that his response makes him sound a little more than guilty.)
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:08, Sun 10 Feb 2008.

Gunther finds that the vidscreen is off and looks like it doesn't work.  It is old and run down like the rest of the place.

The man says to Ginger, "Mission.  Yes, mission.  Scrubots.  It was something about...Yes, that's right.  Reports of scrubots...attacking citizens.  Cleaning them too vigorously.  That must be it.  That's your mission!"

His eyes droop, and then he punches himself in the nose.  "The mutants will only eat me if I fall asleep.  Have to...stay...awake."  He pokes his eye with his finger.  "Scrubots.  Nothing is clean anymore.  Scrubots.  The transbot.  Maintenance robots.  It's all...gone to hell.  Scrubots."  He pinches himself.

"Scrubots?  So our mission has to do with scrubots and mutants that eat people?"
This message was last edited by the GM at 18:07, Sun 10 Feb 2008.

"I'm pretty sure its just to get rid of the scrubots. I think he is just tired."
CL gives the crazy little man some EZ-DUZ-IT.
"He should be better soon."

"I really need some medical attention on my arm!!" Rob says as he holds his arm. He raises his eyebrow as he asks "So now we are to hunt down some clone eating mutant? Wouldn't you all agree this is a little too much like the vidshow 'The Clone Eating Mutant That Ate Sector TKO'?"

"Yes!" the man says.  "Yes, it's just like that show!"

wait this seems odd...the computer sent us to get a mission breifing from a crazy guy in a dusty old abandoned room? I mean scrubots and man eating sound kinda kinky but do you think this is the correct room?

Ginger says, "Do you think this is the correct room?  Do you think the Computer--our friend--made an error?  Isn't this exactly the type of thing the Computer would want us to do--to root out mutants and take care of whacko robots?"

Then she turns to the guy with a kind voice, "What is your name, Citizen?"

"Yes!" he says.  "Yes, it is the correct room.  Yes, it is kinky.  Yes, go take care of your mission." In answer to Ginger, he says, "My name is Hans-O-HGF-3.  I have not slept in 8 days.  If I do, the mutants will eat me.  They'll EAT ME!!"

Ginger says calmly, "Hans, where are we supposed to go to solve this problem?  Is there any way we can help you?  Maybe our happiness officer can give you a happy pill.  Can you give us all the mission parameters?"

"Yes, yes, I can."  Suddenly, Hans-O's eyes go wide.  "The walls!" he shouts.  "They're coming out of the walls!  I won't let them take me!  You can't make me go!"

He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a grenade.  Most of you have never seen a real grenade in use before and yet, strangely enough, every one of you understands at an instinctive level that this one has been triggered.

What do you do?  You can't imagine having enough time to do more than one action.

"CRAZY BOT!"

Dexter runs for the door as fast as he can.
This message was last edited by the player at 06:12, Tue 12 Feb 2008.

"I told you so!!"
Vicsis says while running towards the door.
"Make that garbage disposal of a mutant eat it maybe his stomach can handle it!"

Robs makes a run for the door, right behind Dexter and Vicsis. "Aaaagggg my arm!!!" he yells.

PM

CL runs to the exit with his hands over his head, "No, thats not biology friendly!"

OOC: Regarding your moves, this is probably a very good time to think about spending perversity points.

Remember the following:  You can spend as many points as you want.  Each point affects your die roll by 1.  You can also spend as many points affecting your party's die rolls (up or down).  You must indicate the number of points you want to use.

There is no limit, so even if your modifier makes your success rate over 20, that's fine too (although a roll of 20 is always a miss, but there are other modifiers...and possible perversity points spent by others AGAINST your roll).

Typically, I will award perversity points at the beginning of a new scene, or within a scene if it is taking awhile.

If you die...and with a grenade it is a possibility, you will lose 20 perversity points when starting up your new clone.

PM, all secrets and hushidy hush

PM Feel Very Paranoid!

PM

Yet another PM. 'Cuz I'm speshall. :P

PM

The explosion of the grenade is magnificent!  Divine!  And very, very loud and messy.  Parts of Hans get blown all over the walls with the blast of the grenade.  Just before that, you each took the following actions:

Dexter begins running toward the open door (toward the platform).

Right behind him is Vicsis...followed by Rob...

CL runs with them all...

Ginger ducks behind the cover of the overturned security desk...

Gunther runs toward the closed door (not the one by the platform).  It appears unlocked, and he can open it.  He is sure of it!

Peter stands there and stares dumbly at the grenade.  Perhaps he thought it wasn't real.  Perhaps he thought he was in a virtual vidshow of some sort.  Perhaps he was scared out of his jumpsuit.

Then the explosion...

Dexter safely makes it out of the radius of the blast.

Vicsis also makes it safely out.

Rob trips over Vicsis' foot on the way out.  His last thoughts were whether she intentionally tripped him or whether it was an accident.  Then bits of Rob are blown over the room

CL is hit by flying shrapnel and is WOUNDED.

Ginger is protected by the desk, but not completely.  She is WOUNDED.

Gunther gets to the door, but he only got one action, and getting to the door was one action.  Opening and going through is another action.  Gunther is blown into almost as many pieces as Hans.

Peter takes a second to realize his lower body has been blown to smithereens.  Then everything goes black.

Gunther, Rob, and Peter are decanted with their second clones.  They run for the transbot, find the old beat down one waiting, and they jump in.  It still smells like smoke, but the flames are gone.  They soon arrive back with the other party.

Those who survived have a couple minutes to take actions while waiting for the replacement clones to arrive for their companions.  Your ears are still ringing from the sound of the blast.  Hans is splattered all over the wall in a mesmerizing resemblance of some modern art paintings.

Ginger, Vicsis, and CL are covered with tiny bits of what used to be Hans.  Their jumpsuits are not as clean as they used to be.
This message was last edited by the GM at 20:31, Thu 21 Feb 2008.

"AGGG I'm dirty! I'm dirty! *squek* I don't like being dirty!"
*begins to clean his suit*

OOC: To outline what has happened in game terms:

The base "Violence" of the grenade was 20.  Its effects and violence rating went down depending on the distance you were from the grenade and whatever cover/armor you may have had.

This amount (and damage) was also modified accordingly.  The amounts were also modified up or down based on perversity points spent for or against your roll (we had both going on here, although you don't know who applied points against you).  I can safely say, though, that those who had points applied against them all died.  (Take that as a warning/hint about how to handle future...incidents--and no, I'm not drowning in maniacal laughter as I say that.)

What this means (the "20") is that anyone next to the grenade without any modifiers had no chance to survive since we roll a 20 sided die which cannot give you greater than a 20.

You also had 1 action and very little time.  Those who attempted to do 2 things (such as go to a door and open it and go out it, or those who tried to flee and use a mutation, or those who used a "if..then...") in their post didn't get the benefit of the second action (or had bad modifiers against them, such as using a mutation while running for the door).

---
Over the next week, I will try to post some additional issues, such as the problems using subsequent clones, the process of accusing someone of being a traitor, etc.
---
Some people may receive extra bonuses for successfully fulfilling a secret society goal (such as the death of an enemy/traitor).

Please make sure you review your character sheets and goals again as we move onto the next scene.  This adventure is balanced so that everyone has an enemy, and your enemy may not be the enemy that thinks your his enemy...or something like that.  In any case, your goals as a team are not unified due to your secret goals, so following the pack is the way to quickly die.

Only three deaths so far...not too bad.

Dexter waits a few moments for his ears to come back to him, then heads back in to check on and help anyone left alive in the room.