Border Princes

Session 25 – Be Franc With Us / Cranium Gladiators

It has been two weeks since the battle. We have many refugees at the keep, so many in fact that we are concerned about food.

We get a delivery from Edelhart saying that he will send troops down to Castenea on the river rather than sending them through the mountains. This will just be some assistance and not an occupying force.

We are consistently seeing many haggard people coming from that area. We hear from the wood-elves that the city was breached in three places, but after a while the orks have gotten bored and have moved north through the pass. There was only one more engagement with about a dozen of them, but most of them just moved into the mountains.

Hauptner abandoned the city and started to go south about a week ago. We decide since the city is abandoned, we will go check things out and see what is there. After this we may head south to let Giovanni know that Hauptner and Gilemet are together so this may be a good time to take them both out.

At Groghaven, we hear the sounds of dogs. Some buildings are still intact, but much of it is destroyed. The grain silos have been fired and are destroyed.

Suddenly we see a shape running through the streets. Brokk calls out but he keeps running. Vedasi catches up with him and knocks him down. He has a sack of moldy bread and cheese and a small dagger of orcish manufacture. We check him out and he has smooth hands and tattered, but fair, clothes. We ask him his name and he hesitates a moment before saying “Franc.” He says that he’s from this town and that he’s a scribe. We don’t quite believe him. Jean asks him to show us where he used to work and he takes us to the keep.

The keep itself is in ruin, as most of the furniture and tapestries have been destroyed. We get to the main audience chamber and Jean and Vedasi see a painting that resembles our friend almost exactly. Underneath the painting it reads “Baron Hauptner.” Talking with him more, it’s clear that he’s lost his marbles. We ask him to take us to the Baron’s workplace and he heads downstairs.

We go through the dungeon to what looks like it used to be a safe room. There are some dead people here and we smell a strange smell. We find skaven tracks and Hauptner freaks out and almost goes catatonic.

We bring him out and admits that he is indeed Hauptner. He says that after the attack, he sent his double to sit on the throne and retreated down here. The town was sacked and then his men were attacked by skaven who came through the tunnels.

Brokk binds him and Hauptner takes us upstairs to his desk. Everything here has been ransacked, however Tobruk finds a sack of 25 gold in a false-bottom drawer. Jean finds a scroll case at the back of a drawer. There are some maps and drawings, strategies of how he would attack Giovanni or Sasha, scouting reports, and other materials.

We decide to stay here for the night and then make for the Crossed Lances in the morning. We barricade the skaven hole as best we can and stay in one of the guard barrack houses. Brokk keeps a close eye on Hauptner.

The next day we head back, but Hauptner is getting more and more paranoid. We put a sack over his head and have him in a room to keep an eye on him.

In the morning we talk to the innkeeper and we give him 500 gold to help keep things going in the area. He is astonished but promises to help us.

We head through the mountains toward the dwarven keep of Din Borim and a bad storm rolls through. We stay the night on the road and then get to Din Borim the next evening. The place looks much cleaner and they have gotten the forge going. We stay one night and then continue heading south.

We get into the hilly lands to the south and we can hear the thunder of hooves. We head to a small hill and hide. About a dozen riders come near. They are fully decked out in plate mail that is black, red and bronze. They appear to be riding toward a small village. Tobruk and Vedasi look up to see them coming and they notice Tobruk’s hair. They turn toward us, yelling “blood for the blood god!”

Border Princes

Session 24 – An Arrow to the Knee

Our goal is to patrol our area and harass any orks coming in. Jean is hoping that his sponsor will send help by road or by sea. We continue ranging out and we see signs of a large party up ahead quite a ways. We see one scout and the elves turn it into a pincushion with an arrow through its head, eye, and one through each knee. It bleeds out and we advance past. There is a camp up ahead a couple of miles and we sneak toward it.

We see in the camp a bunch of knight goblins  including a spider rider, shaman, several orks, a  swarm of snotlings, a stone troll, and a squig (a fungus-based animal that knight goblins use for mounts and also food). There are probably thirty creatures here. Some of them are arguing and kicking around the smaller creatures.

The elves approach around a hill to the west and the dwarves go to the east. The elves take out a couple of goblins without anyone noticing, but one of them starts screaming and the orks begin running toward them. The spider rider is also taken out, with Jean burying an arrow up to the feathers in its large abdomen and the elves finishing it off.

Tobruk and Eogard see the stone troll and run straight toward it around a hill. Brokk follows them initially but breaks off when he sees the swarm coming toward the elves. Screaming, the slayers slam into the stone troll and kill a nearby knight goblin. Seeing this, the troll picks it up and tries to eat it. Tobruk promptly cuts his arm off and Eogard finishes him off.

Brokk runs through the middle of the battlefield toward the camp and takes out a knight goblin and an ork. The squig charges up and bites him in the arm.

From out of one of the tents comes a war boss and a shaman. The shaman chants something and a dark aura comes out.

Brokk kills the ork that was on him and bisects the squig.

The shaman fires a magic missile into Brokk’s chest but his armor takes some of it. Jean fires an arrow and it goes through the shaman’s leg.

The war boss is fighting both slayers and strikes Eogard savagely. He is overwhelmed and starts to flee. Tobruk catches up with him and continues attacking, and Brokk joins in. The elves finish him with arrows.

Looking around the area we see a small idol to their god, a bunch of mushrooms, a war chest of 500 crowns (in various types of coin).

 

Border Princes

Session 23 – Scorched Earth

We decide to head back to the keep near the crossed lances and see how things are faring there. The rest of our escort stays at the dwarven keep. Going overland, we don’t pass many travelers. We are close enough to the river to see boats. Later on, we see smoke to the northeast where the Khyprian road crosses the river. Jean references the map and imagines that it’s near Volchbach. We are probably 10 miles away. We can hear the sounds of screaming.

Since this is on the way to our keep anyway (Volchbach is 20 miles away from our keep) we head toward the town. We see fire and flaming things shooting through the air. People are fleeing a massive horde of greenskins. There are probably thousands in total. Everything from orks to snotlings running around, there are boar riders, wolf riders, etc.

We think about what we know about orks. They must have come here for a specific purpose, to sack this city. They are all about fighting so they will probably not be sending scouts toward our keep. We head to the keep quickly and see how things are going. The dock area is more finished than when we were last here.

We have a total of five boatmen (one missing a hand), the two halflings (Sleeves and Thomas) and the lumberjacks and their families here.

We are going to have the lumberjacks create a palisade to protect us from any siege. The elves will talk to the wood-elves nearby to make sure they are on alert, then they will head out to find any refugees and bring them back so we can shelter them and they can help defend the keep. The dwarves look at fortifying the keep and getting supplies from town.

The wood-elves promise to send some supplies. The dwarves get to the Crossed Lances and everything seems to be in order. It is more packed than usual, and we see some people who are definitely refugees. Tobruk looks around and sees another slayer in the corner with a large mohawk. This guy is wider than Tobruk but not taller. The dwarf says that the axe Tobruk is carrying belongs to him, because he got it from his dead brother. His name is Eogard Mungrinsson. He is from Karak Kadrin which is out in the mountains of Sylvania. The name does ring a bell to Tobruk. He knows that the axe does come from a smith that is there. Tobruk refuses to give it back so Eogard decides that he will come along with us. We direct the people at the Crossed Lances to send supplies and also anyone who is able to the keep.

The elves bring bows, arrows, nets and other supplies to us. Civilians start showing up and we start training them. We setup daily patrols and start ranging to the road to see what is going on. We go out four miles all around the keep. We will engage with any parties of 30 or less. During this time we see groups of about 10 and take them out, but haven’t seen any larger parties or groups riding mounts as of yet.

Chicago Runners

Session 5 – Thumper Home Remodeling, LLC

We resume our duties on our next shift, but we are all kind of tense about all of the things that have gone on.  Fortunately it is a quiet shift, until a call comes in around 9 pm.  It is on the other side of our patrol area so we have a ways to go.  Mari says hold on and starts speeding there.  The patient is  Ben Adkins, 31, human, and is basically healthy, but he has a hazardous occupation although it doesn’t say what.  Blood pressure is low and dropping.  It takes us 20 min to get there.  We arrive at Zee’s Club.

Thumper leads the way as we move to the door.  The bouncer confirms our ID and lets us in.  Inside it is loud, crowded, and hard to see.  Isaac cant find the guy so we talk to the bartender.  He says there is another business in the basement that is not part of the bar.  He goes around to the back of the bar and opens a hidden door.  We head down the secret steps into the basement.  We hear different music, much more grinding.  Two guards in security armor approach us and try to stop us.  The trolls keep going and we follow them in.  As we look into the club there are 2 trolls just beating on each other in the center of the floor.  There are a bunch of orc gangers and others around the floor, watching the fight.  They are Sewer Rats.  We also see a guy in a very expensive suit and a woman with blue eyes.  She is very powerful in magic and a little bored but intrigued.  We see the signal is coming from the back of the club.  The bouncer says that the ambulance crew already arrived.

We get to the patient and see the other crew from Crash Cart., 2 guards and 2 medics.  They try to stop us and say that they were here first.  They pull up their guns and point them at us.  Espadas rolls in and slices the barrels off of the guards guns.  Thumper thumps one of the medics in the face, and he lands on his back like a sack of ham.  Ryoshi and Isaac move past the stunned Crash Cart guys and move towards the patient.  The rest of the crew follows.  Ryoshi kicks in the door (everyone else is very impressed).

We see the patient on the ground in a pool of blood with a woman bending over him.  He has been beaten to a pulp and is close to bleeding out.  He is not even recognizable.  We slap on a Trauma patch and start moving him and his girlfriend out of here.  Two trolls start to block our way and say that Ben has to fight and they own him.  Ben comes around a little and says he wants to fight.  We keep talking to the troll bouncers, and to Ben to try and keep the fight from happening, but he really wants to fight and is willing to waive his Doc Wagon contract.  Isaac slaps a Tranq patch on him to try and keep him down.  He passes out.

We tell the troll manager that he can’t fight but he will be able to find him once he is healed.  We keep moving out.  On the way out we notice a person in the crowd with a Universal Brotherhood symbol.  Espadas assenses her and she is a magic user, very strong but the aura is strange.  She also has some cyberware.  We carry the guy out of the club and to the ambulance.  We start treating him in the ambulance and start driving to the hospital.  We get him there and get him secured.

On the way out we run into Dr. Hyun.  She tells us that her man we talked to after the explosion has since passed away.  We are not surprised.  Our shift concludes and tomorrow we are on duty in the station.

We head to the Triple Tap for a drink after a weird night.  We run into Bright there along with his new crew.  He is really happy to be back doing medical work.  We eat and decide to go and look at another of the Sewer Rat sites that was flagged on our map, the one by the old Gold Coast.  We know that this mostly run down and inhabited by homeless people.  We do see one cluster of people hanging around some of the remaining buildings.  These people seem to have better clothing and are more on watch.  We settle in and watch them.  After a while a van backs up to a side door.  Looking through his scope, Ryoshi sees crates similar to the ones we saw in the warehouse.  There are 4 orcs helping with the crates.

After the van pulls away we decide to hit the gangers and take the weapons off the street.  Espadas sneaks up to the gangers and hits two of them with his swords.  They both die instantly.  One of the remaining guys notice the sound but Ryoshi drops him.

Isaac uses his Maglock key on the warehouse door.  He opens it and we look inside.  There are 4 more gangers opening the crates.  Combat ensues.  Ryoshi hits one of the gangers, but doesn’t get through his armor.  Thumper kills one with his shotgun.  They shoot back and Icebox is hit, but he shakes it off.  Icebox hits the guy who hit him.  Espadas charges in and takes out two guys.  Ryoshi drops the last one.

We start looking at the crates but hear more voices from behind the other door in the room.  They say go around and several others try coming through the door.  Several of the crates had grenades and Espadas throws two of them at the door they are coming through.  A bunch of them drop, but one of the grenades bounces back and Espadas catches the edge of the blast, but he is OK.  Thumper also takes out several with another grenade.

Icebox shoots and he shoots Espadas in the back, in spite of the Joker.

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We dispatch the remaining gangers.

We hear other noises from in the building.  We grab what we can carry and Thumper shoots a rocket into what is left to blow the rest up.

Best Building Collapse GIFs | Gfycat

Thumper gets caught in the explosion but manages to not die.  Mari comes an picks us up and gets us all back to the Triple Tap.  We stash the weapons we took.  Isaac gets a message from an anonymous person.  An older man’s face appears on the screen.  Isaac recognizes him as the guy who was with the blue eyed girl in the basement bar.  His name is Vincent Dupree and he is an executive at Saeder Krupp.  He asks to meet when it is convenient.

<scene>

Chicago Runners

Session 4 – Things that make you go BOOM!

Work has gone back to normal at Doc Wagon, except that Thumper seems to be really quiet and keeps to himself.  We keep going to the restaurant and things are OK there, but Thumper seems to be troubled about the Troll gangers we ran into.

Bright was promoted into an EMT position, which he is really excited about.  He has been moved to a different team as their primary med tech.  However they have not yet backfilled his position, so we are running short handed.  We have a day off.

We know Franz was organizing the weapons shipments from Germany, but didn’t know who was behind the idea and why they helped Franz.  However we did not see a Universal Brotherhood symbol there, so we don’t know if it was related to the previous deal down by the docks.

We are at the Triple Tap with a day off.  Thumper is really busy working both the front and back of house, so he cant leave. We decide to go look around the city, to see if we can find Dr. Hyun’s nephew as well as find any more information about the weapons deals and the Universal Brotherhood.  He was last seen near Clybourn and Larabee in the NW part of the Shattergraves.  She also give us a description and a video from one of his presentations.  Ha-Joon Hyun.

We take the L down there.  On the way we also get a message from Charlie Zero say he found something, with a link to Noose Net.  We get off near his last know location.  There are still some businesses, but may are boarded up and things look really sketchy.  Matt finds a quiet stoop and accesses the message while Espadas and Ryoshi keep watch.  However he is not able to connect.  He head to his last known location.  We find a community of apartments that is being built around a park.  The project seems abandoned, and there is only some work going on in one building.  We go into one of the other buildings.  There are some squatters, and we ask them about Ha-Joon.  One of the squatters identifies himself as Jim.  He says the project was shut down after some sort of a problem.  All of the workers just left after some sort of security people told them to leave.  We ask about the Universal Brotherhood.  Another guy comes forward and says he was in there but he got out.  They lie about projects and preach a lot, but nothing ever comes of it.  At the higher levels they get really weird, and people often go missing.  That was why he got out.

We leave and check some other buildings.  Issac notices that another building has a basement and looks a little more finished.  It also seems empty, with no squatters.  We head downstairs and it doesn’t seem to be residential.  There is a large boiler and it is very damp, dirty, and smelly.  We find some boxes and cases from old supplies, but a lot of it is ruined.  There is one computer terminal that seems to control all of this machinery.  It saws it is a water treatment system.  Ryoshi notices a Universal Brotherhood symbol on the wall, scrawled by hand.  There is a trap door nearby, but with no visible mechanism.  Issac looks at the terminal and sees it has some hidden commands.  However when he tries to access them he fumbles and ends up shutting off the terminal.

We go old school and Espadas whacks the floor with his swords.  He slices through the latch and the trap door opens.  There is a lot of dust and darkness, along with a stairwell that goes down.  There is a different smell from below, like chemicals or cleaning solutions.  We head down and find a hallway with a very high tech looking door at then end.  The door says C-104.  The door also senses as magical.  Isaac has a maglock passkey and is able to get it open.  The lights are also on in the room ahead.

Inside is some sort of lab, with an isolation chamber.  There are some glass tubes to one side with some blobby, living things moving around in them.  There is a panel on one wall that says “Verify identity”.  When we don’t respond some small drones drop out of the ceiling.

Espadas moves to block the door so it can’t trap us in here.  He shoots at one and misses.  Issac is able to use his maglock key to hack the security and get the drones to go back into the ceiling.  We grab some files and Issac scans the room and records it with his cyber eyes.  We close the door and get out of there as quickly as possible.

We head to the roof, intending get from there to another building.  We see some security on the road below us.  We quickly climb to the roof and climb over the wall to the next building.  The cops think they saw something and follow us, but we are able to slip away and out the back.

We head to  the restaurant to check on the link and let Charlie Zero know what we found.  The link takes us to a video and a directory that is self deleting, we need to download the data then it will erase itself.  The data has a map of the city showing locations where the Sewer Rats activity have been concentrated.  There are at least 4 hotspots, including the location of the original weapons deal on the docks.  There are 6 or 7 other gangs listed that are competing with the Rats, including two larger gangs.  We can see where the gangs might come into conflict, including the apartments where we just were and around the Triple Tap.

After looking at that we scrub our video to remove faces and voices, and send him the results.  We also include Ha-Joon’s image and tell him what little we know about the Universal Brotherhood.    Since we still have some time we decide to head down to the docks to check out where the weapons deal went down.

As we were riding the L down there, we see that there was an explosion in the area where we just were.  There were casualties, and the explosion leveled multiple buildings, including the building where the lab was and where the homeless were.

We get to the docks, and this area is even seedier than the last area.  There doesn’t look like there has been much activity since the bust.  We find vehicle tracks, marks from large trunks, and many foot prints.  We also find some crumpled paper.  One is a business card for Scott Wilson, who works for the FBI.  The other is a crude map of the warehouse with an area marked to the south is circled.  It is about 1-2 blocks away.  We head that way.

Things smell even worse in this area.  We find another set of buildings that are abandoned.   This was another hot spot on the Sewer Rat activity map.  We stealthily case the neighborhood.  We see some activity on the south side of the building.  There is a cellar entrance there, and some people standing around outside.  They are on watch but we are not spotted.   They do have Sewer Rat patches, and they are all orcs.  Once again Issac records the location and all of the faces to share with Charlie Zero.  We don’t want to take on the whole gang so we retreat.

We head back to the Triple Tap.  We first get a message from Charlie Zero saying that after he started looking around based on our last message when he attracted a lot of unwanted attention.  He is going into hiding and said we should destroy anything we took from the lab.   So of course we look through the folder that we took from the lab.  There seems to be data on test subjects that are identified by a serial number.  The  data tracks them over time and records symptoms.  All of the patients seem to have died, except for the last one.  That one says stage 4 achieved, moving subject to another location.

We decide to replace the binder with a Doc Wagon cover and then hide it work.  We find out that the VTOL crew went to the explosion site. Jay walk says that they had two patients and one fatality.  The patients said he saw some people there right before the explosion and he saw a van.  That guy is in surgery right now.  We head home and will come back just before our shift tomorrow.

When we get in we ask Dr. Hyun.  She says one of the patients is in a coma, but the other one is awake.  She says we shouldn’t talk to him, but Issac goes anyway.  He does his best doctor routine.  Louis Chatwell is the patient.  He is an architect for a firm downtown and was looking at a potential job site.  As they were going past the apartments he saw a black van pull up and several people go into the building carrying big cases.  The ran out shortly after and drove away.  He was about a block away when the explosions started.  It looked like several people were caught in the buildings when they exploded.  He can also describe one of the men:  long nose, Van Dyke goatee, and quite pale skin.

We start our next shift.

Chicago Runners

Session 3 – Isaac pumps up Franz

Things have calmed down after the action from last time.  Mari got a settlement from Saeder-Krupp to keep it hushed up.  She is going to use it to help her mom, and she is incredibly happy and thankful around us.  She knows we saved her from a bad situation.  We are finally back on regular duty.  The runs have been mostly boring, but there does seem to be an increase in gang violence.

Things have gotten a little rougher around the neighborhood, and the regulars at the Triple Tap are carrying more weapons.  We still hang out there several times a week.  One night we are hanging out there when Isaac gets a high priority message from Dr. Hyun.  Her 20-year-old nephew Ayun has been missing for 3 days.  He was part of a young person’s organization that went on a humanitarian project in the slums.  He has not been seen since.  They have not found anything around his last known location.

We recognize the symbol as the Universal Brotherhood.  They have a cover as being an organization about the sharing of universal truth and companionship.  However, we know they have a violent side as well and they have gathered weapons.  The founders of the group created it to promote peace, however they both got sick and committed suicide.  At a guess there are 18,000-20,000 members in the Chicago area.  We decide to keep our eyes and ears open but keep doing our regular runs.  We cannot afford to get in trouble again.

The next day we go back out on patrol like normal.  We get a call around midnight on Thursday.  We notice that the name is Franz Donner, Thumper’s cousin.  The signal is coming from down by the docks, which is nowhere near the restaurant.  It is coming from a warehouse.  As we pull up, we see several Eagle security units with bullet holes in their cars.  The ping from his bracelet is coming from inside this building on the south side.  We get the cops to move and then pull the ambulance to the south east corner of the building.  There are no doors on this side.

We sneak around to the West side and find a side door, along with Edge and Scales, the shadow runners we ran into before.  They try to wave us off, but we come up anyway.  They say there is a blood bath in there and we might not want to go in.  Thumper tries to break the door but fails.  He shoots out the hinges and then runs into the room, yelling for Franz.  We see the same orcs that were bothering the Triple Tap, part of the Sewer Rats.  As we move into the room, we see a group of trolls on the other side.  Many of them are people that Thumper knows, but some of them are dead and others are wounded.  They are in bad shape.

We manage to stabilize Franz and get him on a stretcher.  As we are loading him up one of the trolls says they were selling the weapons so that the gangs would destroy each other.  As we start moving towards the door, the big garage door explodes inward and a combination of Eagle Security and Corp Sec busts in.  They immediately start exchanging fire with the orcs.

The EMTs look in the bins and find some riot shields.  They grab them and use them to cover the stretcher as the group starts moving towards the door.  The trolls start following us, and the orc gang members start shooting at them and us.  Espadas drops one gang member who gets close to us, and Bright swings at another and wounds him.  The orc gangers and the corp sec keep exchanging fire.  A couple of the troll gangers take wounds.

Icebox gets the stretcher and Franz out the door, while Espadas drops another ganger.  Thumper also kills one.  The group piles out into the alley and runs for the ambulance, with Ryoshi and Thumper covering the rear.  We all head for the ambulance, and two of the troll gangers also escape.  Isaac keeps working on Franz, who seems to be getting worse.  We keep driving to headquarters and rush him into emergency surgery.

Isaac helps with the triage and surgery.  Thumper waits at the emergency room.  Franz is in surgery for three hours, but he does pull through.  Espadas and Ryoshi go back to the restaurant.  A few of the trolls that are usually there are not anymore.

Franz wakes up around mid-morning.  He is covered in bandages and very weak, but lucid.  He says that 3 months ago he was approached by corporate guys who said they could make money while the gangs tear each other apart.  Franz wants to get rid of all the other races, metahumans and otherwise, then trolls could take over.  Corp security shows up soon after to question Thumper and Franz.  Icebox rolls up behind them and starts telling them they cannot question him now.  They leave.

Thumper gets the details from Franz about the weapons shipments.  There were 8 shipments with assault rifles, pistols, armor, shields, and cannons.  The shipments come from Germany and are smuggled through customs then they sell them to the gangs at cost just to move more of them.  The meetings were anonymous (his face was masked), but we have the location and time.

The cops come back and separate Thumper and Franz.  They grill Thumper in their paddy wagon.  He cooperates and tells them what he knows.  Eventually they let him go and he comes back to the restaurant.  Ringo had no idea that any of this was going on with Franz.

Our next move is to try and meet with Edge and Scales to see what they know.  Thumper’s fixer does not know how to contact them, but suggests we get a message out on Noose-net.  Isaac wows us with his hacking skills and can find a way to contact them.  We also find out there are possibly thousands of sewer rats and other gangers underground that come out at night, commit crimes, then go back underground.  A user named SuperWiz has tons of information about them including maps of activity.  We also find that Edge and Scales work with SuperWiz, and they are helping law enforcement.  We decide to try and meet them at a restaurant near us and send SuperWiz a message.

We agree to meet at a nearby noodle bar in the afternoon.  SuperWiz shows up and asks is we have some information on the Sewer Rats.  Thumper and Icebox talk to him and agree to share to their knowledge about the weapons deals.  Icebox will give him the video from the warehouse fight (minus Espadas face of course).  They arrange for a drop point.  The decker reveals that his actual handle is Charlie Zero, and SuperWiz is an alternate username. After the drop we get a message says he has it and will be in touch.  We go back to work for Doc Wagon.

Chicago Runners

Session 2 – Four $*#@$%^ Crit Fails !!!

Dr. Hyun has been promoted to the emergency room across the street.  Icebox is now in charge of the ambulance crew.  It has been two weeks since our last high danger run.  We spend some evenings at Thumper’s restaurant, and have some other calls.  Icebox is taking his new role very seriously.  He is making videos of our runs and editing them into suggestion videos for upper management.  They are very well received, along with his extended cleaning of the ambulance by the EMT crew.

The area around Thumper’s restaurant is deteriorating.  There is a lot of new weapons and hardware, and several gangs are picking up activity, including the Sewer Rats.  Thumper gets some more security for the place.

One day after a long shift we return to the office.  Mari is in a good mood.  She comes out of the locker room all made up, and says “I have a date.”  She seems happy and then heads out.  We are still hanging around the office with some of the other crews.  Jaywalk approaches us and starts making small talk.

We decide to head to Ulrich’s for dinner.  Jaywalk comes with us.  He and Bright really hit the booze hard.  The rest of us hang out, eat dinner, and talk.  During dinner Icebox gets a call from Mari, and she seems in trouble. We agree to go help her.  Icebox tries calling corp HQ to get her location.  Jaywalk says he can drive us, but he is pretty slammed from his margaritas.  Mari is located in the core of downtown Chicago, in the Saeder-Krup building.

We head back to HQ and Jaywalk runs to the VTOL pads.  We pile in and he takes off suddenly. Icebox was not belted in and flies into the back bulkhead.  We make it to the building in record time.  Icebox is trying to call Mari.  She says she is on the 31st floor of the Saeder-Krupp building, apt 3108.  She is bleeding from a cut on her face, and says she has three other women with her.

A security guard tries to waive us off, and says he has gotten no calls.  We land and say that we have a call.  More security comes out to question us.  Icebox tries to talk to them and let them know we are on a legitimate call.  He doesn’t buy it, but Icebox tries to go along.  Ryoshi tries to help talk, but fails miserably.  They come towards us threateningly.

Meanwhile, Espadas grabs rappelling gear and goes down as far as he can.  He slashes open a window  and tries swinging into it.  He succeeds and then cuts the rope.

We jump back into the ambulance.  Jaywalk drops us down to the 39th floor.  We see the hole where Espadas went in.   Some drones come up around us and we have to duck around behind another building in the VTOL.

Espadas calls us and tells us he is heading down to 31st floor.  He gets down there and sees two security guards.  They spot him and start approaching.  He rushes them.  They shoot at him and miss.  He knocks one of them to the floor.  A melee ensues as they try to get tasers on him.  Espadas turns and busts the open the door to 3108.  He hears Mari from one of the rooms and he goes into the room, where she is waiting with 3 other girls.  They lock the door and he calls us for a pickup.

They bust into an interior courtyard down from the apartment.  They cut through a few more walls and break a window to get access to the outside.

We swoop down in the ambulance to the opening, but several combat drones also close in.  We shoot and disable the drones, but more appear.  Ryoshi accidentally shoots the back wall of the ambulance.  Mari and Espadas grab the girls and jump on the ambulance.  We shoot some more drones, and they shoot back.  We sweep away from the building.

On the way back to the garage, Mari tells us what happened, after thanking us profusely.  She was dating a nice, rich guy (Charlie Dupree), but she admitted she ignored some warning signs.  They went out for dinner with him and some other guys and friends (Jenny, Bambi, and Laurie).  They all went back to his apartment to continue the party.  The guys started getting abusive, and trying to attack them.  They talked about doing a deal tonight with some serious weaponry laying around the apartment.  She was able to take a picture of the location of the deal.  It is in the Shattergraves area near the lake.

We come up with a cover story that Mari was calling for one of the other girls who has a bracelet but wasn’t able to activate it.   We make sure everyone knows it and then return to the base.  The station manager meets us at the pad and we tell our story.  He is clearly pissed but doesn’t want us to yell at us in from of the girls we rescued.  He tells us to meet in one hour.  Mari coaches Jenni to tell her dad that we saved her, so at least we will get a customer to help our case.

We are suspended for a week.  Espada was not involved as far as the corp knows, so he is still working.  Ryoshi works at the Triple Tap to help out Thumper and family.  Mari and Jaywalk stop by during the week.  Later in the week we here that the weapon sale was not stopped, but several people were arrested leaving the scene.  Charlie Dupree is in prison awaiting trial.

After a week we return to work.  Grunt seems to have gone to bat for us.  There are some dirty looks but otherwise things seem to return to normal.

Chicago Runners

Session 1 – A baseball bat and two grapefruit

It’s September 2054 in Chicago, more than a year after the Spiritbane incident. We are a team of medics and security personnel for a DocWagon High Threat Response (HTR) unit that patrols the streets and rescues clients.

John – Ryoshi, elf physical adept and sniper
Bill – Thumper, troll street samurai
Matt – Icebox, human medic
Paul – Espadas, troll physical adept and sword fighter
Jon (NPC) – Bright, human street samurai and former medic
(NPC) – Mari “Gearz”, dwarf rigger
(NPC) – Dr. Hyun, human doctor and team leader

We spend the end of our shift at DocWagon sitting around the station and talking.  Thumper shares that his family has a restaurant nearby and invites us all for dinner and drinks, including Mari.

We go to the restaurant and meet his wife and daughter.  Some sewer rat gangers come in and start pushing around his daughter and other customers.  Thumper goes and and speaks gently to them, at which time they decide to leave.

The next day we spend most of a boring shift just riding around in the ambulance.  However towards the end of the shift we get a call about a car accident with gunfire.  We pull up and a green car with gangers has crashed into a silver coupe that has our patient and four others.  We pile out of the car and the gangers seem like they are threatening the car.  Ryoshi quickly shoots off the side mirror of their car and the gangers all hit the dirt.  There are also two shadowrunners there, Scales and Edge, who say the green car rammed into the silver one and they are there to help.

The runners stay out of our way as we move in to stabilize the patient.  Just then the window of the building next to the scene explodes as a desk come flying out of it…followed by two grenades.  Everyone dives for cover.  Thumper and Espadas dive on top of the victim and his friend.  Dr, Hyun and Icebox are stunned and knocked flat.

Espadas runs and vaults off the desk up into the open window.  He hits and kills one of the 3 guys there with his vibrosword, effectively cutting him in half.  The rest of the team starts to move the patient to the ambulance.  Ryoshi drops another ganger in the window, and Espadas slices the last one.

Just then another truck crashed into the intersection.  The team is able to get the victim in the ambulance, along with Dr. Hyun who is still stunned from the grenade.  One of the gangers shoots at Bright as he is moving back, but Ryoshi shoots the ganger.  Thumper drops a ganger and Scales drops another ganger.  Dr. Hyun finally gets up and is able to get in the ambulance.  Scales waves at us to indicate danger and shoots at the truck.  We start getting the other people into the ambulance, but the panel of the truck pops open and a ganger pops out.  He shoots a missile launcher that catches our med tech, two of the victims, and Icebox.  The medtech is down.

Bright pulls out his SMG and drops the guy with the missile launcher.  Another jumps out but Thumper drops him.  Two more gangers pop out from the van and shoot at Thumper, but miss.  Ryoshi kills one of them.

Eagle Security shows up and the last ganger cowers against his car.  We get the rest of the people in the ambulance.  The last ganger shoots at Thumper but Ryoshi drops him.

The gangers all had Sewer Rat paraphernalia. However they usually do not attack in large groups in public, and they usually do not have this kind of hardware. The med tech expires.

The original victim who called us in is Locus Pendleton.  Icebox recognizes him as the son of a Corp from Shiawase.  Locus is a well known celeb partier, and we recognize his girlfriend as well.

Eagle Security contacts DocWagon and lets them know that the danger has passed, and they are investigating what happened.

The next day, Dr. Hyun is reassigned to a post at the hospital across the street as the director of the ER department. As a result, Isaac “Icebox” is now the team lead on the ambulance and will have two med-techs under him.

Cataclysm

Session 30 – Future History

GM: Paul
Players: Ian-Brad, Alex-John, Dusty-Matt, Jon-Simon, Bill-Chet
Game Date: Oct 28-Nov 6, 2003 / Jan 19, 2019

We get off the street into an alleyway. Luckily, Ian says that he knows someone who lives a few blocks away from here that he was in the service with in basic training. We walk toward there and Ian knocks on the door. A man answers but he doesn’t recognize Ian until he gives him more info. After the two catch up, the man agrees to give him some food and $60 cash.

We go to CVS to Ian gets a hair kit and some razors, as well as a new shirt and pants from a thrift store. He cleans himself up and then is able to go to the bank. When the rest of us see him, he actually does look a few years younger. We head to the bank and he withdraws $5000 in cash.

We head across town to a motel and get two rooms for the night. We clean up and get a good night’s sleep. The next morning we wake up and head to the store to get some clothes. We pay $2400 for a used minivan — Ian talks the guy down from $3000. We load up and head north to Milwaukee.

We stay another night in a different hotel, then head into Milwaukee the next afternoon. Ian drives us to Donges Bay Rd. to his uncle’s summer home and picks up his stuff, as well as his SUV.

Simon remembers that AJ is living on the East Side, on 1509 E. Kane Place and Oakland, right near Pizza Shuttle. Simon and Alex go to AJ’s apartment and knock on his door. He agrees to speak with us outside at a picnic table. Simon tries to explain that he knows things about AJ and that he needs his help. AJ doesn’t believe in the supernatural but agrees to the “mind link.” Simon tries and the mind link and it goes horribly, creating backlash on Simon. He crumples in pain.

Alex does a mind link with AJ and shows him some Talolan things, and he seems curious. Simon recovers and he shows him things from his life and also from the future. He starts to believe us.

We head up to his apartment and he sends his girlfriend out for pizza. While she’s gone we start telling him about the future, but Alex is not sure that we should share specifics. Ian and Simon disagree, saying that more information would be the most helpful, because we don’t know how it will affect the future. Alex agrees but says we should also tell him of his death. Ian tells him and he takes it pretty well.

After a while, his girlfriend Karin comes back and he tells us to zip it. We head down to  Caesar Park and talk for a couple of hours more, and Chet goes to get a case of beer. At 11 PM, we all have a strange sensation like our souls are being pulled from our bodies, but it goes away. We can’t figure out what caused that.

AJ says that he needs to get to bed, and we thank him for his time. He tells Ian to ditch his phone since that could be tracked. He will get a burner phone or call from a payphone. He gives us his cell number. Before we leave, Chet asks him if the government is aware that this disaster may happen, and AJ says absolutely not — there are not even scenarios being run for this.

The next day we meet again and he says that he was able to find something. He says that the sun is going through a very active period, and the time we arrived coincided with a huge solar flare. It was so large that it actually took out the “SOHO” monitoring satellite. We don’t know if there was another solar flare at 11pm the previous night.

We head back to St. Charles, thinking that we should be there when it’s time for us to go back so we can help those who need us. Also, our stuff will be there. We spend some time buying things at CVS so we have drugs and other supplies, knowing that these will be useful if we get snapped back to the future. We even sleep in our clothes in case it happens at night. However it’s several days and we haven’t gone back. We start thinking that it may not happen. But on the 6th of November, we are suddenly snapped back into our time.

It is very cold here, even with our clothes on. We hear rumbling in the distance and there are two Sno Cats coming toward us. Ian uses his scope to see who is driving and he sees AJ. We are all pretty shocked but happy. He comes to meet us and asks us if it worked out. Dusty shows the T-shirt that he was wearing over 15 years ago. We have changed the future, but who knows how much.

Cataclysm

Session 29 – Future History

GM: Paul
Players: Ian-Brad, Alex-John, Dusty-Matt, Jon-Simon, Bill-Chet
Game Date: January 5-19, 2019

We return from the museum. Ian looks at the gear that was found in the sheriff’s office and finds a smartwatch of some type; the backpack seems to hold data and provides power. He gives it to Simon to see if he can do an object reading. Simon does so, and he is able to rewind back really far — to the time that the watch was created. It was given to the man, “AJ” Gary Johnson who was an agent with a Division-like organization in Milwaukee.

From his POV, Simon sees the events that happen during the cataclysm including AJs wife’s death and his subsequent work helping with the aftermath. He was one of only five agents in the Milwaukee area and all of the others were killed between 2012 and 2018. He went into the Sheriff’s office to scavenge for supplies. There he was stabbed by the beast we ran across and bled out.

From this, we find much more information about the state of the government after the disaster. There is part of a functioning government but everything seems to be mostly local like it is here, since there are no communications. At one point martial law was declared, and there have been several presidents in the past few years. DC was nuked, there was radiation fallout in New York, and also in the Dakotas. We also find info on the Talolans; there are some in the southeast US.

The watch is functional and has maps and reports on it. Reports still came in after AJ passed away. He has some areas tagged on maps — The Orphanage (run by Cassidy MacLoughlin). 18 kids are here, 8 adults, etc.

AJ was getting people in touch and helping them, but in many cases it’s only 5-10 people.

Alex is working on the Blues project with Lucy over the next couple of weeks and things are quiet. However, on the 18th of January during the day we see a big fireball coming through the southern sky and we see a mushroom cloud. There is basically an earthquake here and a wall of snow blasts toward us. Some people are hurt from falling ice and all the glass is shattered on the cabins here. We figure that the impact happened in Chicago.

We work on getting those who are injured to the infirmary and board up the windows. Dusty checks on the livestock and they are very anxious but okay.

We check in by radio to all the people we know and everyone south is in trouble. We decide to head south and see what we can find out. Meaghan goes to the southwest to help some people and the rest of us go straight south.

The Ironwood Golf Course sends some sno cats and a bunch of people and supplies. Ian coordinates with several other settlements. He goes to address the hub before we leave. He asks everyone to be prepared to suffer some hardships in the short term as we are helping more refugees and everyone needs to help out in order for this to work.

We pack up our gear, food and medical supplies and head out the morning of the 19th. We camp overnight and the next day we find a settlement near St. Charles, IL. There are several people here who are injured and one with severe internal bleeding. We patch them up and Alex uses his psionic healing on the one with internal bleeding, however we don’t let them know that he’s a Talolan. We offer to have them come with us. Simon finds an old snowmobile in a small shed. The spark plug is messed up and we replace it. Then we head to bed as it’s 11pm.

The next morning we head out, leaving the people some supplies and instructions on where to go if they want to start moving.  We see multi-story buildings that are flattened. We find another group with lots of people injured, and help them out. We search around and find 5 more survivors. They are trapped underneath a building, but we’re able to dig them out.

We head out and suddenly there are wooly mammoths. We try to skirt around them and suddenly a group of sabretooth tigers jump out and attack us. We gun the snowmobiles and barely escape. As we zoom away, one slashes at Chet and his thick jacket just saves him.

We head closer to the impact site and see a huge crater, over 3.5 miles wide and as high as the Empire State Building. We see something huge and Alex and Simon recognize it as a main drive from one of the ships. Suddenly there is a huge flash and we all feel strange. Some of us feel like our clothes are loose and we realize that all of our buttons have been pulled out, and anything metal is completely gone. We see grass underneath our feet and look around to see Halloween decorations.

We realize that Chet has a length of rebar stuck into his leg. Alex helps him pull it out and heals it almost immediately.

A man pulls up in a car and asks us if we need help. We are confused and not sure what to say. He asks why we are wearing such warm clothes and we say that we’re getting ready for a Halloween party.

Simon checks out the man’s license plate and it says that it expires in Feb of 2004. So, apparently it’s Halloween 2003. We discuss and decide what to do.