Episode 1.7
From HOTGT
Contents |
TEASER
“She says she'll eat while she works. She was still welding.” Vincent said, bemused, as he sat down at the makeshift picnic table the crew of the Mao's Claw had set up.
Before the war, Athens had been a prosperous Rim world with both urban and rural centers. Now those urban centers were bombed out ruins. While United Reclaimation owned the salvage rights to the entire planet they couldn't patrol it nearly as well as they did their more established junk yards on Beylix. With a little skill and a little luck a small ship could find an out of the way spot, set down, and engage in some illegal salvage. For the last few days the crew had been stripping large chunks of metal from destroyed buildings in order to patch up the Claw's hull. Now the process of actually welding the fragments on was taking place. Del was just finishing up one of the patches.
“Figures.” Nadie said, with a smile. The last few days had been nice. James was recovered from his illness, everyone was in decent spirits, the Mao's Claw was on her way to being fully repaired for the first time in months, and the weather was calm and warm. Things were going well.
Of course, it couldn't last. The center could not hold.
They heard it before they saw it. Shouts coming from over the rise. Alert for guards, James, Fin, Nadie, and Vincent rose with their hands on their weapons. It wasn't a United Reclaimation patrol that came into sight, however. It was a single man, running frantically. Behind him came two men in full body armor, each toting an assault rifle. One stopped, dropped to one knee, took aim and fired.
A three shot burst tore into the back of the running man. He hit the ground, hard.
“Mei yong ma duh tse gu yong.” Nadie muttered.
END OF TEASER
Opening credits: Real Folk Blues from the Cowboy Bebop soundtrack.
ACT ONE
Currently playing: Versus Spider from the Metroid Prime soundtrack
“No witnesses.” Nadie and James both heard one of the rifle toting men say to the other.
“Maybe he meant they don't see any witnesses.” James said, hopefully.
“Or maybe not.” Nadie groaned as the two armored men began marching towards them, past their fallen victim.
The four of them scattered, seeking cover behind piles of twisted and ruined urban wreckage. The battle was short but furious. The armored men were better armed but the defensive positions of the crew kept them from harm. Nadie tried to sneak closer but fell into an almost hidden pool of water and refuse. She had trouble clawing herself out. Both Vincent and Fin got in good shots, ultimately taking down the enemy. James also hit but more often than not his bullets ricochetted off the men's armor. When it was all over, they cautiously approached the two men.
“Who are they?” Nadie asked, frowning. She was soaking wet and covered in things she'd rather not know the name of. She nudged one of the men, flipping him over. There were no marks on the armor but it was too nice and too uniform to be anything but professional.
“They're Blue Sun.” Vincent answered, “Secret operations. They use them in cases of corporate espionage and the like.”
Fin, James, and Nadie all stared at Vincent for a moment.
Vincent shrugged.
“Both my folks were Blue Sun executives before they retired.” he explained.
Fin peeled away from them, moving over to kneel next to their victim. He pressed two fingers to the man's neck.
“Faint pulse.” Fin said to himself, then louder to the others. “He's alive!”
Fin pulled open the man's shirt so he could begin first aid procedures. Instead, he found himself in a somewhat passionate kiss. The dying man grabbed Fin by the hair and dragged him down, then pressed a kiss to his lips.
Then he died.
James, Nadie, and Vincent just... stared.
“You know...” Vincent said after a moment, “... he could have at least picked someone better looking than Fin. I mean, I'm right here.”
END OF ACT ONE
ACT TWO
Currently playing: Track 2 from the Parasite Eve 2 soundtrack, disc 1
“I recognize the tattoo.” James said, pointing to the mark on the dead man's body. “Companions sometimes get it in celebration of graduating from their training program.”
“These are nice clothes...” Vincent remarked, fingering the fabric of the man's blue shirt. Silk. “But what is a companion doing getting chased down by Blue Sun secret ops in a destroyed city on the Rim?”
“Good question. Let's see if these guys have any answers.” James searched the two Blue Sun men's bodies but found nothing. No identification. No messages. The battle had damaged their com systems so they couldn't use that to run any traces. Quietly, James began stripping the armor off. Between the two men they could salvage one complete set of body armor. That and the two assault rifles would be stored in the ship's locker.
“A quartermaster's job is never done.” James muttered to himself.
“We're miles away from the nearest actual settlement.” Nadie noted, “He couldn't have run that far and I doubt they did either. They might have a craft of some kind.”
“Could be someone guarding it.” Fin noted. He rubbed at his mouth, frowning. Something was wrong. He sniffed but found his sinuses were clogging up. His entire body was beginning to ache.
“Either way, there might be answers there. Let's take the Claw up and scan the area.” Nadie said. Vincent nodded and began walking back to the ship to prep for takeoff.
“Could we at least load the rest of the hull scrap?” Del asked. She had come up while the others had been talking.
Del smiled sheepishly.
“Guess I was too caught up in the work. Didn't hear a thing. Sorry I wasn't here to help.” Del said, glancing at the dead bodies.
James was in the process of shoving them into the hole Nadie had fallen into earlier.
“Better the boat's fixed.” Nadie said, “Come on. We'll get the crane and the forklift. Get the rest of the metal into the hull. Fix her later. We don't wanna be here if more Blue Sun shows up. Too many questions.”
“I think we've got other problems.” Fin said, his voice rough and sore.
“D'un yi shia. You sound sick.” Nadie noted with a frown.
“I am sick.” Fin said, “I think the companion gave me something. Whatever it is acted too fast to be an ordinary illness. It feels like a regular cold but this sort of onset time only comes with genetic enhancement.”
“Great.” Nadie groaned, “A dead companion, two dead Blue Sun secret operatives, and a genetically engineered illnesse. That's just shiny.”
--
“There.” Vincent pointed to the screen, “A power signature about half a mile away.”
They were in the air now, hovering a hundred feet or so above the ground. The hull scrap had been loaded into the cargo bay and squeezed next to the shuttle. The assault rifles and body armor had been stowed in the ship's locker.
“Too small to be a long-distance sorta ship.” Nadie noted, “could be a shuttle or a land craft.”
“Just in case, though, we shouldn't fly there.” James said. “Keep the Claw out of sight.”
“Right,” Nadie agreed. “We'll take the mule. Vincent, set us back down.”
--
It turned out to be a simple helicopter. A two-seater, painted black, with registration markings indicating it was originally from Londinum. James attempted to finese the copter's lock but ended up locking it down. In the end, it took an old fashioned lever and some force to crack the thing open.
They didn't find much. There were straps for the assault rifles behind the seats, indicating the copter had been built for this sort of thing but beyod that, little else.
“Okay,” Fin said, thinking the problem through, “so this is a two-seat helicopter. They couldn't have brought the companion with him in order to play their version of “the Most Dangerous Game”. He must have been somewhere nearby.”
They looked around them. This had once been a residential neighborhood towards the edge of the city of Plato. Now, it was just as much a set of ruins as everything else.
They searched for several hours, though Fin had to sit and rest for much of the time due to his sudden and odd illness. In the end, they found what had once been the basement of a house, intact. There were camping supplies. A sleeping bag. A camp stove. A rubber trunk full of good clothing and a pile of dirty laundry. They searched the place thoroughly.
“So,” Fin leaned in the corner of the basement shivering and hugging himself, “we have a companion who upset Blue Sun in some way, had a genetically engineered illness, and hiding here in his childhood home.”
“Don't have nearly enough information.” Nadie grunted.
Fin covered his mouth as he went into a coughing fit.
“Maybe the illness will tell us more. I might not be able to shake this unless I know what this is. I need access to a DNA scanner.”
--
Every other lead turned out to be fruitless. To avoid attracting attention to their illegal salvage efforts the Mao's Claw was lifted up into orbit and then flew down into port. There they looked into both the Blue Sun operatives and Monroe Solange. Neither had been spotted in town.
Fortunately, they had better success with getting access to a DNA scanner. Vincent, it turned out, knew someone who knew someone who had a former girlfriend on Athens. They were able to get Fin fifteen minutes in a laboratory. Enough time to scan the virus and record the data. He took it back to the Mao's Claw to analyze.
“There's something odd about the sequencing here...” Fin frowned as he peered at the screen. He pressed a few buttons, isolating and then enhancing part of the image. “This sequence of dark spots here... other than this it is a simple cold with a quick onset time and a nasty resistance to drugs.”
“I've heard of this sort of thing,” James said, “Though I thought it was experimental. Coding a message onto a virus or into someone's DNA. That way it can't be taken away. The quick onset time is part of making sure the virus takes in the first place while the resistance helps you carry it.”
Fin nodded his agreement.
“It would take direct fluid to fluid contact to transmit this one... and a lot of fluid.”
They all looked at him for a moment.
“... it was a sloppy kiss.”
Nadie coughed to hide a smile.
“What's the message say?”
It turned out to be binary code. When translated it read:
Stingray Cove Newhall Box 315 Code 2171512181
END OF ACT TWO
ACT THREE
Monroe Solange was listed on the companion registry as working out of Bellerophon. They had debated visiting the temple there but, in the end, the crew of the Mao's Claw decided the best course of action was to follow-up on the clue left in the message.
“Here we go. Box 315.” Nadie said. They stood in front of a long wall of post office boxes at the Alliance mail center in Stingray Cove, a mid-sized community on the water world of Newhall.
James entered the code. 2171512181. The door to the box opened.
Inside was a neatly wrapped Christmas present and a card.
“Huh.” James said.
--
Currently playing: Home on the Rangoon from the Shanghai Noon soundtrack.
“Dear mom,” the card read, “I hope you enjoy the gift. I made sure to wrap the present carefully so you could save the paper. I know how thrifty you can be. Love, Yvonne.”
“Someone check it for ticking,” Fin said, only half in jest.
“Let's just unwrap it.” Nadie said with a smirk.
“Carefully,” Vincent noted.
They were careful, making sure not to tear the paper too much. There were two points of interest. The first was what was inside: a box containing a simple voice data recorder. There was also a surprise on the paper itself. Written on the inside of the wrapping was a map and notes.
“It looks like some sort of facility. Listen to this.. most doors have card and thumb scanners.” Vincent scanned over the map.
The others did, too. Nadie and Fin took special note of the name of the facility that was mapped out, written at the base of the map.
GAMMA WHITE LAB.
That wasn't so far off from Beta White, the name of the camp Fin had worked at during the war. The last place Nadie is sure her father was after his capture.
“Let's hear what's on the recorder.” James suggested. He pressed play.
“I don't know who will see this. I hope I get the information to the right people but if I don't, you need to make sure something is done. They can't go on doing these experiments. They're trying to make monsters. Perfect people with no souls. The lab is at 52 degrees 10 minutes latitude 109 degrees 5 minutes longitude on Saint Albans. Please, the Gamma White Lab must be shut down. The SY sample and all the research notes will be there and only there to prevent a security leak. Someone has to do it... before they destroy the human race.”
“This is something.” James said as he puzzled the pieces together, “Someone inside the lab managed to get this package out... the post-mark on the outside is from August on Saint Albans... they manage to get this package out but they need to make sure someone finds it so he or she creates a virus to carry a message. It gets passed on, either directly or through a third party considering how much bodily fluids are involved with hiring a companion, to the companion who figures out he's in trouble and runs to hide.”
“He knew to pass it on.” Vincent pointed out. “He must have known about it.”
James nodded.
“So, who is the person in the recording?” James asked.
“Doctor Yvonne Sweet.” Fin said. He stepped back into the room from the infirmary. “I just checked on the cortex. I remember reading a paper she wrote. She's a specialist in genetically engineered viruses, working on the theory that since viruses can't be eliminated they can be modified to be less resistant to treatment. I just listened to a brief snippet of a lecture she gave a few years ago. It was recorded on a site on the cortex. It was her voice on the recording.”
“So, who did she think the “right people” were?” James asked. “And what do we do about it?”
Their discussion went on for hours. They poured over the map and the notes left for them by Doctor Sweet but, in the end, all they concluded was that they weren't in a position to do anything at the moment.
“Don't have the resources for a direct infiltration,” Nadie said to the others, “don't have the contacts to figure out who could. I do wanna find out what's there. Maybe do some good at the same time but we need to get ready for it. Take on a few jobs. Build up some capital. Buy supplies.”
She stared down at the map.
“Then we'll find out what the Gamma White lab really is.”
END OF ACT THREE
EPILOGUE
“We'll have to tell the technicians at Delta White that the cybernetic GPS systems worked perfectly.” the woman with short cropped hair said as she stared down at the cess pool and the three bodies that had been stuffed within.
“It seems they neutralized the target.” the man next to her said, “But someone neutralized them and stole their armor. Security breach?”
“Nothing on them should connect them to our employer.” the woman said, “this was likely scavengers taking advantage of what they thought were mercenaries. We should return to our main task.”
“Yes,” the man agreed, “we still have to find James Heru...”
FADE TO BLACK
| Heroes of the Great Tree Topics | ||
| Impossibilities | I-verse background • Player Characters • NPCs • House Rules | |
| Phantapunk | Aeryn Background • Player Characters • NPCs • House Rules | |
| Concrete & Crimson | World Background • Scoobies • NPCs • House Rules | |
| Keep Flying | The 'Verse • The Crew • NPCs • House Rules | |
| Polybius | The World • Investigators • NPCs • House Rules | |
| Labyrinth | The World • PCs • NPCs • House Rules | |
