Adventure Overview
Players: Mr. Rhyze, Morton, Faust.
Enemies: Scorpion, Sub-Zero, Boshi, the Fat Man in the Speedo and Dracula.
Started: As Mean Gene arrived to comment on the arrest of Captain Falcon.
Ended: With the conclusion of the security briefing.
As usual, the action resumed in Bennigan's, the station's only Irish pub. Morton, Mr. Rhyze and Faust had just come in for the afternoon meal. Their expectations that the place would be crowded were entirely justified. Along with the regulars, the pub was also full of Red-Shirts, apparently joining Jamal in investigating the premises for any signs of the escaped prisoners. Of course, Jamal's contributions to this investigation seemed to include sitting at a table with Falco and eating donuts. It was also the only table with free seats, and thus soon drew the three protagonists into its empty chairs. Lucky was terrified by the appearance of Faust, whom he had not seen in quite some time. Fortunately, the mortician's order of brains coincided rather nicely with Mr. Rhyze's desire for a burger. Noting that he still had a few Irish cows left, Lucky rushed away to prepare the orders. Morton held off his appetite in the interim by grabbing a few bites from one of Jamal's donuts. Noting that he was running the short, the security ensign asked if he could borrow one of Morton's donuts, since the pilot seemed to constantly have them whenever he was around. After munching down a few bites, Morton was more than happy to return the donut to Jamal, thus greatly impressing him. Of course, Jamal was easily impressed. And dismayed, for that matter. He spent most of the meal complaining about how bad it was that the prisoners had escaped. Apparently, one of the one of the fugitives was C-Bear, and Jamal was afraid his old rapping partner would come back for some revenge. Falco, on the other hand, was more interested in berating Morton over his performance at the Kessel Run. He maintained that he could have easily won the race, and declared that Morton and Johnny had lowered the station's reputation. But at least Johnny had looked good while doing it. Still, even Falco had to admit that Morton's second place finish wasn't bad for a first attempt at the most famous space race.
By this point, Mr. Rhyze had finished eating. He proposed some Blitzball, and invited Morton to join him in the hydrosphere. Morton couldn't refuse such an offer, but noted that Mr. Rhyze first had to help him answer an email. Though normally Mr. Rhyze would have charged for such a service, he agreed to do it for free in this case, and led the pilot towards the computer lab. When the two arrived, they found only Vance and Diego in the room. Vance was quick to profess his shock at seeing Morton anywhere near a computer. Morton replied that he had decided to seek Mr. Rhyze's help, after breaking the moose associated with one of the lab computers. Vance was even less impressed by the email Morton wanted to respond to. Email degrees, even from such institutions as Bovine University, were nothing more than a meaningless slip of paper, and only a pale shade of a real degree. As such, Vance concluded that it really was only fitting that Morton should get one. Diego noted that he had several, including the recent MBA. Holding up the framed degree, Diego noted that he could easily draw a sequence diagram of the steps necessary to obtain an MBA. Morton was certainly interested, but Mr. Rhyze didn't think it would be necessary. Logging onto a computer, he easily loaded Morton's @epsilon email. Sure enough, a message therein promised a degree to anyone capable enough to click the reply button. Mr. Rhyze did so on Morton's behalf, and wrote out a message declaring Morton to be an incompetent pilot, totally unqualified for a degree, and unable even to open his own email. Morton would have protested, but the communications officer sent the message before he had any real chance to do so. Prof. LaVache's personal respond came back amazingly fast. Most of his email was spent gushing about Morton's incredible abilities, and noting that his life experience had clearly earned him a degree. In fact, LaVache noted that the impeccable grammar and spelling of Morton's message demonstrated that he was almost overqualified for an MBA. Needless to say, LaVache's own email was riddled with typos and other errors.
Still, LaVache declared that Morton would have to solve a simple skill-testing question within a certain amount of time before being sent the degree. In truth, Mr. Rhyze speculated that Morton would receive the degree either way, and this was merely a method to make him feel like he really deserved it. To make things more difficult, LaVache told them to meet him in a chatroom, where he would reveal the skill-testing question, and they could ask him simply yes or no questions about it. Fortunately, this proved to be no problem for Mr. Rhyze. Unfortunately, the skill-testing question itself seemed to stump the communications officer. It involved figuring out why a man named Pat figured he could get away with whacking his brother upside the head with a frying pan and killing him. Of course, Pat's pathetic plan ended up with him dead as well. Morton was also puzzled, and looked to Vance and Diego for help. Vance replied that he only put in effort for real degrees, while Diego promised he would have a context-model diagram of Pat's plan together in no time. Unforunately, in the world of software engineering, no time actually meant several months. As such, it was only with the help of the disembodied voice of Faust and one of LaVache's clues that the mystery was solved. This put them a bit below the best time bracket, but as Mr. Rhyze had predicted, the performance didn't actually seem to matter to Professor LaVache. He promised that Morton's authentic degree would be sent to the station. With this finished, Mr. Rhyze suggested that Morton should go round up Johnny, while he went up to the bridge to check on things. The pilot strongly suspected that this meant Free-Cell, but agreed to the plan all the same.
Faust was interested in neither degrees nor Blitzball. He had other important business, such as finding freezer space, and reading the Monstrous Manual that he had nicked from Vin Diesel. The mortician figured that animating his corpses into zombies or some such monster would help cut down on freezer space, as well as being really cool. Dracula had somehow managed to raise an undead army using the Book of the Dead, and Faust yearned to do the same. But first, he would have to deal with the immediate shortage of freezer space. A quick trip up to sick bay easily enlisted Sam to the cause. The medical officer proudly proclaimed that he had two coffeepots, though he had to admit that the only freezer in the room was the one already used for the morgue. However, he had heard that the pilots had set up some sort of freezer down in the military bay lounge. Armed with this new information, Faust made his way down to the lowest level of the station. His first stop was Docking Bay One, where he looked for any ships that might possess some form of refrigeration. He found the Blue Chip, with its constantly rotating stock reports. The hatch was currently closed, but a quick knock caused it to open. It also unforunately caused The Broker to pop out on his scooter. Faust had not yet met The Broker, but it didn't take him long to refuse the latter's offers for shares in a hardware company, regardless of how many hammers were thrown into the deal. In fact, Faust declared that he wouldn't consider any deal that didn't involve a free fridge. Confronted with such circumstances, The Broker's only option was to flee on his scooter, shouting that Faust would never catch him. Indeed, the mortician did not seem inclined to do so, since the ship was still open. Stepping in, Faust searched the jumble of items and found what he was looking for. It was only a small fridge, but it would be large enough to hold the parts he had picked up on the Grand Prix, or maybe a few of the dogs that had once had bees in their mouths. Regardless, it contained Coca-Cola, making it a most valuable find. Disconnecting the fridge, Faust went looking for more.
His next destination was space bay two, where he had less success. The only ship docked in this room appeared to be an Electran transport. The hatch was currently open, so Faust decided to investigate. He had barely entered the ship when he was confronted by one of its occupants.
Bahljas Faust greeted Bahljas with as many ranks as he could think of, before finally hitting on the right one. This didn't seem to bother the Electran as much as the fact that Faust was entering his ship in the first place. The mortician quickly explained that he was doing a standard inspection, and needed to know if the ship had any refrigeration devices. Bahljas had been unaware that any such inspection was mandatory, but replied that his ship did not have any such facilities. A baffled Faust could then only ask where the Electrans kept their dead. Bahljas replied that he had no intention of losing any men in this mission, and delegated one of his soldiers to 'assist' Faust while he went to meet with the station's commander. This sort of assistance wasn't exactly what Faust had been looking for. After a short guided tour, the mortician decided that Bahljas had spoken the truth. The Electrans did not seem to have a freezer on their ship. Faust found this lack of a morgue highly disturbing, and left the ship with several scathing comments about the state of the Imperial Military. Continuing on his inspection of military vessels, Faust moved next to the Military Bay Lounge. Unfortunately, his plan was somewhat hampered by the presence of Falco Lombardo. He got around this obstacle by suggesting a drinking contest, and promising to refill Falco's jug of whiskey when it was finished. It didn't prove necessary. The ace pilot was obviously up for the challenge, and proceeded to kick bag most of the keg. While he recovered from this obviously daunting task, Faust made his way into the APC. With the absence of the Silverdust, the APC was the only transport around, and he thus speculated that it must have some sort of fridge. It turned out that he was correct, though he found a bit more than he bargained for.
The small fridge had actually been transferred from the Silverdust by the ingenuity of the pilots. It was swiftly unplugged by the ingenuity of Faust. While attempting to transport the fridge, Faust found it to be amazingly heavy. He speculated that this could be due to the heavy alcohol it likely contained. The true reason proved far more sinister. When Faust opened the fridge, he was startled to find someone crouched within its frigid depths. His investigations had apparently awakened this figure, who straightened with a twirl of his dark cape. It was Dracula, the self-proclaimed Lord of Darkness. Dracula laughed that he had been sleeping in the cool confines of the fridge, absorbing its powers. And now, his Powers of Darkness were stronger than ever! Once again, though, this proved to be almost more of hindrance to Dracula. When facing Faust, he continually failed to execute powerful attacks, such as an energy blade. Faust responded by setting Frankenstein on his ancient enemy, and drawing forth his battle-scythe. Dracula's psi-fire sooni took Frankenstein out of the battle, but not before the zombie dog bit his foe in the chest. Dracula's white shirt was now stained with crimson, although he insisted this was due to the ketchup packets he had pocketed from the fridge. He made a similar claim moments later when Faust struck him with a chickenbone attack. Running low on his dark energy, Dracula resorted to his fangs, but the bite proved typically inaccurate. Before the Lord of the Undead could escape, Faust struck him down with a mighty blow. Dracula naturally insisted that he wasn't hurt, and that he would grow more powerful and return for his vengeance. Faust only believed the second half of that statement. Hoping to dispense with his dark foe once and for all, Faust decided to push Dracula down the station's garbage dispenser. He didn't really believe that it would work, but figured that it was worth a try. Once that was done, he picked up the fridge and carried it past the slumbering form of Falco Lombardo.
Race: Electran
Occupation: Electran Sergeant
By all appearances, Bahljas was almost the perfect Electran soldier. He certainly looked the part, dressed in a long blue soldier's coat and uniform, festooned with several medals. He also wore polished boots and white gloves, and had a heavy gunbelt around his waist. In addition, Bahljas seemed to have unwavering loyalty to the Electran Empire, and was willing to do any sort of duty required by it. In this case, that meant coming to Epsilon aboard an armored military transport. His exact purpose on the station remains unknown, but it is quite clear that he will be working in conjunction with Fayde. Some, such as Mr. Rhyze, have suggested that Bahljas' arrival on the station is the prelude to an attempt by the Electrans to take over this station, now that they have lost their own. Needless to say, Bahljas would take offense to any such view that would slight Imperial Electra.
Meanwhile, Mr. Rhyze had gone up to the bridge for some stimulating Free-cell. Getting his replacement off the console was really no problem at all. He was just starting a game when Bahljas arrived on the bridge. He greeted Zaya and Picard with a military salute, which Picard returned in the best Starfleet fashion. Presuming Zaya to be in charge of the station, Bahljas explained that he had been sent by the Empire to provide support for Fayde, and to help explain the mysterious massacre at the Electran Steel Star station. Zaya replied that Bahljas was welcome on the station, though Mr. Rhyze seemed to resent the presence of more foreign officers, perhaps because it would increase his own workload. All the same, he agreed to call Fayde when given word by the Commander. Apparently, she needed to speak with the two Electrans in private. Before Mr. Rhyze could finish his current game of Free-cell to send this transmission, he noticed that he was receiving a message from Starbase Intergalactic Spacestation. Picard got the jump on Zaya this time, and suggested he put it on screen. Unfortunately, Mr. Rhyze could not comply with such an order, since it was only an audio message. Instead, he put it on the speakers. The voice that spoked belonged to Vandred. Zaya was anxious to hear from him, noting that he had disappeared from the station the night after the team had left for the Kessel Run. Ignoring her questions, Vandred coldly stated that a matter of great urgency had come up, and that he would deal with it himself. He added that Zaya knew as much as she needed to, and that they would speak again soon. Without waiting for any response, he cut off the transmission. Zaya was somewhat annoyed by the lack of information, but Picard noted that it was probably caught up in paperwork anyway. With a sigh, Zaya led Bahljas towards the briefing room, while Mr. Rhyze instructed Fayde to meet them there. Once done sending that message, he decided to go down and get the Blitzball game ready to go.
Morton was already working on assembling a game. He found a very drunk Falco down in the military bay, but more importantly located Johnny, who was busy playing the Y-Box. Johnny rejected the challenge of a Blitzball game, because Morton was no challenge. But he'd be more than happy to outscore him again. As such, he promised to report up to the hydrosphere as soon as he finished his current game. With this arranged, Morton headed up to the sphere for a little warmup. Or cool-down. Whatever you'd prefer to call it. Coincidently enough, he ran into Mr. Rhyze while walking through the main level. The communications officer accompanied Morton to the sphere, where they were greeted with a disturbing sight. Police tape covered the door to the Hydrosphere, with a big sign attached telling everyone to Keep Out. While Morton speculated whether this was related to the big investigations sweeping the station, Mr. Rhyze proceeded to open the door, an action he would regret moments later. To his surprise, the hydrosphere was actually full, and thus water came flowing out as soon as the door was opened. The drenching wasn't much of a problem for two people who intended to play Blitzball anyway. But the horrendous sight of the Fat Man in a Speedo, lying like a beached whale in the center of the sphere, undeniably was. Groaning that his plan to keep people from disturbing his baths had failed, the Fat Man slowly rose to his feet, his waves of fat trembling in anger. Morton instantly lept forward to tackle him, but ended up bouncing back. The Fat Man rewarded him for his efforts with a bowl of Jell-O to the face. Mr. Rhyze was not so eager to advance, and noted that the Fat Man appeared to have bulked up since their last encounter. With a laugh that shook his massive belly, the Fat Man launched a blistering attack of Jell-O. Morton and Mr. Rhyze had difficulty retaliating, and could only occaisonally muster the willpower to actually look at the Fat Man in a Speedo long enough to attack him. Of course, the length of this battle was no problem for Mr. Rhyze. His unparalleled apathy easily caused his opponent to strike Morton instead. This wasn't at all reassuring to the pilot, but eventually their combinations were able to down the Fat Man. Rolling him out of the sphere, proved to be as much of a challenge as defeating him, but eventually they were able to push him into the hall, at the enxpense of the wall.
Johnny slid up at this point, making several degrading comments about the fact that Morton was covered in Jell-O. This earned him a bowl of Jell-O to the face, that he couldn't quite knock aside. Fortunately, it was purple Jell-O, one of The Man's favorites. Mr. Rhyze remembered that he still needed to get Keepa, and rushed off to find the Epsilon Replacements' best (and only) goaltender. Fortunately, Keepa seem to have anything else on his schedule. In fact, he didn't have a schedule. As such, he was more than happy to join them for a practice in the hydrosphere. Once the sphere had filled, Keepa literally kicked the action off by launching the ball towards the other three players. Both Mr. Rhyze and Morton lept to receive the pass, but it was the Magnetism of the Man that brought the ball. Johnny's posing wasn't even interrupted by a failed tackle from Mr. Rhyze. Just as Johnny began mocking the communications officer, he was hit from behind by Morton. He didn't keep possession of the ball for long, and instead passed it to Mr. Rhyze, who used his formidable Sphere-Shot to score the first goal of the practice. Keepa didn't even see it coming. However, the next few goals were all Johnny, as took Mr. Rhyze down with a manly tackle and scored on Keepa twice. Morton also managed to score a goal. Still, the star of the sphere appeared to be Keepa, who shocked everyone by actually saving a few shots. He seemed to be on fire, or had simply learned to situate himself in the corner of the net into which all players would shoot. Though he didn't come near blocking all the shots, his performance still greatly impressed the other players. That's the beauty of low expectations. Mr. Rhyze, on the other hand, was facing intense pressure to outscore the man. In the end, he only accomplish it by enlisting Morton's help. While the one-eyed pilot scrapped with Johnny in a corner, Mr. Rhyze was able to score two more goals in quick succession. As the sphere emptied, Mr. Rhyze declared himself the top scorer of the practice. Johnny didn't agree, and noted that Mr. Rhyze was only half the man he was, while Morton seemed to be serving as the other half.
After his victory over Dracula, Faust returned to his search for freezer space. His quest brought him once more down to the lowest level of the station. While on his way to the boiler room, he happened to notice another ship docking in space bay two. Deciding to check it for freezers, Faust hastened to investigate this new arrival. It appeared to be an Electran transport, though clearly not a military model. In fact, it belonged to The Transporter, who stepped out of the cockpit to greet Faust. The mortician was quick to ask about the ship's cargo. The Transporter replied that he was delivering a 'package' to the station, which apparently contained the missiles. Since Faust appeared to be a station official, The Transporter suggested he should take possession of the missiles, so that he could return to his other deliveries. Faust agreed to do so, though he would certainly have prefered either corpses or freezer space. While unloading the sealed pair of crates, Faust noted the many others in the ship, and asked what they contained. The Transporter claimed not to know for sure, since he made it his policy to never open the packages that he delivered. Regardless, The Transporter departed from the station moments after Faust had finished unloading the package. Shrugging, the mortician went back to his own tasks.
The boiler room didn't contain the a freezer, but it did offer control of the temperature throughout the lower level of the station. Noting that few people used the lower level anyway, Faust quickly lowered the temperature, and turned down the incinerator. Soon, the lowest level would be as cold as his own room, making for an ideal storage space for the dead. This line of thought gave Faust another idea. Each room on the outer ring offered some form of interior temperature control. As such, the morgue could be expanded to include any empty rooms. With this in mind, Faust went looking for Blank, intent on securing any free rooms for the storage of the dead. Before he could reach security, an announcement over the intercom instructed all named officers to report to the briefing room. Blank was in the process of obeying this order when Faust found him. As the two walked towards the briefing room, the mortician asked the chief of security about the number of available rooms. Blank replied that the station was equipped with thirty guest rooms, of which about a dozen were unoccupied. However, they needed to keep a few open for new arrivals. Mr. Rhyze and Morton had just finished their blitzball practice, and joined the two. The communications officer was inspired by Faust's line of questioning, and asked if he could take one of the beds from an empty room to form a double bed in his own. Blank was skeptical of this idea, but Faust replied that both ends could be accomplished in one stroke. After all, the dead had no need for any sort of bedding. This point was granted, as was permission for Faust to use four spare rooms. Mr. Rhyze also asked about the possessions of former crewmembers who were now prisoners in the brig. In particular, he speculated that a skilled hacker like Neo must have had a fairly powerful computer, and he wanted to confiscate it. Vance joined the group before Blank could reply, and stated that Neo's computer equipment would make a good addition to the station's computer labs.
By this point, the group had arrived at the briefing room. The first sight that greeted them was a sneering Shaimus, who briefly looked up from his welding to scowl at the new arrivals. All the other important crewmembers were already there, in addition to several of the station's guests such as Fayde, Bahljas and Tintin. Commander Zaya and Jean-Luc Picard waited in chairs at the end of the table. Once everyone had settled themselves, Zaya explained the purpose of the meeting. As most officers already knew, a recent jailbreak had occured at the station's brig. During this event, several criminals had escaped, and had yet to be captured. The circumstances surrounding this event were still under investigation, and Zaya invited Blank to explain the current progress. Blank remarked sardonically that there wasn't much progress to report. But he would give everyone the information they had already pieced together. First of all, the breakout occured during the night after the team had left for the Kessel Run. The time could be pinpointed to within an hour, since the security cameras in security and the military bay had apparently been deactivated during this period. A pair of Red-Shirts had been on duty in the brig, but the fact that they had been killed during the escape was not much of surprise. Just to make sure everyone was aware, Blank listed off the identities of the escaped fugitives. Blank considered the two most significant to be Moriarty, the master criminal, and Laura Secord, his accomplice in crime. Lucky was more worried about the fact that McTaggert had also escaped, and might soon be coming back for another shot at his pot o' gold. The other two escapees included Captain Crunch, space pirate and cereal mascot, and C-Bear, the Loracian 'rap' star.
Blank was obviously troubled by the fact that only these criminals had escaped. They had not been stored in the same cell, which meant certain criminals must have been prevented from escaping. The only evidence offered to explain any of this came from the other inmates, who weren't exactly reliable sources. They told tales of a mysterious man clad all in black, from his technician's uniform to his gloves and balaclava, who had quite deliberately selected the prisoners who would escape. There were no other indications of this mysterious figure's existance. Neither cameras nor any other crewmembers had seen any signs of this mysterious figure. Though the prisoners didn't seem to know the fellow's identity, they did suspect that he was working with Moriarty, who had often bragged about how easily he would escape from the brig. Still, he must have had qualified help to do so, since the cameras had been shut off before the breakout had even begun. Security was still combing the station for any signs of the fugitives. Initially, Blank had assumed the criminals had stolen the Silverdust, and made a quick exit from the station. However, new information suggested that the Silverdust had actually been taken by Vandred, who had apparently also departed that same evening, to deal with some urgent situation. His transmission had come from Starbase, though attempts to have Gene Roddenberry locate him had so far proven unsuccessful. Possibly due to dubious efficiency of Chris Tucker's security procedures. Since the Silverdust was the only ship to have departed since the jailbreak, the criminals seemed to have disappeared into thin air. Security had already searched most of the station, but there remained one area where these fugitives could be hiding out, and both Mr Rhyze and Morton were quick to point it out: The Engineering Tunnels. Blank nodded grimly, and grumbled about the vast number of Red-Shirts he would doubtless lose in attempting to search them. Faust didn't consider this much of a disadvantage at all.
The briefing ended with a solemn warning from Blank, to all the station's personnel. Evidence suggested that the criminals might still be hiding on the station, and if history was any indication, they could certainly be considered dangerous. And several of them seemed to have reputations for holding grudges. This alone was enough to send Lucky running from the room in terror, doubtless to his habitual hiding place in the cupboard of Bennigan's. As the three protagonists exited the room, Faust noted that it was very good thing he had expanded his morgue. With the upcoming search of the dark engineering tunnels, they would surely be needing the extra space.
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