Adventure Overview
Players: Morton, Ginzu, Rei and Jazz.
Enemies: Undercover Brother, Darth Maul and Count Dooku.
Started: At a tense meeting aboard the Fascination.
Ended: With the departure of Blank.
Instead of helping Jazz deal with Undercover Brother's mess, Rei was heading over to Admiral Thrawn's room. She found him seated behind a desk, covered with maps of sector Y. The welcome she got from Thrawn was considerably less than warm. The Admiral was not interested in the janitorial status of the station; he had been here to win a war. And he didn't think that keeping the station clean was particularly important from that perspective. Rei disagreed, noting how sloppy this station had become. Admiral Thrawn was willing to admit that the station's crew was certainly in need of some polishing, and some discipline. But he hardly felt that a janitor would be capable of turning the troops around. Still, Rei was finally able to win Thrawn over due to the good word from Picard and insinuations that she was the only one who could use the main gun and wasn't usually blind. With this settled, Thrawn declared himself very busy, and dismissed Rei from his presence.
Rei was only too willing to remove herself from Thrawn's presence, though her enthusiasm wilted slightly when she found Johnny waiting for her out in the hallway. True to his word, The Man had brought a bottle of Mr. Clean from the boiler room. Though he claimed that some dead guy in the room had tried to stop him from taking it. Johnny clearly considered this aside inconsequential, but Rei was more than a bit shocked. Declaring that she needed to go investigate, she managed to get rid of Johnny through various vague promises of meetings and rewards. Within moments, Rei had reached the boiler room. Upon poking her head inside, she quickly noticed that an angry skeleton had rised up from the morgue, and was stumbling about, flailing at random with its longsword. A crushed juicebox labelled as Revive lay nearby. Unable to abide the messiness of the Undead, Rei attacked, her mop against the skeleton's sword. Within moments, soapy bubbles were popping out of the creatures empty eyesockets and mouth. But still it came on, seeming extremely angry. Only the arrival of Gulstamp, sorceror of light, ended the undead's shambling reign. After a few switches of accent, Gulstamp assisted Rei with his magic missiles, and together they destroyed the skeleton. Rei had several questions for this strange fellow, one of which probably involved his reasoning for wearing a foxskin on his head. But the others were more pressing. Rei demanded to know why her boiler room was full of corpses, and where some of her missing stuff had gone. Gulstamp professed to have no answer to the second question, but explained that Faust had taken over the boiler room as part of his morgue in answer to the first. Rei didn't like this idea, and shoved all the corpses on top of Gulstamp, and ordered him to take them to the morgue before slamming and locking the boiler room door.
Now that she was alone in the boiler room, Rei could hear sounds coming from the engineering tunnels. Though she knew it not, these sounds were being made by Ginzu and Sam, who were both still lost. And they had heard the sounds of Rei's clash with the skeleton. Sam could only assume that it must be the food-filching criminal that they were hunting. As such, Ginzu felt the best way to net this villain would involve a trap. As such, he quickly cooked up a helping of General Tao's Chicken, and left the platter sitting in the middle of the engineering tunnels. This time, the dish would certainly strike hard and fast, in more ways than one. Noticing a plate of food in the tunnels, Rei stuck her mop into the tunnels to clean up the mess. She was rewarded with a slice of Ginzu's swords that shortened the mop handle considerably. Fortunately, a little duct-tape was able to repair her precious mop, and a few of Rei's directions were able to guide Ginzu and Sam from the tunnels.
During all this excitement, Morton was speaking to the engineers. They admitted that Jordi had been talking about some sort of Gray Matter Powercells, but they hadn't actually seen him in quite some time, which was about the reverse of usual, wherein Jordi hadn't seen them in quite some time. Ignoring the engineers' crude attempts at humour, Morton finally learned that Jordi had last been seen heading to the science lab for a visit with Vance. But when Morton found Vance, the science officer declared that he hadn't seen Jordi for quite some time, and that far more qualified people than Morton had been looking for him. Last the science officer knew, Jordi had been going down to the engineering tunnels for some routine maintenance. While Morton was away from the military bay lounge, Rei took the opportunity to reclaim several of her old items. Tipped off by Johnny, she knew that she would find her television and her chair in the lounge, and before long both had been returned to their rightful place in the boiler room, much to Falco's chagrin. Fortunately, an announcement interrupted them before the pilot could fully vent his outrage.
After complaining about his most recent Free-cell loss, Mr. Rhyze's replacement declared that all officers should meet on the outer ring. Not quite sure what to make of this terse message, the heroes dropped their respective tasks to respond to this summons. Undercover Brother declared that he would surely catch Jazz later, even as the DJ streaked out the door, boombox on one shoulder. It didn't take long for the heroes to join a crowd that extended around the outer ring, centered around Admiral Thrawn's room. Almost all the important officers were there; Commander Zaya, Jean-Luc Picard, Vance, Blank, Lucky, Falco, Johnny and even Fayde were all present. Jordi was still mysteriously absent, and Sam had claimed to be busy helping Gulstamp relocate corpses into sick-bay. A ring of Red-Shirts held the crowd back from Admiral Thrawn's room as Blank, Zaya and Picard investigated inside. The word brought out by the security chief was grim indeed. Admiral Thrawn was dead, and it seemed quite clear that he had been murdered. Zaya concurred with Blank's analysis, and ordered most officers to return to their duty while Blank and his men looked into the matter. Most obeyed, but the curious heroes intended to investigate the scene for themselves, even as Blank's Red-Shirts injured themselves while putting up security tape around the door.
Admiral Thrawn's room remained much as Rei had last seen it, with the obvious exception that Thrawn was now slumped over his desk, quite dead. A quick investigation showed a small hole right through his chest, with small burns surrounding the wound. It appeared to be quite recent, and Morton was almost positive that it was the work of a lazer weapon, although certainly a smaller one than the rifle he carried. A similar mark was found in the wall right behind the dead Admiral, suggesting the shot had penetrated right through his body. According to Blank, the body had been discovered only minutes ago by a Next Generation Red-Shirt who Picard had sent to Thrawn with some confidential reports. Blank now had these reports, and reluctantly agreed to show them to the heroes after he'd had a moment to glance over them himself. Carefully moving Thrawn's body, the group discovered that he'd been looking over the station's personnel records before being killed. The list was in descending order of rank, and Thrawn had still apparently been working on the first page. Blank also grabbed this paper before Jazz could look up his own file. Done with his preliminary investigation, Morton declared that the murder weapon had very likely been a Z-1 laser pistol, and demanded to know how many were on the station. Blank replied that only Zaya and Next Generation Red-Shirts were known to be armed with phasers, but that it would be quite easy to smuggle one onto the station. He promised that his Red-Shirts would do an inventory of all laser weapons, and search the station for any that were unauthorized. Fayde had also stayed for this discussion, and now noted the possibility that the killer could be a Spheran agent. After all, they would be happy to see Thrawn dead, and were more than capable of possessing laser weapons. Before this possibility could be fully considered, Rei and Jazz suggested checking the security cameras.
Fortunately, there were several such cameras along the outer ring, and one right outside Thrawn's room. Unfortunately, it had been remotely disconnected about an hour ago. Checks of the other cameras around the outer ring revealed that they had also been shut off remotely, although they had been reactivated shortly afterwards. In fact, these cameras had only been down for a total of a few minutes about half an hour ago. The last few moments of footage showed little suspicious; a pair of Red-Shirts walked along one end of the outer ring, and Zaya walked from her room into the hallway. While scanning the security systems, Blank also noted that the station's garbage pipe had recently been emptied. The exact time appeared to have been scrambled, but this clearly wasn't a standard maintenance procedure. As Blank's Red-Shirts began their search of the station, the heroes were left putting the pieces together. There was some talk about whether the strange brown-robed figure in the Armorian mask could have had something to do with the killing. But Jazz didn't think so. The fact that Thrawn had clearly been killed while sitting in his chair, facing the door, suggested that the arrival of the killer hadn't alarmed him. Which meant that it must be someone well known on the station It very much seemed that Mr. Rhyze wasn't the only evil traitor on the station.
Discussion of this mystery was abruptly interrupted by a power failure, which caused the room to plunge into darkness. Emergency lights switched on moments later, illuminating the station with an eerie red glow. After only a few moments of confused milling, Vance's voice crackled over the intercom. Someone had apparently been able to remotely shut down the station's main power generator. The auxilary generator seemed to be functioning, but only had enough power to operate the atmospheric generator for about thirty minutes. According to the science officer's analysis, someone must have logged into the station network and used one of Jordi's passcodes to shut down the power. And since the power was out, Vance couldn't log in via computer to fix the problem. Although Vance planned to head down to engineering in an attempt to reactivate the generator, he admitted that he was not about hardware. That was Jordi's domain, and they would need his help to get the main generator going. It was up to them to find the chief engineer. Blank declared that he and his Red-Shirts would search the main levels, but that the engineering tunnels were simply too dangerous for the fragile ensigns. This left Ginzu, Rei, Morton and Jazz heading down into the darkness of the engineering tunnels, into almost certain danger.
In order to cover more ground, the heroes decided to split up. Jazz and Morton made their way towards the briefing room, while Rei and Ginzu headed down through the tunnels located in Bennigan's. It didn't take long for the two to find signs of the mysterious food thief that Ginzu had previously been hunting. Half-eated potatos and other used canned goods could be found strewn against the side of the tunnel. Following this makeshift trail, the two soon heard sounds ahead. Upon turning another corner, Rei's flashlight illuminated a figure sheathed in a black cloak. As the two watched, this mysterious villain pulled out a second source of light: a double-edged thunderblade. The red glow that eminated revealed the evil Scith apprentice known as Darth Maul. Declaring that the two would go no further, Maul lept to the attack, his first blows almost dropping Ginzu. Faced with such a menace, even the brave Warchon had no choice but to wind-walks and flee. Rei did much the same, though she remained in plain sight, and consequently the evil Scith was able to fly after her. Had they not been in dark, twisty tunnels, Darth Maul would surely have caught Rei in moments. As it was, he was gaining fast, with Ginzu falling far behind. Finally, the janitor burst up into Bennigan's, but found little help there. All the Irish were hiding, and Jamal was unable to leave his chair, even for something that was so clearly a security breach. Now in the open, Maul was easily able to catch up with Rei. But before he could finish her off, Blank arrived on the scene, saber drawn. Within moments, the security chief and Maul were dueling through the halls while Rei and a few Red-Shirts offered what little support they could.
Meanwhile, back in the engineering tunnels, Morton and Jazz were unaware of all the commotion with Darth Maul. Continuing through the darkness, they eventually found a small maintenance chamber. And it was occupied. Jordi LaForge was tied to a chair. An idling laptop sat nearby, which clearly must have been used to shut off the power. Fully aware that they had only a little time left, they both rushed forward to free Jordi. But in so doing, they were taken totally by surprise when Count Dooku swooped down from above, longblade flashing. Jazz went down, even as Morton readied his guns. Still, not even the gruff pilot, could stop the melodramatic Count Dorku from making a speech revealing his evil schemes. Once the life-support system lost power, everyone on the station would surely perish. Except, of course, for the Scith, who had their small breathing appartuses ready. This long-winded speech was interrupted by a stream of bullets from Morton's autoblaster. Fortunately, it seemed that Dooku was much better at making speeches than he was at fighting. After only a few rounds of combat, Dooku grabbed Jordi and flew from the chamber. Clad in a cumbersome spacesuit, there was no way that Morton could pursue. It was up to Jazz.
The fight with Darth Maul was still fast and furious, and all involved were now bleeding heavily. Maul was on the constant retreat, attempting to avoid being surrounded by his numerous foes. Ginzu was also on the move, and was rushing out of the engineering tunnels into security. He could see Blank and Maul dueling out in the hall. But he still couldn't get there in time. Leaping back yet again, Maul led Blank right into the hydrosphere, and the glass door slammed shut just as Ginzu and Rei reached it. The two could only watch as Darth Maul and Blank concluded their deadly dance. In a highly predictable move, Maul slammed the handle of his Thunder-blade into Blank's face, throwing the security officer off guard. This gave the Scith an opening, and he took it. Within moments, the red Thunder-blade of Darth Maul had pierced right through Blank's chest. Ginzu and Rei could watch no more, and ran to find a way into the engineering tunnels. The janitor knew that the tunnels opened up into the hydrosphere, and if they could get there soon enough, they might still be able to save Blank. Upon reaching said tunnel exit, Rei pushed the hatch open only to have Darth Maul's black-gloved hand grab her by the throat and lift her into the hydrosphere. A force-globe was all it took to down the wounded janitor. But Maul was vulnerable for just an instant as he stood over the hatch down into the tunnels. Ginzu lept from that hatch and sliced with both swords. Looking very surprised, Darth Maul slowly toppled back into the open shaft, his torso separating from his legs as he fell. He was surely dead well before he hit the bottom.
Even Jazz's Kung-Fu running couldn't allow him to keep up with a speeding Dooku. Fortunately, he remembered the cybersuit he was wearing, and the jet-pack it included. In moments, he was zooming down the corridors, and after only one mangling crash, he caught up with the dark lord. Dooku had stopped in his tracks, confronted by the hip form of Undercover Brother, who had come to put an end to his evil reign. Snarling that this would be the last time B.R.O.T.H.E.R. would stand in his way, Dooku used the force and easily took out the Brother, who still hadn't recovered from his training with Jazz. The DJ was similarly weakened, but with the help of Jordi LaForge's laser eyes, was able to defeat and kill Count Dooku. Now it was a race against time, but with his jet-pack, Jazz was able to get LaForge to the power generator in the nick of time. The station had been saved yet again, though dark questions still remained.
A few hours later, most of the crew of space station Epsilon had gathered in the space bay. Blank was being loaded on a transport in a stretcher; Maul's blow had badly wounded him, but an optimistic Sam believed he would probably survive. Unfortunately, his recovery was sure to be slow. Which meant that the station would be without its chief of security. Morton took this somewhat inappropriate moment to obtain some Gray-matter Powercells from Jordi. The others also wanted to ask the chief engineer questions about his imprisonment. Apparently, the Scith had repeated demanded to know the password to some door, but Jordi hadn't a clue what they had been referring to. In the end, they had settled for his engineering passcodes. But this was no longer a worry, declared Picard, since the Scith were dead. Zaya wasn't so sure. Two Scith had been killed, but a sense of evil tension suggested the dark side had not died with them. As the adventure ended, the camera zoomed in on the smirking face of Vance, outlined by the flames of the Scith's cremation.
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