On The Horror Trail

Setting: Samarkand

• Tyler enquires about
• Discussion of plan to put tracer on smuggling cargo to find out where Lovecraft Chips come from
• jon_hector creates psionic tracers that can be located by the three crew members with psionic powers (rhea, Tyler and kaine). Decided not to have it cause migraines, but arousal instead
• Smugglers contact the group with a list of neutral planetoid locations for meet and transfer of cargo - the planetoid the crew pick enhances psionic powers with a natural crystal lattice.
• 5 crates of mock “performance enhancers” are tagged and placed on the planetoid. dirk richter and Hector wait for smugglers.
• 3 Smugglers from the Shen Loung Leadership Collective appear and start approaching the cargo when a frigate from a rival smuggling faction appears (Dirk's Danger Sense)
• Dirk runs to warn the Leadership Collective of the frigate, Hector returns to the Lady Jane. Kaine keeps tabs on Dirk's progress on the planetoid through psychometry and the local crystals.
• The frigate goes after the LC's freighter.
• Hector with the “help” of Tarquil hacks the frigate, which shorts the systems of the frigate, the freighter and the Lady Jane. Luckily he is able to fix the Lady Jane fairly quickly.
• Scan of the surrounding area shows many local police ships (which are discovered to be corrupt and helping out the frigate)
• Tarquil bluffs that this is a sting operation and we have backup. Hector streams video feeds of the cops to the local newsnets and blogosphere.
• They all bugger off.

• In regards to using his newly acquired Fusion Bomb so soon after acquiring it to blow up the frigate:
  jon hector: But I already have the plinth!
• jon hector: A Fusion Bomb is for life, not just Christmas.

• jon_hector's “criminal reputation” amongst the Leadership Collective paints him as an evil, unscrupulous mastermind.
• Discussions were made on the Leadership Collective's freighter after repairing it as to whether the smugglers should be taken over by the crew of the Lady Jane, but in the end it was decided that the LC would be our agents to discover more about the chips and they were given a quick summary of the chips.

• The Farseer locates the secret base of the smugglers that has the most Horror influence. Tyler reads her mind and paints an image based on what it looks like.
• Smuggler base is a kind of Space Tortuga (or possibly Sportuga)
• Two of the three LC leaders are given drugs to fake their deaths to be handed in for bounty to the evil smugglers
• The Stealth Team (Team is to break into the base and bring the leaders out alive
• The Bounty Team (Criminal Masterminds) are to get information from the evil smuggler computes as to where the chips are coming from
• The Bounty Team pilot the LC ship in and negotiate while the Stealth Team spacewalk to an airlock.
• eight and kaine break into a secondary access airlock and make their way to the medical/mortuary/recyc module
• The bounty is worth more than the LC ship, and we agree to track down the third member of the LC leadership (so as not to get double crossed)
• Tarquil convinces Keth, the 2-in-C to the frigate captain, that it is his own interest to help the master criminal ™ Hector to expand his smuggling empire into this area and there would be a place for him to take over this branch
• Hector hacks the system, turns of security for Team B's movements, sets up subroutines to download all records of the station, and hacks the power distribution display to show that one faction of smugglers is gradually using more power than they are entitled to
• The bodies are moved towards Team B
• The Fist of Thunder gunboat carrying a lady from Tarquil's society turns up. She is seeking Tarquil and panics Hector. Hector prematurely re-awakens the LC leaders before they get to the medical module.

• On the possibility of using the Fusion Bomb as a distraction while records are downloaded
  jon hector: There's nothing like suddenly ceasing to exist to distract someone.
• On eight's use of academics to break into the airlock
  jon hector: They Google their way into the secret base.

• The lady has a number of mind controlled guards
• Tarquil has convinced Keth that the lady has caused Hector to panic and appear not to be a master criminal
• Kaine has created an obsuring mist around the guards escorting the LC bodies with a trick shot
• The LC leaders are in space suits, have (now used) adrenaline shot remote controlled devices, and psychic trackers
• The smuggler base uses geothermal power

• eight and kaine overpower the guards with the two Leadership Collective that are rudely awakened.
• dirk richter investigates the base and discovers a guarded storage room with 7 large cargo pods filled with Lovecraft Chips.
• The remaining LC leader is contacted to try to get re-inforcements to come help move the cargo pods. They will unfortunately take 11 hours to appear. This is plan C
• jon hector proposes plan B1 - of re-routing the geothermal output to vent through the storage area and push the cargo pods into space. From there a second venting will propel them towards the local sun.
• Eight, Kaine, Mercy and the other LC leader make their way out of the smuggler base and into escape/repair pods with Dirk.
• Some fighting breaks out in the hanger. With the judicious use of decompression alarms, Hector causes all smugglers to go to their ships or back into the main base
• Using the pods, Kaine, Eight, Dirk and the 2 LC captains jam the hanger doors
• The frigate captain returns to his ship and prepares to leave when the storage area is breached and the cargo pods are released into space. He is delayed by the hangar doors
• To speed up plan B1 the pod crew intercept the cargo and maneuvre it into possition for the second geothermal boost into the sun with M A G M A
• The frigate escapes and opens fire on the pods, damaging Kaine's and forcing him to abandon the pod or get incinerated in the M A G M A
• Hector releases the M A G M A and propels 5 of the cargo pods of DOOM ™ towards the sun, incidentally damaging the frigate
• keryn_thorgeld tries to enter her ship with the 2-in-C under mind control. Hector shoots the airlock from the smuggler freighter (Shen Long)
• Keryn overpower's Hector's brain in response and knocks him unconscioius

• Various catgirl attacks of doom

• Kaine is drifting in space in a spacesuit. Eight and Dirk are drifting in escape pods with 2 LC captains. Hector is unconscious in the smuggler's freighter, the Shen Long
• Lady Thorgeld with Keth are approaching the Shen Long. The frigate is approaching Kaine
• 5 of the 7 cargo pods of DOOM ™ are on a vector to the local sun. The other two are drifting in space
• A stream of M A G M A struck the frigate as it propelled the cargo pods

• Tyler and keth attempt to get into the Shen Long which has now been taken over by keryn_thorgeld and her mind zombie Stormtroopers
• jon hector is tied up and locked in the engineering room with the rest of the crew
• kaine signals the LC smuggler allied ships that show up for a rescue
• Hector overpowers guard by shooting them both in the foot, which temporarily distracts Lady Thorgeld from shooting Tyler with the ships guns
• Locking the door to engineering before more Stormtroopers come in, Hector begins reconfiguring the ships airlocks to mass open
• Kaine is rescued by inon
• The Shen Long leaves the hanger and is fired on by a small smuggler ship. It returns fire
• Tyler takes over one of the small smuggler ships and follows
• The Shen Long cleares the planetoid and approaches the large space battle of LC ships versus the frigate. Hector spaces the majority of the Stormtroopers (which are in space suits)
• Tyler attempts a psychic assault on Thorgeld
• Hector starts to repressurise the Shen Long (as does Thorgeld). He leads the crew to the armoury and then to the tracking devices that were previously used to send out a psychic signal. They are modified to produce a large static burst and disrupt psychic powers
• Thorgeld pilots the Shen Long into the wake of the frigate for protection, Tyler approaches from behind
• Hector leads the crew in an attack on the bridge. The psychic disruption gives them a drop on the Stormtroopers - many killed and injured. Then Thorgeld does the same airlock trick and attempts to space everyone other than her. Hector is able to remotely close the outer airlocks and save the crew (who were not in space suits). He is flung out into space (in a suit)
• Kaine trick shoots the debris around the frigate clouding its sensors, enabling an advantage to the all out attack of the LC ships
• Hector is picked up by Tyler
• Tylor pilots his ship into the Shen Long's cargo bay after Hector remotely opens it.
• With the crew, Tylor confronts Thorgeld near the escape pods, threatens her, then lets her go.
• Hector, Tyler, Kaine and Inon board the frigate to take down the captain who is apparently the only crewmember with a lovecraft chips
• Hector evacuates most air from the bridge, which knocks all crew but the captain unconscious.
• In the final assault on the captain, Hector is knocked unconscious by another psychich assault. Inon shoots the captain with a weapon that hurts Horrors. The chip is removed and thrown into the frigate's engines to be destroyed.

• On assaulting the captain and using the Mathus III anti-psychotic drug to protect the crew from Horror psychic assault:
  Tyler : I don't think we should risk taking the anti-psychotic just yet
  jon hector : Meh, I take them regularly anyway…

• Eight and Dirk were last seen drifting in escape pods in a massive space battle, they stopped communicating
• inon has a robot race gun that hurts horrors and now owns the frigate
• 1 cargo pod is missing presumed smuggled, the other 6 are disposed of