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Uncanny Justice 8: Pirates Beyond Time!
A solo play, featuring Abe Cadabra, Honeybee, and Demiangel. The adventure is Fainting Goat Games’ “Pirates Beyond Time!”, written by Chuck Rice.
- Scene 1: (New) Home At Last
- Scene 2: Attack of the Robo-Buccaneers
- Scene 3: Enter the Devolved
- Scene 4: It Gets Personal
- Scene 5: This Should Be Simple
- Scene 6: Quaking In My Boots
- Chapter 7: The Gorgon’s Eye
- The Cast
- Game Mechanics
Scene 1: (New) Home At Last[1]
In the new headquarters Lauren tightened the last screw on the dresser. It wasn’t a huge dresser, but she didn’t plan to live here; she had her own place about twenty minutes away. This place just needed a change of clothes and toiletries. When you can fly as fast as a jetliner, the commutable distance is large. The whole business with Steve last fall had convinced her not to date in the same city she worked in.
She decided to test the lamp. She clapped to turn on the light, then clapped again to turn it off. Good. That worked.
Lauren liked gadgets.
Across the hall, Bill (Demiangel) Halvorsen folded another shirt. He had a dozen shirts, three of them good! Seven pairs of pants! A set of PowerOn clothes! And his own room! Even the temple hadn’t allowed him to have his own room, but Abe and Lauren had let him, without hesitation.
Even if he was the junior member, he felt like part of the team.
Abe was in the kitchen, cooking. If he made a dozen little meals they could grab in a hurry, they’d eat … well, better, if not properly … during a crisis. He turned down the flame on the gas stove just a bit.
He heard Lauren’s cry from her room. “You bastard! Now you call! Now!”
He moved the pan off the heat and hurried down the hall to Lauren’s room. Bill was already there. They were both looking at Lauren, and beyond her, some kind of holographic projection: a hellish landscape over the dim outlines of the bed. A man in mechanized version of Roman centurion armor stood there; behind him, monsters battled giant robots.
Lauren said, “Great! A holographic Dear John letter!”
The man said, “This is the future, or at least one future. Lauren can explain more, but time is a river. Events in the past can alter the future, and sometimes the course is beyond recognition. I am Tempus Bellator, and Lauren can confirm that. My sworn duty is to protect the timeline —”
“Well, you’ve done a terrible job so far,” muttered Lauren.
“I arrived here in a placid peaceful future, 24 chrono-units ag—”
“Hours! Say hours, dammit!”
“—found Captain Aetherblade, a nefarious time pirate, plundering this era. When I engaged the villain, he set off an improvised temporal explosive that damaged my armor, trapping me in this era. I was able to track him to your era, but a timequake struck and the future was altered from one of peace and justice to the nightmare you see behind me.”
“Timequake my ass,” muttered Lauren.
“Shush,” said Abe.
“I need your help.” There was a series of loud bangs and then a woman ran across the screen, chased by monsters. He looked back and said, quickly, “I must try to survive here until I can repair my armor and travel through time once more. Lauren, we didn’t part on the best terms, but you have to locate Captain Aetherblade and prevent whatever change he wrought that caused this. I know you will do what is right. Do not underestimate him, as I did…”
The woman screamed; a monster roared, and the image shifted — clearly Tempus was going to rescue the woman — and then the image cut off.
“If it were a movie, I’d want to know what happens next,” said Bill.
“Was anything he was saying true?” asked Abe.
“Oh, it’s probably all true. Despite the fact that I’ve seen a better hellscape in a bad movie.”
“You two dated?” asked Bill.
“And then he left me in the past! I had to team up with my great-grandmother and steer her to my great-grandfather. Very Back to the Future, but with superpowers.”
“I’m guessing you really liked this guy,” said Abe.
She sighed. “He’s a great guy. Just awful on the personal relationship front, and it’s always the timeline with him. He never mentioned this Captain Aetherblade person to me, though.”
There was a bang at the front door.
“Think it’s Captain Whozit?” asked Abe.
Lauren shrank to Honeybee. “Yeah. We fight outside the HQ, right? I just got this furniture together.”
“If we can,” Abe said.
Bill was already gone.
Scene 2: Attack of the Robo-Buccaneers[2]
Movement caught Abe’s eye. Two robots were outside the window, scaling down on ropes. “Oh, god,” said Abe, “we haven’t even been in here two days!” He chanted on his mystic shields as he ran to the window and threw it open—but it was too late; one robot had already swung through the second side of the window. “I opened the window for you!” he said.
“Shiver me timbers!” said the robot. Abe heard it with an echo: it was both there but also over the communicator channel.
Abe said an obscenity, and the flames from the gas stove[3] leapt and wrapped around the robot. The robot was still standing, though, and the other one was climbing through the window. Abe skipped back and turned on all the burners of the stove.
In the front foyer, the door had been smashed open, and four more robots stood there. “Yo-ho-ho!” they chanted in an echo-y way. “Blow the man down!” All four pointed their cutlasses at Bill and fired. [4] The hilts of the cutlasses emitted small puffs of smoke and made a ”pew” sound. The laser “blades” shot through the foyer, but only one hit Bill. The other three badly scorched the receptionist desk; fortunately the team hadn’t gotten around to hiring a receptionist.
“That hurt!” said Bill, and he sprouted wings of flame as he dove at the one who had hit him. [5] His punch knocked the robot’s head clear off, where it hit the elevator doors just as they opened. Four young women stood there in the poses of people who don’t know each other but are forced to share the elevator. The robot head sailed straight to one of them, who caught it by reflex. The other three hid at the edge of the elevator; she stepped out.
“Yours?” she asked. The elevator doors closed behind her.
“Hold on to it for a sec, would you?” said Bill. “And duck when they turn to face you.”
In the meantime, Honeybee fired at one of the others,[6] but (though she hit) didn’t knock it out. She heard the same echo and had turned off her communicator.
In the kitchen, both robots swung their cutlasses at Abe, saying, “Yo-ho-ho! Hoist the mains’l!”[7] The new robot managed to wing him, but the shields absorbed all the damage. In return, Abe[8] used magic[9] to fling the new robot out the window. It was only six storeys to the ground, but he would gain a few seconds while it came back up.
Bill turned to[10] another robot and knocked it immobile. Honeybee said, “Hey! He was mine!” over her loudspeaker and[11] hit the second-last one with her “sting.”
“Sorry,” said Bill.
“Oh, the shrunk one. She’s cool,” said the young woman.[12] “I heard about her back when she was with the Micro Org. Hi!”
The laser “blades” were reforming on the other cutlasses but the robots swung the hilts at Bill to hit him; fired at Bill,[13] but both missed. Bill said, “We’ll be with you in a moment, miss—?”
In the kitchen, Abe[14] said, “Oh, the hell with it,” and threw the other one out the window too, as it was saying, “A bottle of—”
He peeked out the window. Neither was below, though there was a dent in the parking lot where the first had landed.
Abe turned for the foyer, and was greeted by Lauren walking in with Bill, carrying four robots, and a young woman he didn’t know, who was carrying the head of one of the robots.
Bill said, “Abe, this is Olivia Franklin. Olivia, Abraham Cadabra.”
She smiled and handed him the head. “Nice to meet you. I presume this is yours.”
“Not really. And you are…?”
“Process server.” Abe stared at her. “Kidding! I’m hitting every business to see if I can find a job that works around my school schedule. Are you guys a business? Are you hiring?”
“We’re a non-profit,” said Abe. “We’re on the city’s retainer for extranormal events. Among other things.” He took the head from her.
“She kept her cool when robots attacked,” said Bill.
“Okay,” said Abe. To her, he said, “We have like two months’ worth of saved messages on the voice mail from all the time we were without a headquarters; we need somebody to listen to them and transcribe them. That’s something we can work around your school schedule. We’ll talk terms after the crisis du jour.” He paused. “High school?”
“Ivy College,” she said, to Abe’s relief. Child endangerment was no joke.
“My alma mater!” said Lauren. “Well, one of them, anyway.”
Olivia’s phone pinged. She pulled it out of her purse. “I have an alert set for news about school. Lets me know if it’s closed for snow or…” She glanced at the screen. “Or if zombies are attacking the campus.” She showed the phone to Lauren.
Lauren looked at the picture. “I don’t think it’s zombies. Bestial alt-humans of some kind, though. I think it’s a temporal thing.” She looked up at Abe. “In other words, Captain Featherweight.”
“Aetherblade, but I like your name better. And how the hell did he get our communicator channel?”
Scene 3: Enter the Devolved[15]
One of the doors had been ripped off Palmer Hall and students were still running from the building. Bill-as-Demiangel set the gondola down near the fallen door, and both Abe and Olivia stepped out. From the screams the alt-humans were still inside.
“Ideas?” Abe asked her.
She shook her head. “I’m Humanities. This is science territory.”
“I thought it was arts and science.” Olivia looked at him like he had failed to grasp that water was wet.
“I’ve found them,” came over their communicators, nearly inaudible over sea shanties. Honeybee had gone ahead. “I think noise for Kimberly Yang. noise e a talk.”
Kimberly Yang was a sixteen-year-old genius who preferred underage partying to studying.“What’s your location?” asked Abe.
The shanties had ramped up so fast that Honeybee’s answer[16] was inaudible to Abe.
“I heard,” said Demiangel. “Amphitheater.” He flew in the door.
“I’ll seven-league it,” said Abe. Abe cast the spell to step into the amphitheater. The spell had limited range but it was smart enough to find the amphitheater for him, even though he’d never been inside Palmer Hall.[17]
“What does that mean?” asked Olivia and he couldn’t answer while casting the spell.
The portal opened in the space before him and he stepped through.
“Righteous,” said Olivia.
In the amphitheater, Abe could see the air-wavers caused by Honeybee’s blasts. She was keeping herself between Yang and the alt-humans. Yang was pretty obvious: she was the only one in the room who was sixteen, in a belly shirt with a sparkly heart on it, and carrying a copy of Leininger’s Biochemistry.
There were six of them, armed with spears and axes. Abe knew that Demiangel would be along in a moment, so protecting Yang was top priority.[18] He hoped that Honeybee would be able to protect Yang for another few moments, but he chanted loudly, hoping to get their attention.[19] None turned around.
Clearly they weren’t going close because it hurt, so three of them threw their spears.[20] The spears were headed directly for Yang, but conspicuously changed direction, and Abe knew that Honeybee had diverted them.[21]
Abe put a glowing wall before Yang. (He couldn’t see Honeybee so he dared not use a globe for fear of trapping her inside.)[22] He saw Demiangel fly in from the other side and dive for one of the alt-humans who still had a spear.[23] He dove straight into the alt-human, who collapsed.
That got their attention.
Yang hampered the effect of the glowing wall by peeking over it.
With ululating cries, the alt-humans swarmed toward Demiangel,[24] stabbing with spears and swinging axes, but Demiangel avoided all of them.
Abe started casting a second spell, the remote hands spell he had cast earlier in the day. Honeybee[25] hit another one, who stood there, stunned for a moment.
Demiangel[26] hit another so hard that it flew through the wall that Abe had created and popped it like a soap bubble. The alt-human was knocked unconscious as it flew across the room but now the remaining four had clear access to Yang.
Yang went “Oop” as the wall she was leaning against disappeared and she fell down; that gave her a little protection as two of the others threw spears and the other one charged.[27] With a cry, Abe took the seven-league step to put himself between the spears and alt-human and Yang.[28] The ax and spear whistled toward Yang and suddenly Abe was there. Both hit him, and were barely absorbed by his mystic shields.
Honeybee finished off the one who was stunned.[29] Demiangel said, “Varlet!” and[30] knocked unconscious the one who had just connected with Abe.
Yang scrambled to her feet. “Hey, guys, are you distracted by these?” Abe didn’t know whether she was talking to him and Demiangel or the alt-humans, but out of the corner of his eye he could tell she was lifting up her shirt.
The alt-humans weren’t distracted, but Demiangel and Abe made a wall they couldn’t get through. They swung their axes at the two. One grazed Abe in trying to get at Yang, the other didn’t hit anyone.
Abe encased them both in a sphere and lifted them in the air. “Miss Yang? If you could pull your top back down? —Don’t look,” he told Demiangel.
“Can they break through that force sphere?” Demiangel peeked anyway. Yang smiled at him before she let the shirt drop.
“Depends on how strong they are. You could break it.”
“Okay, I’ll get ready…”
“Well, I also encased Honeybee, so I figure they’ll be out in a few moments.”
They were, and Abe let them fall to the ground.
Honeybee grew to a height of a meter and said, “Yang, please pull your blouse down. Why does someone as smart as you want to do that?”
Yang said, “Look, smart lasts your whole life. Young and sexy does not. By definition.” She shook her head. “ Duh. ”
“Does if you die young,” said Honeybee darkly, but not so Yang could hear.
With all of the alt-humans unconscious, the sea shanties on their communicators had stopped.
Olivia appeared in the doorway. “Go, Pirates.” To the others, she said, “My dad was coach for Kim’s soccer team.”
“When I was a kid,” retorted Yang.
“He knows us,” said Abe. “He knows where our headquarters is even though we haven’t been there two days yet, he knows what channel we use for communications. And too many pirate connections,” said Abe.
Honeybee said, “Even if Captain Featherweight has information from Tempus somehow, I didn’t know that stuff then. My relationship with Temp was before I met you, Abe.”
“Tempus? Time?” said Yang. “Like time travellers? So he knows you in the future. You’re just meeting him but he already knows you.” She rolled her eyes. “Duh.”
“Must be terrible going through life with everyone being so stupid,” said Demiangel. “We’re more about punching than thinking, so you’re not going to find brilliant from us.”
Abe raised his eyebrow.
Olivia said, “I hope you’re a better thinker than you were a soccer player.”
Scene 4: It Gets Personal[31]
Abe was buffing the scorch marks out of the reception desk when Lauren came in. “Yang drives me nuts but she sees things other people don’t.”
“Not here, sadly.” Abe put more cream on the buff rag.
“No. The alt-humans are being genetically analyzed. Be done soon. I got Doctor Franklin to rush it.” Abe looked at her. “Doctor Franklin turns out to be Olivia’s mom.”
“Glad we got a sample..The alt-humans are gone. I just got off the phone with the police. Someone broke all six of them out of jail and let others get free. Fortunately they didn’t have any other supers. I figure it was…”
“Coprolite Aetherbag? Damn.” Abe continued buffing. “No response? I’ll keep trying new nicknames.”
“I still like ‘Featherweight.’ Abe shrugged. “Think she’s a plant? Olivia, I mean.”
“Who knows? Maybe when she finishes school she becomes a time-travelling supervillain.” Lauren shrugged. “Or not. Like Bill, I’d rather think that people are what they actually show us they are.”
“It’s the timing that bugs me. I know, time travel is timing, but a pirate-themed villain shows up at the same time that Kimberly Yang appears on the scene; the greatest female pirate was born Shi Yang, which does not feel coincidental.”
“We still have the robots, though.”
“Only broken one, anyway. A three-letter government agency came and took the other three.”
“Which agency?”
“Doesn’t matter, they were lying. Their faces didn’t move right. One of them there would have been an excuse: botox gone wrong or unfortunate accident. Two was unlikely. But they had the right passwords and background knowledge…again, they knew about us.”
“Why let them have the robots though you knew they were lying?”
Bill walked in, eating an apple. “I know. I bet you bugged them.”
“Magical tracer, but yeah.[32] They wanted the broken pieces but I explained how the pieces were at the university.”
“We can share?” asked Bill. “I did not know that.”
“We don’t share,” said Lauren. “I presume they are not at the university.”
“They’re in the broom closet,” said Abe.
“That feels more on brand for us,” admitted Bill.
“Working theory is that Captain Featherweight wants them back. Could be another organization who wants the secret of the robotics, but the robots weren’t that good. They weren’t at the Kid Synthetic level, and we can do Kid Synthetic right now in our timeline. Anyway, whoever took them, we can find them magically. ”
Olivia appeared in the doorway. “I’ve done a day’s worth of transcription.” She held up a USB stick.
“That…is a lie,” said Bill. “You don’t have our info yet.”
“That’s how you know I’m kidding. My mom wanted to give you this report, so I said I’d deliver it. You said you didn’t have the Internet set up yet, and I know you’re old, so I figured I’d help.”
“I am over thirty,” said Abe. “Also, computers and magic, bad combo.”
“I am not over thirty,” said Lauren and plucked the stick from Olivia. She stuck it into a dongle in her tablet and pulled up the report.
“You got the doors back on. That’s good,” said Olivia.
“Demiangel is handy with that kind of thing,” said Abe. He said to Bill, “If she’s going to work here, why don’t you show her around?”
“Cool beans,” said Olivia. Bill led her out of the room, and Abe looked at the area he’d been buffing, made a little grunt, and started packing up his tools.
“Human but not,” said Lauren. “Right number of chromosomes but not enough nucleotides. I’ll bet some kind of damage in the past, and the survivors were the ones who only had so-called ‘junk’ DNA affected. They can’t breed with us right now, but if you put that back in, they’re totally human.”
“They look like mouldy soap.”
Lauren shrugged. “Alleles.”
The floor trembled, knocking Abe’s tools off the receptionist desk. Abe caught all of them but the buffing chamois.
“You felt that?” he said, but Lauren had already shrunk down and disappeared to get her costume.
Abe was tying his tie — his version of a costume — when Bill showed up with Olivia behind him. “Earthquake?”
“Or giant pirate air-galleon landing. Fifty-fifty which one. Suit up.”
Olivia looked at her phone. “A giant machine showed up at the college, at the Pym Exotic Engineering building!”
“Well, crap,” said Abe. He pulled on his duster. “That’s where I told the faux agents that the robot pieces were.”
Olivia said, “But my mom has her lab in the Pym building!”
“Your mom is a biologist,” said Abe.
“But her lab is in the Pym building. The stuff she does is kinda exotic.”
Lauren re-appeared. “To quote Yang, ‘Duh.” Abe knew she had just grown into her costume. “He knows us,” Lauren said. “What if it’s a distraction to get the robot pieces?”
“Good point. Demiangel, you take Olivia to the university. Her knowledge of the campus could prove useful. Honeybee will stay here to get me to the campus after I cast a protective spell.”
“Sure.”
“I assume the communicators won’t work this time either, so do what you think is best, and we’ll join up with you there.”
“Mind-link?” asked Demiange.
“Too far if we’re here and you’re there.”
Demiangel nodded. “I’ll take her in the gondola. Come on,” he said to Olivia, and they sprinted to the rear of the headquarters.
Abe listened with half an ear while chanting a spell.[33] There was the sound of the hangar doors closing, and Abe said the last word.
Instantly there appeared a small man with pointed ears and a feral look despite his double-breasted suit.
“We’re working out a deal with the neighbor dimension, young Abraham. You’ve interrupted me.”
“You have a fine and full life, my elder Hob. I cannot help but interrupt you.” He began to walk toward the broom closet.
Hob followed him. “That’s true, child of my heart. What can I do for you to whittle down my debt?”
“I have some parts from a mechanical man, and I need them hidden in a place that is not of this earth. I do not know when I will need them back, but I think it will be longer than your dalliance with the Friesian dame and less than the passage of the moon. There seems to be time-travel afoot, so do not believe any friends about sudden aging.”
“Time travel? Under the hill or over it?”
“Both, so far as I know.”
Hob shook his head and tsked. “I do so gladly.”
“And Hob?” The small man stopped. “You know that I have never cared about the debt.”
“I understand. But the debt-paying is part of me, like wind and rain, and I cannot deny it.”
“My thanks.” Abe bowed from the waist.
The man bowed back. Abe threw open the broom closet to reveal the robot parts, and the small man disappeared, taking them with him.
“You waited until Olivia left to do that.”
“I’m hoping that while Captain Featherweight might have known us in his past and our future, he’s not sending himself notes about what happens next. Then results are unknown to both of us.” He turned to present the carrying loop on his coat. “Lift, please?”
Scene 5: This Should Be Simple[34]
Demiangel could see the buildings shaking as he got closer to the campus. He made one loop around the campus to check, then put the gondola down in the open space of the Old Quad. (Ivy College had three Quads. In this one, students had already taken the opportunity to put chains around the statue of James Duncan Allon, an early slave-holding donor to the college.)
The device causing the earthquakes was obvious: it was in the center of the four cannons that pointed outward from the North Quad: a gleaming obelisk of gleaming white metal, polished wood, and jade. The four cannons, Olivia was quick to point out, had always been there; they were part of the history of Ivy College. There had been a bell tower there, but during Lauren’s time there, the tower had been destroyed. (Lauren had never spoken of it.) The bell was safe in storage but the tower itself had been bulldozed and ground sodded while a committee decided what to put there.
Now it was occupied. Between the cannons, around the earthquake obelisk, were a dozen of the alt-humans and robots. There had been more, but there were bodies of alt-humans nearby, and outside the ring, ambulances were leaving. Campus police and regular police were huddled behind cars on the road that surrounded the greenery of the cannons. None could get near the Jeffries Building, which was nearby: a new building made to look old, but five storeys taller than the old building and second in height only to the Hank Library, on the far side of the campus.
There were no faces looking out of the windows in the Pym Building; everyone had fled out the back entrance, and then alt-humans had taken position near the doors. No one had messaged or emailed from inside the building, so it was probably empty.
Demiangel tried the communication channel. “—shall we do with a drunken sailor?” He turned that off.
He flew around the obelisk. Alt-humans, three per side, so twelve—no.
On the far side, between the obelisk and the Pym building were five alt-humans, and two of them were holding a captive. She looked like Olivia but Olivia was back with the gondola. This woman was dressed like a scientist.
Olivia’s mother. And one was holding an axe to her throat.
To borrow an expression from Abe, well, crap.
Abe would probably have magic to deal with this; Honeybee had her venom-thingy. He could throw fire spears and he was strong.
That didn’t seem like enough. He called to her. “Fear not for verily, I am here.” He didn’t know what that meant, but maybe she’d feel better.
He could see from the reflections on the windows that the earthquake happened again. The alt-human moved the axe away from her throat when that happened, to avoid killing her prematurely.
A loud cheer from the south from the students indicated that someone or something had brought down the statue. He hoped Olivia was okay.
Here he had a different problem.
If he flew closer, they’d kill her. If he left her alone, they’d kill her. Throwing fire wasn’t really…
Hrm.
The grass was brown and dead; it hadn’t greened up for the oncoming spring, not yet. He was just lucky that it was visible. If they were busy, though, perhaps they couldn’t react in time.[35]
He threw down a bolt of fire upwind of the alt-humans. The grass caught and started to spread to them.
“You missed!” croaked the one with the axe to her throat. I do not know why Carruthers and the others had such problems…”
Another one snarled at him, and the alt-human looked back at the fire.
Now! While they were distracted!
He flew in and grabbed Dr. Franklin, swooping her up. Two spears fell beside them.[36]
Demiangel carried her back to the gondola, where he had left Olivia.[37]
He watched for a moment, so see if they actually knew each other, but mother and daughter embraced. “Mother, we need to go somewhere paved. That fire will get here.”
Demiangel nodded and flew back.
He could go in and start beating up individual alt-humans but would that deal with the earthquake machine there?[38] Three of the alt-humans threw their spears at him; one was a clear miss, he dodged another but that put him right in the way of the third.
“Ow!” If they can each do that, having them around is a danger. He dove down and[39] knocked one unconscious. One down, a baker’s dozen to go.[40]
He threw down a spear of fire at one;[41] the fire knocked the alt-human unconscious. He grinned and threw spears of fire at them.[42] That first shot had been a fluke; the others didn’t fall unconscious immediately; he had to hit them twice before the other two fell.
He moved to the next side, and saw that the alt-humans had put out the fire. Good for them. He let them loose their spears;[43] all of them missed. Before they could run to fetch their fallen spears, he returned with a flurry of his own fire spears.[44]
“Leave a few for me,” came the loudspeaker beside him.
“Go ahead,” said Demiangel. “I think it’s about time to hit the big machine.”
“I’ll call you if I need help,” said Honeybee.[45] Demiangel could hear the sound of Honeybee’s sonic stings. He decided to punch a section of wood near the top; wood looked the weakest.
The punch was solid, but the target was unexpected: his fist sank into the wood, and the harder he tried to pull on it, the stronger it held him.[46]
This is embarrassing , he thought. He heard more sonic stings from the other side of the obelisk. He tugged some more.
From below, he heard Abe say, “Be careful, it’s magical— Oh.”[47]
“Thanks,” said Demiangel. “Don’t suppose—er, canst thou not dispel this foul glamor?”
“A, it’s not a glamor; a glamor is an illusion. B, no type of magic I’ve seen, probably from the parallel dimension. If it can hold you, though, it’s probably stronger than anything I can generate. Give me a minute to get up there.”[48] A moment later, Abe was on top of the citadel and Honeybee had flown up. “Hmm. Hard to see from this angle, too. Honeybee, you mind touching my finger for this spell?[49] I need to see through your eyes.”
The spell complete, he asked her to examined where Demiangel’s hand had sunk into the wood. There was no seam; it was as though he were growing out of the wood.
“Hmmm. Fortunately you have wings and can stay there, Demiangel. What if you move up just a bit so you’re pulling up rather than straight out?”
Demiangel adjusted his position and then did a quick yank. [50] “Nope.”
“Let me lay the spell out in front of me. It’s all pretty tangled but I think I can follow the thread that’s holding you.”
Honeybee advised, “Find a way to relax. This is like reading circuit diagrams for him, and it’s never fast. Abe? You still need my eyes? Because I want to do a thorough look at this thing.”
“Communicators still borked. I’m going to keep the link but ignore it unless you ask me.”
“Good enough.” She went down over the side. There were wooden strips around the obelisk at about shoulder height from the ground, about the same distance from the top, and a pair at the middle framing a carved and inscribed stone strip. The rest of the obelisk was metal sheathing, with rivets holding together arcanely-shaped pieces of metal. Abe had started the tuneless humming that indicated deep absorption.
She flew around the obelisk once (another earthquake as she did so). Two of the faces had holes as big around as Demiangel’s fist, but different inscriptions.
Abe was still humming tunelessly, and she passed Demiangel again, who was waiting.[51]
“Abe? You want to look at these inscriptions?”
There was no answer. She flew up to the top.
Abe was sitting there, his eyes closed, tunelessly humming. Every once in a while his fingers twitched, as if operating a touch-screen.
“Abe!” she said, with her loudspeaker on, but there was no response.
She dialed the loudspeaker up to full volume and said, “ABE!”
Still no response.
So Abe was mentally immobilized, Demiangel was physically immobilized, and she was sure if she went into one of those holes, she would be immobilized.
She enlarged.
“Demiangel, can I borrow your phone?”
“Sure. Let me unlock it.” He reached into his robe and pulled it out, traced a pattern on it with his thumb and handed it to her.
She switched to the camera app, aimed the flash at Abe’s eyes, and took three quick pictures.
No effect; his eyes were closed.
But he could see inside her mind; that was the point of the eye-link spell he had used earlier, and he said he wasn’t shutting it down…
She glanced around to make sure she wouldn’t be attacked as soon as she did this, was satisfied, and blinded herself with the flash.[52]
She heard Abe grunt, “What?”
She couldn’t see anything for the pink spots of afterglow. “You were mentally trapped. I blinded myself to get your attention.”
“Thanks. You okay?”
“No, I’m blind. It’ll pass, though. You okay?”
“Yeah. Demiangel?”
“Just hanging around. You could hurry up some.”
“Will do. Honeybee, you land up here and sit until your vision comes back. I’m going to free Demiangel.”[53]
She heard his voice move away. “Demiangel, I’m going to cast a spell that weakens the one holding you. I can only hold it for a few moments; when I tell you, work hard to pull your hand free.”[54] She assumed he was using fancy hand gestures; there were a few magic words, but not many. “Now!”[55]
Demiangel pulled free. He crowed “Got it!” and flexed his hand, looking it over to make sure it wasn’t made of wood now or something like that. It looked fine.
“Yeah,” said Abe. “That’s not getting better. Hold still; I’m going to try something a dead Egyptian once taught me.” She could feel him moving her goggles and then moving her eye lids shut. “Fortunately we’re already linked.”[56] He said something in another language, and she felt his fingertips leave. “Now open your eyes.”
She could see.
“I think the intent was for us to get trapped and then the alt-humans would take care of us, but fortunately Demiangel decided to get rid of them first. Now, you want to look at those inscriptions for me?”
“That’s actually what I was asking you.” She adjusted her goggles and shrank down.
As she carefully examined the first one, Abe said,[57] “Oh, that one has ‘This is the trap’ written on it. Norse runes softened to look Asian.”
She flew around and looked at the other side. “This one said ‘Real entrance’ on it.”
“Do we believe it?” asked Demiangel.
“Who knows? We don’t know him well enough to figure out if he would lie.”
“Did he expect someone to be able to read Norse runes?”
“He knows us,” said Honeybee and dove into the hole that claimed it wasn’t a trap.
Hope I wasn’t wrong, she said to herself.[58]
Scene 6: Quaking In My Boots [59]
She took the wrong turn, and saw the other hole from the far side of the trap (a diamond bottle filled with some oily clear fluid, probably poison) and a diamond reservoir beneath it. Then she took the next wrong turn, she backed up again and kept going. Then she made a couple of good ones and ended up in the central cavity
There were shafts across the space that rotated some oddly shaped cams. Some of the cams were actually attached to other cams so that the cams itself changed shape. Right now three of them were long enough to touch a row of stone pads at the bottom of the chamber. The three hit at different times, but when all three of them hit together, she could feel the earthquake.
She flicked on her communicator, and sea shanties started playing. No, the communicators were still useless.
She started blinking in Morse code.
An agonizing minute later, Abe’s voice came in her head.
We’re mind-linked. You wouldn’t be part of this but we’re already linked through the eyes.
Then she “heard” So this is what it’s like to see in the dark. Right; she’d forgotten that Demiangel couldn’t see in the dark.
Clearly magic: the bottom pads are some kind of seismic resonators, activated when touched.
She thought, Thanks, Sherlock. I had figured out that much myself.
So keep the cams from touching the pads.
Even shrunk, she was stronger than normal, but was she strong enough to break the cams?
She grew a little larger for a better grip and took one of the cams that already existed. [60] The first one did nothing; the next attempts had an unpleasant effect: two of the remaining three cams unfolded until they were long enough to touch the pads.
“Okay,” said Abe. “What about moving the pads? If they’re not there, they can’t be touched.”
They also couldn’t be moved. Maybe they could be destroyed? She fired a sonic sting at one just as a cam brushed it.[61]
The first two cams rotated slightly so they were in sync. Now there was a slight tremor with every revolution.
“Everything I do is making this worse,” she complained.
“So you’re doing things he expected,” said Demiangel. “Don’t.”
“That’s as helpful as Abe saying it’s magic. Ideas?”
“A few. Look at the couplings for whatever rotates the shafts.”
She looked. The universal joints were encased in that metal.
“He’s thought of that. Fly around the space; I need to look around.”
She did a quick tour of the space. The motor, for lack of a better word, was in a casing near the top of the space.
“Why would he do that? Wouldn’t you want it in the most secure place?” asked Demiangel.
“And the thing doesn’t radiate enough magic for that to be a battery” added Abe. “So it’s drawing power from elsewhere.”
Honeybee said, “The whole inside space is a decoy, meant to give us something to do while it gets in place for the earthquakes.”
The quakes were stronger and more frequent now.
“Out. I think I know how to stop it,” said Abe.
She found Abe on the ground. “There are two possibilities,” Abe said aloud. “It’s largely empty space, so Demangel should be able to lift it. The first possibility is so stupid that I don’t think it will be correct. Demiangel tips it over. Then the pads are not connected with the ground, and the whole thing might stop. Depends on the spell used, and we know I can’t look.”
“Tip it over? That seems kind of … lame,” said Demiangel.
“I agree,” said Honeybee.
“Me three,” said Abe. “But it’s a necessary precursor to actually stopping it, so we pause at that step and see. We need to tip it over so the ‘motor’ is against the ground.”
Honeybee pointed out the correct direction, and Demiangel heaved. The ground was stuck to the obelisk, but[62] Demiangel grunted and strained, and the obelisk tilted over.
The next earthquake was stronger.
“PIty,” said Abe. “I was hoping that trap was some kind of corrosive fluid that would destroy the motor. It might even do that, but we don’t have time.” He put his hands on the metal of the obelisk and began an incantation. [63] When he finished the entire obelisk was sheathed in a glittering shield.
Abe kept chanting.
“Inside. Check the trap. Is the stuff against the motor now?”
She dove in.
From the acrid fumes, the motor case was indeed being eaten away…but the ground was shaking even as they tried.
“Break it!”
Honeybee didn’t need a second instruction. She held her breath and used a stronger blast than she ever had before. [64] The casing came apart, and she blasted it again and again.
These pieces were not as strong, and came apart.[65]
She left before she fainted from lack of air.
Chapter 7: The Gorgon’s Eye[66]
Abe was in the gondola, and they were making long circles around clouds in the sky.
“He was broadcasting magical energy. That powered the earthquake machine; it was a Tesla kind of thing, if Tesla had been a sorcerer. He’s a pirate. He must have a boat, and he’s wacky enough that it flies.”
Honeybee said, “That seems like a bit of a stretch. Why couldn’t his boat be underground?”
“I’d have noticed broad beams. He was using tight beams of some kind. The sky is the best bet. Stay under the airliner limit.”
“Does he even know about airliners?” asked Demiangel.
“By Satyrane’s beard, I don’t know. If they have dimension and time travel I presume they have air passengers, by balloon, tall ship, or ornithopter.”
“Who?” asked Demiangel, but Abe didn’t answer that one.
As a group, they had many virtues but it was times like this when Abe was keenly aware that they were not particularly good at spotting things.They were fair, at best, and he wouldn’t say that he was one of the best.
Nonetheless, he was the one who spotted the ship, floating in the top part of a cloud. It was a galleon re-interpreted by an autodesigner in 1952, and painted by a surrealist. He pointed it out. “Honeybee, do you want to check it out? I can’t imagine that putting the gondola down will be— Never mind.”
Figures on the ship were moving the cannons. “They’re probably not cannons,” said Demiangel.
“Whatever they are, they’ll be unpleasant,” said Abe. “We’ve lost the element of surprise; let’s go in.”
One of the shining figures on the deck fell over; clearly Honeybee was already there.[67]
Abe chanted a spell.[68] Demiangel set the gondola down on the stern and dove for the nearest person,[69][70] and knocked the robot to the bow of the ship.
Abe stepped out of the gondola and gestured at the one that was now the closest; the robo-buccaneer who had been pushing a cannon shrank and dwindled, until it became a robotic frog.
“Most frigid,” remarked Demiangel.
“Sometimes I like to go with the classics.” Over on one side, an alt-human clutched at his side and they heard the low whine of Honeybee’s afflicting sting. [71] Three of the robo-buccaneers chanted, “Yo-ho-ho!” and swung laser cutlasses at Demiangel; all missed. Four of the alt-humans swung at Abe; all hit but one. Fortunately for Abe, the mystic shields absorbed the damage.
The alt-humans cheered and redoubled their efforts. Abe knew that he wasn’t particularly difficult to hit, and his biggest hope was that no one would actually knock him off the ship.
“Ah. I have the ticket, if I can just cast the spell.”
Demiangel hit another robo-buccaneer but didn’t quite manage to knock him out.
“New plan,” said Abe. “Lift me above these guys.” He started chanting the spell. [72] Demiangel backed up to protect Abe on one side.
Another alt-human cried out as Honeybee hit him, and the one she had hit before fell down, unconscious.
The robo-buccaneers against Demiangel all missed; amazingly, so did the alt-humans, not expecting him to move.
Demiangel lifted Abe up and carried him to the crow’s nest. “Perfect. I’ll just frog-ify from here.” One of the robo-buccaneers who had been facing Demiangel became a frog.[73]
“You do you,” said Demiangel. “And thanks.”
It took several moments but soon all of the visible pirates and alt-humans were unconscious or frogified.[74]
“Good,” said Demiangel.
A door burst open and out walked…something. A cyborg alt-human, asexual, the colouration of mouldy soap, and with strands of metal crossing over its body. It didn’t slink; it strutted. Behind it was another robot, but this one was decorated with an eyepatch and a bandana.
“I’m guessing these two are special”, said Abe over the mental link. “Cyborg-alt is probably strong, and the robot is probably more robot-ish.”
Demiangel said, “Honeybee? You want to take the strong guy, we’ll take the robot? No sense meeting them strength for strength.”
Honeybee[75] responded, “Busy below-decks. Heard Yang’s voice and I’m trying to find her.”
“Oh. Great.” Demiangel looked at Abe, who shrugged.
Demiangel flew down and feinted[76] a punch to see what the robot would do.
The answer was “shoot at him.”[77] His gun, unlike the ones they had seen earlier, did not produce smoke; it just fired a laser beam at Demiangel, which missed. He checked to see if the blast might have hit the cyborg-alt, but there was no cyborg-alt: there was only a frog wearing aluminum foil.[78]
“Got your back,” Abe said mentally.
Demiangel moved in closer, inside the gun’s reach and punched again.[79]
“Oh my god,” said Honeybee from inside the ship.
“It would be fun to see the fight, but obviously there’s no time,” Abe said.[80]
There was a frog standing in front of Demiangel, who flew up and fetched Abe.
They heard, aloud, “Tempus! You bastard!”
“What’s she seeing?” Demiangel asked Abe.
“Don’t know; I stopped the spell. Hurry!”
They heard Yang say, loudly and clearly, “No! You’re cute but you’re ancient and I am sixteen.” They headed for the voice.
Under the stern deck was a large room — maybe the mess — and in it were a few people. One was Yang; two of the robots were holding an older couple hostage. Wearing a gray mourning coat over pirate motley was Tempus Bellator, but one eye was clearly artificial, made of bronze and glass and riveted to his head. Another robot was standing there holding a book as if it were a bible.
Clearly it was a wedding. And clearly, Yang was not willing.
“Witnesses! Excellent,” said Aetherblade. “And so lovely to see you again. I spotted scrumptious Honeybee earlier[81] and knew the rest of you were near. Don’t move; I have two hostages, and I’m willing to use one to prove my point.” He waved his sword in their direction.
A robot moved slightly, and Yang screamed.
“You have us at the advantage,” said Abe. “I don’t recall meeting you before.”
“We will, we will have met. I could use the proper tenses but your version of English hasn’t invented them yet. Witnesses make it legaller. I have temporarily ceded captaincy to my quartermaster, Mister Cogswell, so that he might marry us.”
“Marriage?” said Abe, edging to the left as Demiangel edged to the right.
“I know, your time with the lovely Shaylah ended poorly, but we do not all have such a jaundiced view of marriage. She says hi, by the way…or she will. I forget when we had our dalliance.”
Abe stopped and blinked.
“That’s good. I did tell you not to move, but I’m willing to forgive the slight, seeing as how you don’t know yet that I am a man of my word.” He lifted a hand, the robot holding the man stood up straighter, and Yang screamed again. “Demiangel, I was hoping that you would be my best man, you being my first officer and all.”
“What?”
“Well, you aren’t yet. But I was talking to a different version of me, one with a stick up his butt—he calls himself Tempus something or other—and down the timeline he saw you as my second in command. Well, that’s the kind of job reference you just can’t buy. Or steal.” He waggled his eyebrows. “And I’ll need a captain while I’m on my honeymoon.”
“Go ahead,” Abe said in his head. ”Get close.”
“What does the best man get?”
“To be best, of course! Now, let’s make this a real offer so you’re not just playing for time. Second in command, of course. Riches beyond belief as we plunder along the timelines.”
“The robots are tough; I can only frogify one, not both of the robots holding Yang’s parents,” thought Abe.
“No place to spend it, though,” Demiangel pointed out.
“I know a place or twenty. Places where the morals are lax and the expectations are for sale. Demiangel—Bill—you chafe under Abe’s…restrictions. You’re the junior member, not a full member.”
“I can’t knock the other out in one shot,” said Honeybee. “Still too risky.”
“Bill! You’re not supposed to be really tempted!”
“I’d still be subordinate to you,” Demiangel said, slowly walking forward. “Who says I’m tempted?”
“For a bit, sure. When you’re ready, we steal another ship. We’ll call it Angel’s Revenge. Load it up with as many guns as possible and we roam parahistory together, or split, as the whim takes us.”
“Mental link! We can tell!”
“And your young Yang there?”
“Has a possibility to be the third, our Pirate Queen. Knowledge courtesy of our Tempus. We three can be Caesar, Cleopatra, and Marc Antony…without the uncomfortable stabby bits.”
We’ll get the robots. You get the Aetherbunny there.
Both of Yang’s parents turned into frogs. [82] Honeybee [83] hit one of the pirates, and Demiangel surged toward Aetherblade, [84] hitting him lightly.
Aetherblade sighed, grabbed Yang, and held his sword to her throat.
“We’ll just have to try again some other time. Perhaps you need some ripening. Cogswell, I need command again; we can try the marriage later, once these people have been dealt with.”
Honeybee said, “You’re the captain, Cogswell. You don’t have to.”
“No,” said Cogswell without hesitation.
“What?”
“Your offer to that fellow bag of meat indicates that you do not have First Matrix in mind. You would replace him. That one’s treatment of the crew is uncertain; First Matrix treats the robots well. We aspire to be like First Matrix.”
“That’s insane. I’m your captain.”
“Incorrect. I have command. I am my captain,” said Cogswell. “Yo-ho-ho.”
“But with the understanding—” began Aetherblade. Yang also became a frog, slipping out of Aetherblade’s grip. Aetherblade grabbed for her[85] but missed. “Oh, Abe…that’s hardly cricket.”
Abe shrugged. “We’ll collect our friends and leave you to your dispute with Cogswell.”
Cogswell was saying, “The position of quartermaster is open, and the ship needs stores on Dimension X—” as the heroes slipped out of the room with their frogs.
Once the gondola was off the ship, Honeybee said, “How do you undo the frog thing? We’re not going to have to find Yang’s true love to kiss her or anything, are we?”
“Unless you do frog-like things, like eat flies, it wears off after an hour.”
“The crew, though, could they be stuck that way?”
Abe shook his head. “Wrong time of year for flies.” The other-dimensional ship shimmered, folded on itself, and disappeared.
“I wonder if there are flies in Dimension X?” mused Demiangel.
The Cast
Uncanny Justice
Uncanny Justice:Abraham Cadabra
| PRW | CRD | STR | INT | AWR | WIL | Stamina | DP |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
3 |
5 |
3 |
5 |
3 |
6 |
9 |
3 |
|
Specialties Occult Expert (+2), Leadership (+1) |
Powers
|
||||||
|
Qualities
|
|||||||
Honeybee (Lauren Twilt)
| PRW | CRD | STR | INT | AWR | WIL | Stamina | DP |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
6 |
5 |
5 |
5 |
4 |
5 |
10 |
2 |
|
Specialties Science Expert (+2), Technology Expert (+2), Aerial Combat (+1) |
Powers
|
||||||
|
Qualities
|
|||||||
Demiangel (William Halvorsen)
| PRW | CRD | STR | INT | AWR | WIL | Stamina | DP |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
6 |
6 |
8 |
5 |
4 |
4 |
12 |
2 |
|
Specialties Aerial Combat (+1), Wrestling (+1) |
Powers
|
||||||
|
Qualities
|
|||||||
Team Qualities (Uncanny Justice)
- We do weirdness
- Found family
- Connections everywhere
(I like “Found family” but the others need refinement)
Pirates
Robo-Buccaneers
In commentary on the product page, apparently all the robo-buccaneers had the same stats as First Matrix, but I felt like that took away a bit from the “lieutenant fight” feeling that I wanted from the battle with Aftershock and the First Matrix, so my version of the Robo-Buccaneers is a little less powerful. (I ended up avoiding the fight with First Matrix and Aftershock entirely.)
| PRW | CRD | STR | INT | AWR | WIL | Stamina | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
3 |
4 |
5 |
3 |
3 |
4 |
9 |
|
|
Specialties Athletics (+1), Laser Cutlass (+1) |
Powers
|
||||||
|
Qualities
|
|||||||
The Devolved aka the Alt-Humans
Given in the adventure, so not included here.
Aftershock
Given in the adventure, so not included here.
First Matrix
Given in the adventure, so not included here.
Captain Aetherblade
Given in the adventure, so not included here.
Other
Olivia Franklin
| PRW | CRD | STR | INT | AWR | WIL | Stamina |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
3 |
3 |
3 |
4 |
4 |
4 |
7 |
|
Specialties Athletics |
Powers
|
Qualities
|
||||
Kimberly Yang
| PRW | CRD | STR | INT | AWR | WIL | Stamina |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
3 |
3 |
3 |
8 |
3 |
3 |
6 |
|
Specialties Science, Performance [Dance] |
Equipment None |
Qualities
|
||||
Game Mechanics
[1] If any Mythic questions come up, we start at CF 7. And I’ve skipped the part where they find a new HQ; the story I had in mind never gelled, so we skip it and if an idea works, it will become a flashback.
[2] Sounds like it’s getting busy. Now to CF 9 for Mythic questions.
[3] Does he hit? 5+1 > 4, so this robo-buccaneer takes 3 Stamina. If Abe turns up the stove or works at increasing it, he can do 4; if all 4 burners are on, he can do 5.
[4] They attack: 4+1-1<6, 4+1-3 < 6, 4+1+2 > 6, 4+1-3<6; one hits. Bill takes 7-4, or 3 damage.
[5] Does he hit? 6+4 > 4; does he stun? 8+2 vs 6: yes.Knocks it out.
[6] Does she hit? 5+2+1 > 4, so yes. She doesn’t get a slamming attack, though; it just takes 6 stamina damage.
[7] 4+1-4<5; 4+1+0=5
[8] He’s going to stunt because it’s faster, tagging his Child of Magic quality, spending a DP to get Telekinesis.
[9] Does he hit? Willpower 6+0>4, so yes.
[10] Does he hit (6-1=5; marginal) the robot that Honeybee attacked (unlikely)? 06: Extreme yes. So even a marginal knocks him out.
[11] 6+2-1>5.
[12] Say she’s Awareness 4, but 4+0<3+2.
[13] 4+1+0<6, 4+1-1<6
[14] Does he get the other one? 6-1>4.
[15] No change to CF.
[16] Do they hear?
[17] Fortunately, 5+2+0>6, so he casts the spell correctly. Teleport 3 plus Accurate. And let’s just check for Teleport shock right now: 6+1>2. He’ll be fine.
[18] The spell is for Constructs, which will act as a force field and let him carry her up and out of the way. 5+2+3>6. He’ll have it on the next page.
[19] How many turn around? Let’s say 0-40: none, 41-50: 1, 51-60: 2, and so on up to all 6. 11: none. Crap. All of them attack Yang, who’s Coordination 3.
[20] Honeybee interposes, giving up her next action; the three throws are 3+0, 3-2, 3+0; even with the +2 that interpose grants the attacker, they would marginally hit her natural Coordination, but she’s shrunk for +2 more.
[21] Oh. Initiative. Abe 11, Demiangel 7, Honeybee 7, Yang 6, Devolved 5 We’ll pretend that throwing the spears was the end of the page.
[22] Eww. Marginal hit: 6+2-4=4. So marginal Affliction, but it probably won’t work: 3+2<6.
[23] 6+5>4. Stun roll is 8>6; knocked out but he would have stunned it.
[24] 4+2<6+1, 4+0<6+1, 4-3<6+1, 4-5<6+1, 4+1<6+1, 4-5<6+1. All miss.
[25] Blast: 5+2+4>3; stunned for a page
[26] 6+1>4; Slam is 8+2>6; so to the wall. Let’s make Trouble for Abe and he gets a DP.
[27] She gets +2 for the sudden fall, so she’s difficulty 5 to hit. One spear: 4-5<5; Two spear: 4+1=5 (marginal); axe 4+3>5.
[28] No teleport shock (6+3>2), but he doesn’t have the benefit of falling. And the interpose makes them more likely to hit…but he does have his mystic shield up. One spear misses, the other hits, the axe hits. His mystic shields absorb them.
[29] She hits: 5+2+3>0.
[30] 6+0>4
[31] I feel like it’s a little calmer. CF 8.
[32] Well, now. It will cost a determination point as a retcon the first time he wants to use it.
[33] The spell is Alteration Ray (dimensional travel) and he gets 5+2+1>6. Everything else is flavour text.
[34] Still CF 8.
[35] He’s going to set the grass on fire and create a Diversion quality. Stunting off the Blast, activating “Trying to do good”. We’ll say that he’s using the ability with a difficulty of the ability. 4+1>4. He gets one free activation.
[36] Say it’s the next page; two throw spears, but he’s defense 7 and they get 3+3 and 3-1, so they miss.
[37] I have such a mind. Mythic: Does Dr. Franklin actually know her? (likely, CF 8) 62%, yes.
[38] He’s been there a second and he’s got these flaming wings. Mythic, do the alt-humans attack (likely)? 56%, yes. Say three of them. 4+2<7; 4+4>7, 4-2<7. One hits for 2 stamina.
[39] 6+0>3.
[40] Three more have spears: 4-2, 4-2, 4+0. All miss. He misses, though. On this side,they don’t have spears any more, so he can stay out of range by throwing fire. He hits, 4+5>4; stunning knocks it out, at 4+5>6.
[41] Spend a determination point to stunt Burst.
[42] Not as good a roll: 6-2>4, but no slam or stun effects. Both of them take 4 Stamina, though, and can’t fight back. 6+2>4, both are knocked out.
[43] Defending, and all three attack with spears: 4+1<9, 4-5<9, 4-1<9
[44] Still has Burst stunted; 6+3>4; stunning has no effect (4+1<6); 6+0>4 for second flurry.
[45] Honeybee is 5+1+2, or 8 to hit. Kind of hard but not impossible for the Devolved. So: 4-2,4+1,4+0 means all three miss with spears. She uses “There is no one like me” to stunt burst also, and blasts: 5+3 (I’m not giving the Shrunk bonus), so 8>4, all three take 6 Sound stamina and are down by 6. Next round (offscreen): 5+4, all are knocked out. Remaining side: hits all (7>4), they throw spears but all miss (4+0,4-2,4-1). She gets 5+0>4, and all fall down.
[46] GM decides the wood has Supreme (10) binding as aura, triggered by hitting. 10+0>8, partial hold.
[47] I could faff with a spell, but it’s a determination point, insight, activating “Child of magic.”
[48] Spell: Teleport. We switch into non-combat time as we try and figure this out. 7>6, and no teleport shock 7>2.
[49] Spell of ESP 6, 5+2+4>6. Now he sees whatever Honeybee says.
[50] 8-1<10.
[51] Is there a trap that’s ensnared Abe (Likely)? 24%...yes.
[52] Well, that’s accepting Trouble (lost page) to spend an Advantage on Abe.
[53] There’s a clever way to do it and a brute force way. He’s supposedly clever; does he come up with the clever way? (Likely) 92%. No way. Brute force it is.
[54] So now he’s going to cast Nullify on the Binding Spell. 5+2+4>6, the difficulty of the spell. With 6 Nullify applied to the Supreme Binding, it’s only Fair, and Bill might be able to pull free.
[55] Bill manages 8-1>4, and turns the partial hold into no hold.
[56] He gives her an Advantage (from Leadership) and she uses it for recovery, which eliminates the Dazzle.
[57] Obvious trap or not? (I’ve decided one is good, the other is not. So truly 50/50) 27%: Yes.
[58] He’s not going to make it easy; it’s a maze, difficulty 6. How does she do on it? Poorly. Glad this isn’t a pyramid test; she doesn’t beat the difficulty until her fourth attempt: 5-1, 5-4, 5-3, 5+4.
[59] They won but have to do something new…call it unchanged. CF 8.
[60] These are mechanical difficulty 10 because they’re meant to withstand anyone but Demiangel. She’s strength 5, so at her luckiest she can’t do anything, unless she has Advantage and she gets +5. She does not: 5+4, 5-2, 5-1.
[61] Aiming isn’t the problem; good damage though: 6+4, which isn’t enough.
[62] Demiangel pushes, using his “trying to do good” quality. Fortunately; his strength check is a 10 (8+0+2>8)
[63] A spell: 5+2+1>6, he makes it.
[64] Again, hitting isn’t a problem. But she activates “There is no one like me” for Advantage, adds +2 to her damage roll. 6+3+2>10-6.
[65] Just giving her that.
[66] Who knows? But this is the big finish, so we’ll up it to CF 9.
[67] A freebie. I’m going to make them fight six robots and six Devolved in the first wave, so I don’t care if a thirteenth goes down in the interests of storytelling.
[68] Not telekinesis; even if Abe threw robo-buccaneers overboard, they might land on someone. Alteration Ray: Transformation Extra Offensive Limit Offensive. He’s going to turn people into frogs. I feel like they should get some kind of defensive roll, so they get a Willpower roll against the strength of the spell. 5+2-1=6, but he manages.
[69] Initiative: Demiangel: 6+5 Abe: 5+5 Honeybee: 6+4 First Matrix: 4+6 Devolved: 3+5 Robo-buccaneers: 4+4 Aftershock: 3+5 Capt: 3+2
[70] 6+1>4 hits a RB, slam is 8+2>6, knocked to next range; 1-2 means off the boat, but it’s a 5
[71] Honeybee 6+2-1>4, Affliction is 6+4>6, so Devolved takes 6 stamina
[72] He gets 5+2+3>4 to cast the wall crawling spell.
[73] Coordination to hit (5+2>4), magic vs willpower (6+3>4)
[74] This is to clean up, so one to-hit roll (5+1>4 & >3), and one transformation (6+0>4) test.
[75] I set it up, but let’s confirm. Mythic, is Yang involved (very likely, CF 8)? 04% Extreme yes. Well, we hinted that the pirate queen got there by marriage, so…
[76] When I say “feinted” I mean “rolled nearly as badly as you can” — 6-4<5.
[77] The shot misses: 4-3<6+1
[78] 5+4>3, 6-1>4
[79] And continues to do sucky: 6-2<5
[80] 5+3>4, and 6+2>4
[81] She gets a determination point for that, because I didn’t roll: just had it be so.
[82] Abe stunted Fast Attack, activating Child of Magic. 5+1>4, 5+2>4
[83] 5+2>4, for 6 Stamina
[84] Marginal hit: 6-3=3. 4 Stamina. So he’s not hitting lightly on purpose, but we might play into that.
[85] 3+1<3+2
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