Friday, September 13, 2013



[In the downtime since last session, Torgath does some research.]
Ariel: "Am I investigating the slaves, or do we care?"
Brock: "Not anymore. We don't care about slaves."

[We discover that the crate which held the slaves is owned by WestRim, former subsidiary of WestCorp, a northern-based company which may have some illicit dealings in the south.]
Brock: "Can we ask anyone other than Dawn about this?"
Ariel: "Isn't she the highest-ranking Northerner we know?"
Brock: *grumbles*

[Joe has left the game and been replaced by Zac, which means a bit of in-game shuffling is required.]
Georges the GM: "Gabriel wasn't dealing well with you guys staying at his place."
Julie: "So he kicks us out?"
Georges the GM: "Politely."

[Zac is introduced to the basics of the Humanist Alliance.]
Julie: "Everyone's helpful, friendly, and polite."
Zac: "Almost unnervingly so."
Brock: "It's the Stepford citizens."

[More about the Humanist Alliance.]
Georges the GM: "It's not a perfect society."
Brock: "Yes it is. Everyone says so."

[Zac also gets some information on Terra Nova in general.]
Brock: "Terra Novans haven't had a global satellite system until the CEF accidentally gave it to them. By losing the war."

[Having now been in the Humanist Alliance for a half-season -- longer for Lukas -- it's time to start blending in better.]
Brock: "I get new clothes."
Julie: "Do I get new clothes?"
Brock: "I dunno. Do you want new clothes?"
Julie: "Of course! You always make this mistake!"

[In the Humanist Alliance, there's a dual pricing scheme whereby foreigners pay much more than citizens. Lukas wants to rectify this, at least in our case.]
Ariel: "What you ideally need is an identity card from someone who's dead, who won't be found for a while."
Georges the GM: (skeptically) "...Uh-huh."

[Okran Radsley, our sometime employer, meets with everyone at the C&C Café, a coffee house near the university quarter.]
Georges the GM: "You could fit in here. You're the right age."
Brock: "Though they're mostly grad students. We don't have the slight whiff of disappointment that grad students give off."

[Radsley opens the conversation.]
Okran Radsley: "Sorry about Gabriel. He wasn't adjusting well to your... impetuous nature."
Lukas: "Improvisation wasn't his strong suit."

[Radsley introduces an associate, Esme, who goes by the moniker 'Fennec.' She explains her somewhat unusual handle.]
Fennec: "Every two-bit desert rat goes by 'Fox.' And half of them want to be mistaken for the other half."

[Zac shows a picture of the brightly red-haired Fennec to the rest of the players.]
Brock: "It makes more sense now. You look like you're wearing a fox under your hat. You carry it with you."

[Now that we've finally met the new PC in game, we go around the table describing what our characters look like. More or less.]
Ariel: "My eyes are eye-colored. My hair is hair-colored. I'm like visual wallpaper."

[We take stock of the new girl who will be coming with us on the next job.]
Torgath: "Can you handle a firearm?"
Fennec: "...What are we discussing here, Radsley?"
Okran Radsley: "Nothing that should require firearms."

[Fennec sums up her impressions of Lukas and his team.]
Fennec: (hesitantly) "You seem like... nice people."

[Radsley hires us for a job: 3,000 each to return the crate back into the shipping depot we took it out of, in the hopes of having the original owner reclaim it so we can follow it to the source.]
Fennec: "So it's just a quick hotwire job?"
Lyta: "If things go right, which they never do."

[By sending us back to the same depot, Georges the GM is able to reuse the map he used last time.]
Georges the GM: "Like Halo, I get you to go back in the way you came out, for the level-up."

[Fennec, who works for Radsley's friend Joe, is not quite sure where she fits into the payment scheme.]
Fennec: "They're getting three thousand a head. Where does that leave me?"
Okran Radsley: "Three thousand. One head, one share."

[Radsley suggests that if Lukas has some sort of legitimate business, it'll help us get into the depot more easily. And while we do have a business -- the Corner Coffee Haus -- Lukas doesn't want to contaminate it.]
Okran Radsley: "If you get caught, the least of your worries is whether your business is compromised."
Lukas: "That's not true. It makes money while I'm in jail."

[It would, on the other hand, be beneficial for us to have a business in the Humanist Alliance, so that we could stay in the country legitimately. Brock intends to set something up.]
Georges the GM: "If you set up a business, you could become--"
Brock: "Employees of ourselves?"

[Lukas has some private business he wants to discuss with Radsley. Meanwhile...]
Lukas: "You want to take her to an alley and check her out?"
Lyta: "No, not really."
Lukas: (annoyed) "Why do I phrase these things as questions?"

[Lyta and Torgath go outside and question Fennec. Lukas is not impressed with their thoroughness and decides to do the job himself.]
Lukas: "Are you a Northern spy?"
Fennec: "Would you believe me if I said no?"
Lukas: "Try me."
Fennec: "No."
George the GM: "You believe her."
Lukas: "...Are you a Southern spy?"

[Going down the list...]
Lukas: "Earther spy?"
Fennec: (sarcastically) "Now you've got me. I'm a Jezebel and all it took was you asking that question."

[The problem with Zac reading some of the sourcebooks is that they are set ten years after our campaign, when certain things are better known than they are now. Things like Jezebel GRELs.]
Julie: "Do you actually say 'Jezebel'? Because that might cause us to kill you just for knowing."
Brock: "You're not one of the three people we know who knows..."

[Lukas tries to see how suitable Fennec is for our mission.]
Lukas: "How sneaky are you?"
Fennec: "It's in my name."
Lukas: "..."
Fennec: "Well, I won't say I've never been caught, but I still have all my fingers."
Lukas: "Haven't spent much time in the ESE, huh?"

[Let it never be said we don't learn from our mistakes.]
Lukas: "You got flak?" *pokes Fennec*
Georges the GM: "Yes, she has flak."
Lukas: "Well, you're already one up on our last guy."

[Lukas comes to a decision about our new potential partner.]
Fennec: "Are those all the questions you had for me?"
Lukas: "Yeah. You don't seem like a muppet."

[Fennec has some questions of her own. First up: the mask Lukas wears, and the scarring beneath it.]
Fennec: "Is that a shrapnel wound?"
Lukas: "Yeah. And a gator came out of the sewer..."

[Clearly, Lukas is the front man. But what about the rest of us?]
Fennec: "What about the rest of you?"
Lukas: "Grizz is our researcher, and Ryss is in human relations."

[Fennec also gets some sense of the op.]
Fennec: "So we're just going in and out? No one notices?"
Lyta: "That's the plan. That's always the plan."
Fennec: "If things go according to plan."
Lyta: "Which they never do."

[After parting, we each do some respective researching on each other.]
Georges the GM: (to Zac) "You clearly didn't get their real names."
Ariel: "'Grizzlethorp Brunhilde Squadgley'?"
Georges the GM: "Exactly."

[We prep for the op. Recall that Lukas has had reconstructive surgery on his face that he hasn't told anyone about yet, not even his siblings.]
Brock: "I will go into the bathroom and 'work on disguising myself.'"

[We meet up at The Bench, a restaurant/watering hole near where Fennec has been staying.]
Georges the GM: "It's a truck-stop sorta place: low ceilings, kinda dark..."
Ariel: "Still with cameras everywhere?"
Georges the GM: "Well, yes. It is the Humanist Alliance."

[Some light conversation at The Bench.]
Lukas: "How often do you come here?"
Fennec: "Only when I got company."
Lukas: "How often is that?"
Fennec: "Not very."
Lukas: "So you've never been here before?"
Fennec: "...Once."

[We discuss our mutual experience in Khayr ad-Din.]
Fennec: "Khayr ad-Din is the best place!"
Lukas: "Except for the smell."
Fennec: "Well--"
Lukas: "And the people who live there."

[We discuss a little bit about our experiences.]
Lukas: "So you've met one Sand Rider?"
Fennec: "Yeah."
Lukas: "Steal any children?"
Fennec: "No. I don't think they do that."
Lukas: "Everyone knows they do that."

[Lyta and Torgath are somewhat taken aback by Lukas' outright lying regarding the Koreshi stealing children.]
Georges the GM: "Are you shocked? Ashen-faced?"
Brock: "What are you talking about?! We know they do! They did it to us!"

[Lukas covers for his siblings' obvious bungling of his beautiful lie...]
Lukas: "Where we grew up, a neighborhood kid was stolen. They were friends -- that's why they don't like to talk about it."

[We return to Fennec's place: a converted longrunner section full of junk that she's 'fixing up.']
Lukas: (deadpan) "I love what you've done with the place."
Fennec: "Thanks! It's the best I've had in a while!"
Lukas: "I've never seen a longrunner done up quite like this before."

[Lyta checks out Fennec's mechanical repair rig, which is both very pared-down and mostly made of recycled parts.]
Lyta: "Where's your screwdriver tips?"
Fennec: "Oh, you just file the end off your knife and it works just like a screwdriver! Isn't that cool?"
Lukas: "Did you just say you cut the end off your knife? That tells me all I need to know about your combat capabilities."

[We go over the details of the plan.]
Lukas: (to Fennec) "You're in charge of placing the receiver. If you get caught, we're leaving you there. So don't get caught."

[We arrive at the depot. Lukas goes off to find a crane while Lyta and Fennec leave to get an automated platform, leaving Torgath alone at the truck. Which is unfortunate.]
Ariel: "Did we have a plan for when people show up?"
Brock: "Stall him, divert him, mislead him..."

[Lyta and Fennec get the panel open on a platform and smoothly plug in the receiver for their PDA. We both roll quite high.]
Georges the GM: "The two of you work like..."
Julie: "Like we've done this before!"

[Now to get the platform back to the truck.]
Zac: "Which one of us is driving?"
Julie: "Me, because I have the drive skill."

[We get the platform back to the truck, and Lyta and Fennec rush off to get the crane working. Lukas, meanwhile, is approached by security to find out what the delay's all about.]
Guard: "Control, we have a delay on 6C."
Georges the GM: "Lyta finally gets the crane moving."
Lukas: "Oh, there it is."
Guard: "Good job, Control. Moving on."

[Of course, things are not that simple.]
Guard: "Control tells me they're not operating the crane."
Lukas: *shrugs* "Well, it's automated."

[Lukas tries to bluff his way through the encounter.]
Brock: "Things happen. Bureaucratic problems happen."
Ariel: "Not here."

[Having got the crate onto the platform, Lyta, Fennec, and Torgath go off to get it into the stacks, leaving Lukas alone with the empty truck, stalling for time.]
Brock: "Can I get the truck wedged in somewhere?"
Georges the GM: "You're having a hard time..."
Brock: "Fuck it, I just light up a cigarette."

[Lyta and Fennec plug the receiver back into the platform, rolling exceptionally high.]
Lyta: "We're getting better at this."
Fennec: "We should get a job here."

[Lukas, meanwhile, has been approached by security yet again.]
Guard: "Hey, you! What are you doing here?"
Lukas: "Slacking off from work."
Guard: "...I beg your pardon, citizen?"

[Lukas explains that 'our supervisor' doesn't provide bathroom breaks, in the interest of efficiency, and the rest of his team have gone off to find the facilities.]
Lukas: "We'll be gone in five minutes, tops."
Zac: "I love the blue-collar bluff. Classic."

[We fill Zac in on some of the other memorable Lukas bluffs we've experienced over the last few years.]
Ariel: "Can you remember the best one?"
Julie: "The crooked vice cop."
Ariel: "Oh, yeah! We should get you to do the crooked vice cop again!"

[We get the crate into a stack and Torgath rushes back to the truck. Meanwhile, Lyta and Fennec realize that security has figured out there are 'intruders' in the stacks and are investigating. They decide to slip between the various crates and make their exit out a side tunnel.]
Zac: "I'm guessing if you looked at us, Lyta would look graceful and I would look scrambly."

[Lukas and Torgath leave the depot.]
Georges the GM: "You could just walk away from the truck. You don't have any attachment to it."
Brock: "We did steal it in the first place. But it's worth money, and we've got a cash problem that no one else is aware of..."

[Lyta and Fennec get into the side tunnel.]
Georges the GM: "You tell Fennec about the silent trains... or do you?"
Brock: "Does Lyta want to have that sort of slinking competition? Maybe she wants to test just how good Fennec is..."

[Lyta and Fennec get out, and we all disband for the night. The next morning, we meet up with Radsley.]
Okran Radsley: "Good job last night. Went off without a hitch?"
Lukas: "Well, a few small hitches."

[Radsley has another proposal.]
Okran Radsley: "Can you do another job with Fennec?"
Lukas: "What kind of job?"
Okran Radsley: "A more complicated job."

[Radsley explains the job.]
Okran Radsley: "If all goes well, it's a one-night job."
Lukas: "Twenty-five to life?"
Okran Radsley: "If all doesn't go well, yes."

[The job: to break into the local Department of Administration and get information from three separate locations, both physical and digital, all in the span of an hour.]
Lukas: "Are we going in soft and squishy or cold and fast?"

[One of the pieces of information we're getting will be accessed with the flash drive we picked up from Bhakir's longrunner on our first job for Radsley.]
Lukas: "Didn't you say you wanted to sell that?"
Okran Radsley: (innocently) "Did I?"

[Radsley explains how happy he is that we'll do the job for him.]
Okran Radsley: "As you can imagine, the perfect team of infiltrators, systems accessors, data archivers, and exfiltrators is hard to come by."

[Lukas isn't quite certain of Fennec's capabilities yet.]
Fennec: "You want to do this job with only three? No skin off my back. I'll sleep better tonight."
Lukas: "I'm just asking how much you're gonna bring my average down."

[Lukas evaluates Fennec.]
Lukas: "I'm giving you a C-level rating on this job."
Torgath: "I'd say C+."

[Lukas agrees to have Fennec as part of our team for the next op.]
Lukas: "We need to depend on you, you need to depend on us, or we all go to jail for a long time and they jam wires in our brains."

[The group disbands. For now.]
Lukas: "We'll meet at your place tomorrow. Have snacks."

And that's it for this time! Next week: infiltrating the Department of Administration! Yay!

Heavy Gear Roleplaying Game


ZAC said...


I love this, and how it makes us all seem wittier in the retelling.

Also, are you a robot? Because I don't remember you scribbling notes like a madwoman. Clearly you had the whole session bugged.

Julie said...

I scribble notes like a madwoman. Not only quotes, but plot points also. It's why Brock calls me "the group's brain." If I'm unobtrusive enough that you didn't notice, I'm doing my job properly.
