Cosmic Odyssey: A Hostile Solo campaign. Episode 4: Planet AR81.
Episode 4: Planet AR81.
The crew of the Odessey has arrived in orbit of Planet AR81, a harsh desert world, at the direction of corporate executive Sanford Rains. In his company is a mysterious young woman who fled the Starport Heritage after three security personnel were killed and seems to be under his protection. As the ship enters the planet’s orbit, the ship’s computer wakes the crew from their cryogenic slumber.
Captain Dominick Sambrano leaned back in the pilot’s chair, his eyes scanning the main monitor, a vast desert filled the screen.
Behind him the door hissed open.
“What are we looking for Rains?” He asked as the young executive walked in.
Chief turned in his co-pilot’s station to see the young woman quietly walk in beside Rains. “Um Hoss.”
Sambrano turned and coolly regarded her. “And you are Vergis?”
The young woman nodded.
Sanford Rains stepped forward, “She is a Con-Am contractor and as such is under my protection.”
“Relax Rains, we’re in deep space, there’s not a god damn thing I can do about her now.” Dominick replied.
“What are we looking for?” Chief interrupted, trying to head of a potential argument.
“You’ll know when you find it.” Sanford Rains replied icily.
The door hissed open behind them, “OK people, let’s get this party started.”
A tall grey haired man with steel rimmed glasses sat down and punched several buttons at the console.
“Ready to get started Jack?” Sambrano asked pointedly ignoring Rains response.
“I am skipper.” Jack Leftwich, the ships scientist replied with a grin on his face.
“What do you have so far?” The chief asked as he turned his chair around to face the scientist.
So let’s do a spotlight of Jack Leftwich.
His reason for leaving Earth was rolled as “You are following your father’s or mother’s footsteps.”
So let’s roll on the personnel inspiration table and theme tables
Roll 1D66: 33, Susceptible.
Roll 1D66: 63, Hatred.
He has an issue with his father being a famous scientist and left his cushy position as a director of a research institute to travel among the stars to try and make a discovery that will cement his name and reputation to be on a par or surpass that of his father.
“Well.” Jack said after an hour or so examining the planet via his various instruments.
Roll 1D6: 2, thin atmosphere
Roll 1D6: 4, hot temperature.
“It’s definitely a desert planet, there’s hardly any water on the surface at least.”
“What do you mean on the surface?” Sambrano asked, confused.
“Well, I’m getting a reading below the surface of water and hot water at that.” The scientist looked over the steel rims of his glasses. “I’m guessing there are steam vents that go under the surface and that is where you’ll find any water.”
“That sounds like my cue.” Chief replied with a smile.
Chief Jerry Vasconcelos is going to try a comms roll to see what the initial planet scan picks up.
Roll 2D6 for time taken: 4 hours
Roll 2D6 for comms roll: 3, failure. Nothing is picked up with the initial scan.
Second comms roll for scanning the planet.
Roll 1D3 for time taken: 3 days
Roll 2D6 for comms roll: 5, failure. Nothing is picked up with the secondary scan either.
The third (and subsequent) searches take 7 days! (Yikes)
Roll 2D6 for comms roll: 10, Success, finally after 9!! days of scanning.
We’ll say atmospheric conditions on the planet made it difficult to scan.
After the third day of scanning Sanford Rains storms onto the bridge and begins berating Chief about the time it’s taking to find anything.
To Avoid a Bad Reaction: 8+ is need for the Chief.
Roll 2D6: 12 (nice)
So instead of Sanford chewing the chief out, Jerry will turn the tables on him.
The door hissed open, and Sanford Rains stormed onto the bridge. “Haven’t you found anything yet?” He demanded; his mouth twisted in a cruel sneer.
Chief slowly looked up from his monitor and regarded the young corporate executive cooly.
“It takes time Rains.” He replied icily, “Especially when I don’t even know what this needle in our haystack looks like.”
“That’s classified.” Rains snapped back.
“And it will stay classified if we don’t find the damn thing. So how about you tell l me what the hell I’m looking for and I can calibrate the system to find it so we’re floating up here with our thumbs up our ass?”
Rains glared at him, then licked his lips uncomfortably. “It’s a ship.” He said quietly.
“Alright, that’s more like it, what kind of ship?” Jerry replied his hands hovering over his terminal ready to punch in any new information.
“An S Class cruiser.” Came the sullen reply.
“Alright hoss, I’ll get right on it, now I know what I’m looking for.” Chief smiled brightly at the young executive. Rains in response scowled and stalked off the bridge his hands thrust in his pockets.
The ship continues scanning for 4 more days. In the meantime, I feel another spotlight coming on.
Sanford Rains, Con-Am executive and the driving force behind this mission.
His character sheet gives us the reason for being here: An investigation uncovered corruption, and you were forced to step down.
I think he was forced to step down in disgrace, if only because he got caught. Since his father is a corporate big shot, Sanford is desperate to get back in the Con-Am good graces.
I think we’ll go for an action and theme roll.
Roll 1D66, action: 58, Find.
Roll 1D66, theme: 42,Community
So, I think the driving force is a ship full of some kind of colonists has gone missing. The young woman Vergis is somehow tied in with these people and behind it all Con-Am is interested in her, them and the ship they are travelling in.
“Bingo, we have an S-Class cruiser.” Chief crowed happily as he punched his monitor display up onto the main screen of the bridge.
Captain Dominick Sambrano opened the ships comms, “Rains, we found your ship.”
Less than two minutes later Sanford Rains hurried onto the bridge with his mysterious young companion right behind him.
He looked at Vergis, “Is that it? Is that the Maxim?”
Vergis looked at the monitor as it zoomed it to get a better picture of the ship on the surface of the planet.
She nodded and said quietly, “That’s the Maxim.”
Fantastic story and game play!
This is getting even better. Love it.