Then they arrived at the Mine. Outside, they saw the
ATV left by Connie's people, as promised. Outside the mine was a windowless building with the door pulled off the hinges. Inside was a huge gout of blood covering the wall. After calming down they went inside, and tried to search. They didn't find much inside the Mine Office / Locker Room, but did find an open safe with
Two Bounty, a handgun with half charge, and a diary. He indicates they were the Taker crew Frag, mentioning the members Marjorie, Gunge, and Wizard, with the author being named Turbo (
). He was on watch duty as, it turns out, they were the original crew sent to do this mission, which was three weeks ago. Despite the blood, there was no body, and there were drag marks leading into the mine. After collecting the things, and realizing the other two rooms in the building were just a bathroom and laundry room, they tentatively went inside the mine to search for coal.
Inside the mine, they took it slow and followed the drag marks. They went towards the air and escape shaft to confirm it was still viable, which it was. They then took the left, shorter fork, and went down the side tunnel. There, they saw their first Casualties at the very end of a coal-less tunnel. Electing to go down the other small side tunnel, where the drag marks led, they ran into a shocking site; a body stripped of most of the flesh, with claw marks along the chest that scrapped the bone. Using Pixie's med skills, she determined that the bite marks were consistent with only one eater, and that it was maybe an animal? Definitely not normal human.
They went up the other, longer side tunnel, and with Freebird barely succeeding in an awareness check he realized this tunnel was not structurally sound. Turning back, they went all the way up the main tunnel, passing a few more casualties and going off the written map. They found coal, and even some mined coal! Successful in their mission, they elected to fill up the flatbed of the ATV for coal to negotiate for some bonus Bounty and turned around to leave.
As they drove, the closer Casualties had stumbled into the tunnel out and were kind of unavoidable. With Freebird using Elder's silenced handgun and Elder using a steady foot, they managed to lure the Casualties backwards and kill all three in relative quiet. They looted the bodies. They only found another diary, but elected to read it outside of the mine. As they got closer out of the mine, Elder failed a Drive check and accelerated too fast.
That's when they heard the scream. (Another!) crit success from Pixie made her realize that wasn't human, or Casualty, or animal. Advising Elder to floor it, they sped down the tunnel, and behind them was an abomination. It was once a man. It was also once a Casualty. But as the black veins of the Blight spread, they all threaded around his limbs and head, giving him long, black, clawed feet, long, tri-clawed hands, and a long, almost mole like head. With some failed Self-Control checks by the non-drivers, they found their first Aberrant.
As Elder continued to succeed in Drive checks (with a Will thrown in), Freebird with his Rifle and Pixie with her Shotgun shot at the creature giving chase. Freebird used a ton of charges to OHKO the left leg, with the black veins fraying like rope and the fleshy bits exploding like... flesh, Pixie did some damage to the right leg. Going in for the kill, Freebird used a Called Shot to take out over half his chest HP in one hit, and Pixie did the rest. The beast fell.
After realizing evidence of an Aberrant would be worth a ton of bounty, Pixie was 'elected' to take it. They agreed that decapping it seemed like the best idea. After succeeding in her First-Aid Test (and making sure she had gloves on), she also had to roll Self-Control as the scalp of the human the Aberrant once was was visible as she splintered off the head. Now with a load of coal, an Aberrant head and before and after footage from Pixie's Laptop, the Reformers fled the Little Pittsburg, victory in hand. They picked up Anton and Bruno (where Anton barely made his self-control check,) and headed back for the Four Seasons, a job well done, the aftermath and post Contract info to be done next session as we had gone over.)
Market TickerI only had a brief bit of info written down for the Mine Office. Again, you don't always realize what you need 'til you're in game. That's why improv and Yes And-ing are so important.
The dead Taker crew may or may not be a reference to something.
Sorry, Caleb!
The below attachment is the Modded map of the Little Pittsburg. I divided it into 20 zones. I rolled once to determine where the body of Turbo would be, and once to determine where the Aberrant was. I rolled 17 for the body and 16 for the Aberrant. trinite BARELY made the Awareness check, or the chase scene might've been a bit longer and they might've said to hell with the Contract.
I came up with this Contract by rolling on the Market Fiat table and rolled energy, I tried to figure out what would be a good Contract. I searched "Energy Production in Missouri", and found this Department of Energy page, which indicated that Coal makes up a huge part of Missouri's energy, and is something that would still be used after the Crash.
http://www.eia.gov/state/?sid=MOI then modified the search to "Coal Production in Missouri", which came up with this "Read More" site for the Missouri Department of Natural Resources, which is actually a call to action article about asking for historic maps for ABANDONED UNDERGROUND COAL MINES.
http://dnr.mo.gov/geology/geosrv/coalminemaps.htmThe phrase "Abandoned Underground Coal Mines" sung to me, and I had my answer. They even had the map I used in game, and with a name like "Little Pittsburg Coal Mine in Lingo, Missouri" I had no choice but to use it.
Next came the twist. At first I thought an earthquake to seal them in might be interesting, but the more I thought about it the more I realized that would be too railroady. I then wanted to include an Aberrant. I know the rules aren't as defined yet, so I hope I didn't take too much artistic license from Caleb, but based off of the description of the Blight I think I came up with what I hope is an acceptable inference of what they COULD be. I also find it hilarious that the RPPR crew keeps ignoring / failing to find the Aberrants, and not only did my players select the Contract with the Aberrant hiding in it, they found it AND killed it.
We had so much fun. It was great, and I'm proud and glad of the fact that my players had fun. I was so nervous going in, and I did make mistakes (too many Awareness Tests, for one), but I did my best and it worked. I'll reserve greater detail for Caleb's eyes, but for you, the fans; Caleb's doing good. Red Markets was great! Can't wait for next session!
