Mothership Play Report: 4:33 Intermission

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

A short intermediary session, featuring

• Manny the scientist (JOZO)
• Jes, the tecnavi (Zelda)
• Zach, permanently drunk biker gang member (thatotherguy)

Several weeks after the events at the weather station and dealing with the Church of Skin, the gang has collected their payment from FRIEND and returned to life in Wasteland Park (generated via Michael Raston's Infinigrad tables).

Wasteland Park was one of Colony Central's public parks, but over the course of the war has turned into a kowloonlike warren of shipping containers, groundcars, cargohaulers, tents, lean-tos, and clapboard sheds. The warren is so tightly packed that most passages are single-file. Disease is rampant and it is one of the poorest districts in Colony Central. Paradoxically, it is also among one of the safest, due to the actions of the Trollgarden, the dominant gang. These malfomed folks (signified by the exotic flowers always on their person) are led by a notorious glutton, but have managed to maintain the stability and safety of Wasteland Park against threats both outward and inward.

Using Humza K's community rules , Wasteland Park has Identity 6, Prosperity 4, Safety 11, Governance 7, Legitimacy 10, Sustainability: 8

Manny takes the plunge and, using some of the funds gained through the job for FRIEND and some support from the Trollgarden, establishes a small clinic to treat the sick in the community, increasing Identity by 1. In the weeks since the clinic started he has made friends with the local drunk Zach, and now has run into the tecnavi Jes, carrying a message from Shipmother Talibiri.

It seems that the tecnavi the group found at the weather station put in a good word for them, as Talibiri is offering a bit of aid. She is willing to help crack open Dess Kartz' logic core, in exchange for access to the information. The trio take up this offer, as while beaming it to lunar orbit is a bit slower than trying it in the clinic, it is safer.

A few hours pass before the cracked monitor in the clinic switches to a public newsfeed - hundreds of Lamplighters, more than anyone has seen in the years since Lantern Boy's presumed death, are marching against Zaibatsu riot cops near the space elevator. Violence is already breaking out and looks like it only going to get worse.

Manny takes charge, whipping up a plan to run to the front and helping injured civilians - neither the militant Lamplighters nor the Zaibatsu are particularly friendly towards those outside their respective factions. They sneak out of Wasteland Park to where Zach is keeping his delivery van, and book it downtown.

There's tear gas and molotovs in the air when they get there, rubble and wounded in the streets. Taking care to stick to the sidelines, the crew are able to pick up the wounded and set up a makeshift clinic in an abandoned cafe. By the time the violence lulls, six folks who would otherwise be dead aren't. Talibiri had finished cracking the core by this point, and had the information ready for them when they made it back to the clinic.

The logic core contents are as follows: the androids had gathered at the weather station as part of typical android behavior - non-emancipated androids will, in the absence of direct command, gather together in herds at the nearest place of authority. So they were standing around exchanging minor bits of data for months until someone - a tall, gaunt man with lank blond hair and the disheveled appearence of the truly apathetic - arrived and presented the herd with what appeared to be a sizable fragment of carapace.

There are no insects or crustaceans of that size known to live on Maha Raurava.

After that, it was a swift course in the establishment of the Church of Skin. Dogmas are set down and debated in gigabytes of raw text files. Sermons are recorded, as are the murders and skinnings. This continues for some time, until Dess Kartz is sent off by truck to the radio tower he was found and killed in. Of note is that the man never returns, and that the garage has no horrific amalgam of flesh and metal in it when he leaves (and the core has no mention of plans to build such a thing), which is only shortly before the events of Episode 1 and less than a week before the events of Episodes 2 and 3.

Manny grabs his phone and calls FRIEND. The line rings for abnormally long before FRIEND's cheery voice comes over.

"I'm sorry I missed you, but I'm dead!"