AEON B-Team (Nomads) Season 8 Session 11 Aliens Among Us!

 

Cast: The Nomads

• Amie-Belle T. W. Lee aka Whisper (Played by Curtis): Cold War era super-soldier/spy that got put in the Freezer, because she got poisoned. After getting thawed out and cured she tried to back to work, and was given an “adjustment period”. Uncle Sam called 2 years later, with work… because once you’re in, you’re in for life. Tagline: “In and out without a whisper.” Absent
• Beauregard K. “Bo” Ratnam aka Wirerat (Played by Brice): Technopath, inventor, and hacker. He specializes in co-opting enemy systems and tech assets. Tagline: “Nice tech – I’ll borrow that.
• Stainless Steel Rat aka “Sir” (NPC Ally): Bo’s best friend and assistant. A sentient drone in the shape of a stylized shiny metal rat mindlinked to Bo. Specialties are rapid repair construction and modifications. Imagine if K-9 and R2D2 made a baby and it looks a bit like a rodent. Tagline: “Repairs and upgrades in progress”
• Derrick K. Ratnam aka Ledgerdemain (NPC Ally): Spin doctor and media liaison for Project VANGUARD. Twin to Bo. Tagline: “Well, actually that’s not how it happened.
• MIA Sentient AI made from recovered tech on a prior mission.
• Rafe Hanlon aka Nyx (played by Chris D.): An umbrakinetic petty thief still on work release several years later, on his way to becoming a true agent and hero. Tagline: “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”
• Layla A. de Blackburn aka Nox (NPC): CIA-trained child assassin all grown up to be Daddy’s Little Monster. Maybe a little mad. Argues with her shadow often. Tagline: “No, we shouldn’t do that…should we?”
• June B. O'Neill aka Prodigy (NPC): Savant with hyper-intelligence that may have cracked the universal power-dampening conundrum. Fresh out of the Meraki Institute for the advanced and gifted. Extremely intelligent, but young (she's 16).
• Vincenzo L. dePrezzo aka Threshold (Played by Rory): Doctor, Mathematician, and Scientist (yes, capitals) and Spatial Manipulator. Threshold can bend space like a pretzel, teleport, obliterate things, and has extraordinary senses. He’d rather be in a research lab than fight. Better known for his work with Doctors Without Borders, the United Nations, and disaster relief than famous battles. Tagline: “I can be there in a snap!”
• Eleanor C. Bulli aka "Bubbles (NPC): Manipulates bubbles of energy, short range teleportation, can fly on the bubbles, use them for shields or attack and even see through them.
• Grant L. Wojcik aka Fridge Boy (NPC): Can control ice/cold, but mostly the ability to create ice that explodes. 16 year old emancipated orphan, Our janitor. 
• Rudy A. Coldwater aka Gimmick (NPC): Mildly hyper-intelligent savant. Stutters. Makes very accurate guesses. Typical nerd, not yet 20. Wants to make a difference, assigned to support duties.
• Summer Stratos aka Chain Jacket (NPC): Ferrokinetic
• Vargas Manwell Tilium aka "Impulse" (NPC): Speedster.

Putting the Pieces Together

Nyx and Nox have been mulling over notes about August, including the deck of cards that were wrapped in orichalcum foil and dossiers and other reports. Nox made a crit fail in her roll of Intelligence Analysis and they pretty much were just stuck.

Whisper and Threshold noticed Nox feeling depressed and frustrated and assembled the team to try and go over the data. Figured a variety of skills and perspectives might give a fresher perspective.

With the cards in the lab we noticed under the UV light for the plants that the cards had pictures of people on them, previously hidden.

This was a GM gimmick to move the plot along and though that kind of thing is acceptable and frequent among fiction, especially comic books I felt it was not the best choice.  I hate contrived plot devices, even if they are sometimes necessary. In this case UV for plants triggered the image, meaning sunlight likely would too - not vey secretive. It could have been handled by one of Wirerats Scanners sensing something off or Threshold using his Scanning Sense (Para Radar with Scan and Bioscan). Either were very plausible as Threshold pretty constantly uses his para radar and scans the environment for things like toxic hot dogs or other exotic poison's Nyx may hide around the place, food Whisper sneaks into Bo, and general shenanigans around the place. Plus he had specifically looked at the cards before.  Alas I had almost mention scanning them to find which was the Queen when Nox was playing solitaire and said she needed it but opted not to say anything as Threshold felt she would not like to cheat.

(GM asks that we mention criticisms so he can get better, and when thinking of fixing a plot bump its not always obvious how. My rule is to review the players actions and abilities and see if there is anything that resolves the issue. Outside a game its easy to consider multiple options, during the game you're more likely to stop on the first one though)

Once we saw the pics we recognized several as local politicians and other VIPs. They looked like elves or some versions of Aliens.  Obviously the latter makes much more sense (Thresholds bias here). Threshold opted to check on a few of them, using his para radar which has 200y range, Penetrating 2 (see through up to 2 feet of walls), and the aforementioned Bio Scan and Scanning. 

He confirms that the individual is indeed not human and checks 2 others just to confirm it wasn't some lucky glitch.

Reporting back to the group he asks for ideas. Whisper and Wirerat suggest kidnapping and interrogation, no one else has any ideas. Threshold chooses to try and do this legally and reaches out to  the President (Actually has as a Contact on costs CP) and gets a quick meeting.  He pops back to the group with permission to use our version of the Patriot Act and begin the kidnapping.

The Bricklayer Arrives!

While we are going over the above and doing some other household discussions the Bricklayer knocks on the door.  The City has paid for our repairs and renovations as a reward for stopping Erebus (yay we get recognition! Now if it gets cited in a good journal somewhere Threshold will be ecstatic).

The Bricklayer is doted on by Whisper who tends to him with home cooking and he fixes the place up. We now have our nice comfy super base in a firehouse.

Afterthoughts

A bit short but not too bad. It had been several months since our last game session (Early Oct and this was Dec 11th) and we all were a bit rough on our feet as to recollections.  Thankfully our note keeper helped review things, though he was a bit under the weather.

Space Cat is acclimating to the group, I think he has decided to take on annoying Wirerat as a pet project as cats sometimes do. Molerat was quiet and did not come up in the session, probably still hiding in Thresholds couch. Threshold really has to scan the place a lot to keep these ruffians (PCs) from getting away with their practical jokes and other tricks.

I think we all had fun and it was kinda cool using a Contact I never actually expected to use in the game. It was more intended as background and a possible plot hook.