Great White Games/Pinnacle Entertainment Group

[Rohan]

The adventure picked back up at the house of Doc Spartan. The players had been taken under the wing of Spartan and he had become their patron. They had quarters in his manor and staff dedicated to taking care of their belongings and wishes. They were roused before dawn their second day there and they were ushered into Spartan’s study.

“Come quick, we’ve lost the Nova!” Spartan said, still dressed in his pajamas. He presents a device to the party that none of them have ever seen, a tape recorder, and depresses a switch. A panicked voice cracks through the static as Malchisadek fingers his tomahawks while looking apprehensively at the strange talking box. The other two men stare at the wonder, listening to the voice.

“Recovered… orb of…heading…Spartans…Cult…ing down!” and the voice was cut off not by static, but by a rapid fire string of explosions and then silence.

“That transmission was received at one of the relay stations two days ago,” Doc Spartan said calmly. He looked at the three adventurers before him and burning stare of the man from 1807 and slid the tape recorder further away, safely out of him arm’s reach. “We really don’t know where the Nova was heading, where it was at, or where it was coming from, though we’ve got some guesses from the tape. We think it was heading here and they had some trouble with the Cult of the Machine. Sounds like it was bad trouble. She was one of our airships, one of the good ones built by the Artificer’s Guild.”

“I still don’t believe you about the flying ships. Ships sail. On water,” Malchisadek asserted. Doc Spartan nodded gravely and considered the group before him in silence; the three adventurers looked at each other apprehensively, waiting for someone to speak.

“So if you don’t know where it was…” Jeffrey started. He was cut off with a raise of Spartan’s hand.

“We have received reports from the Orinoco of an explosion on the edges of the Krael Anhkar, about two days by foot south west of here. The location is near an ancient temple site, Kraelkakor. I want you to go down, recover survivors, recover any cargo, and report back here what you think may have happened. Be careful though, if the Cult of the Machine is involved, there’s a good chance that they have men in the area.”

“What makes you think there’s something to recover?” the cowboy asked quietly.

“Well, the mention of ‘the orb’…there is no such component on an airship, so I think they might have found something and were trying to bring it back to Spartansburg.”

“What exactly do you think they found?” the cowboy asked again, and as always was polite in his directness.

“Well, I don’t know. That’s what I want you to find out. Obviously the Cult of the Machine thought they had something…” Spartan said, his voice trailing off. “In any case, stop by the armory, get some gear, and get out there at first light. It will be a solid two days of travel to get down there and you’ll need to use all the daylight you can get.”

The group left, accepting the terms and requirements of the mission. After a brief time of gathering their belongings and requisitioning some additional gear and a shotgun, they set out from Spartansburg, heading back into the wilds of Krael Anhkar.

Immediately, they noticed that there was a band of savages following them. That was customary in this part of the jungle, they had been told, and their previous experiences with indigenous peoples confirmed that. However, this time they weren’t just taking passing glances to satiate their curiosity; this time they were looking with the watchful eyes of a pack of predators slowly circling for the kill. Walking ahead with the knowledge that they were heading straight for a trap, the group made a plan which included all of the things that they do best.

The frontiersman dropped to the jungle floor and went for cover, easily concealing himself in the thick underbrush of the jungle floor. The other two adventurers readied their weapons, the cowboy cocking his shotgun, the wanderer preparing his rifle. Fully realizing that their ruse was up, the savages attacked, with the leader of the war band (a wild card) charging with his spear. He closed about half the distance to the two armed men before he stopped dead in his tracks with a violent lurch.

Jeffrey managed to catch a glint of steel splitting the bridge of the savage’s nose before blood welled and then gushed from the center of his face. Malchisadek stepped out from behind the tree he had been taking shelter behind and freed his tomahawk from the leader’s skull with a jerk, watching the body slump as brains and carnage gushed from the cleft brain box. Jeffrey leveled his weapon at a different savage and blew him half way to hell while Johnny blasted another one of the circle that had fully intended to attack the party. The will to attack had been compromised, especially with the death of their leader, so they did what most savages do in that circumstance.

They fled. The savages chose to die running like cowards instead of standing their ground like men, and the trio of adventurers was more than happy to oblige them. The frontiersman threw his twin tomahawks, each solidly striking its target; one catching a savage in the breast bone and sinking in to the haft, the other catching a savage in the back, severing its spine between the shoulder blades.

The man from 1930 shot another in the head, leaving nothing but a smoking, splurting stump between two narrow little shoulders. The man from 1875 peppered another savage as he tried to run. The frontiersman chased down the final target and knifed the wounded heathen as it tried in vain to escape the carnage that was laid upon his war band. After taking stock of the situation, no weapons were lost, no damage done to the party, and the recovered seven steel spear tips.

The group moved on. The rest of the day progressed normally, but there were no more signs of the jungle savages for the rest of the day. As the light began to fade in the jungle, the group set up camp beside the dry river bed they had been following. Meals were eaten, defenses created, and the watches were set.

It was Jeffrey’s watch that the tranquility of the night was interrupted. The normal sound of animals and insects in the night was interrupted by a loud buzzing sound. After taking notice of the situation, he spotted four mosquitoes moving in; mosquitoes that were the size of small dogs! Without hesitation, Jeffrey threw rocks at his two sleeping companions to rouse them from their slumber. His next opportunity to act was spent leveling his shotgun and firing a shot into the closest of the giant mosquitoes. Malchisadek was a light sleeper and was instantly on his feet with the impact of the rock, and after taking the situation in; he acted fast, quick drawing two tomahawks. With a quick flick of the wrists, the twin axes found their marks, each of them shattering carapace and chitin as thick green ichor fell from the still flying corpses of the monster blood suckers. Only for a second did the wings continue to flap and both bugs fell to the jungle floor.

The fourth of the quartet shot straight for the cowboy. It missed him by the merest fraction of an inch, giving the gunman time to pull his .44 Dragoon and blast two shots into the vampire. The first shot hit the creature but did no obvious damage to it, the second shot turned the bug into a canoe and it fell to the ground, shattered. With a careful scan of the surrounding area, they surmised the danger was over and they each went back to sleep, except for Jeffrey who had to finish his watch.

Morning broke. The trio was clearing their camp after eating a breakfast of unidentifiable dried meat and coffee when they heard a strange clicking noise, not unlike the cocking of a shotgun. A quick survey revealed that it was one of the many types of birds of paradise that appeared to be mimicking the cocking of Johnny’s shotgun from the previous night. Without hesitation, Johnny pulled his Dragoon and blasted the bird.

The three headed out of camp, keeping a close look out for velociraptors, smilodons, and other nasty creatures that were unknown to them. At about noon, they came to the remains of a bridge that Doc Spartan had told them about and they looked through the encroaching jungle to see partial remnants of an ancient road that was supposed to lead to the temple site of Kraelkakor. The three of them also realized that since the road had fallen into disuse by man, it had become a game trail for creatures of the jungle, and they kept an especially keen eye out for anything that might consider them to be lunch.

They failed to notice the two velociraptors hiding in the underbrush for just such a meal. After getting the drop on the party, one of the two raptors narrowly missed the frontiersman and shot into the brush on the other side of the trail. It lined up for another run just as the cowboy leveled his heavy cap-and-ball pistol at the creature and fired; both shots merely sinking into the beast’s flesh but doing no real damage. The wanderer searched through the brush to find another one of the pack-hunters, and finding none, he felt it best to keep looking with his weapon readied. The original attacker, however, charged the frontiersman and again, he narrowly escaped the slashing claws and gnashing teeth with his life. The creature had knocked the adventurer down and was preparing to use the opportunity to disembowel him where he lay.

That plan did not come to fruition as both tomahawks hit the monster, one barely scratching it, the other slashing its throat to its spine. Blood showered the frontiersman and he never stopped in his assault, not even when the 300 pound beast fell on him. The adventurer, used to hunting the biggest game on the continents of the outer world, kept a keen eye out for more raptors; they had been told they hunt in packs. His keen eyes caught the beast lying in wait and without a second thought, he leveled his rifle and put a shot right through the beast’s eye. After taking a careful stock of the surroundings as well as a few souvenirs from their kills, they kept moving along the ancient road to Kraelkakor.

As the sun started to fade into the jungle, they came upon a valley littered with small temple ruins. In the center of the valley was the wrecked hulk of an airship that looked as if it had exploded in mid air. All of the trees surrounding the ruins has been shattered and blown down by the force of the explosion in a radius of 100 yards. As the three of them examined the area, the keen eyes of the gentleman adventurer failed to disappoint him again. He spied two men, shaved bald, wearing long leather trench coats, moving in and out of the wreckage of the Nova. The man from 1807 and the man from 1875 started shooting through the sundered jungle and the man from 1930 shouldered his weapon, taking time to aim.

The two men moving in and out of the Nova, members of the Cult of the Machine, unslung two rifles of their own. By the time they were shouldered and pointed, one of them had already fallen to Jeffrey’s shot. The other two adventurers continued racing for the remaining cultist as he let a shot fire toward the frontiersman, missing him by a narrow margin. The next instant, the frontiersman was ready to loose a tomahawk, the cowboy had pulled his dragoon, and the adventurer has lined up his next shot; the adventurer had the faster trigger finger. The last of the cultists fell like a sack of hammers.

It is here that the intrepid adventurers took a break, taking stock of their situation, and preparing to check out the sundered Nova.
_________________
Kevin Rohan, Content Director
www.silvergryphongames.com

Become a fan on Facebook: www.facebook.com/Silvergryphongames

Current WIP: Wellstone City Chronicles, Puppets, and One-liners

[Dave.B]

i'm the cowboy.

having fun. hope we get to play this coming weekend.


Dave
_________________
David Baymiller


http://theosrlibrary.blogspot.com/

[Dave.B]

c'mon kevin!
post the rest!

we want to show the guys how my two fisted cowboy couldn't kill s@@t with my pistols (terrible terrible damage rolls) til i got p@ssed and used the shotgun!


_________________
David Baymiller


http://theosrlibrary.blogspot.com/

[Takeda]

Too bad this thread didn't live long and prosper ... looked like fun!
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Dean: "Ya' know she could be faking."
Sam: "Yeah, what do you wanna do, poke her with a stick?"
[Dean nods]
Sam: "Dude, you're not gonna poke her with a stick?"
Supernatural Quotes

[Rohan]

Takeda, worry not...this will be my campaign for the next year....with more secret societies, some that are not-so-secret, more creatures, and more airships! Also, turbine-powered sharkpedos for aerial combat!
_________________
Kevin Rohan, Content Director
www.silvergryphongames.com

Become a fan on Facebook: www.facebook.com/Silvergryphongames

Current WIP: Wellstone City Chronicles, Puppets, and One-liners

[Takeda]

[MagusRogue]

*waiting with bated breath*
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Freelancer and Proofreader (check me out in the Noir books!)
Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaand this rant is over.

[Rohan]

I'll be leaving updates on the play log as we resume!
_________________
Kevin Rohan, Content Director
www.silvergryphongames.com

Become a fan on Facebook: www.facebook.com/Silvergryphongames

Current WIP: Wellstone City Chronicles, Puppets, and One-liners