Torg update – Session of 1 October 2009

Ren is a very, very upset kitten right now.  But no one gets to see her cry.

Here we were after last week, thinking that everything was fine, we’d killed the Hunter and he couldn’t hurt us anymore.  We all walked in thinking that all that had to be resolved in the facility was Grace getting Rosebud (the Wraith calls it “Void” — I think I like “Rosebud” better) out of the weird science machine that was masking its presence and then we could leave.  Sufficient to say, we were more than a little bit wrong there.

The Hunter decided it was going to take some of us with it to the grave and quite literally exploded.  Most of us dodged the worst of the blast, but things very quickly went from bad to worse.  The Hunter had decided it was going to take out one of the tanks with it–a tank full of industrial acid.  Most of the others had dodged away from it.  Ren had the misfortune of dodging toward it.  And trying to dodge falling acid.  And getting shoulder-checked out of the way.

By the time she turned around, the only thing she could see where Grant must have been was a very large hole in the ground.

She froze up.  I’m not sure anyone realized she completely froze up, but that’s pretty much what happened.  Christian and Mable jumped down the hole to look for (whatever was left of) him.  By the time they managed to get a little ways away from the hole, Ren managed to recollect herself enough to shine her flashlight down, trying to give them a little more light.

Christian found Grant, but didn’t actually see what had happened to him.  Just a figure, heard a voice that sounded awful telling him to stay back.  Grant was scribbling something on some paper.  Then he looked up toward Christian.

 Grant: “Tell them both I’m sorry.”

And then he ran.  Christian and Mable tried to find him, to no avail.  Ren is, in a word, devastated.  But at least he’s still alive.

About that time, before we got Christian and Mable out of the hole, DeSoto comes back carrying Mei, who is quite literally chewing on his cyberarm.  Ren starts muttering a few choice words and gives Mei some happy drugs (mostly a sedative so she stops gnawing on Fred).

While all of this is going on, we can all feel something, and that something is Void interrogating Grace and trying to figure out what’s what.  Grace ends up getting at least part of Void/Rosebud back for long enough to prove to it that her (and our) intentions are honorable.

We pull Christian and Mable out of the hole.  Christian tells Fred and Ren what Grant said, since the message was for the two of them.  And then they tell us about the paper.  There’s a single word written on it.

Legacy.

None of us are sure what it means. Mable has it. Ren might take it from her–Ren doesn’t have anything of Grant. She never did.  Of course, she might not.  She might quietly nurse the hurt and the hope that he’s okay, somehow, somewhere, and that he’ll come back.

Ren ended up punching DeSoto in the chest (he was the closest thing to punch) in frustration and pain.  He invited her to keep doing it if it helped.  But in turning toward Fred, Ren spotted something else that could be a good vent for her wrath.

The Wraith.

The grabs him by his collar and stares at him and starts yelling.  No one interferes in her screaming, though several want to.

Ren: How is it that bad things like that happen to good people, but you’re still here?  Why?  Why?

It was all pretty downhill from there.  Ren ended up with a gun to his head but couldn’t pull the trigger.  She did the Tom Hanks Twitch (from A League of Their Own — I’ll have to find a clip of it on YouTube) and backed off.

And then we started to make our way out of the facility.  When we’re all tramping out the door, we hear something behind us.  Mei goes running back in with weapons out while Christian is yelling for the squishie folk to get the hell out (which we do; there’s a comical image in my head of Ren, Grace, and Mable just kind of standing outside the door to the facility looking at each other funny).  And what does Mei turn her weapons on?  A cowering diplomat decked out in North Face who’s been looking for us–for Amaeren Colby (who isn’t a sergeant, dammit, she’s a Captain, get it right!) because she was connected to Amarant (why he was looking for Amarant, we’ve reallynot quite gotten a good answer on).  Ren’s mask of leadership goes back on and she’s in command of herself, at least for the moment.  We take the guy along (Alexander; he says he was working at one of the Italian embassies but Ren is definately suspecting otherwise, given the sniper rifle he has in his possession) and head to where Wraith stashed some vehicles–it’s an interesting question, is he on our side or is he not?  What game is he playing?

He said he made a promise to Mariah, a promise he kept.  That’s why he’s doing what he’s doing.  And he’s afraid of her.  Afraid of whatever she’s fragmented into.  That much is almost certain.

So we pick up a pair of armored vehicles and then we turn back south again to pick up some of Xander’s gear from his Volvo that he left parked somewhere.  Mable cannibalized part of it for components for a new helmet for Mei.  Mei is looking forward to having a new helmet.

We camped for the night shy of the storm front between Core Earth and Tharkold.  We relaxed for a little while–Ren went off and had a good cry in private, Christian and Fred sparred a little, Mable worked on the helmet.  Everyone that night except for Mei had disturbing, twisted, frightening dreams (which David left up to our imaginations–Ren’s were definately about Grant and Bad Things, Christian’s were about being powerless to stop Bad Things from happening to his children, ect ect).  Ren’s pretty sure that someone aimed that at the group, but she’s not sure who, or how.  It wasn’t normal for that sort of thing to happen near a storm front–realities don’t reach beyond their boundaries like that.  At least, not that she knows of.

In the morning, we passed through the storm front and into Tharkold.  And that’s where we left it for the evening.  Ren has plans to talk to Fred about some things–the sort of things that Grant could never tell her, but maybe Fred knows something.  And maybe between the two of them they can figure out what “legacy” means.

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