Continued from here.
Once The Sting emerged in The Zone polar space, F-Mouse prepared for her first mission. Near the location Sting selected to dock she could see (D6=)6 shuttle slipstreams ready to take her to the surface. She decided to test them in order they are, so she selected first from her left.
Shuttle slipstream 1
What I see: Fingerprint, Well, Horned helmet (RSC).
After shuttle landed, F-Mouse noticed a garden labyrinth, with well in the middle. Labyrinth walls were not at all high, and she could jump over them, but they were made from some really thorny plant.
Create situation aspect - Path through labyrinth. Create advantage action with difficulty 2, using Recon (1). Roll -1 (+ - - _), fail BUT: Building + Fight (RSC).
F-Mouse could not detect a pattern through the maze, but she noticed that thorns react to insects that come close to them, and even fight each others if they start growing too close. Seems that plants will attack any intruder who enters the labyrinth, and F-Mouse was not happy about this. She wanted to investigate that well. So, she decided to risk pulling through that maze.
For this I used contest rules, where F-Mouse used overcome action (Agile 1) and thorns tried attack action (Profession: thorn plant 2). F-Mouse rolled 0, plant -1, resulting in tie. Plant gets a boost - blocked passage. Also, according to contest rules, something strange happens: Alarm clock waking up somebody, Monster from the bushes (RSC).
Thorn wall moved, and blocked the entrance into the maze. F-Mouse looked across the plants and noticed a human figure standing up by the well, stretching as just awakened from long sleep.
It seems that F-Mouse waked up one of the ancient inhabitants of the system!
In this moment I decided to compel to the system aspect "We are still here" to make a complication and take a fate point (pool rises to 6). What will the newly awaken men do? Whip, Knock-knock (RSC).
Zone immortal took his whip to chase away the trespasser.
Locals in the zone all have skill Profession: Zone immortal 7. Since he is using a whip across two combat zones, so out of the normal range, he gets -2 accuracy penalty, bringing him to 5. F-Mouse uses Agility 1 to evade, adding armor from skin vest (defense 3) to a total of 4. Zoner rolls -1, F-Mouse +1. F-mouse wins ans rolls away to safety.
Even though men was rather far, whip crack was dangerously close. Close enough for F-Mouse to get the message. She turned and made a running start towards the shuttle. She may be returning from her first mission empty handed, but she met Zone immortal and lived to tell the tail - more than many stalkers could say.
Back on the Sting.
I made a maintenance roll to see if I can afford a space in a ship after coming empty-handed. Zone is a R4 system, so I need to roll against difficulty of 4 using wealth 0. I rolled 0 (+ - _ _), and tagged "Hitchhiking through galaxy" (one Fate point used, 5 left) aspect for -2 shifts as final result. I marked second box on wealth stress track.
Returning empty handed made F-Mouse worry about her financials. If she does not bring something to captain, he might throw her out from the ship. Of course, she could always offer him to maintain the ship drive during the return trip, but she still felt uneasy about her first result.
Shuttle slipstream 2
What I see: Volcano, Cactus, Dwarf miner (RSC).
After good night sleep, F-Mouse took second slipstream shuttle. It landed at the feet of heat radiating mountain. Some thorny plants she knew from the day before grew here and there on the mountain sides, so she made a mental note to avoid that areas if possible. Mountain seemed to be hollow, and holes that resembled mine entrances were scattered everywhere on the slopes.
Create situation aspect - safe corridor. Create advantage action with difficulty 2, using Recon (1). Roll +2 (+ + _ _), success AND this is the corridor that leads to some kind of treasure.
Create situation aspect - unopposed road to the tool-room. Create
advantage action with difficulty 4, using Operator: mechanical (5). Roll +1 (+ + - _), success BUT: Pill, Footprint (RSC).
F-Mouse selected one mine entrance where the heat was not so distinctive, and descended into the mountain. She felt better immediately, leaving open spaces for the safety of the corridors. This place reminded her of her beloved ship tunnels. She knew spaces like this, such corridors usually ended with the tool-room or storehouse. There should be no dangers this way, she thought. Tool-rooms are never locked or protected. Nobody likes to work, so if you took the trouble to come here and take a tool, you probably need it and you are also authorized to do it.
She was right. Corridor took her to the mining tools storage. Unfortunately, it was not in good condition. Earthquake or some similar event moved all tools from their places and piled them in one big iron mountain. F-Mouse tried to pull some good looking peaces of equipment, but she disturbed equilibrium and everything collapsed on her.
F-Mouse is under attack from falling tools, accuracy 4, penetration 2, damage 2. She defends with her alertness 2 helped by snakeskin vest 3-2=1 for total of 3. F-Mouse rolls -4, debris rolls +3 for a total of 8 shifts! I decided to use Snakeskin vest aspect (4 Fate points left) to make a re-roll. Second roll is +2 so better. Total result is 2 shifts victory for debris. I mark first two stress boxes on both Health and Composure.
Our hero was alert, she have seen falling parts and tried to react and step back from the main impact of the falling metal but failed, and the mountain fell directly on her back. All she could do is to haggle and hope that her elastic snakeskin vest will deflect the metal parts.
Dust settled. broken equipment was laying all around our hero. She could feel the bruisers all over her body, but nothing was broken. Snake's skin did it's job.
F-Mouse took a short rest and then started looking around for some still functional peace of equipment.
Overcome action with difficulty 5 using Operator: mechanical (5). Roll +1 (+ _ _ _), success AND she finds two good tools.
Soon F-Mouse detected not one, but two operational peaces of mining equipment. One was automatic drill worth 3 cost shifts and another one a precise hand drill used to remove precious stones from their rock beads, 2 cost shifts worth. She put the small drill into pocket, but the big one looked cumbersome.
Overcome action with difficulty 1 using Strength (0). Roll +2 (+ + _ _), success AND she didn't even get tired doing this.
But it only looked that way. It was superior peace of technology made by advanced race of humans - and it was actually rather easy to carry.
Back on the Sting.
F-Mouse give the big drill to the ship captain. This eased her mind, for it was enough to pay her stay on the Sting for the moment. Captain also informed F-Mouse that the Sting will stay in Zone for 4 more days, before moving to Outpost. This was good, she had time to run one or two more surface missions and maybe find something that can be used in one of her homelands.
Big drill was sold for 2 wealth shifts, enough to clear wealth stress track. Since captain got something, I will not perform maintenance check for next 4 days, but I will see if the captain will have some request once they return to Outpost - probably through social mini game.
To be continued....
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