So the situation looks pretty grim for The Power, with no one to blame but himself. Yet it's actually even more dire then it first appears.
Allow me to explain...
When Corey's PC, the hard light armored archer named Ballistix, determines that the train rocketing North East is not only moving at incredible speed but hasn't made any of it's scheduled stops, he suggests the escaped super criminals from the Stronghold prison facility might be on board and using this as getaway plan. Since The Power is on that train and a few of the villains are pretty serious customers, he asks for back up.
Here's the kicker...The last three sessions have occurred over a period of no more than 10-12 hours in game time. During that time the PCs and many major NPCs have battled a number of villains, tried to out hack a genocidal artificial intelligence and have saved the international space station in Earth orbit and the dozen astronauts contained therein. Following that was a 1 to 2 hour break to get food, coffee, etc., a short debriefing meeting and then the personal meetings that resulted in The Power being let go.
So pretty much every hero capable of fighting the escapees is either asleep or is really low on Endurance. Some are also otherwise occupied, like the NPCs Microcosm (who went to NASA Mission Control to drop off the astronauts) and The Ultramarine (who flew back to England with Silver Sun tagging along).
Knowing his options are limited, S.I.M.O.N. (Third-in-command NPC back at the base) requests Silver Sun return to the states and asks Arcane (Lee) and Professor N (Ray) to stop what they're working on and assist.
So heading out to stop the villains and save The Power are...
Arcane - At about 60% Full Capacity
Ballistix - 100% Full Capacity
Professor N - Pretty much Full Capacity
Silver Sun - At about 50% Full Capacity.
Fingers are duly crossed.
***
Ballistix uses a power rarely encountered among superhumans called 'Reason' and decides to flip a manual emergency brake on the train track. Just in case this doesn't work he goes about 100 to 200 yards ahead of the brake and physically damages the track. "No matter what, this train is stopping", he tells me.
Unfortunately, one of the criminals on the train is 'The Grey Ghost', a villain with devices that can make himself, others or objects intangible to varying degrees. Attaching one of his gadgets to the Kinetic/Interial device that is speeding up the train, he is able to make the train pass through the brake stop.
That's when all heck breaks loose.
Silver Sun, whose powers are partially mystical in a weird science/cosmic/technomagic kind of way, is able to hit the ghostly train and rips open the roof of the engine car to get at the bad guys. He also fires superheated blasts at the wheels and track, hoping to melt the train into a stop.
Professor N waits for his moment and then slips onto the train with his 2D form, which makes him resemble a molecule thin sheet of paper. He gets into the front car where three of the villains and the unconscious Power are (the other three villains are searching the train in case The Power wasn't alone). He then returns to normal, grabs the accelerating/phasing machinery attached to the train engine and teleports it and himself away.
The train, now normal although partially fused to the track and the ground due to damage from Silver Sun's heat blasts and it's desolid/suddenly solid nature, finally strikes the part of the rails Ballistix had bent.
Derailing spectacularly, the train and it's occupants go flying. Think Tank ends up spinning through the air like a frisbee. Gigaton activates his force field and survives pretty much unharmed. Grey Ghost 'ghosts' through the wreckage and makes it out OK but frazzled. Mako doesn't do so hot. He ends up a mess, skidding across the ground at high speed. The last member of the group, the super strong Ogre, manages to crawl out and run for it with not much more then bumps and bruises.
Oh wait, there was one more...The Outsider. Originally disguised as a train worker, he attempts to escape by transforming into a crow and flying away. He is tagged by one of Ballistix's light arrows and taken down.
Now a battle ensues with those villains that remain standing...well...actually only Gigaton. Grey Ghost is kissing the ground, happy to be alive and Think Tank seems to either be down for the count or playing possum.
Ballistix takes a shot at Gigaton and misses. Gigaton takes at shot a Silver Sun who, I forgot to mention, taunted the Big 'G' to come after him. The blast from Gigaton probably would've put a mighty large hurtin' on ol' Silver Sun, had Arcane not used his Strong/Weak Nuclear Forces Manipulation powers to dissipate the attack down to a mere 2D6 Energy Blast. Very sweet.
In the end it was Silver Sun who took out Gigaton in a most satisfying way. Switching to X-Rays and turning invisible, Silver Sun ran up to Grey Ghost while Gigaton was distracted. He grabbed one of Grey Ghost's 'Ghost Bomb' grenades and made the ground around Gigaton intangible, causing Gigaton to fall into the Earth below his feet. Gigaton can fly and so he got himself out, flew over to Grey Ghost and grabbed him, ready to punch him in the face. "What's the big idea you bastard?"
Just as Grey Ghost says it wasn't him, Silver Sun puts his hand up to within an inch of Gigaton's face (Silver Sun is invisible if you recall) and lets the G-man have it with a full force, dump everything he's got into it blast. Threw the guy 65 feet through one of the wrecked train cars. Awesome.
Now at some point in the ruckus The Power woke up but was still down to practically nothing power wise. He tries to push himself, knowing it may knock him out again, to plant a suggestion in Think Tank's mind. He compels Think Tank to try and access the Mechanon AI program zipping around Earth orbit or contact someone who could do this for him (see last post for the, um, 'specifics' of his plan).
Bad news, it works but it's more like Mechanon discovers Think Tank trying to jack his program and he takes over some satellites and beams himself into Think Tank.
Good news, the heroes detect Mechanon's specific carrier wave (neutrinos are the key component) and use a trick of the rapidly tiring Silver Sun to deflect the signal. Mechanon's AI is sent packing back up into space while the heroes, pretty much running on empty at this point, capture all the villains. When a few of them go after the left over guy Ogre, the team uses bluff and intimidation to convince him to surrender. After all, they beat up Gigaton and they aren't even tired (wink, wink - since in truth they're all freakin' exhausted).
The very last thing to happen was The Outsider revealed that he'd been hired to break these guys out and take them to a secret meeting with their new employer. They are scheduled to meet at Think Tank's old base in...holy crap! About 4 hours!
No rest for the weary...
AD
Barking Alien
Allow me to explain...
When Corey's PC, the hard light armored archer named Ballistix, determines that the train rocketing North East is not only moving at incredible speed but hasn't made any of it's scheduled stops, he suggests the escaped super criminals from the Stronghold prison facility might be on board and using this as getaway plan. Since The Power is on that train and a few of the villains are pretty serious customers, he asks for back up.
Here's the kicker...The last three sessions have occurred over a period of no more than 10-12 hours in game time. During that time the PCs and many major NPCs have battled a number of villains, tried to out hack a genocidal artificial intelligence and have saved the international space station in Earth orbit and the dozen astronauts contained therein. Following that was a 1 to 2 hour break to get food, coffee, etc., a short debriefing meeting and then the personal meetings that resulted in The Power being let go.
So pretty much every hero capable of fighting the escapees is either asleep or is really low on Endurance. Some are also otherwise occupied, like the NPCs Microcosm (who went to NASA Mission Control to drop off the astronauts) and The Ultramarine (who flew back to England with Silver Sun tagging along).
Knowing his options are limited, S.I.M.O.N. (Third-in-command NPC back at the base) requests Silver Sun return to the states and asks Arcane (Lee) and Professor N (Ray) to stop what they're working on and assist.
So heading out to stop the villains and save The Power are...
Arcane - At about 60% Full Capacity
Ballistix - 100% Full Capacity
Professor N - Pretty much Full Capacity
Silver Sun - At about 50% Full Capacity.
Fingers are duly crossed.
***
Ballistix uses a power rarely encountered among superhumans called 'Reason' and decides to flip a manual emergency brake on the train track. Just in case this doesn't work he goes about 100 to 200 yards ahead of the brake and physically damages the track. "No matter what, this train is stopping", he tells me.
Unfortunately, one of the criminals on the train is 'The Grey Ghost', a villain with devices that can make himself, others or objects intangible to varying degrees. Attaching one of his gadgets to the Kinetic/Interial device that is speeding up the train, he is able to make the train pass through the brake stop.
That's when all heck breaks loose.
Silver Sun, whose powers are partially mystical in a weird science/cosmic/technomagic kind of way, is able to hit the ghostly train and rips open the roof of the engine car to get at the bad guys. He also fires superheated blasts at the wheels and track, hoping to melt the train into a stop.
Professor N waits for his moment and then slips onto the train with his 2D form, which makes him resemble a molecule thin sheet of paper. He gets into the front car where three of the villains and the unconscious Power are (the other three villains are searching the train in case The Power wasn't alone). He then returns to normal, grabs the accelerating/phasing machinery attached to the train engine and teleports it and himself away.
The train, now normal although partially fused to the track and the ground due to damage from Silver Sun's heat blasts and it's desolid/suddenly solid nature, finally strikes the part of the rails Ballistix had bent.
Derailing spectacularly, the train and it's occupants go flying. Think Tank ends up spinning through the air like a frisbee. Gigaton activates his force field and survives pretty much unharmed. Grey Ghost 'ghosts' through the wreckage and makes it out OK but frazzled. Mako doesn't do so hot. He ends up a mess, skidding across the ground at high speed. The last member of the group, the super strong Ogre, manages to crawl out and run for it with not much more then bumps and bruises.
Oh wait, there was one more...The Outsider. Originally disguised as a train worker, he attempts to escape by transforming into a crow and flying away. He is tagged by one of Ballistix's light arrows and taken down.
Now a battle ensues with those villains that remain standing...well...actually only Gigaton. Grey Ghost is kissing the ground, happy to be alive and Think Tank seems to either be down for the count or playing possum.
Ballistix takes a shot at Gigaton and misses. Gigaton takes at shot a Silver Sun who, I forgot to mention, taunted the Big 'G' to come after him. The blast from Gigaton probably would've put a mighty large hurtin' on ol' Silver Sun, had Arcane not used his Strong/Weak Nuclear Forces Manipulation powers to dissipate the attack down to a mere 2D6 Energy Blast. Very sweet.
In the end it was Silver Sun who took out Gigaton in a most satisfying way. Switching to X-Rays and turning invisible, Silver Sun ran up to Grey Ghost while Gigaton was distracted. He grabbed one of Grey Ghost's 'Ghost Bomb' grenades and made the ground around Gigaton intangible, causing Gigaton to fall into the Earth below his feet. Gigaton can fly and so he got himself out, flew over to Grey Ghost and grabbed him, ready to punch him in the face. "What's the big idea you bastard?"
Just as Grey Ghost says it wasn't him, Silver Sun puts his hand up to within an inch of Gigaton's face (Silver Sun is invisible if you recall) and lets the G-man have it with a full force, dump everything he's got into it blast. Threw the guy 65 feet through one of the wrecked train cars. Awesome.
Now at some point in the ruckus The Power woke up but was still down to practically nothing power wise. He tries to push himself, knowing it may knock him out again, to plant a suggestion in Think Tank's mind. He compels Think Tank to try and access the Mechanon AI program zipping around Earth orbit or contact someone who could do this for him (see last post for the, um, 'specifics' of his plan).
Bad news, it works but it's more like Mechanon discovers Think Tank trying to jack his program and he takes over some satellites and beams himself into Think Tank.
Good news, the heroes detect Mechanon's specific carrier wave (neutrinos are the key component) and use a trick of the rapidly tiring Silver Sun to deflect the signal. Mechanon's AI is sent packing back up into space while the heroes, pretty much running on empty at this point, capture all the villains. When a few of them go after the left over guy Ogre, the team uses bluff and intimidation to convince him to surrender. After all, they beat up Gigaton and they aren't even tired (wink, wink - since in truth they're all freakin' exhausted).
The very last thing to happen was The Outsider revealed that he'd been hired to break these guys out and take them to a secret meeting with their new employer. They are scheduled to meet at Think Tank's old base in...holy crap! About 4 hours!
No rest for the weary...
AD
Barking Alien
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