[Side Quest: Huey and 9s]
After the crew divided up the various tasks, Huey and 9s (9 of 12 decided this was an acceptable nickname) decided to take the task of returning one of the children they rescued to his father. The boy explained that his father was one of the God Keepers and the boy promised him safe passage into his fathers domain.
Huey and 9s decided it would be best to leave as soon as possible because 9s was adamant that they should conduct all of their business during the day and should not be out and about at night. This is due to the fact that places like these change when the sun goes down.
The boy explained that he will lead Huey and 9s from the south side to the northern center area in a round about way avoiding the major tracks of the central city. As they left the safety of their Rail Tank they almost immediately come across a very busy bar by the name of the Lucky Rail. In a quick whispered conversation Huey and 9s decide it will be best to avoid any distractions and get the boy back as fast as possible. As they continued to push forward doing their best to avoid any contact with the locals and making sure the boy stays close to them they pass a place called The Clotted Dream and standing out front was a female bovine mutant with makeup, dressed in lingerie with her utters hanging out, and she quickly singled out Huey as we passed by. The female bovine smiled largely at Huey and made man suggestive remarks and how if he ever wants some loving they will change his life to come back. Huey blushed and quickened his past as 9s made asked, "I think she likes you, we should come back later", and Huey mumbled something that 9s could not quite make out.
They traveled on and passed a blacksmith shop called Tarley's Vegan Bloodshiites with an armadillo mutant hard at work at the forge and 9s made a mental note about some of the shields for sale. During their tour of the city, 9s would point out various things to Ren or react to things she pointed out and would explain various things to her. Huey ignored these interactions and the boy never said a word about them. They quickly came across an open air market with various stalls, tents, and lots of food vendors. Huey drooled as he passed various stalls with cooking meat and 9s promised Ren on the way back he would get he something.
As the crew rounded the corner heading back in a southern direction they passed a very stalked modern weapon shop called Max Death the looked like it had all kinds of firearms and other oddities in it. The person standing on the sales desk appeared to be a large human dressed in desert camouflage and Huey looked at 9s and said we definitely have to do some shopping there. This was the first time Huey saw 9s fully smile (outside of the half smile 9s has when he is talking to Ren) and Huey considered the full smile psychotically horrifying. After more time, they come to a store called The Stinky Pillage that is full of junk - a sight that can only be described as a post apocalyptic thrift store from hell. The boy leads Huey and 9s into this store and around a piles of junk and down various isles to the back where the boy opens up a secret door into what appears to be a rail car heading down into the earth. As soon as they step through the door closes behind them and the boy motions to keep following. They tread slowing with Huey and 9s being on edge and reminding each other to stay frosty. They cross over to the another rail car heading farther down into the earth before it levels out and they come across two guards dressed on gold and white, armed with charged staffs. The guards stiffen up when they see the boy and exclaim, "it is good to have you back".
The boy leads them past the guards and into a natural cave structure. They quickly enter a main area set up with tables that people were eating at and more guards. The guards once again stiffen up and exclaim how happy they are to see the boy alive as the boy leads them into a side corridor that slants upward and then they enter a round room with a table and chairs in the middle, and about six people on their hands and knees praying. These people appear to be praying to a giant metal orb set in the ceiling with various lights flicking through it. Huey asks the boy, "what is that" and the boy simply responds, "God". One of the praying people looks up and notices the boy, jumps up, yells "SON!", and runs to the boy to embrace him. After a long time the man hugging the boy looks up to Huey and 9s with a scowl before the boy explains these people saved him from the Star people and tells his father Huey (as the boy points to Huey) carried him out of the lab himself. The boys father introduces himself as Selonius and becomes jovial and invites them to dinner. Huey is more then happy to agree as 9s sits off to the corner feeding the various vegetables to Ren (The God Keepers are vegetarians) and Selonius (and the other onlookers) is kind enough not to question 9s about his behavior. After sometime Selonius leads them away from the crowd and thanks them again for bringing his son home and asks them if there is anything they can do. 9s says it is a hard expensive world out there and whatever help he can provide would be greatly appreciated. Selonius looks at 9 like he is looking into someones soul and smiles. Selonius Produces a strange circular crystal with circuitry inside of it and hands it to Huey and explains, "this will help keep you and your crew healthy". Selonius then turns to 9s and hands him a very heavy bag of coin and says, "this should help you in your journey". After countless promises from Huey and 9s not to reveal their existence as Selonius hands him a coin with a symbol of an eye within a cog on it and says "whenever you need help from one of our kind, show them this and you will always find friends."
Huey and 9s are lead through a different mage of passages and exit out into the sunlight of Rail City. As they walk towards the tracks they see a rail car surrounded by heavily armed men dressed in black with very crude robots loading packages into the cart. Some of the men take notice of Huey and 9s and Huey quickly acts like he his zipping up his fly and proclaims they he had to much to drink and sorry they had to witness his handy work as 9s just tips his hat towards them as they keep to the edge making sure not to stare at the men in black and what they are doing. One of the men in black grunts, takes a long drag of his smoke, and waves them on. Huey and 9s head north away from the men in black and quickly recognize the area the boy led them through and continue on.
The first building the pass has a strange symbol on it as they stopped to look inside. This quickly attracts the attention of someone proclaiming to be a priest of the Cryrorx and explains that they can show them them the way to the deep freeze and how they will never want to leave. The priestly fellow rambles on about this for sometime before 9s had enough and pulls Huey away by the elbow and Huey says they may swing by later. As soon as they are out of ear shot 9s explains to Huey how he used to work in a Cryo lab freezing and unfreezing people before and for sometime after the bombs fell. Huey was surprised by this knowledge and proclaimed almost to loudly that 9s must be an ancient one.
9s then tells Huey that they should swing by that Max Death shop before it gets dark and so they do. 9s hands the guy a round from is colt .45 and asks if he as more. The owner of the shop tried to sale Huey everything as 9s looks through a giant box of random ammunition and getting frustrated after only finding 3 rounds, flips the guy a gold coin, and says "keep the change".
Huey and 9s leave the shop and pass through the market place as 9s mumbles something about it is getting to dark. As 9s starts arguing with Ren about how he will buy her some meat on a stick tomorrow because they market is closing down a huge explosion from the south side the rocks Rail City. As the rumbles die down, everyone goes back to they business, except for the city guard who start coming out of various buildings and down the walls to head in that direction. Huey finds the person he sees and asks, "What was that explosion?" The stranger responds with, "it is a dangerous land and a dangerous city. Rail city is a sanctuary to some and a coffin to others" as the stranger moves about his business.
Huey and 9s decide that is a good idea ti get back to their tank as quick as possible as the sun is setting and Rail City is becoming darker and dark as it really does not have street lights. As the backtrack they see a young kid with a vest that has a familiar symbol on it pick pocket and gentlemen in robes and vanish into the darkness. Huey and 9s quickly decide it is not their problem as 9s reminds Ren to stay out of sight. Huey and 9s pass the The Clotted Dream and 9s tried to convince Huey he should pay the gal that liked him so a visit, how it would be a good place to hole up, and they he would even pay for Huey's stay. Huey would have not of it and kept on walking.
As they start to near the noisy bar and their Rail Tank a trolly passes them, lighting a young male with a sharp piece of metal trying to break into a door. Huey starts to light his torch and 9s yells about the torch and why it is taking so long. A sharp piece of metal flies over Huey's head and before they realized it the mysterious person shoulders past them and tries to run off in the dark. 9s quickly concentrates on the culprit and hear a yelp of pain as Huey takes after him and tackles the culprit to the ground. Huey rolls him over as 9s positions himself behind him to block ans escape routes. It is apparent that their culprit is in bad shape with a bloody mess of a face. Huey takes out his crystal, presses it to the culprits face as the wounds start to close up as he become more coherent and starts to mumble how he meant nothing by it and did not want to hurt anyone but was just hungry. 9s decides that they have wasted enough time with this and presses a gold into his hands and tells him to run as fast as he can. Huey lets the culprit up and he takes off.
As Huey and 9s get to their Rail Tank they see the half of the South gate is blown open with the door off of its hinges and there is a complete work crew (with a crane and other heavy equipment) in the process of repairs as a large number of the city guard stand in a defensive formation with a large green mutant in the middle of it all overseeing it.
9s quickly checks the tank to drop Ren off and realizes that the rest of their crew is gone as Huey goes of and questions some people at the bar and one of the guards. After Huey barely escapes some suspicion with the guards he returns to the Rail Tank to find 9s tucking in Ren singing a bedtime song as Huey starts to explain the short of it is some asshole took issue with the big green boss and shot a missile at the gate and the asshole was caught and was taken to the death pits. Huey and 9s surmised in was one of their assholes and decides to investigate in the morning when it is safer.
Just another day in Detroit Suck City...
__________________________________________________________________________________
PLAYER THOUGHTS: So, after episode 10 we all decided it would be best to divide and conquer because there was so much everyone want to accomplish in Rail City. Before I even go into the rest of my thoughts, I have to say this was a really fun session. It had almost no dice rolls as it was 99% role play.
The side quest we were on actually ended up getting rescheduled 3 times due to various scheduling conflicts (our side quest was originally scheduled to be first). This strangely worked in out favor as the other players got to due their side quests first which provided various intertwining story lines (which is going to end up in a few parts to each side quest) for us to interact with. A lot of what we accomplished really ended up being because one of us decided to save one of the kids in the cages a few episodes back and we kept a low profile (think this was a big part of our success so far in Rail City). I think the interaction between our characters and the men in black could have went south (and that is what the encounter was meant to do I am sure) but a clutch Nat 20 was rolled in the Charisma area and the men in black did not consider us a threat.
I (playing 9s) would have also burnt the God Keepers to the ground (not out of spite but out of 9s self preservation crusade to destroy knowledge of the old world) if it wasn't for the God Keeps treating 9s like a human and looking at him like a being with a soul.
Once we got back to the rail car and learned (well one hell of an educated guess) that it was our assholes that blew up the fence and ended up in trouble we all laughed and there many snide comments of that figures and worse.
Our lovely GM respond to our series of conspiracy theories about the other members with a shrug and this statement;
"NOT EVERYONE GOT A HEALING CRYSTAL AND A BAG OF GOLD"
