Heading out of the orbit of Pallas, the crew of the Maelstrom Strider set a course for Mars. The mood on the ship was less that of a group of confident spies headed for a covert mission to thwart the scheme of a system wide menace, and more that of a group of people facing down the barrel of a firing squad.
Most of the adventurers felt this was a suicide mission and as they approached the orbit of Mars, that feeling was reinforced when they discovered the plant had significant floating defenses. A large group of assorted ships created a veritable web of patrol around the planet, ensuring that only those who were supposed to be coming and going from the red planet had the opportunity to do so unhindered.
From a good, non-threatening distance, Scott.dos examined the patrol routes along with the information that Seraphina and Zaphod gathered with targeted sensor scans, to determine that approaching the area they needed to land at around 11 PM that night would bring them in contact with the least amount of resistance. Incapable, or unwilling of coming up with a different plan, the adventurers agreed that Scott gave them the best opportunity, with a good exit plan to boot.
Zaphod identified the two RAM medium cruises they were about to approach as the Heat Death and the Adder. When Buzz adjusted the Maelstrom Rider’s course to that of a Martian surface destination, the two ships stopped their patrol and hailed the ship.
As a group, the adventurers discussed what to say to the ships, briefly discussing cashing in their favor from Jared Robak but thought better of it. A lot of ideas were floated, but then after quickly digging through their notes, Zaphod mentioned that quarter marshal Flit Hewitt was someone that Talon frequently ran guns for. Since the RAM ships had made it clear that the Maelstrom Rider was not considered a stolen asset, the adventurers thought it would make sense to pretend to be affiliated with Talon.
Buzz radioed back to the RAM ships that their current business was with Flint and this was not exactly a sanctioned activity, the soldiers on the RAM ship agreed to let them pass, for a price. Doing some quick back of the envelope math, the adventurers decided it was OK to offer the soldiers 25k credits to be paid 10k now and 15k later when the Heat Death provided them safe passage back off the planet.
The Adder fired its engines to continue its patrol route, while the Heat Death traveled to the Maelstrom Rider to board and exchange the promised funds. After a few minutes, the soldiers took a quick count of the money in the case that the adventurers provided them, and then asked the adventurers when they expected to be back. Everyone agreed on two days time at the same time and the RAM soldiers reboarded their craft and cleared the way for the Maelstrom Rider’s descent.
Once past the planetary defenses, Scott.dos showed the group a ring of mountains to land in that would protect their ship and provide them cover while they loaded and unloaded their vehicle.
Once on the surface, Scott.dos gave them some places in the desert to examine. The group was reminded they were here to find and disrupt the operation related to whatever was being researched and built at the asteroid base. The adventurers got into their van and started heading West.
The moon light on mars was not significant and there were dense but sparse clouds leading to large pockets of pitch black in the open desert. As they drove toward the Western feature, they discovered a group of Sand Squids that were herding and predating on a group of smaller wildlife. Alex did his best to avoid the creatures, but as they got close, some of the creatures gave chase to the van.
Alex deftly maneuvered across the dark desert avoiding the subterranean creatures and around 3 AM they found themselves near some very large areas of desert that were completely glassed over. Zaphod and Seraphina dug into all of their collected knowledge and were unable to find a natural reason for this, being much too far away from, and much too limited in scope, to be from volcanic activity, they came up blank. Looking at the angle and the degree of the glassing, Alex determined that this must have been a result of testing from the prototype weapon that was being developed on the asteroid.
Carm was not far from the group and looking around the edges of the glass, where there seemed to be remnants of stone walls, when he discovered something interesting. As he called attention to his find, everyone realized they were in the ruin of a desert runner village that must have been targeted by the laser weapon.
As Carm stood waggling some kind of quiver, a moment of bright moon light revealed two hulking forms in the ruins as well; Carm was flanked by a pair of Desert Apes. Alex drew his guns as quickly as he could, but at that moment some clouds moved between the red planet and Demios causing Alex to fire into the dark at the pair of creatures, one of which grabbed Carm and started to run.
Buzz ran back to the truck to swing it around to get Max and Zaphod into the fight, while Seraphina ran toward the creatures where Alex stood blasting at them with little effect; the creatures simply had hides too tough and bladed arms too large to be affected by the blasts from Alex’s laser pistols, worse, Alex blasted it became obvious there were not just two Apes, but eight.
Buzz arrived with the car and Zaphod and Max jumped out. Max took a shot and also found the laser was simply not strong enough to hurt the creatures, while Zahod ran in with his sword to try and take the creature that had moved to attack Alex at the knee.
As the chaos continued, Carm was being carried away and Seraphina ran right into the clearing and making herself appear as large as possible, screamed a primal challenge to the Apes. Four of the Apes just started running, three of them stopped in their tracks, including the one holding Carm, who dropped him to the ground, and looked Seraphina in the eye. The Final Ape became overly incensed and began to pound its chest and run in circles. Buzz took aim and shot the angry ape to death, while the other three fled when Seraphina indicated they should do so.
After a few brief minutes, the fight was over and Seraphina was equal parts scolding and consoling Carm. Everyone got back into the van and then the group headed North to check out another glass feature in the desert.
Around 7 AM they were in daylight again, and the group examined the glass feature, discovering that it was also from massive laser fire. Spending a few minutes doing math and checking the size of the laser glassed area, the adventurers determined a potential place for the base that the laser could be mounted.
Heading a bit West, their suspicions about where the base was located were confirmed. As the adventurers approached the large base, Zaphod noticed a number of large drop ships circling the desert above, like they were looking for or preparing for something.
When they were within visual distance of the base, the adventurers attempted to hail the base on the emergency channel. In response, what appeared to be a targeting light began to illuminate the van, prompting Alex to take the crew north to hide in the cover of the mountains.
Shortly after they stopped and hid, one of the large ships dropped a full assault squad into the desert to try and find the adventurers. After an hour of careful examination, the assault squad was recovered and RAM moved on.
Understanding now that this place was ultra top secret, Zaphod argued they should leave and get reinforcements, but the rest of the adventurers were quick to point out that they had at least another day and a half before they had a safe exit route. While the group argued about what to do next, Alex lead a reconnaissance mission through the mountains to get to the edge of the base and get a good look at it.
The base was massive, with what appeared to be a large weapon mounted in the middle of it. There was a 15 foot wall around the entire facility with no visible entrances, but as they watched, more than one ship landed and took off from the middle of it. Soldiers patrol the top of the wall and there were large weapons mounted there; it was obvious that RAM had a shoot first ask questions later approach to defending the knowledge of the existence of this facility.
As the adventurers watched the base operations, Max scanned the communication channels and discovered the RAM channel, over hearing chatter that would indicate five assault squads were being deployed to eliminate the Desert Runner village in the East.
Feeling like they had a responsibility to alert the Desert runner village in the East, and thinking they may find some help there, the group decided to trek back that way. As they drove, they inspected the quiver of bolts that Carm discovered, finding they belonged to a desert runner cross bow, and Alex identified them as armor piercing bolts.
A few hours later, and a good amount of time before the scheduled RAM assault, the group arrived at the door to the village around 3 PM. As the van approached, a desert runner appeared from the gate and waved the adventurers in.
Once inside the stone walls of the village, they discovered they were in a narrow stone walled alley, with a RAM assault robot sitting in the middle of it. A pair of serious looking Desert Runners stood demanding to know who the adventurers were and why they were here.
The adventurers explained they were from Earth and were here to help stop RAM from destroying this village. The Desert runner that was speaking introduced himself as Tuscan and argued that the group could be lying. Alex pointed out they had nothing to gain from being untruthful, but Tuscan was not immediately trusting. A female Desert runner demanded that the quiver be tossed to them, and so Max threw the bolts past the RAM robot into the middle of the alley.
The desert runners seemed ready to attack, and the adventurers were ready to defend. Who knows how it will end.
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