The Glitterbois Play Rifts 13: Look Who's Gorshkovving!

Breakfast Puppies.

This podcast contains adult language and content and is meant for mature audiences. Listener discretion is advised.

This is Troy. This is Troy. And we're going to have so much fun. You're listening, glitter boys. Right, let's go.

Riley o' Shea is running through a forest. All around him are trees and darkness. He has no sense of where he's going or why. But he hears something. It's a distant sound. It's metal striking metal. It's steady and it means something, but he doesn't know what. He heads towards it, and it grows louder. Light begins to grow as well. It's this blue light just starting to force its way through the trees. And suddenly you emerge from those trees. Or maybe they just disappear, you're not sure, but they're gone. And there's a wall in front of you, a huge wall of blue light that some might call a ley line. It's more massive than any ley line you can imagine. It runs entirely from your left to your right, horizon to horizon, reaching up to the stars themselves. You know, innately, that it runs. The entirety of the earth, the universe, the everything. Silhouetted in this light is the outline of a man. Tall, noble, hammering metal on an animal. Bright blue electricity sparks with each hammer blow. You can smell ozone. It's all you can smell. But soon enough, there's a continuous light of lightning between this hammer and the anvil. The lightning is coruscating out, and you realize you were wrong about the leyline. It's not a leyline. It's a massive, continuous, eternal bolt of lightning. And the man looks at you, looks at Riley. In his eyes, there's fire instead of pupils. What does Riley do?

Riley is a combination of terrified, confused, and weirded out. So he does what you need to do at this sort of situation. He pulls out a pack of cigarettes. He pulls one out and goes, got a light?

He looks at you and he smirks. He says, I always bring fire. And he snaps his fingers. The cigarette bursts into flame. And Riley bursts out of this vision dream. And you are jostled because you're driving the Mountaineer down the road to New Laszlo. You don't remember the last hundred miles. And sitting right next to you in the passenger seat is Troy. And he's talking about something.

And I thought. I thought it was worth it, up until the tentacles. The way she looked at me reminded me you remember? But just. I wasn't ready for a tentacle. I thought I was ready for everything. I thought it was past. That kind of weird.

Concerns just don't date chicks oriented Japanimation man.

Yeah, same thing with Catherine. But she didn't actually have the tentacles this lady did. I needed a relaxing night, Riley. God, I needed a relaxing night.

You went out and went drinking with Henry and then picked up a girl. Girl in a bar in New Laszlo. This is like a risk that it can happen.

I didn't. Until the skirt came up. I didn't know. I. I don't know.

Did you complete the mission, son. That's what matters.

I got her number, I think. Kind of thing. Maybe I think I paid for some drinks.

It's the number that goes to an apart in Atlantis.

Where the hell are we? I look out the window, like realizing I've been talking and I have no idea where we are.

Roughly. Michigan Fair.

So Troy looks out the window and some of it does seem familiar because you've driven this way before.

Rough Michigan.

Many. Well, not many. About, let's see, a month ago you were driving this way. After you. After all of you first left that hillside where you arrived in Rifts and drove into New Laszlo. Down the road you can see these great men here, these huge stones. You remember these? They're leaning towards one another, forming a crude arch covered in magical runes. This is the. Essentially the gate into New Laszlo. Beyond it are orchards and tilled fields and the rising skyline of the city. And there's also something you haven't seen before. There are about two dozen figures, cloaked and hooded, standing in a line outside this archway, this gate in your path. Their robes are ruby and jade. And as the Mountaineer approaches without Riley doing anything, the vehicle begins to slow as if it's moving through mud. And the leader raises a hand to signal you to stop.

I kind of slew off the road to stop, just because since Bronson's behind me in the road hammer, I still don't entirely trust his braking. If someone's gonna plow through the jade robed guys, you know, let the dog do it.

Yeah, yeah. You pull off the road. You see the road hammer come up beside you, very slowly slowing down. It is actually levitating off the road. The wheels are still spinning and a number of the wizards are approaching. You see Bronson arguing furiously with Mr. Cat in the cab. And then one of these members of the warding order, the defenders of New Laszlo, walk around and raises their hood. And it is a person that you remember. It is jovial Rat.

Oh, jovial.

How you doing? I shout from the Mountaineer window.

A very fine day, all of you fine fellows. I don't suppose you have the intention of bringing into the boundaries of New Laszlo a literal truckload of stolen Coalition technology, easily tracked due to the multiplicitous homing beacons embedded into said hardware. Any Coalition officer worth the wherewithal in Gall could locate.

Huh? Yeah, that was the general idea, all right. I mean, minus the whole thing about considering the frequent. The whole tracker thing.

Yeah.

Yes. Should you remove those, you would be most welcome, New Laszlo. Till then, we shall have to ask you to remain outside the city's environs.

Oh, God damn it.

Are you shaking us down, Red? Or are you just saying we can't bring the stuff inside?

No, no, no, he's got a point. I hop out of the Mountaineer. None of the stuff is in the Mountaineer. Will you let the Mountaineer and them go in? I guess I'm going to be out here for the next fucking four hours yanking chips.

Yes, that would be fine. Also, young Riley, I've completed my perusal of the gray fold ledger. You may collect it at your leisure at the hall of Rogel. Half Head.

I'll see you in a bit. By the way, if you hear any stories about huge storms bringing down a Death's Head transport. Yeah, no, they're entirely fictional.

I shall let our scryers know that they were wrong.

I can verify that it was not taken down solely by a storm.

So can the Cat.

He is really lean.

Principles involved. Yes.

The Dragon, he does know when you've been good or bad, Riley. Apparently

I lean over and whisper to you.

To you, like I give a.

All right.

Riley's gonna stay out and remove the homing bacons.

Yeah, I'm just gonna be parked outside along the road going through things with a frequency scanner that just going beep beep.

Shit.

Digging it out of wherever it's hidden.

Who is going in to do Leslow. And you can take the Mountaineers. Jacob said it just has the stuff that Matt. Alexander Macedon knew could be safely stolen.

Yeah, just. Just know that when you're driving the big Betty over there, the Transit axle is a little funny at the moment. Didn't take well to the missile. Look, I start to glance over at Jovio and I start to say it didn't take well to that rough patch of road.

What do you do? You need a skill to drive. Is that a. I think if you

have like a basic pilot, you can operate it if you're not doing anything crazy.

Yeah.

Otherwise I believe it would be pilot truck.

I have pilot automobile.

I think that Works too.

Yeah, absolutely.

Henry would offer the services of Gorshkov to help speed that process up.

Well, shit. I would definitely take the assistance of our Russian friend, if he's agreeable.

How about it, Gorski?

Yes, we can do this.

Right on.

Donna hops out. I think Morthak's a little tired. I think we need to head in.

Yeah, go in, get a hot meal and a good bed, glass of wine.

So we're driving in. You two are staying in.

Who's coming in and who's staying out?

Sorry, we're staying out to debug the truck.

Don and Morthak are going in.

I guess I'm going in. I don't think I'm any use out here.

I look at you and like your whole demeanor. I go, can you do me a favor? Can you keep an eye on Bronson? He's got a taste for driving and I don't want him hot rodding around in the Mountaineer in the middle of New Laszlo.

Oh, that's brilliant. Have to crazy. Watch him.

Yeah, yeah, I could do that. I could do that.

Have the crazy in his depressed phase watch him.

Let's give me some credit here.

I'll be staying out. I'm very fascinated by these robot things. They look like toys. Wish to play with one.

So Bronson has a. Has a vehicle that we can take into the town or do we have.

We're leaving the road hammer outside.

Okay.

So I can go. Basically go through the car.

Other mountain.

You can take the Mountaineer in. Yeah.

Okay.

Troy, do you want to drive? I mean, I drove a big Suburban, you know, around town. I could probably maybe figure this out if you want.

You should introduce your character.

Yeah, I was about to.

We can save that for a break if you want. But I'm like, I have no idea what I'm looking at.

Well, let me ask you a question. Question, Sean. What was your relationship with Mikey's mom? Unrelated? This is just my cranston's curiosity.

He would have actually probably gotten along well with Mikey's mom. He was surprisingly a laid back guy. He wasn't introducing drugs. He was back in the other world. He was a big, kind of heavyset ex football kind of guy who just had that linebacker who's been hit in the head too many times, but it comes across as nice, kind of. So he would have always been like, hey, Mrs. Mikey, that's fucking not her name. But what? You get the point.

Yeah. Mrs. Kripke or Donna, her first name.

Did we ever establish if Mikey's mom has got it going on.

I was biting my cheeks so hard.

In this world, you are not a middle aged mother. Or are you? You still rolling with that?

Well, the person who just spoke to you. Imagine like the most stereotypical 90s romance novel with Fabio, with, as Alex would put it, cum gutters ripped, glistening, oiled, big blonde hair blowing in the breeze.

Oh, she does have it going on.

She's got it going on. Yeah, I'm basically a big hunk. Muscle man, Cyber knight.

Okay.

Yeah. So I got. Got the sweet like armored legs and arms and a rippling chest of.

Are you bare chested?

Oh, yeah.

So am I. Yeah, it's awesome.

Hell yeah.

Great. Just what we need. Dark falcon and you comparing skin. Skincare routines.

Listen, I had to give Bronson my armor, remember?

How tall is Troy?

I think I put him at like 62 ish tall, but not crazy tall.

In this world, I'm taller than you by about 6 inches.

Gorshkov never imagined he would have in his database the sound of two beefy men flexing their pecs off.

You could do that thing where you jiggle.

You can't.

I would have introduced myself. Well, am I introducing myself or did we already do this?

Like, I don't.

I don't know how you all.

It's possible that I don't know based on what the GM wants, but if he's been in a real depressive side of his bipolar, you may have met you and just not really. So if that makes sense.

No, nobody knew. Nobody knew Troy was in the truck until he got out. They're not sure at what point he got in.

Okay.

And I never mentioned over the radio that he and I had been talking for the last hundred miles or so.

Should I have told anybody I found Troy? Apparently not.

I'll just assume that Morthak and I have been in the back of the road hammer.

And due to this handy guide, it looks like Morthak is a dragon.

Yeah. Normally takes the shape of an innocent boy.

Okay, so we're gonna drive the Wagoneer to town. Or the Mountaineer, whatever.

So compared to what you looked like as. As Troy versus As you look as crazy Troy.

I. I don't. I do not think that you would make the connection. Partially because right now he's in his depressive state and that's something he got from being a crazy. He wasn't bipolar before.

He also has those lumps coming out of his head.

Yeah, I do. Like a lumps with like little wire. Like.

Well, who. Who's who's our new little friend here. So, yeah, this cyber knight ripped hunk comes up to you and goes, hi, nice to meet you, and gives out a handshake.

Before you can shake hands, Bronson slams into Troy. Oh, Troy, you've been gone for so long. I thought you might have been eaten by that bear.

You know, I'm gonna. If you. Unless you object, I'm gonna re. I'll probably get the same thing. But I feel like being reconnected with Bronson might change my state one way or the other. It did not. That's fine.

You got any spare fate?

Oh, I forgot about the fate mechanic. It's okay. Once more things. Anytime something dramatically changes. So I pat him on the head and totally forget to introduce myself. But I kind of feel like a half hearted fist bump.

Donna's got her hand extended and you like fist bump his fingers. Dark Falcon's fingers.

Dark Falcon.

But Donna doesn't react.

So Donna is Dark Falcon.

Yeah, Donna Bronson did call me. Troy, Donna's just looking in your eyes deeply. And you would notice that tears start to well in her eyes. In his eyes. In this hunk's eyes.

In this hunk's eyes. Well, normally I would roll seduction against you. No, just kidding, Troy.

I drove a truck and there were missiles and a giant airship fell out of the sky and there was a buffet.

Troy, why are we here? Can we drive into town? I'm sorry, he's really. He's not even like looking away from you or actively ignoring you. He's just totally disengaged. Oh, yeah, sorry. Troy. Troy.

This hunky dude puts his hand on your shoulder tenderly and says, it's been so long.

Were you there the night with the. With the tentacles? Her?

No, Troi.

No,

it's me. It's Donna. Donna Kripke.

Uh, you look different.

Well, so do you.

Ah, shit, I forgot.

She starts bawling and gives you the biggest hug.

I mean, it's a half hearted hug, but I'm a crazy, so it's still like. It's a lot.

Sure, sure. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You weren't in Mike's game. How did you. What? Snacks.

I.

And that's when there's a loud crash from the back of the Road Master. Whatever it's called.

Road Hammer.

Road Hammer. There we go.

You guys have called it everything.

We got the Street Thunder.

Yeah, I was just listening to the last episode. I get out of the hammer time.

I put on my hammer pants.

Yeah, I want to shoot the skelebot on top of the Hammer Slammer.

Donna doesn't.

That's okay. You don't have to. You don't have to tell me. It's fine. It's all fine.

It's just really good to see you.

Yeah, you too. You too, man. Ma'. Am. Both.

Have you seen. Have you seen my boy?

No, but I haven't seen a body. That's good.

Like a tender squeeze. She's like, thank you, Troy.

We have seen some other bodies, but

I don't think we've all seen a lot of bodies.

You mentioned a crashing noise. Is Mr. Cat back there?

So who's around us right now?

Bronson.

Bronson the boy.

We're out back. We're outside of town.

They're at the other vehicle.

Yeah. So Bronson, Troy, Dark Falcon, and Morthak piling the Mountaineer and head into new Laszlo. Mr. Cat, Henry, and Riley are staying back at the Road Hammer to remove the coalition tracking devices.

Oh, were y' all in the car the whole time, or were you all just standing out there?

I thought we were standing outside.

Yeah, during that. But now we're getting into the vehicle.

Otherwise, you would not have heard Mr. Cat getting into shit.

Okay.

Yeah, yeah.

As we get in, I absolutely pat Bronson on the head, and I'm like, you got the wheel, man. All right, buddy.

I'm pretty much an expert. I've driven a lot.

Donna insists on riding shotgun,

and I have my brick if I need it.

Let's. Can I see the brick?

What if I need the brick?

I'll give it back.

Okay.

I'm right here. I just want to see it. It's nice.

Very hesitantly holds it out so you can see it. It's just a big rock.

Donna takes the rock. Oh, you're such a good boy. Thank you for the brick.

Thank you. Yes. Can I. I want it. Yes, you do.

You're such a good boy. And she, like, sets it, like, next to her.

He's like. He's driving. He's driving in a new Lazlo every three seconds, his eyes look at the brick.

She's. I've, like, tucked it, like, between the door and the chair so it's sort of out of sight. Who's a good boy? Bronson's a good boy. She's, like, singing the song that she used to sing to him.

But what if I need to do

combat driving in the city and I don't have my brick to put on the gas pedal?

You'll have the brick if you need it.

Okay. He's not convinced at all, but he drives. Where are. Where are the four of you heading?

I guess we're just heading into. What's the main city where the dealer was at.

Well, New Laszlo. But where in New Laszlo? There's Happy Trigger Emporium, which is where your probably head to.

Pseudo Happy Trigger Emporium.

Are we here for more guns? Funny you should say that.

Yes,

we, we did. We did a little mission and yeah, there's some guns in exchange for that. Boys are just going through the tech and getting rid of any trackers so we can turn it in.

Excellent. So you pull up to Happy Trigger Emporium, the leading provider of weaponry, mundane or arcane, in New Laszlo. At least that's what the sign says. The exterior is metalwork and stained glass. The front doors open as you pull up in the the Mountaineer. And the short robot DB that calls himself Alexander of Macedon trots out, raises hands. Eureka. And then we cut back to outside where Henry, Riley and Mr. Cat are taking apart the other weapons. The ones that I. I'm assuming the ones that you are giving to Alexander were in the Mountaineer. Yes.

Yes.

Okay, it's like where are you going with that sentence there, Kyle? Yeah, yeah, we're out of words.

Just to make sure I'm following you. So you're essential. Trying to remove the trackers from these weapons so that we can make weapons.

You know, like opening up the case of highly controlled explosives and feeling around in the felt, Running the frequency detector to find. Oh shit, it's here.

For all that extra cool stuff we made away with. I wish to get inside one of these armors and press buttons.

The Samus suits.

Yes.

We stole a coalition. Big grade, full of coalition juicy bits.

We have three complete Samus.

Yeah, yeah. You should not be in power armor. No,

the question is, do they make a size that would fit an 8 tall cat? 8 foot tall cat?

Have you seen how cats can fit into just about anything? Didn't we have four Gorshkov? Oh, that armor's three.

Just three.

Okay. Okay, so Mr. Cat is getting into a Samus suit, pushing buttons. Assume Riley has started breaking things down.

Yep.

Jacob, what skill are you using to find homing beacons? We'll assume Gorshkov is assisting with this.

Riley is using the skill off of his character sheet that just closed down. Give me 30 seconds. But he's got a very appropriate skill. It is pretty darn good at it.

Or it might have been four. Sorry, I know we have three.

Skelebot power systems, electronic countermeasures.

It's something like that

fine contraband that would work too.

I think it is for Samus.

Come on.

The number of complete power armor suits we have is an important distinction to make.

Well, imagine if Troy got in one of those.

When he's depressed, you just see a sad pseudo power armor trudging down the

street right next to Bronson in one.

So I was. I could use one of three skills potentially for this. Electrical engineer, radio, basic, or read sensory equipment. Read sensory equipment strikes me as the most appropriate one in this.

Yeah. Unless you are going to be physically dismantling everything and coming through it. I think Reed sensory equipment is.

Yeah. To find them would be read sensory equipment. Then we have a whole shitload of skills for anything else. For the actual removal.

Yeah. So I think this is four read sensory equipment roles. Because all the trackers are in the Samus. Not even the coalition puts trackers in their small arms.

Any bonus for Gorshkov's assistance?

Yes, you can have advantage on those.

Excellent. Thank God for Gorshkov off the first one. 57 out of 62. Okay, 58 out of 62. 18 out of 62. And a nine out of 62.

Wow. Nice.

That's our Riley.

So you found all of them. Which means you don't have to intrusively damage them searching for them. And so I'm gonna say that since you found them, Riley has the skills to remove them them, it's just a matter of time.

Yeah, I mean, I'm probably a little slower than if I actually had power armor. There's a power armor specific skill. But I have armorer, I have electrical engineer, I have mechanical engineer. I may not be a specialist in this, but I can figure it out.

Yeah. Now, NPC, Mr. Cat is climbing into a suit of Samus armor, correct? Pressing buttons, and correct me if I'm wrong, but you don't actually have the ability to safely operate.

Nope.

Okay.

Yep. So long as I'm all on the same page. I'm smart enough to figure this out.

Sure.

100 confident in my ability. Child's play.

Yes. So what is your main pilot skill? Assume you have what? Pilot jetpack or Pilot jetpack.

Yep.

Okay. Which is not the pilot skill you actually would really want.

Not at all.

But you might get to fire the rockets or something.

Like some Slim Pickens.

All right, let's see.

You said, I'm sorry, these were the smiling Jack Samus, right?

No, these are the. The old style.

Oh, okay.

Skull. Okay. None of that's. None of the new Coalition war Equipment has been rolled out in this timeline yet. All right, so roll your robot and power armor Combat Elite. But you don't have. Yep. So calculate what it would be and roll it at half value.

Oh, okay.

Robot.

Is that elite? Interesting. I don't think it has a skill percentage. This is a. It's one of those 15 level skills that gives you bonuses.

Oh, really?

Yep. It's basically a hand to hand combat skill. Unless I'm looking at the wrong thing.

It may not be. I thought it gave you. Pretty sure it's a percentage because the military specialist gets plus 10% to it. It maybe the elite. Maybe robot Combat Basic is the. Oh, I see what it is. Pilot robots and power Arbor is the pilot skill, and Combat Elite is the hand to hand skill. So it'd be pilot robot and robots and power armor.

Ah, there we go. Got it. Okay.

How could anyone have made that mistake?

You said at half what I would have.

Yes, because. Well, obviously you don't know what you're

doing, but if you're naturally good enough, it'll work out.

Oh, here goes.

I gotta get at 30.

No, I'm gonna spin a heroism just to reroll that. That was an 86. That's an 03.

Oh, there you go.

So Mr. Cat pulls the helmet down, closes the armor in pushing buttons, finds out there are buttons in the gauntlets. The armor power system activates, lights start coming on inside. And he hears this voice homing beacon. Engaged. Autopilot returning to Skull base. And he quickly figures out how to turn that off before the pilot, the Samus, automatically flies back to Coalition territory.

First try.

So what Henry and Riley see is this. The suit. Just like levitate off the ground for a second. Engine's full, and then it just drops back down.

I meant to do that.

But you can now record pilot robots and power on your sheet. And when you level up, you can have the full skill.

Okay.

Probably require you to spend some XP to open that up, but I'm assuming you want to fly around in the same.

Yeah,

you'll probably have to take your jetpack off.

Yeah, yeah. This is a long term project. Yeah, long term project. Next I gotta paint it.

Priorities.

So, at Happy Trigger Emporium, Alexander Macedon is inspecting the equipment that you all have stolen from the COVID Coalition warehouse in Muskegon. You took the four heavy crates out of the back of the Mountaineer, took them down into his sub basement. He's scanning them with a variety of technological devices, some of which are entirely alien in origin. And they're all kind of working automatically. So. So how did it go?

Well, no problems.

Excellent handed out. Nobody knew you were there?

No.

Wonderful.

Yeah. Very easy.

Not detected at all?

Nope.

There's not going to be any blowback.

No.

Cool.

Yeah.

So who replaced Donna with Riley?

Donna's learned some. Donna's crafty.

Okay.

As agreed. And he walks over to a table covered by this big white sheet. He rips the sheet away and there's rail guns on the table. Soviet ski. Made modified by yours truly. AR44 rail guns. Cyberlink integratable. 155 pounds. 40 round burst. 5000 meter range. Bull fed ammo drum with 2400 rounds. Mega damage armor. You're welcome.

How many? Just one.

There should be at least two.

He did say guns. Portal.

I thought he did say guns. Okay.

Yeah. I would like to roll recognize weapon quality please.

Okay.

45 under my.

No.

Heroism. Nope.

Heroism.

Shit. Nah. Oh, damn it.

I was gonna say like I was. I wanted to see Dark Falcon go. Donna with a butcher who's trying to scam her at the grocery store.

She just didn't heroism.

Wait, wait, wait, wait. Don't roll again yet. I think I can help you.

You okay.

Out of character. I think I can help you.

Okay.

So as I'm seeing her eyeballing them, Troy will walk over and he'll just pick one up and start shaking it, hefting it, sniffing it. You can. He would. He could literally smell rust. If it has the slightest pin loose, he will hear it rattle. He can't tell you if it's a perfect gun. But he could potentially tell you if they're in good condition.

You know what? You can get help from Troy.

Awesome. So to be advantage on each of the rolls.

The one you already made.

I already made the one you're gonna do five. Yeah. We under boys.

They are. There's three of them. Excellent condition. They're clearly used. But maintenance has been performed.

They've been refurbed.

Yeah. Refurbished. Yeah. Yeah, it's a good word for it. And it is essentially what Alexander promised.

Yeah. Donna also picks ones up. Pick picks one up and is like looking down the bore and checking everything out.

Like.

These are great. Yeah. It's exactly what you promised. Thank you.

Well, yeah, yeah, of course. Alexander does not make promises lightly.

I can see that. Well, it's much appreciated.

So let's talk about how you guys are. How you all are going to move all that other stuff you stole.

Yeah. We have a plan.

Oh, okay.

How'd you know about the other stuff we stole?

Everybody Knows about the other stuff you

stole outside, you hear?

And I stole this.

That's how Bronson marks his territory. All right,

well, I was gonna go talk to my friends the Torchbearers, before we started looking at that, but are you interested?

Oh, well, always. I mean, yes.

Okay, I'll keep you. We'll keep you in mind.

All righty.

Are these weapons intended to be man portable weapons or are these more like. You should put them on a vehicle.

Well.

Well, put them on a. Henry, Those railguns are. They're like a bar. Technically man portable, but for you or Henry, it's not a problem.

Yeah.

Okay.

We could mount one on the Mountaineer.

So if I have weapon proficiency heavy military weapon.

Oh, I'm. I don't remember if that covers this,

but quite possibly it feels like it's the least close.

Yeah, it's at least close. Yeah.

Is there ammo here too?

He gives you a drum of ammo for each one.

Nice. Yes.

Load that up immediately.

We don't have to put one in the chamber though, yet.

I am not proficient, so I'm probably failing to load it properly.

So these would fall under the heavy mega damage weapon proficiency.

So your military weapons aren't mega damage?

Yeah, so this is kind of one of the oversights in Rifts where they have the weapon efficiency that's clearly for 20th century weapons, which nobody really in Rift's earth would have. They would all have heavy mega damage weapons because even though the game talks about oh yeah, there's still people carrying around machine, that's actually not really the case in any of the examples. So yeah, you can. You can use weapon proficiency heavy heavy military weapons for this because that's what it would be.

But typically weapon proficiencies give you a bonus. Doesn't mean you can't use it without it. You're just not getting the bonus.

Yeah.

Oh, that's fair.

But you're. It sounds like he's going to give you the bonus.

Well, I might. I might talk to you later too, to change it because I haven't used it and the spirit was to use the big fuck off weapons.

Yeah, that's fine. If you just want to switch it over to heavy mega damage weapons, that'd be dope.

Thank you. Thank you. Oh, generous and wise gm. Yeah. So I guess we load those up into the. Into the back of the rig and

then I was just going to carry him around if we had other business to do. Don't mind me. Just two in one hand.

You know, Troy, I was thinking maybe we just put him away for now, and then later we could. We could carry them around with us. How's that sound?

It's fine.

The cell? Fine.

If you don't think anybody was going to steal them out of the back of a rig, that's fine with me. I'd steal them. Look at these things. They look nice.

Well, we're not. We're not necessarily going to abandon them.

You're in charge.

Okay.

Troy, do you want to talk? I know you've. I know we've all been through a lot.

Actually, you know what? I know there's a bar right over there. Let's just take the railguns with us. We're not leaving them in the rig. Go have a drink. Go wait for the rest of the group.

I have a bottle of vodka right here. We could just drive and then park, and then you and I could.

I know this nice place down by the canal. Henry and I went there last time we were in Laszlo. It'll be a great place to park and. And chat and have a few drinks.

Okay. Yeah. Let's go to the canal. Donna drives and follows Troy's directions.

We take the Chevy to the levee, and then we get drunk. Okay, so is there a radio in this vehicle? Should we call the rest of the team? That's out of character.

Yeah, we have radios.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Riley.

Yeah.

Hi, Riley. Yo. We made the exchange. And we got the cargo.

Okay.

And the cargo looks good. Okay. And now we're gonna go drive to a canal.

Why?

To drink.

I'll take the controller from his hand for a moment and just be like, Henry knows the place.

Okay.

Donna was talking weird there. Not sure what that's about, but do you remember what we were talking about in the truck?

Yes. Why you gotta bring that shit up again, man? I want to. Almost forgot.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Just listen to me, okay? I'm not saying this is. I'm. If you're just going down to have a drink, that's fine. But if it's anything else, complete the mission this time.

Oh, thank God. Donna doesn't know what you're talking about. Donna takes the radio back. I just. I was. Is this line encrypted? I didn't know.

You're better safe than sorry. So, yeah, keeping things vague was perfect. Donna, thank you. Y' all have a good time now.

I

see you later over at Experiences House.

Okay, So y' all are just going to, like, a public park to get trashed?

I don't actually think Henry or He can. I don't think Troy can get trashed. He's got a disgusting crazy endurance he would have drafted. Take a lot of that vodka, that's all I'm saying.

All I know is you two are taking something that amounts to a conversion van down by the river.

It's cool. We got three railguns in the back. Nobody will ask questions.

Especially if they look at who's in the fucking. Who's in the rig.

I would love to suggest that during this radio conversation at one point that there is suddenly a loud explosion as Mr. Cat lights off yet another volley accidentally, perhaps on purpose. How many mini missiles was this supposed to have? It came this way.

It takes Riley and Henry Gorshkov with Mr. Cat. Definitely not helping. Until around midnight to remove all the homing devices. What do you do with them, Jacob?

As much as there are many, many things I would like to do with said homing devices, I think well placed rocks is going to be the method of the day. You know, hammering them until they're itty, teeny little bits, many missiles.

I was just thinking about that good rock I just wasted.

Actually, I got. Well, no, that would. Ooh, I have an idea. Rather than doing that, I like wave at Mr. Cat, who's probably flying circles and learning how to do acrobatics and shit.

No, I'm still just falling over.

Okay. You ready to fly that thing yet?

So you're. You know when you put like a scarf. A scarf or something on a cat and it just can't figure that shit out? Now imagine you shove that cat in a suit of power arm. Most of the time I'm walking backwards.

If Riley ever gets mean drunk, Mr. Cat's waking up with a strip of tape down the center of his back.

I just love. The answer to every cat's problem is to walk backwards.

It's the universal solution.

Yeah.

Hey Cat, you got that thing up and running yet?

Yeah. When you call hey, Cat, he turns, of course he's got the railgun cannon pointed like right at you. Yes.

Think you can take it for a little flying jaunt?

Yes.

It's the cat. Riley cares less about the cat that he does about the quote unquote real people. Hands the bag to Mr. Cat. Yeah, go, go have a nice little joyride in that thing. And every so often throw one of those out, preferably someplace random. Bodies of water, tops of mountains, whatever.

You hand them to me. Yeah, I just crush them or do that with the power armor strings. Yeah.

Okay.

The sound effect goes here.

There's that too. Thanks. Thanks. Riley pulls out one of the special cigarettes and lights it up.

They're Virginia Slims.

No, he's got one pack of really, really high end cigarettes that he saves for important occasions. And realizing he was such a goddamn idiot to be driving around with a truckload of shit that he should have known would have had trackers on it. He's not having a good self self image day.

I thought it was going to be a spliff. And you're going to make Henry all sad.

Oh hell no, Riley isn't. Riley's a drinker, but he does not usually toad.

All right, so once you have that done, you can safely head into New Laszlo with the Hammer Barn.

That has three more suits of power

arm in the back heading to Experience this house.

Were we going to the river spot? Well, I figure if. Wait, wait, wait.

What was the original plan?

We were going to dump all of this stuff with Alexander.

Yeah.

Yeah, we were.

Except for like a suit of power armor for us to forget for the party to use.

Yeah, I mean when.

Back when we were stealing the stuff, Donna did talk about trying to give some of it to the. To the rebel cause.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I think we're parking it in front of Experience's house for the moment. If for no other reason than we, you know, we. Yeah, I mean, we gotta have a discussion about this. Apparently.

If there's any guns though, I think you said that there were.

There's an unspeakable bunch of rifles. Yeah, there is an unspecified cash value worth of coalition items of kind of our choice. So.

Yeah.

And Don is not expecting us to give everything to the rebel Cause I

at least want one of those Coalition assault rifles. Yeah, they're very nice.

I was gonna say it's gotta be better than the NG Northern or whatever rifles.

Yeah.

Yeah, I suppose we could. If we're done at the canal, we could show up at Experiences place at the same time.

And your character's a cyber knight. They're like. Good, right? Good.

Yeah.

Can I use this moment as the justification to try and roll again and maybe not. Well, actually I should probably stay depressed while I have railguns and easy access.

Oh God.

I don't know, but does sound pretty exciting like. Like suddenly three railguns come into your life. I think that's a moment.

It's a moment.

That's fair.

If I. If Donna let me load it, then maybe there would have been.

You are holding it. Getting real close. Smelling it.

Well, maybe while we're throwing back Some vodka Donna mentions. You know, if you want,

we could

go out of town later tonight and I could show you how to load these up, and we could just have a good time. Is that with advantage?

The situation is changing significantly.

Yeah. So in Troy's brain, there's this railgun sitting nearby, and it's got this, like, cartoon face on it that says Detroit. Well fired. Call me Charlie. That sounds like a fun town. We'll roll.

We'll see. Maybe I'll spend. That's better. I'm gonna spend the.

Well, do I. Do I give Troy advantage?

Oh, absolutely. Yeah.

That doesn't help. Would I like to be balanced, which is better, but it's not good.

Doesn't that give you another roll?

Oh, I thought advantage was. Oh, it's okay.

Yeah, free roll.

Yeah, yeah, you roll twice and take the best.

No, so. So I'm using my. I'm you. Can I use a hero point on this kind of roll?

It's not a. Yeah, you can use a heroism or whatever.

Or heroism that time. That's good enough. I. I don't know that that's good, but that gets me. That gets me into manic. Like. Yeah. Ow. Donna, it's. It's weird calling you Donna because this.

But, yeah, I get it. You can call me Dark Falcon if that helps.

It does not, actually.

What if I say you can call me Dark Falcon?

Let's just. Tell you what, tell you what. We're at the it. Let's pull it out. Let's just take one shot down the. Make sure that the guns are actually good, and then later, we'll go shoot a little bit more.

I was thinking maybe we go outside of town late at night, and then we'd see if the gun. The guns are good. I don't think Troy. That we should be Troy.

He is definitely already got one loaded up.

She says Troy, like she would, like when you were a kid.

Okay, all right, all right, all right, all right.

Right, Troy.

Fine, fine, fine, fine.

The face on the railgun, which is all in Troy's head, by the way, gets all sad. Oh, I ain't zeroed in or nothing.

All right, but no, you promised.

I promise.

All right, fine. Let's go see if they got rid of the armor things.

Yeah. I promise not to shoot through a building.

Was that Bronson or the gun?

The gun.

Okay.

I pat the gun, which is half loaded, and say, I know, buddy. I know, buddy. But Donna's not ready yet.

Okay.

Okay.

So later, some of you intoxicated, some not all convene. Experienced in zor's house. Riley, Mr. Cat and Henry pull in in the Super Club. Hammer time.

Yeah.

Riley, you notice there's a iron golem in her yard? It's got vibro axes and it's cutting away this tree that has been struck by lightning. Split cleanly down the middle. Whole street smells like ozone. Gus, get out. And I assume you're gonna go in. Her house is lit, but there's not. Appeared to be a dinner party this time.

When you arrive, I will absolutely knock the tree down on the way in. I got you, buddy.

Are we all here now?

Yeah.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Guys are gathering in the front yard.

You don't want to take a look in the back of the rig?

Oh, shit.

Oh, I forgot. Yeah. I go back to get one of the railguns.

The party favors.

Yeah, we got three of them.

Ooh.

And the favors are very favorable.

I wish to track down Experienced Densmore. She's there.

She is. You come to the house. The front door is open, and she is. You can see her sitting in the front room. It's a little cool this time of year still, this climate. And there's a small fire, fireplace. She's reading a book with a glass of wine.

Where is the smaller version of you?

Oh, Mr. Cat. Well, you're back.

Yes.

Do you mean my daughter?

Yes.

I see. You should look at the Cruel Rose. It's a tavern boarding house. She gives you directions. Why are you looking for truth?

I have a message for her.

Oh.

It is important.

Well, I believe you'll find her there with her friends.

Thank you. I just leave.

Never to be seen again. Real cat.

Okay. Are you going to that tavern?

Yes.

All right. Are you taking anyone with you or going alone?

Doing alone.

All right. What is everyone else doing?

I'm gonna walk in and sit down on, like, the love seat that's, you know, off to one side of where experience is sitting and light another cigarette and go, howdy, we're back.

She puts her book down, puts a bookmark in, closes it. Welcome back. How was your criminal excursion?

It happened.

Well, I'm sure that will make Alexander very pleased.

Not our best moment. Or more to the point, not my best moment. But what's done is done.

She gets up. Would you like a glass of wine, Riley, or beer?

Riley thinks about it for a minute. Wine sounds fine.

So she goes into the kitchen. You can hear, you know, getting glasses. She says. Anything else happen of interest?

Oh, we ran into a couple. Small complications.

Oh, yes.

Took care of those.

Now, where Is Henry Troi and Dark Falcon?

Yeah, I was just thinking, if we're out looking at the guns, Donna kind of looks at Henry. I think Donna gives Henry a hug. Henry's acceptable to it.

Henry returns the bear hug.

Yeah, yeah. We're both trying to, like, lift each

other off the ground.

Instead, we're just squeezing each other really hard.

That's not how physics works.

Hey, Henry, do you want to stay out here with Troi and the. Yeah, and I just want to run in real quick and see if Truth Dinsmore's around.

Yeah.

No, Gorshkov's been yelling at me to get our hands on the. On the big guns.

Yeah. Ab, Please, now, if we could, that would be wonderful.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I get it, buddy.

She.

She, like, looks at you, and then, like, eyes.

Troy, leave, woman.

And then, like, walks inside. Wait a minute, wait a minute.

You're leaving?

No, no, no.

Don't discourage her.

Troy, Henry, and the impulsive dog alone with three railguns.

Yeah.

Bronson might want to go see experience.

Possibly. I don't know. But Donna trusts Henry. Or is trusting Henry so far, as

Henry lovingly, like, caresses the real guy.

Ask Gorshkov. I have not been able to get them loaded yet. Ask him.

So, this whole time, the moment Donna's back turned, Henry's hands just started moving. Whether Henry willed it or not,

it'll be fine.

I will be passenger, Princess. But not for these.

It's that Gorshkov touch.

But, yeah, Gorshkov can tell you exactly how to integrate the Sovietsky.

So is that attaching to you, or just so that you can hold it, but integrate your systems was going to

be my next question, because I immediately thought of somebody with a giant sword on their back. Like, can I just magnetically, somehow, some way, have this as my giant weapon?

Yeah. I mean, it's built for Borgs.

Sweet.

Yeah. I mean, other people with the strength can carry it around. A Borg can fully integrate it into themselves.

How big is the ammo in that? Could I hide some ammo in one of my secret compartments, which still reek of bacon?

You could, yeah. I mean, the ammo is not particularly big. I mean, the drum has 2, 400 rounds.

It's about firing them real fast.

The drum. The drums are fairly large. Individual ammo is.

I got you.

Yeah. Okay.

Okay.

But you could hang one off of each hip and be just this fashionable droid Borg of the decade, you know, Excuse me.

Pardon me.

As people 10ft in front of me get shoved out of the way.

So Donna goes into the house. Bronson is already in there. He's. There's a meal on the table. He's eating it. Experience is talking to Jacob, and she says nothing else happened.

Hi.

What are you trying to get at? Experience?

No, nothing.

Oh.

Hello, Dark Falcon.

Is Truth Dinsmore around?

Oh, Cruel Rose is where you're looking for. And Cranston, Dark Falcon knows where this is. You've been there many times.

Yeah, I figured.

It's a tavern and boarding house, and it caters to adventurers and mercenaries, scoundrels, smugglers, rogues of all type. It's on the city's north side, on the other side of the river. It's not exactly in a rough neighborhood, but that's about as gritty as New Laszlo gets. Sometimes the youth spray paint things there.

All right, I'll head over.

All right. NPC.

Yes.

Mr. Cat walks into the Cruel Rose, which is this very low ceiling building shoved in between two apartment blocks. It's low and long, runs down the length of one of them. There's a long bar on one side, small, very small tables. And it's crowded. There's a night crowd of locals and clearly people from out of town. And far in the back, in a private room, you can see. Well, exactly who you expected to see is the Torchbearers and Truth is War. And also the Arcanine Knots, the people that you rescued in the forest north of Detroit.

Excellent.

Oh, that's been a while.

Yeah.

They will be very pleased to see me, their savior.

Yeah. They are all laughing and drinking and sitting in the table. In the center of the table is Mor Thak. And he's telling them. You can. You can pick up that. He is telling them about exactly what went down in Muskegon.

Okay.

Some farts are even true.

I'm going to approach.

Yeah, you walk in. Everybody's laughing. Truth Dinsmore is standing near the door. She looks you up and down and gives Mr. Cat a nod.

I headbutt her.

She chuckles. Welcome, Mr. Cat. We were just hearing about your latest

adventures Relic over at Morthak. And make eye contact. And I look back at Truth. Morthak did very well.

She shrugs. Kids. They grew up into nightmare dragons so fast.

Yes. Yes, they do. Okay, I leave. I promised Morthak I would deliver the message. The message has been delivered. I'm leaving.

Wait, what was the message?

Mor Thak's like, tell truth, Dunsmore. I did very well. It's from previous episodes.

Oh, I see.

I said I will.

So Mr. Cat turns to go and truth says, so are you going north with us?

What's north?

North. Hercules Adams. People that need help.

That's the Greek fellow? Yes.

No, Glitter boy Pilot. He's one of the people fighting the Psy Stalkers that those weapons you stole were gonna go to.

Do I know anything about Psy Stalkers?

Not really. I don't think Mr. Cat would. Probably not.

And who are they?

She gives you a quick explanation of the Michigan Psy Stalker tribes and how they've been more and more organized over the years and just coincidentally attack any town that tries to organize into anything larger than an isolated kingdom. Almost as if they're trying to prevent Michigan from building any sort of regional polity.

Would you say that the Psy Stalkers are evil? Or simply that they have been injured, manipulated by a greater force that itself could be evil?

Well, they're definitely being manipulated from Chi Town.

Do you think they would appreciate a savior?

She gives you a very confused look. I don't know that they know. They need one.

They never do.

But there's a lot of town, northern Michigan that could use a savior.

Yes. We'll be going with you. I will let the others know.

She looks down at something on Mr. Cat's belt. She says, nice sword. The Dagger of Rostam is a short sword.

Just feels like a dagger to you.

Well, it has grown in size.

Oh, okay. I thought you were. I am really, really big.

Yes, you are.

Yeah, it has grown in size. It is much larger than you remember. It does 66 damage now.

Yes, it is very nice. Have you seen it before?

No, I don't think so.

Oh, shame. You should. It's very pretty.

Oh, wait, hold on. She may actually have.

I have it right here, but I'm not going to show it to you.

If I were to draw it, I would have to kill something evil.

Yeah, actually she has. Because she knew the Cyber knight that it was taken off of.

Oh, shit.

You draw and chop a cheap lager in half. This beer is criminal.

The prices here are way out of line.

It's a good thing he knows nothing of Jesus. Japanese history.

Yeah.

Yeah, so she says. I assume the person you took it from is dead.

Okay. It's been so long. Where did I get. I got this from the. From what's his name? Moro. Moro.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Okay.

We got it from Moro Mok. But whether it was his or one of the people that were sacrificed.

A fight.

Yeah. He was evil.

Yeah. So you know, it's.

Oh, yeah. I. If I recall correctly. Mr. Cat used his psychic powers and saw Moro mock taking it off the body of a cyber.

Yes. Yes.

Who?

Truth Densmore knew the previous owner was slain, but not by my hands. The dog stole my kill. The owner before that was slain by the previous owner. I understand he was something of a hero, akin to Mike's mother.

I don't know what that means, but yes, Magnus was a hero.

The one called Dark Falcon.

Yes, Dark Falcon. At that point, Dark Falcon walks in the front door of Cruel rose. You see Mr. Cat talking to Truth Dinsmore.

Like I said, I. Mike's mother.

Who's Mike?

Oh, Mike.

Do I hear them say that?

No. They're at the back of a very crowded bar, so unless you can read lips.

No. Yeah, but I assume Donna spots them. They're in the usual spot. Yeah.

Mike was the God of his realm. And all of these in my party simply supped at his table. I miss him very much.

Truth doesn't quite know what to make of that, so she just nods. Cool.

I'm weeping for Donna. I know she can't hear this, but if she did, she's been hanging on to so much shit. Donna just goes to the bar and orders, like, the nice bottle of red wine that she knows. Everyone likes two bottles.

So Donna makes it into the private dining room where the Archonauts, the Torchbearers, are mor thak. Selling a table. Then mom said, go kill everybody, Mor Thak. Kill everyone in that ship.

I said kill all the bad guys, Mor thak.

Yeah, that's what I said.

Okay. You did very good.

Everybody's laughing uproariously.

I put the two bottles on the table.

If you know anything about the previous owner, I believe his name was Magnus. I would like to hear stories. Then I can know more about the man and the knife.

She says, pull up a chair.

I pull up this real small chair.

Cataracts.

This place has db, so they probably have some bigger chairs. So, yeah.

Yeah. They have an odd assortment of furniture to fit various sizes. And so she starts telling you about Magnus, the cyber knight, who you had seen but never obviously met.

Does Donna know this person?

Yes. You would have known Magnus. Okay. He didn't work directly with the Torchbearers, but, you know, actually, I'm sure Truth Dinsmore would have known Magnus through Dark Falcon, as Magnus was a cyber knight.

Oh, wow.

But he was one of the Cyber knights in working in Michigan and Northern Ohio, that sort of wilderness region.

Would I recognize the weapon that Mr. Cat has?

Probably.

You should roll your recognized weapon quality. Yeah, maybe spend some heroism on it.

I still have one whole heroism, thank you very much.

What did our cyber knight do? Mostly just ogle weapons. Just the whole game. Just salivating, hugs and weapons.

Yeah, that's a. That's a 20. So definitely, definitely recognize this one.

Yeah. You recognize it?

Yeah.

Well, I'll be.

Yes, you will.

No, it's. It is that. That's. That's his weapon.

We were just saying that.

Yeah, I mean, I. I knew him.

Oh, join the conversation. Tell me more, Kyle.

Tell me to tell him more.

You go into a dawn.

Cranston was not here. This is Rostam. It is this rune weapon. It's got a blue gray blade that glitters in sunlight and indecipherable runes from tip to hilt, though you don't remember it being so large. It's very short, sword sized. Whereas when Magnus had it, it was more of a dagger.

Oh, good. I have weapon proficiency sword as well. Okay.

I do remember that episode, though. I listened to it twice. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Good editing on that, by the way.

Yeah. Long story short, I want to get as much information as I can about Magnus because I feel if I know more about Magnus, I can kind of know more about the knife, know more about the story, and know more about this destiny I've been pulled into.

I. I think the. The. The information that Tree and dark falcon give Mr. Cat is essentially that Magnus is the stereotypical cyber knight.

He.

He's a very much a knight of the round table style. Hero, sacrificed, worked, you know, lived for the job, and a very high character individual.

Good to know.

Yeah. Donna might even kind of like the way she talks about him is like he's kind of. He's kind of like a mentor to her.

So back in experience, Dinsmore's house, Riley inexperience or she glass of wine and she says, well, frankly, Riley, you all are a conundrum for me. You peered out of nowhere and saved me, and for that I'm grateful. But I'm just trying to get a bearing on what you're here for, what side you're on.

Riley takes a long drag of a cigarette.

Experience.

The only side I care about is the one where I can at least give the kids a chance to go home.

Well, I think it's fine that you hold on to that, but is your

conundrum, you say whose side we're on? I think you're not talking about, like, New Laszlo or the Federation of Magic or the Coalition, are you?

Well, not Directly, they're. They're all proxies in a much larger war.

Oh, you know, like a war that may or may not involve a guy with eyes of fire who likes to intrude people into people's minds to have short, very short conversations while they're smithing pre chance.

Well, he doesn't intrude into everyone's mind rally.

I mean, no, he's not the first. So, yeah, it seems to be going around these days.

Well, you've attracted his attention.

Great. What is he? Psionic parasite? Magical mastermind?

He's the watcher. The watcher on the hide. Riley.

Jesus Christ.

Bringer of flame. Master the secret fire. There's older names. Prometheus.

So what's going on here?

Really?

Experience. All I know is I was sitting in a different time and place, and suddenly I woke up in a goddamn altar with Maro Mok trying to kill me. So excuse me if I'm a little out of step with the current events.

So there's a mountain sacred place. It's not easy to get to, but you might find answers there.

So you have no clue what's going on? I'm just gonna get one of those bullshit quest for the mountain things, huh?

Sometimes you can only get the answers when it's time to get the answers. Can't get them before.

Riley, you're worse than my trigonometry professor.

Mr. Cat would be proud of that philosophy babble.

Riley blows a couple smoke rings, takes a swig of wine and goes, this is pretty good wine. Now, as of late, we've been kind of crashing at your place. Is there some way where we can square this up? You know, pay you back for, oh, I don't know, all the miscellaneous, property damage, whatever Bronson dug up in the backyard, the meals, etc.

We'll worry about that later, all right? I'm not too concerned.

God hates a freeloader, but thank you for the wine. There's a pained expression when he says the words thank you.

So she says, oh, before you go, you should. It's called Black Torch Mountain.

Do you know.

Do you happen to know where it is?

It's in the Smokies, where old gods sleep deep.

Oh, God, not Appalachia. Black Torch. It's just a coal mine on top of an old mountain.

Yeah, that's been on fire for the last century. Yeah, yeah.

Post apocalyptic appellations.

Yeah, that's the best place to commune with him. Great.

Great. God damn it.

Thank you.

Thank you for the tip. Oh, shit. He suddenly realizes, looking down at the couch. I owe you a new couch. He looks down at his blood covered overalls. He jumps suit goes like, I'm sorry, my bad.

She shrugs. It's all right. I know a wizard.

Riley gets up and walks out to the backyard muttering something about this idea of being able to use techno wizardry to create this fully autonomous robot that could just go around your house and vacuum for you. And what a world changing invention that would be to name it Rosie.

So where do Henry and Troy go with these guns?

We're in the front yard or the backyard. You're going in the back. We're still out front, right?

Jesus Christ.

Just making sure. Okay. Yeah, we're not going anywhere. I think both of us are really excited at this point. Troy is standing about 10ft away from Henry with his left arm stuck out to the side, trying to convince you to just put. Just put one round in it. We need to make. I'll be fine, plastic man. I'll be fine. Just one. Just out. I want to feel it. Come on, hurry, before Donna comes back. I can take it.

I think we can shoot him one time. It's fine.

Just. Just like a glancing blow.

Not like a burst.

Just like one. All right, right up here. Yeah, yeah, right up here on the armor. Bronson, where are you, buddy?

You behind me? He was still out here, right?

Oh, he went inside to eat.

Oh, okay.

Okay.

Well then I don't say that I blast away.

Okay.

I'm assuming I'm unmoving target Gorshkov's assistance.

Who doesn't?

You can have advantage from Gorshkov. He's very hyped about this.

If I read the weapon correctly, I think a single bullet only does 1d4mdc.

Donna's not here, but I just want

to say roll twice and take the best one. Oh, I don't need to.

I roll twice when she left the house.

Oh, shit. Nat 20, yo. Sorry.

Nice.

She gave Henry some eyes. Now Proceed with your Nat20. You son of a bitch.

I think that's the best roll Henry has made all game.

Fortunately, a railgun is a very quiet weapon, so nobody's gonna notice that.

You have to know I'm very happy to have rolled a 2020 in not killing Troy or his arm.

Yeah, so that's max damage.

Yeah. At least it's not piercing armor because that would be bad. So if somebody wants to double check. I think it's just a D4 for a single round.

It's. Well, it's D6 times 10 plus 20.

Wait, where? What the hell?

Reversed. A single round?

Yeah, a single round. If you find a burst, I am dead. Well, I'm not aim.

I'm aiming at his arms. So I'm not wouldn't.

Yeah, I guess the round would just be D6 damage. So just be 6 damage.

Max damage. No, it's max damage because you don't even have to roll.

Yeah. There's a massive boom from the rail shot. Rail gun firing. It knocks Troy off his feet. You hear the Plastic man crack?

I should double check how much Plastic man has in one arm. It's probably like 10. It's not good. Hey, what's you already got?

Peg leg. What's the pe.

Yeah, Gorshkov says this is best day ever. Can we shoot other Barb.

Holy, holy, holy. That was awesome. Okay, okay, my turn, my turn. Come on. Okay, okay, okay. I do one of those. Unless Riley or experience intervene, I will definitely return the favor.

As long as I'm only here in single shots, it's. I have to not care at some point.

Yeah, so is it. I forget is a nat one is always a miss. I haven't rolled yet. I haven't rolled yet. I'm just making sure. That's the only way I think I can miss.

Yeah, it's always a miss. The worst possible thing that could happen.

Yeah. And it's five to hit. It's been a while, so yeah, I hit. And it's just a single round. So though only 2 damage.

2 MDC to my right arm.

Yeah. The round hammers into Henry's arm. Leaves a small dent.

I like the fact that you're like. I'm fine with single rail shot rounds. That's fine. That's an acceptable number. Hell yeah. That was good. That feel good? Missed you, Henry. Missed you too, buddy. So they technically the plan is what? To stay here tonight, sell the rest of this crap and then go be heroes? Maybe we don't know about the heroes part.

Yeah, just.

Just.

Yeah, the whole heroes part. Black Mountain thing we got. We got some decisions to make.

Apparently Donna definitely wants to hand over a lot of this shit to the anti coalition that they got going on here.

Allow me to make a suggestion, Mike. Mom, Consider the thought if you would, of what you might do should you have an opportunity to assist insurgents and arm them and they would follow you into battle. Wouldn't that be amazing? What I'm saying is we should hold onto these weapons for now. I have a feeling we could use them soon in the liberation of that place that I've already forgotten, Mr. Cat.

Yes. And we already have a group of insurgents.

Oh, do we now? Truth.

Do you want to.

Do you want to maybe take over from here?

She's already told me about them. About what? The insurgents.

The good ones or the bad ones?

The good ones. The bad ones don't have to be bad ones for long. If we simply take out their leader,

I think they might still be bad.

Maybe.

How long have you been here, Mr. Cat?

Not very long.

Kyle. Do you remember the exact timeline that Donna. I think it was like 2049 that she like, came in, right?

I don't remember the. It's. Donna's been here for a few. For about three years at least. She came. She came forward in 2004, but I believe she's been on rift's earth for three or four years. I believe. Yeah, a little while.

Mr. Cat, I've been here for years. Yes, I have a. I just. I want to press that. I have a good understanding of what we're up against.

Exactly. You will be a valuable commander.

Thank you, Mr. Cat. You've always been a good and loyal cat.

I headbutt you.

Aw.

She like scratches just behind the ears where you like it. I don't think we necessarily need to get rid of all of our pilferings, but I do think that Truth Dinsmore and the Torchbearers could make good use of these weapons. In the name of good and humanity, certainly.

And then we will conquer them and arm our minions and they will take over, is what I'm thinking in my head, not what I'm saying aloud.

Either way, Donna pours you a hefty glass of this good red wine and hands you a. I do like wine. I think you'll enjoy this particularly, Mr. Cat.

Can I get a quick visual on what it looks like with Mr. Cat drinking wine? Oh, it's very much like a hold it.

Do that.

Still hasn't quite figured out the concept of holding things up and pouring it back.

Well, that split upper lip really makes it real challenging. And the muzzle and the whole bit, you know?

Yep.

All right. So is there anything anyone wants to do this evening or do we cut to breakfast where you're all around the table discussing your next steps?

I'm down with cutting.

Down with cutting.

I'm okay with that.

That's fine.

So your all around experiences. Dining room table just covered in breakfast foods. Bacon, sausage, biscuits, oatmeal with raisins and cinnamon.

Can I say that Donna made the pancakes and it's got two Banana eyes and chocolate chip mouth.

There you go. Yeah. Waffles, pancakes, eggs cooked different ways. A quiche, coffee.

Same way she would have brought them to the boys.

Yeah. Truth Tens was there obviously experience as well. Morthak is nowhere to be seen. Bronson is of course eating already.

Troy is pacing. When are we leaving? He doesn't even have to say it. He's got that vibe. He already finished eating. The food was not done and he was scraping it out of the pan with bare hands and just eating it. He's excited, he's energetic.

Riley looks up from his pancakes and goes leaving to where?

We just.

What?

What? I thought. What? We're not staying here. We can't stay here.

Obviously we're going to go meet Hercules. I mean, we gotta do something with these. And I hold up,

like,

knock the table, jostle some coffee cups.

Troy keeps the real gun poking a hole in the. Poking his finger in that hole in the arm. Like for this.

When Mr. Cat says Hercules, Donna kind of stops eating. You're going to go up north with us, Mr. Cat.

Yes, we are. So we agreed last night.

Wait, what? We're doing what?

We are going to go assist a Greek God in rescuing poor people and some side stalkers and shit.

He's a glitter boy.

Were you just planning to stay here and see how much of a dent your butt could put in that couch? Come on, man. This will be fun.

Do you remember before we left to get the weapons? I was like, as long as I'm back in a few days for the trek up north.

You talked them in to getting involved with your ragtag bunch of insurgents.

I mean, I came to this decision of my own volition.

I have no doubt.

I was hoping that maybe if I went with y', all, you would come along. You know, it's in the name of good.

How many days until your crew leaves?

How many days, Kyle, from this point?

Well, if it was up to truth, that everybody would be. You'd be leaving right now.

Yeah, I. There was a plan though, right? It was like. I think it was three days. How long did it take us to get the weapons and back?

I think it was about two days.

So it'd be like tomorrow.

It's been three days because we stayed there overnight and then we stayed here tonight. So this is day three.

That's true.

Yeah.

This afternoon, God damn it, it.

Riley gets up for the table, doing that classic former. I was in the military and I've just been told I have to do something. So, like shoving things in his mouth. As fast as he can as he's heading to the door. I'll be right back. I'm driving over to the bakery.

Okay. All right. Heading to Lustful Flowers. Yes.

I come walking through the door. I walk on up to him, I look him in the eye and I go. I need a portable welder, a cutting torch, and some spare random combat grade plate. I have a shitload of Coalition equipment to trade for it. Oh, and can I get a dozen bagels for the road?

So by him I assume you mean Zane the Techno wizard bagel. Yeah. Oh, hey, Riley. Okay, let's go out to the shop. Alberic, you got this? And so the DB, like bipedal anteater type guy says, y got it.

As we're walking back, it's like. And that doesn't make him a mixed batch.

Yeah, yeah. Okay, so what do you want to get from him?

Basically, I'm looking for like a portable welder and a cutting torch so I could do some field expedient repairs to the Mountaineer on the road, as it were, because I don't have time to do it properly.

Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, I think that. Let's see, what was the plate charm?

Just basically random MDC grade sheet metal so I can weld up the holes that were put in my Mountaineer by missiles.

We have Death's Head transport scrap.

We do, but you know, a couple extra that aren't blown to shit would be helpful. You know, I mean, I'm definitely planning on using that, but you know, a couple decent sections so I can cut pieces that need to fit like fenders and stuff.

Okay, yeah, he would have that. He's got a bunch of scraps.

Just a couple plates is all I'm looking for.

Okay, so essentially basic vehicle repair tools. Yeah, basically scrap metal.

Yeah.

And what else? Anything else?

A dozen bagels?

Oh, sure, sure. Yeah, that's a given. And you're going to trade Coalition gear for it?

I got a bunch of Coalition gear, parts of some skelebots, half decent suit of, only worn once. Sky Pilot armor. Armor didn't take it. Didn't take it.

Why can't wear it once?

Well, when he hit the ground, I don't think anybody else had worn it before him.

Oh, because he died. Oh, got it.

Yeah, yeah.

Let me just put it to you there. Again, the paint scuffed, but like it didn't take any shots.

Oh, well that's, that's cool.

Broke his neck.

And they say impact snapped his neck. Yeah, yeah, Messy, right?

Gotcha. Okay, well yeah, that's cool. I could probably help you out so he can give you. You get like a full set of like a full portable toolkit, scrap metal. Like 500 credits.

Oh, yeah, sure.

Oh, wow.

Like 520 with the bagels.

We don't even need to give them any of this stuff.

Yeah, yeah.

Like, if you want a professional field kit, you could do that. Could be 2K, but for just something to repair MDC armor and not much else. Yeah, like 500 credits.

Yeah, that's all I'm really looking for.

Okay.

Just enough to patch up the wagon. The mountaineer, cool hand, 500 credits. Tip him an extra hundred because.

Hey.

Oh, thanks.

He's my kind of people. And his bagels are fabulous.

Yeah, he's like, well, good luck. Hope to see you back soon. You guys, you know, dangerous life. You ever thought about open like a machine shop or something?

All the damn time. If I end up being able to settle down and the kids quit dragging me around, I will definitely look you up in on that.

Okay.

Seems like this place could use someone who knows how to work with heavy equipment.

Oh, you know the mechanical arts. Lou Laszlo is not exactly known for it. Yeah, yeah. Can't sling a dead cat without hitting

a wizard, but yeah, they don't know

the difference between a, you know, synchro gear and a clutch plate.

Ah, these people. Anyway, anyhow, good luck.

Thank you much. And Riley does this really unusual thing. He extends his hand to shake it.

Oh, yeah. Zane, of course, shakes it.

Oh, yeah.

And then hugs you.

Riley grimaces as he's hugged. And then goes out front, gets the dozen bagels, picks up a couple things of schmear, throws him in the Mountaineer and drives back to the house. All right, we have this entire. He comes like, walking back in the house and like, we got this entire road. Road hammer full of coalition gear. I suppose you want to give the quote, unquote, freedom fighters, that stuff lock, stock and barrel. Are we gonna sell some of it? What's the plan?

I thought we were gonna sell some of it.

We need money.

Yeah, we don't need to necessarily. Truth. Do you maybe wanna have some folks come take a look, see what you can use and see what we can keep for ourselves?

Will do. Yeah. So she'll get people that know to come look at it.

Riley, do you want to supervise them?

Sure. It's not like amount.

Not like they're gonna steal. I told you guys.

Now 500,000 credits worth of military hardware. Yes.

Yeah. Okay.

500K. Yep.

It's a lot of bagels. A lot of bagels.

And I think we should keep the armor. It's better than Plastic Man Troy.

Which. Oh, the flight suit.

We have a suit of dead boy flight suit armor.

Yeah, I'm gonna. I was planning on tossing it at you.

For the record, anything that we can use ourselves definitely is above anything that we give away. We get first crack.

When you say that, you hear the sound of the road hammer doors slamming and being locked. Because it's like. Well, in that case.

So are we getting rid of the power armor? I'm assuming we at least maybe you're keeping one, Zoo.

I would like to keep one so I could learn how to use it. My only thought about the Samus armor is that it's not necessarily incognito. Well, it will be when I paint it. Perfect. Exactly. Problem solved.

And as you can tell from the Mountaineer, Riley's a surprisingly dab hand with a paintbrush.

So Riley and truth few experts. She knows Dark Falcon are going through the equipment in the road hammer. Mr. Cat is messing with Samus armor. And so when there's a knock on the door to experience Densmore's house, it is Henry that answers. And Alex, you open the door and you see a towering wide cyborg, big 10 gallon hat, rough clothes. It is Hardwick Kindle, the Borg you met north of Detroit after you guys escaped the cyber rats, if you recall.

Oh, yeah, definitely. He kind of looked like a Scuttlebot.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

What's up, big boy?

Oh, well, howdy, friend. Did not expect to see you here. I was. Well, I was acquiring with Mrs. Dinsmore, but I. I suppose you are on good terms, right?

That'd be the case, brother. Come on in.

He steps in. Well, I. I do not want to keep. I have business to attend to, but I know that truth. Her daughter and other such people are, well, anti coalitionists, as you might say.

Oh, we found ourselves anti coalition as well lately.

Ah, well, excellent. Well, I. I would. I wanted to bring it to attention. My peddler route takes me through quite a lot of Michigan. And I cannot say for certain, but I believe I may have located some near the Wells Clandestine Manor, if this is something of interest to you.

That sounds right up our alley, brother.

Yeah, so he tells you. Kind of to the northeast of New Laszlo, almost to. And I'm gonna. I. I cannot. What's the. It's not like Erie. It's the other lake that's. It's the lake that's to the northeast. The Northeast side of Michigan.

You're on.

Yeah, that's.

That's like Aaron.

Yeah, some old industrial side. I don't rightly know the name, but some of the signs say Port Sanilac, and I know there's a number of fellas where the camouflage reconnoiter seem like they're up to no good.

Well, you lost me.

Or Rekka Whatsit.

But the up to no good part, that seems right up our alley.

Well, they wear this coalition armor, and they move at night, and they're spying on towns and folk and keeping themselves on the down low. I only noticed because of my previous history.

Well, we happen to have a bit of coalition armor ourselves, and sounds like we ought pay them a visit.

All right, well, I just wanted to make it aware. I don't want to take part in these troubles, you understand? Wash my hands of this, but did not feel right to not let someone know.

To speak of grease and not wash it from your fingers. It's a curious choice.

I don't quite understand that.

I was trying to sound wise.

It's fine.

After the reconnoiter thing, he was compensating.

Well, best of luck to you, Mr. Henry. Perhaps I will see you in the wilds.

Hopefully so, brother.

All right, well, good day.

See ya.

Turn around and go find who's awake and fill them in.

Yeah. To Dark Falcon, it sounds like Coalition Rangers.

Yeah. Do you come, like, tell us in the trap?

Oh, for sure. Yeah.

That sounds like a problem. Truth. Do you want us maybe to go take care of that? It's not too far out of the way, she says.

Yeah, if it's true, that would be a problem. We need to know what they know or what they're planning.

Well, I can tell you one thing, truth. Between me and these boys, they're problem solvers.

Does that mean you're gonna go kill them?

Well, yeah, I would hope that they would come. We might try to, you know, interrogate one before we, you know, kill them.

Unless they surrender. They will not surrender.

Is this something we'd be doing on the way?

We'll wait for you at the old fortress at Saginaw.

Donna gives truth a big old hug. We will see you there.

Okay. Is there anything else you all want to do before you leave? New Laszlo Repairs? Oh.

Oh, that's a good.

Yeah, that's. Silly idea.

You have time?

Yeah. Repair those MDC that you just wasted.

Rude.

You want to repair plastic man armor?

No, because I'm getting mine replaced.

Yeah, I'm gonna say it's disposable.

Whoa.

I do have two minor things that I don't that one of them I want to roll on. One is I want to go buy a bunch more railgun ammo. I don't know how much money I have, but I spend most of it on railgun ammo.

I happen to know there's a partially used case of coalition explosives in the back of the road Hammer. I'm sure we can.

We can't have too many.

Yes, but we could trade them for.

Oh, we could swap them out. The problem is that he has already gone and made the purchase before he bothers to talk to you about how he would fund it other than his own personal cash.

So, bookkeeping party. Bookkeeping aside, that we had 500,000 creds worth of stolen coalition equipment in addition to the three Samus suits.

In addition to.

Yeah, the Samus suits were like, specially stated. And then the rest was just stuff that we gather.

So what percentage of that 500,000 went to?

What percent? Yeah. Do you want to do, like, 100,000

worth of gear towards the well after Truth goes through? Like, what. What does she think? Like, does she give a number for like, 60, 40? We. We could also figure this out outside of.

I think we should do this now or we're not going to do it.

Okay.

We're going to forget it between sessions.

Well, let me ask you, Kyle. Is there a specific, like, amount of gear that Truth is like, looking for?

Truth would take literally anything you would give her.

Okay, so 500,000.

We're not giving her 500,000.

No, no, no. I'm just saying that's the total.

So not knowing the monetary system of this game very well, what is an amount where we would be like, that is plenty for us for now.

500,000 would be really great.

Yeah, for buying more power armor. Come on.

What about 300,000 of truth? 200 for us.

No, not. No, Sorry. No.

Nope.

Nope.

This is Mr. Cat or this is NPC.

This is both of us. He's all about fighting the good fight, but also he wants that money because we need money. And we were broke for the first 12 sessions of this game.

You can always give up your share

has lots of money.

No, you don't have 500,000 creds.

No, not 500,000.

We do.

And you just want to give it away.

All right, how about we keep 300,000? It's the vast majority and they keep 200.

I'd be okay with that.

Yeah, that's a lot to anti coalition forces. It is That's a big investment.

We have not been broke.

We were not. The first 12 sessions we had. The first eight we were flat broke so much that we had to invent a new player character to borrow from them.

It was a gift and how dare you.

All right, let's hit the road.

So we're going to sell the rest of this to Alexander.

Yeah.

Pull out a couple items.

You already said that. He was down.

Just a couple people wanted. Coalition assault rifles. Yeah, I'm sure you want more of the grenades.

Yeah.

So figure out what you want to pull out. We'll sell the rest to him before we leave town.

I think we should at least have a coalition rifle and a coalition pistol each.

Now here's the big question. Are we going to see if he'll take the Road Hammer?

He'll absolutely buy it.

Yeah. Oh yeah.

Oh, nice.

So that will up the.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Okay.

How much is this gonna give us for the Road Hammer? Probably not new price, but no, definitely

not new price and I think that is in the black market book.

How often can you sell equipment and guarantee all trackers have been removed? Yeah, or. Sorry. How much are we gonna sell the chili down for?

We scratched out the name and we

just keep doing it.

Now are you getting rid of the Samus suits? You're keeping one, right?

One, yeah.

You don't want one for Branson?

No.

Hey guys, check this out.

All missiles.

So the, the Road Hammer transport. The credit cost for an electric engine transport, which this is, is 550, 000.

Jesus.

Now it's had significant damage and it is used and it is stolen.

I was gonna say.

And it's hot.

So he will give you 200 000.

Okay, that's good.

That's dime on the dollar that I was expecting. So.

Yeah, yeah, you've been tinkering with it. It's in good shape.

Now these SAM suits are fresh in the crate.

Yes.

Those aren't even hot. It's just simply owning them makes you a target of the coalition. They're worse than hot. But they're brand new power armor I

don't know much about. Would it make sense for Donna to get in one of these?

Black market cost, 1.6 to 2 million credits.

Jesus Christ.

Yeah.

Think he doesn't want the Samus suits?

Okay. It'd be a bit of a hat on a hat. Well then we should keep them.

We just keep them in the truck for now.

Yeah.

Mine.

Ada, we could send one back to coalition base with an explosive inside. 1.6 to 2 million. That's the most expensive. Maybe six successful bomb. Hell yeah.

Down for that, too.

You think Henry says that. And Riley's head is immediately trying to figure out how to build a fuel air explosive in the size of a chest cavity.

Here's a question. Can Truth, Dinsmore's group, use a coalition Samus?

Oh, I was just about to ask an npc. Beat me to it. I don't even have to fucking persuade.

What?

That still leaves us with two Samusu.

Look at it this way.

Give it.

You're using his desire to recruit minions against him.

Oh, but this is my idea.

Yeah, yeah.

Oh, exactly. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

The Torchbearers would absolutely take it. So they have a robot pilot, Daisy Boone.

I will offer her two if she can teach me how to fly one.

That is a deal they immediately take.

Okay, he's over here arguing about a couple hundred thousand, allowing Mr. Cat to just.

What are we. We're gonna go around. Okay, first of all, originally, when we were talking about taking the coalition suits, we were told that we could not fit more than one. Or, no, we couldn't fit them all on the back of the Mountaineer. I don't even think we could fit two. So in order for us to get rid of them, we would either have to just, you know, dump them somewhere, or we would have to. If we wanted to keep them, we would have to keep the Dolly Parton.

The log jammer.

Yeah.

Or we can let experience and crew figure out how the fuck to get her. The Samus to their friends.

Exactly.

Donna is so on board. Like she, She. A tear wells in her eyes like when Mr. Cat.

And that's 1.6 to $2 million times two. In favors that they can owe. Yeah, some of that would be teaching me to fly one.

Yeah.

Did these come with manuals?

No. Gorkov.

It's not automatic, if that's what you're asking.

Are we sure you don't want to

add, like, four additional Gorshkovs to the game?

Clutch, you have to use a different accent for every. Yeah, it's crucial.

You want me to copy and fork Gorshkov to install him in a suit of Samus armor?

The way I figure it is that Gorshkov represents the pinnacle of Soviet AI. But for the coalition, their soldiers aren't expected to be smart. So they probably have, like, Jack McBrayer. Oh, well, hey there.

Okay,

so that's what we're doing then.

Why don't you just press that Button.

There we go to get going.

90% of the bonds been fried.

Riley has been fucking with Henry's brain. Is it possible you could upload a new Henry into a Samus?

A new Gorsh?

That was the thing.

You want me to copy and fork Gorshkov into a Samus?

No, Henry.

Oh no, I can't do. Henry, I can't do.

Maybe because he's all cyborg now, technically, human interconnects.

There's some brain, some jaw.

Yeah, yeah, he is a brain. And internal organs.

That's a long term project. But if you want it to happen, I'll try to make it happen.

I like Gorshkov. I think he and Mr. Cat would actually get along.

Oh, I'm terrified of that. As far as Cranston is concerned, I don't know if we want Gorshkov to have full anonymity or autonomy. I don't know, whatever word.

Neither of those.

Either of those a words.

I mean, here's the thing. Unlike a cyborg body that he's fully integrated in, I don't think Gorshkov in a Samus suit would have full control of the suit at the same way. Just because there's. If you think about it.

Yeah. They're not autonomous.

They're not autonomous. They're designed to be piloted and amplify flesh and bone. The person inside of its actions rather than perform the actions.

We could potentially just be extending Gorshkov's capabilities.

Yes.

Well, it'd be like Gorshkov Alpha and then Gorshkov Beta.

Gorshkov. Good piloting. Thank you, Gorshkov. Gorshkov agrees.

Then I'll have to have two Gorshkov tracks. Oh gosh, you guys, look who's Gorshkoving now. We just named the episode.

This sounds like a lot of work for me.

Yeah, that's pretty much. Yeah.

Actually, yeah. I was just saying on the way out of town, Troy has something to do, but I don't think I need to buy anything else. We're keeping a gun and a pistol for everybody. An absolute ass ton of money.

Who wants the. I would love a railgun.

Can you? Oh, you can hold one too.

I'm pretty strong.

Do you have augmented strength or something like that? Or do you just have mundane? I can't answer that myself, but I think you need a non human strength in order to wield it.

Yeah.

Is that P.S.

yeah, yeah, but it would be like P.S. augmented or P.S. robotic or something like that. Or Supernatural. If you shit, the dragon could wield it. If you want to give a railgun,

you know, that's just the kind of thing I think Troy would say allowed.

Oh, absolutely.

Mor is actually not interested.

He.

He would say, but I will. I breathe fire.

But he wanted.

He was so hardcore about getting a gun in the last episode.

Yeah, but that's. That's a cool gun though.

Oh, he just called these guns not cool. I walk away.

Well, he didn't see what they can do.

Yes.

Troy walks away and Mr. Cat looks over approvingly. The student.

Nah, my PS is normal.

Yeah, I think in theory the only other person who could operate it would

be Mr. K. I'm not augmented. I'm really strong. But I. I'm in the 30s, but I don't. Still don't know.

Spring a third. We can have him mount it to the top of the vehicle. It'll be great at some point.

That's why I picked up the gear. Because the cupola may not be professionally installed, but it's happening. So there's gonna be a pintle mounted railgun on the coop on the roof of the Wagoneer with a pop up.

See, we can't call it. It's Mountaineer. It's the same thing.

I didn't have this problem until the road hammer showed up and we suddenly couldn't get that name straight. And suddenly I'm referring to it as a station wagon rather than this gigantic fuck off all terrain vehicle.

Mountain arrow. Could be the Dungeoneer. We thinking I could also do wield

rail guns if we really want to go that route.

That's true. Okay, so in the afternoon you load up in the Mountaineer. It is lighter than when you arrived in New Laszlo and you head out towards Port Sanilac, possibly deal with a group of coalition rangers. After that you will meet the torchbearers at the old fortress at Saginaw, presumably then travel north to meet this Hercules Adams and possibly do battle with King Abel. Or not. Maybe halfway there you guys will decide to go see what New York is like. I don't know, but that's the plan.

Oh, West Virginia on the way out of town. Because we're pursuing violence, but. But Troy's also pursuing personal growth and maybe romance. He will hire a messenger to send a message to Tentacle Catherine that just says sorry about getting squiggy about that. And a filled out punch card to the bagel place.

When you said message, I thought you're

going to be telling me that Riley, of all people, with his Personality that just turns every living creature off has got more game than Troy.

Eye of seduction. I'm using it here. You just don't understand what she likes.

Fair enough.

Catherine the Tentacle Lady. I just want to make sure my

notes are Catherine the Tentacle Lady. He doesn't actually know her name, but she reminded him of a girlfriend that he had named Catherine, so he called her Katherine the whole night. Then they had a thing where he found out she had some tentacles and it weirded him out and it got awkward. Awkward, but he feels bad about it.

Actually named Catherine.

She didn't correct him, though.

I guess her entry on the wiki is going to be not Catherine.

The tentacle women do like it when you insist their name.

Oh, yes.

May I introduce question, mark, comma, tentacles.

I'm going to have to scour the books for some DB with tentacles.

And he's.

He's not charming charming, but when he's manic, he's amusing.

She's. She's a Splurgoith. Do you mean splugorth?

No, Spurgoith.

Distant cousins.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Was she definitely think some sort of Atlantean?

Was she wearing mostly black? She could have been a Splurgoth.

You know, I don't remember there was a lot of drinking either. I missed the pun.

I raise a glass to Sporkoth.

All right, well, that's where we'll end. Tonight. Everybody can have 100 XP just for excellent roleplay.

Thank you. I wasn't actually expecting any tonight. That's very nice.

What a beautiful, generous gm.

I've always said that about yourself. Yeah. Yeah.

Good to have you back, Troy.

Yes, it was fun. Glad I could be here.

Triumphant return. I really enjoy the whole just appearing. That was good.

Well, I kind of imagine that he was like, in the woods outside New Laszlo, saw the Mountaineer, ran, popped in the cab, started talking to Riley while Riley was at this fugue state.

And Riley's like, nobody else needs to know this information. We'll figure it out when we get there.

Yeah, well, so the whole time that Troy was talking to Riley, Riley was having this vision and literally didn't know he was there. And Troy just didn't pick up on it.

All right, I'm excited to see where this goes. Me too. We have railguns now.

We have so much gear in mind.

I've been saying since the first fucking session, we got to get Henry a railgun. And now 13 sessions in we can destiny, we can finally kill people. We meet the same session. That much Quicker.

That's right.

Yeah.

Whoops.

And. And much further away.

True.

Oh, no.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You want to make sure.

Yeah. 4,000ft.

Yep.

The range.

Yes.

Yeah.

It may not be. Maybe I was looking at the wrong

railgun, but it's a long ways wrapping this up, folks. You've been listening to the Glitter Boys. If you haven't already figured that out. I'm npc.

I'm just Jacob.

I'm Alex.

I'm Cranston.

I'm Sean.

Yay.

We got the whole group. Huzzah. Oh. Oh, yeah. And finally. I mean, we can't forget Kyle.

Yes, Kyle, the man who makes it happen.

Kyle, tell us about that other show. Show?

Yeah. I am the GM on the Bastard Quest actual Play podcast. We play lots of games and we have fun doing it. And if you like this, you. You'll probably like Bastard Quest, though it's a little more silly.

A lot more silly.

A lot more silly. Yeah. Yeah.

Although it would be fun to have some of them make a guest appearance every now and then. That could be amusing.

Well, you never know that. We could potentially arrange that we meet

Hercules and he turns out to be Cham.

Oh, no.

Thanks for listening. Please drop by our Discord and say hello. The Bastard Quest folks also have a Discord. I forget, is that open or is it a Patron only Discord Patron only. Nice.

It's a gated community.

Thanks for listening, folks. We will catch you next time. Starships Magic, Mystic Martial Arts Romance. All of these can be found in a cloak of Blood Blades by Isaac Sher. You might have heard my name before. I've done a lot of voiceover work for Breakfast Puppies and I've recently released my first novel. It's available on Amazon as an ebook and paperback and you can get it for free if you have a Kindle unlimited subscription. I do hope you'll support my work as you're supporting Breakfast Puppies and it's been a pleasure talking with you today. Have a good one. You've been listening to the Glitter Boys, a Palladium Books fan podcast. Glitter Boys, Rifts, the Megaverse and all other such topics are the property of Kevin Sambita and Palladium Books. Please buy all their stuff and help keep them in print and making more games. You can order [email protected] and their entire catalog is available digitally at drivethrurpg as well. Our opening music is 8 bit bass and lead by FurbyGuy from freesound.org this closing music is Caravana by Philip Gross available@free musicarchive.org all sound effects used are self made or acquired via Creative Commons zero License. If you like what you have heard, find us on Twitter and Facebook as TheGlitter Boys. That's B O I S and check us out [email protected] glitter boys and also join us on the Breakfast Puppies network [email protected] Discord and if you want to help us out, please spread the and help us build a community. Thanks again for listening. We'll catch you next time. So I have a side story. First time I ever met as a group of friends that I hung out with through my entire life, my twenties when I lived in Atlanta, I met them at Dragon Con. And this one dude that I met, we hit it off very well. And the night that we met at the con, and then that night we're like, let's go partying. We went from room to room at the hotel. And then at one point in the night, he pulls out a stun gun. He's like, all right, just shock me with this. And it's like, all right, cool, whatever. And I shocked him and he flew back like 20ft. And then he goes, okay, now my turn. I'm having flashbacks.