Pax Stellar - the Adventurers Arrive

We jumped over the week long trip in jump space, just noting that it is a good thing that there is a gym on the ship as Shenna, the Navy engineer, was going to town with the fresh food supplies.

Upon arriving in Pax Stellar space, they are met with stern Naval radio messages. Indicating that they have an Epsilon Indigo clearance, they are piped immediately to Admiral Mira Wescott. Normally a small task force with interdiction duties does not require the presence of an admiral. However, the nature of Pax Stellar and the risk and potential to the Imperium cannot be underestimated. She is one of a few dozen who know as much as there is to know about the system in the local task force. Pax Stellar was the primary system in the ancient empire, and has the most interesting and puzzling technologies. Admiral Wescott maintains a berth in the Crucible station in ring sector one in the VIP quarters. She has the Anomolies Run crew meet here at the captain's office near the main control section. A brief conversation about Osrum and the actual plan: get to the power anomaly using Osrum as an ambassador. So far the Navy researchers have been stymied and cannot approach closer than 70 kilometers or so before they are blocked. The group agrees to continue to escort our barbarian from Planet Bob back to his home world.

After a refreshing meal in the café, under the stars, they take a bumpy ride down planet in a Nirvana class drop ship (thanks Robert Pearce - see Yet Another Traveller Blog in my list for his fantastic work). It is a bumpy ride down - the pilot wants to go as fast as possible to avoid any catastrophes and technology failure. They pass by a large, whale-like floating filter that synthesizes hydrogen from the atmosphere, and manage an abrupt stop at research station two. There are the sounds of the pod release and son after, the sounds of the drop ship attaching to another pod and leaving as fast as possible.

The rear of the pod drops open and they are met by a field researcher, an ex-Navy flight officer who is now researching the weird science of Pax Stellar. She and the admiral do not get along, and Esther Inchara calls her Iron-Face Westwood.

They get into the steam powered ATV, and with a toot of the steam whistle, off they go. The power source is only a hundred or so kilometers from the research station, and as they approach the only pass into the area, they are blocked by a mountainous "metal" as Osrum calls them (image from Michael Murdock's Dr Mordecai Crowley's Journal of Interplanetary Travels which was a book from a Kickstarter that ended up being the source for images for Pax Stellar.

Osrum gets out to communicate with the vast creature. It takes a few tries, but eventually, an hour or more later, the gargantuan creature moves out of the way, and with another toot of the steam whistle (Esther swears it is necessary to calibrate the steam engine. Honest!) the steam-powered ATV trundles forward. A bit later, they come into the open area in the middle of the mountain range, where there are native buildings and humans working the fields.

One of the better dressed humans comes up, speaking a language no one, including Osrum, can understand. However, a few minutes later the leader speaks perfect Anglic, telling the Travellers he has been expecting them, and that Gerdy, their god, is waiting upon them.

Leaving the ATV behind, the group treks a few kilometers to where they see what appears to be a modern building, a large communication array mounted on the roof. The natives had built housing from the native stone and timbers, and this building would fit into any modern city. For a 3,000 year old building it was in remarkable shape.

The High Priest, for that is their guide, explains that they drop off offerings, often requested offerings, to Gerdy. Our group gives up some jewelry and knickknacks they have to a small robot, that then disappears into a small elevator.

The walk around the building to the front and enter. There is a foyer just past the front hall, and a holographic image welcomes them.

And then we ran out of time.

Not sure when this adventure will be picked back up - there are several other games in the queue so we'll just have to see if people will want to continue or not.

Next post I'll try & do a post-mortem on the game. What I think I did right, what really needs improvement.