AEON C-Team S2E6: IT'S TIME TO SPLIT!

The Team:

Niklos Xanthopoulos (Kevin): Multidisciplinary genius, medic/doctor, and general curmudgeon. Believes Morphazine is the answer for everything and enjoys asking Marsh to hold organs during autopsies. TIME LORD

Marsh Langston (Maverick): A blond, smiling hacker that will rip the most secure files out of your mainframe while convincing you that he's just downloading more RAM. Marsh is a technical wunderkind and social engineer with a shadowy background in intelligence. PROHIBITION MOBSTER

Mikhail Kovalenko (Alex): Measuring 6'4" and weighing about 230lbs, Ukrainian-born Mikhail Kovalenko was a former special agent in Eastern Europe and is extremely competent at drinking vodka, making friends with random people, piloting, field action, reminding others that he's from Ukraine (not Russia), field operations, and handling firearms. TOTALLY NIKO BELLIC

Agent Veracity (Me): The Subway's resident spook and dumpster diver, Agent Veracity is a highly skilled investigator, tradecraft expert and conspiracy nut. FUCKING SERIOUSLY HOW MANY TIMES DO I HAVE TO SAY VAST CONSPIRACY BEFORE THE OTHERS REALIZE HE'S WORKING FOR VAST?

Events:

After two days chilling in FEMA tents, we're shown to hospital beds and transported in a converted semi truck somewhere else, while hooked up to weird devices. They almost seem to be hyperbaric chambers, except with rings, not glass.

Our nurse seems afraid to touch whatever is around us.

The truck is tricked out with TVs and other amenities, we're still prisoners, but at least it's not punitive imprisonment.

Marsh and Niklos both attempt Science! and Medicine! checks to determine what we're currently in. Marsh knows it's emitting some kind of field, but not much else. Niklos believes they're some kind of temporal stabilizer.

Mikhail recognizes the bumps in the road (utilizing Wheelman!)- we're heading for upstate New York, the Adirondacks specifically.

A short redhaired woman (Mishka Rosenkrantz) from the front of the trailer walks up and asks Niklos what he wants to know. Niklos wants to know what they think happened to us, and what they're doing about it.

The two converse back and forth about how to fix the fact that we're temporally out of phase. Niklos is convinced he can fix it himself. They hand Niklos a set of blueprints for the chambers we're all in to keep him from attempting to disassemble the pods himself.

Blame Christopher

It's stated that our time travel was called "The Time Warp." Marsh isn't impressed with this name, and keeps prodding Niklos to explore his duplication capabilities post time travel. 

Veracity asks for internet access and then remains busy reading up on four years of news.

We're allowed water, but no food. Mikhail would like the woman to know that it's been four years since he last had vodka, and the woman threatens to sedate him.

Mikhail proceeds to throw wads of paper around, hitting Niklos in the head. One ball of paper bounces onto the rings of Mikhail's chamber. The resulting temporal effects cause Mikhail quite a lot of pain.

They pump Mikhail with enough Morphazine to knock out an elephant, putting him under.

After about six hours we arrive somewhere.

Marsh learns that Gunther went on a cross-country rampage across the country, ending up in San Francisco and weathering the effects of an RPG on film.

We're shuffled out into the dark. There's a single light that we follow down somewhere, wheeled into a large cabin. It's a glorified hunting shack, suitable for being a base camp for maybe 20-30 people.

Legend and Breaker are both there. They talk briefly and then Breaker leaves.

Legend informs us that we're basically temporal bombs. He claims that Marlowe is dead or no longer on this plane of existence.

ALL YOUR TRASH ARE BELONG TO VERACITY

It appears that we're probably going to explode sometime within the next two weeks, with a force equal to a hundredth of a tactical nuke. We'll be sleeping in basically a glorified bomb containment chamber. We're still disallowed from eating and drinking to better allow them to monitor vitals.

We're all in separate rooms, but the quarters are nice. There's TV's and computers. Niklos adamantly refuses to try his duplication powers in the off chance it will kick off an explosion, and resists his innate curiosity.

We're not allowed to communicate out. The facility looks custom built just to handle us- and must have been built in an amazingly short time.

The computers resist Marsh's attempts to crack into the internal network AEGIS is using. It resists his attempts with a pre-recorded message about not using the correct password, with Zeke's voice. Veracity tries to use some knowledge he has personally of Zeke to access any possible backdoors Zeke might have installed, but only succeeds in locking his terminal.

Mikhail protests the lack of vodka of any quality.

We all do our best to keep entertained. Mikhail does a bunch of physical exercise, while Marsh, Veracity and Niklos do heavy reading.

Two weeks of enforced isolation for field agents leads to some severe idle hands- such as Marsh scrounging makeshift lockpicks, requests for copious amounts of Mountain Dew, and utilizing ASL to badmouth being kept in lockdown.

We're all given very nice food after five days. Niklos spawns a duplicate on day 10, causing a big fuss as he starts screaming is agony during the process. This causes a big explosion of some sort.

BOOOOOM

All of us are suddenly back on the truck again. Niklos is the only one that remembers anything about our ten days in isolation. We go through everything again, except this time Legend doesn't cut the conversation short because Veracity doesn't question who this 'highest authority' figure is.

Our minder launches into how the Subway was known for disregarding rules and orders, and mentions that the guy Niklos did a psychological whammy on two sessions ago was found streaking down the street cover in Jello and was released from his post.

Niklos starts hearing his own voice in his head. He reasons it might be the voice of his dead self from that explosion, but it is adamant that it can't be ignored. The voice plays up how crazy the rest of the team is- Mikhail doing endless pushups, Marsh trying to beat Zeke's computer system, Veracity digging through his own trash.

Evidently we're going to continue exploding in a continual loop. The voice is definitely playing the part of devil on the shoulder, encouraging Niklos to try and score with Mishka Rosenkratz. The voice claims that in six months Niklos will enter a weeklong coma and wind back up at the facility we're currently in. Sadly Niklos does not tell the other that he's banging Rosenkratz in another timeline/universe, preventing us from becoming the best wingmen of all time.

The rest of C-Team encouraging Niklos

Niklos decides that he wants to create anti-time travel to stop the loop. Niklos starts an insane rant with the voice he's hearing. 

Mishka eventually shares with us that Zephyr has previously experienced this, while we start trying to plan how to solve the catastrophe. On the 13th day, explosion happens and we all reset.

This again? Really?

Back in the semi, Niklos again catches Mikhail's thrown paper ball before it hits him.

Niklos immediately info dumps on Rosenkratz. Niklos makes a bunch of rolls to recall info correctly.

This time the facility is less closed off, and we're kept in basically a communal barracks, and immediately given food. We're joined by a small team of scientists.

Veracity starts experiencing an annoying level of deja vu.

Niklos determines that we are currently harboring GRATUITOUS AMOUNTS OF (Kyberian) ENERGY, which is the root of our problems.

It appears Blue Skies has created some kind of Kyberic energy accumulator that might help out, uncovered in South America after the great Kaboom. Marsh gets to work with Inventor!, and with help from the team and some Karma expenditure from Marsh and Niklos, he ultimately gets a success by 5. 

The accumulator starts correctly gathering energy from its resulting environment. It alone won't be enough to stop us from exploding- possibly just slowing it down.

We hustle to try and create a device that will drain Kyberian energy, and Marsh manages to get a working concept going. 

During piling on more assistance rolls, Kevin rolls a natural 18 and spends 5 Karma to turn it into a crit success since it's the final hurrah. The rest of the team pitches in with Teamwork! (I accidentally attempt to roll 3d5 at one point) and Marsh rolls a crit success on getting the Kyberian drain unit to work.

We use the prototype device on Mikhail first, since he's judged to be the least likely to die. Mikhail crits the resulting HT roll with a 4. Niklos and Marsh zap Mikhail with the device, which starts smoking. Mikhail seems unaffected.

Another attempt and Mikhail is successfully zapped, followed by Marsh and Veracity.

Niklos starts feeling UNCOMFORTABLY ENERGETIC, so we scramble to zap him with the device. Niklos explodes, but this time it's just into his six copies who are all sprawled out on the floor.

Niklos takes a huge FP loss (like, -50ish) and collapses. Marsh who actually has first aid, grabs whatever crash/first aid kit might be available. He succeeds by 10 on the roll, unassisted. He gets Niklos resuscitated very quickly. Niklos is still at a cool -27hp.

Not this again, thankfully

We're granted limited freedom- no leaving the cottage.

Niklos is glad to not be waking up in the back of semi truck. 

We're kept for a week.

Us after realizing this bomb shit cost us $15 Million Dollars

The funds we extracted from Marlowe paid for the shiny medical/research facility we've been kept in. Our names are on a plaque for our 'Charitable Donation'. 

Legend explains that we're all legally dead and asks us if we'd like to keep it that way.

Veracity is totally up for this- pulling off False Flag operations with one's own identity is hilarious.

Legend explains that we were branded as terrorists to cover up the fact that AEGIS was involved with the explosion in South America. Niklos is very pissed about this.

Veracity discerns that the coverup was really good.

Legend wants to offer us a job. Our reactions vary. Niklos is pretty pissed about the being dead part. Marsh is intrigued. Veracity is definitely interested in the idea of doing something momentous. Mikhail just wants some Vodka since he hasn't had any in four years.

Legend learns that Niklos' grandfather was someone he knew, and slides over a pocket watch containing a picture of the Marauders with both Legend and Niklos' grandfather in it.

A guy named Markus is called into the room by Legend. He has dark hair and is dressed in Black Clothing. Claims to be a specialist. He asks us if we know about the Black Swan theory.

Our return must've been on the irrelevant list...

Markus tells us that an event will soon take place that will potentially end the world, likely within 4 years, maybe up to 9. He talks about a machine that can predict potential events that might kick off the Black Swan event- but it didn't foresee us hurtling through time.

The Wall that has been preventing precogs from viewing farther into the future has moved back from 2018 to 2025. Markus suggests that we remain dead to help apply our talents to stopping events that might contribute to Black Swan kicking off.

We're told that we have six months before the real work begins.

Nemesis (Conceptual)

Markus goes into how we need to destroy Blue Skies before 2017. Then a dude in black spikey armor appears out of nowhere. He introduces himself as Nemesis and lists how long we've been disappeared. He says he's part of an alliance between three parties to stop the Apocalypse.

We're being provided access to Sentry's network by Nemesis thanks to Markus.

Nemesis compliments Niklos' work on something. 

Mikhail is confused. Veracity explains to him that the avatar of a super computer and a spirit of vengeance want us to help Legend out. He goes on to say that Black Swan is likely a metahuman apocalypse.

Markus is surprised, since he definitely left that part about Black Swan out.

It appears Blue Skies is perfecting Purple Drank, and AEGIS has been stymied by massive budget cuts. 

Nemesis observes to Legend that some of us have more Kyberic energy than we should. On some scale we're supposed to be 2 or 3s, and we're currently ranking as 5s.

Nemesis shakes our hands, says that he trusts us, and departs.

Markus mentions that we have 187 days before we'll be needed- and to use our time wisely. Then he draws a sigil on the door and walks through a badass portal that appeared out of nowhere and is gone.

Legend asks us who's in. Once all of us agree to being in, he turns us over to 'Billy' for field training.

We're woken up at 5am unceremoniously and then injected with a drug that gives us Doesn't Sleep for about a week.

Breaker proceeds to give us more physical training from hell- Mikhail gets to lug Breaker the entire time as a handicap to account for his increased physical capabilities.

Niklos manages to substitute a clone to spread the grueling exercise around for a while before Breaker catches on and injects him with power blockers to prevent him from continuing to do so.

We're trained along with a group of 5 others. Breaker doesn't appreciate Veracity's Survivor jokes.

We're all asked to roll 3d6 after something strange happens in bootcamp. Kevin mistakenly rolls 3d67 the first time. One morning we'd been tossed outside to survive in the mountains when a mountain lion should've had Marsh dead to rights, and then it decides to fuck off after making eye contact with Marsh.

Marsh starts getting strange reactions from people, and is quickly sent to the med lab. Niklos is tasked with looking at him, and Marsh is diagnosed as being some kind of metahuman. It doesn't appear to be mind reading since thinking really hard in his direction doesn't allow Marsh to hear Niklos' thoughts.

Niklos recognizes that Marsh is affecting his mind somehow, hijacking the sensory input of a single person. Niklos asks Marsh to make a grilled cheese sandwich appear on a tray in the room. It doesn't smell, it has no tactile feedback, and Niklii Six is asked to guinea pig for Marsh's new ability.

Time Loop!

Mikhail and Veracity are both presenting with enhanced Kyberic power fields. Niklos tells Legend.
Evidently the Time Loop imbued at least two of us with powers- one of us may have been a latent. 

The two of us are subjected to prolonged testing to figure out what our capabilities are. An old man named Leland shows up. Evidently Leland has spent 30 years helping people learn about and control their powers. He starts with Mikhail.

Leland thinks that Mikhail is weird. He slaps Mikhail who begins to have an out of body experience. Leland yanks him back into his body via a silver cord linking Mikhail's projection to his body. The projection can move through walls, is invisible to the rest of us, and can move about ten feet from his body. While projecting Mikhail can see the ghost of Niklos' grandfather. Mikhail greets him amicably.

Niklos is a 'level five chronokinetic'. Leland explains that our recent time travel was Niklos' powers mucking things up. Leland explains that Niklos' duplicates have been pulled from other timelines. He also identifies that Niklos has been hearing his own voice in his head. (Terrible pun happened here)

Veracity is up. Leland was saved by ROOK on a few occasions and mentions it. It appears Veracity has powers very similar to his father's clairsentience- having to do with information itself instead.

We're subjected to various training, including stealth training from Nemesis. Niklos pulls a dirty trick on Nemesis during the 'seek' phase by absorbing six after sending six out to hide.

The combat training that follows includes sparring with Urich Rosenkrantz, one of the most skilled non-meta individuals in existence. 

We spend six months without sleep undergoing a hugely regimented and very varied training regime.

We wrap up there.

Commentary:

The Time Loop was a helluva lot of exposition. It's fun to play our characters going off the rails from being confined in a small space without much to do. Marsh and Niklos got the bulk of the day to themselves, since Mikhail and Veracity have didly squat for science capabilities.

Our recent acquisition of Teamwork! via SERE training means that everybody will ALWAYS be able to make a complimentary skill check. Sure, Teamwork! is boring, but it's practical. Mikhail and Veracity both ended up making use of it to assist with the final Kyberian Energy sucker unit thingy.

So with all of us either gaining powers (Marsh, Mikhail), or realizing latent powers (Niklos, Veracity), C-Team is likely going to be a hugely different game moving forward. The loss of PK as a player due to his SJG duties definitely played a part, and it will be interesting to see how our roles as  cops/agents changes- especially since we're moving into territory where we might be operating outside of AEGIS' wheelhouse.

After all, we're being directed by the trio of Nemesis, Legend, and Markus now. We're believed dead by just about everyone- we're ghosts. Nonpeople.  Blue Skies can't think to attack our loved ones (their favorite tactic) until they realize we're alive. It's a perfect opportunity to strike back.

Powers were more or less assigned randomly for Marsh and Mikhail (although they got to veto the first two choices if they didn't like them- the third power option didn't get a veto option at all), while Niklos' powers were more or less dictated by the plot.

For Veracity, the biggest factor was the fact that it's immensely unusual for a meta to have powers unrelated to the powerset their parents had- you don't get people coming from a family with the power of Country music only to develop Death Metal powers. Since ROOK is a clairsentient (let's say Swing), Veracity's powers are constrained to something similar, but it's okay to leap to a related genre (because fuck you dad, I want Electro Swing powers). But no going from Gospel to NWA.

Ultimately it looks like Veracity will be getting a powerset revolving around manipulating information itself. I've already been tasked with coming up with possible powers for the set. (Spoiler: A "I know that you know" capability might be in the works.)

All of us PCs lucked out and have power focuses- meaning we can expand our powers with new capabilities over time. Marsh probably benefits the least from this since Illusion by itself is ridiculously strong and versatile- he could easily rely solely on that single advantage and get by just fine. Veracity and Mikhail will likely benefit the most.

MUSIC:

Christopher's asked me to start including music selections.

Time Warp- Rocky Horror Picture Show- All the time loops

Here it Goes Again- OK GO- Also time loops

Site by Graeme Norgate- Timesplitters 2