Worm City

Worm City
Date 2082-07-05 GM Aurora Location Glow City
Factions Involved
ShadowHaven
Absolute Zero Vip3r
IG 1 for Zero

Summary

Absolute Zero receives a call from BinChicken, requesting that she come out to the edge of Glow City to pick up a statue that BC found in a dumpster. Zero sets out with Vip3r in tow, but when they reach the location specified in the .loc file, BinChicken is nowhere to be found. Turns out the area is crawling with flatworm vipers, and it's up to Zero and Viper to track down their dumpster diving acquaintance before she becomes worm food.

Background

Zero wakes up to a certain technologically inclined kitten wreaking havoc in her room. She takes a nasty scratch trying to wrestle a data chip out of Pixel's mouth before Viper appears on the scene, attracted by the noise. The two manage to liberate the chip from Pixel and Zero goes to bandage up her arm when she gets a call from BinChicken, who tells her that she found a statue of a polar bear in a dumpster and thought Zero might like to have it. The only catch is that BinChicken isn't done diving, so she'll have to come meet her outside of Redmond to pick it up. Zero agrees, suits up, and enlists Viper for what should be a quick and easy trip.

The Meet

Zero and Viper set out in the Jackrabbit towards Redmond to meet up with BinChicken, who's been dumpster diving in the area outside of Glow City. They park the car as close as they can manage before heading out on foot towards the location indicated in the .loc file BinChicken sent. Unfortunately, when they arrive, BinChicken isn't there, but what is there is a set of fleeing metahuman footprints and a track that looks like it was made by an unnaturally large snake.

The Plan

Using the power of snowledge (snake knowledge), Viper determines that the track was left not by a snake, but by a flatworm viper, a large, venemous worm. Zero, through the power of having taken 9th grade biology, remembers that flatworms are prone to regrowing severed parts of themselves, but figures that an icicles to the brain would probably negate that ability and isn't particularly worried. Viper swaps out her APDS for stick-and-shock just in case, and the two decide to follow the tracks and deal with whatever pops up along the way.

The Run

Almost immediately, three flatworm vipers make an appearance, surrounding Zero and Viper. Viper panics and shoots wide, but Zero manages to handle the situation with three well-aimed ice spears to the worm dome. Now firmly aware that they've entered hostile territory, Viper wrangles the local cameras to get a better idea of their surroundings. Along with several nests of flatworms scattered throughout the abandoned buildings in the area, she also finds what appears to be BinChicken, slumped over in the remains of what used to be a bank. With this new knowledge, Zero and Viper make their way towards the bank, careful not to disturb any nests.

When they reach the bank, the glass doors have been barricaded, and BinChicken is unresponsive on the other side. After several attempts to break the reinforced door down with a crowbar, Viper swaps to APDS and shoots a hole through the glass, allowing her to shatter the now weakened structure with a well aimed smack of the crowbar. Through a great deal of cooperative struggling, Zero and Viper manage to push the barricade away and enter the building.

Zero rushes to BinChicken, who is alive but unconscious and has clearly sustained a serious bite. Zero casts a heal spell to stabilize her and get her back into an at least semi-coherent state. BinChicken tells Zero that she was bitten by a flatworm viper and that she accidentally broke the statue she was going to give her, but that she still has the head if she wants it. Zero tells her not to worry about it and that they need to get her to a hospital before accepting the broken polar bear head, which she immediately identifies as having magical properties when she touches it. Assensing the figurine reveals that it is not a technomancer but that it is a power focus, and Zero muses on what something like that would be doing in a dumpster on this side of the city before they're all interrupted by the appearance of a massive flatworm viper.

When the worm sets its sights on Viper, Zero desperately draws its attention, taking a nasty bite. Viper takes the opportunity to put an APDS round directly down the middle of the worm, splitting it in half. The three of them make a run for it before the halves can form into more worms. Zero is hit by the venom on the way to the car.

Aftermath

Viper rushes Zero and BinChicken to a clinic run by a contact of hers to have their envenomation treated.

BinChicken puts the polar bear head on a necklace for Zero.

Zero gets fussed over for several days while she recovers from getting wormed. She secretly loves it.

Rewards

Zero:
IG 1 Discount
Power Focus Force 4 (Unbound) in the form of a polar bear head - 13 RVP
2 CDP

Vip3r:
Shoot First, Don't Ask - 2 RVP
Quick Healer - 3 RVP
5 karma for 1 Rank of Outdoors Skill Group - 5 RVP
Sense Of Direction - 3 RVP
2 CDP

Game Quotes

Zero: If you have to use your gun, I haven't done my job.

Zero: How big is the viper? Vip3r: Like 5'7".

Player After Action Reports (AARs)

Absolute Zero

Did anybody else know the area around Glow City was crawling with bigass murder worms or was I just supposed to figure that out on my own? Good thing I was there, I guess, or BinChicken would have had to change her name to BeenChicken. Ya know, 'cause she'd be...well, y'know what I mean. Thankfully, even limb regrowing, split-in-half multiplying worms die from an icicle to the dome, or we'd have been cluster-fragged three ways to Sunday. Not that anything's gonna hurt Vips while I'm around, but we like to avoid even the possibility when we can.

Thankfully, Viper's a big-brain genius techno-wizard and got into the cameras to point the way so we didn't have to play survivalist training over a handful of worm tracks. I mean, I could have, if I had to, 'cause my mom didn't spend all that time teaching me traditional hunting practices for nothing, but like, ya know, tracking a herd of caribou across the tundra and tracking a big worm through a half-exploded city...very different experiences, you might can imagine.

So a pile of worm-cicles later we find BC curled up in an old bank all shot through with worm-juice. Viper tried to break the door with a crowbar, which was actually kind of funny, and then she just shot a hole through it, which like...I thought she was supposed to be the subtle one on this team, but considering my plan was to blow it away with magic or shapechange into something that could squeeze through and wind up butt-naked on the other side, I'm not complaining that she saved me the drain or the embarrassment. So we get in, I hit BC with the old healing paws, and she's fine. Then what's clearly Queen Worm of Worm City shows up and tries to take a bite out of Vippo, which if much less fine. I guess nobody bothered to tell Her Majesty how things work around here, because there's no way I was gonna let that stand. Of course, that means I got a chunk taken out of my own ass, but that's okay by me. And then Viper split the thing in half with a bullet. Sick.

Wasn't accounting for my blood starting to catch fire a minute later, but we were already on the way out by then, and Vips knows a doc who does charity work, so everybody came out alright, and I got not only a cool polar bear necklace slash power focus out of it but a day of being babied in recovery, so I'm not complaining. Just like...don't tell Viper I was into being fussed over, okay? I'm trying not to make it weird.