Hello All,
... or at least all who look at this page every once in a while.
It has been over two years since I have last posted here, and in that time a lot has happened in my life. Not the least of which has been a lot of gaming.
I am very sorry that I kept any one reading in the dark for as long as I did. I was just not in the mood for this I guess, if that makes sense.
But I am going to try to be back now. In fact at this point in my life I am trying to do a lot of things.
So here goes, with my first post in over two years.
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So a few days ago I found myself with a game group, and we had nothing to do for 3 hours. We were sitting around the table getting ready to start a new game, Game of Thrones. Our DM had helped the newbies through character creation, and then we had built the house that we were going to serve, and then... nothing.
The DM realized that he thought that all of that would take a lot longer and he hadn't planned to run a session that night.
Well, with disappointed looks, as everyone began to pack up, I knew that I could not let the night end that way.
I didn't have a plan, I didn't have a story, but what I did have was a 5-Minute character creation process, an overactive imagination, and a memory that never forgets a conspiracy or a plot line.
So as each of the players picked 3 skills to have at 85%, 4 to have at 70% and 5 to have at 55% for a d100 game I quickly racked my brain to come up with a story for this group.
No one had any kind of backstory for their characters, not even names, so it made sense that they all started out in game with no memory of what was going on.
The party all woke up in a hospital room. There were 4 beds in the room and everyone was there. They were wearing nothing but hospital gowns, and besides basic medical supplies, bandages, gauze, cotton swabs, etc there was nothing else in the room.
Being players, they all got up, quasi-introduced themselves, which is rough when you don't know anything about yourself, and then made their way to the one door in the room.
The door was unlocked, and going out the door put them into a hallway. There were two offices in the hallway, as well as a second hallway around the corner which led to an elevator. The first office was locked, but in the second the party found a set of keys in a desk drawer.
Using the keys they managed to open the locked office door and inside they found a second office, however this one had a computer terminal on the desk. At this point one of the players "remembered" that he was very good with computers. So he started hacking the computer.
As he was doing that the rest of the party ransacked the office. A few lab coats, an employee ID and a few power bars was what they came up with before the hacker failed a roll and suddenly alarms were going off throughout the building.
Quickly deciding that they had to try to get out of the building they ran to the elevator and smashed the call button. Watching as the digital display rent from 37 all the way down to S25 they knew that they were underground.
Taking the elevator to the lobby they looked out the windows and saw nothing but desert, and looking at each other decided that the desert was probably a bad call.
At this point the hacker begun trying his luck on the computer at the security desk. Bringing up a floor plan of the building, they saw that the top 15 floors were given over to "Research and Development".
Since security, or any people for that matter, did not seem to be in the building, despite the alarms they went upstairs and found the massive laboratory that took up the top 15 floors of the building.
The majority of the space was taken up by a large contraption that appeared to be a set of rings all at slightly different angles, and sizes but with a common center point.
Seeing out the windows of the lab that a column of vehicles was making its way down the desert road towards them, along with a few helicopters in the distance the party decided to try to see what all they could find in the lab.
The "newly remembered" genius found an equation that he started to read as the computer hacker started to hack yet another computer, and at the same time as the genius quasi-figured out what the machine was, the hacker had found a way to turn it on.
Seeing as how they really had no better options, the party turned on the machine. As they did a full security lockdown went into effect. Slamming down metal shutters across the doors and windows.
As far as the genius could tell the machine was attempting to open a rip in space time, and to be use the rip as a transportation network to a specific point in the universe that it was currently mathematically connected too.
As the machine started moving into action the circles all begin circling. Spinning in a very specific pattern faster and faster. At one point lasers built into the inner case of the machine started firing at intervals, and after about a minute the party saw a mist begin to appear at the center of the machine.
When the machine hit 100% the circles all stopped spinning at exactly the same moment. And the mist seemed to solidify.
The party was nervous, and through a bucket into the mist, which seemed to be swallowed up by the mist and disappear. The "recently remember" brave and charismatic one throwing caution to the wind took a running start and dove through the ring.
The others looked at each other waiting for something to happen, and when nothing did, they started going through as well. The last one left in the laboratory, "the just remembered" sneaky one, heard the sound of heavy footsteps rushing down the hallway, and right as she dove through the ring she heard a voice yell out, "Fire in the hole"
As the sneaky one found herself on the floor of a large room, devoid of any furniture or ornamentation, she looked around to see the rest of the party scouting the room as well.
They did not have to wait long, as soon after they arrived the room's only door opened, and Vietnam-era american troops began pouring into the room, M16s up and at the ready.
The charismatic one stepped forward, and with an amazing roll demanded to speak with their commanding officer. One of the men went to get him, and minutes later the conversation had begun.
The characters all took turns asking questions, and through the course of the conversation learned about everything that was going on.
They were currently in an orbital station at the Nadir Point around the orbit of Sirius A. The military had established this station only about a month ago.
Thinking that was weird, and highly coincidental the genius started honing in his questions on how this station came into being, and the commander, after admitting that humans did not have FTL capability, stated how a massive ship, with an advanced combustion engine had been built to get them here.
The genius still wasn't fully convinced of any of this however. So the questions started flying faster.
Why was the station here? How long did it take the ship to get here? What was their method of returning to Earth?
The commander began answering these questions as quickly as he could. The mission had launched November 22nd, 1963 and it had taken the ship 52 years to arrive. The genius jumped on that first answer. It should have taken them longer then 52 years to arrive he argued, to which the reply was that the ship was using an experimental engine, and although it took them an objective 52 years to arrive, as far as the crew of the ship was concerned the trip only lasted 10 days.
The genius was once again quieted as the commander continued. However out of game one of the players shouted out, "Wait they launched on the same day Kennedy was shot?" To which I responded that yes, the two dates were the same. This started some wild speculation about conspiracies and the like but quickly we got back to the game and the commanders next answer.
The commander informed them that the ship had been partially cannibalized to build the station that they were currently standing on, and that if their mission was a failure that going home was not going to be an option.
As quickly as that was said, the sneaky one inquired about their mission, to which the commander replied that they were here to attempt first contact with any and all life forms that might inhabit an "earthlike" world in orbit around Sirius A.
The charismatic one chimed in now, asking why they thought that Sirius A had life on it. The answer to that question stopped the game for a number of minutes.
"Well," started the commander, "When the alien ship crash landed in Roswell New Mexico back in the '40s that is where we figured out their point of origin was.
The players were stunned. That twist had them all thrown for a loop, between the alien spaceship crash, and the link to the Kennedy assassination the next 20 minutes were spent on all kinds of conspiracy theories and where the game was headed.
Finally getting back to the game however, the genius asked why they took a ship at all, if the transportation system worked. The commanders reply was that, of the 5 groups of living volunteers that had tried to be transported so far, only the players had successfully arrived here at the destination.
The players took that knowledge, and talked amongst themselves as to why they were possibly the chosen. It wasn't until the charismatic one in game finally asked the question to the commander.
The commander's response, and more importantly the player's reaction was absolutely priceless. "Well, I am not a scientist, but I would say that the four of you, have a subtle shift in your genetics that allowed the technology to work on you, where it did not work on humans"
The genius jumped on that answer immediately, "What do you mean, it didn't work on humans, we are humans and it worked on us." The commanders reply, "Son, you are not a human, you four are the pilots that crash landed the spaceship back in the 1940's, you all have been in a coma for over 50 years.
On that cliffhanger I faded the session to black, with the players all staring at me with vacant expressions of sheer wonder.
It was one of the better plots, and twists that I have pulled out of my butt over the years. Hopefully at some point we will get to go back and continue to see where the story goes, back next week for that group we will be taking a crack at our normal game, Game of Thrones.
I look to be posting on here FAR more frequently, in fact, I hope to post here as much as I physically can, I have 4 games going at the moment, so I should have plenty of fodder for more posts.
Until next time readers, never underestimate the power of a perfectly timed plot twist.
-DM/GM Eraser
