Thevshi

GM With the course of action decided, Moon-Moth quickly teleported everyone back to where the shuttle had been docked. Soon the four Praetorians were all aboard, with Sitara taking the controls and powering up the ship. The small vessel hummed to life and soon it was airborne, starting up towards the outer atmosphere and whatever was going on up in orbit. There was no sign of any additional combat ships lifting off from this part of the surface, but of course there could be more already up in space. A number of other civilian spacecraft had taken off as well, making the airspace above the city a bit congested as others decided the easiest means of reaching safety was to leave.

Okay, OOC for Here. Ex, let me know what Moon-Moth will be stunting once I post moving us on to the shuttle (via teleport) and lifting off toward orbit. (You can then post IC as well)

GM Phalen began to stir as Starshot prodded him back awake. His eyes blinked as a they opened to the bright light of the desert sun and the alien shielded them from the light. "Ahhh, Phalen is back in the burning sands! How did he come to be here? Want to be back in my caves!" He cried out, trying to pull away from Starshot and Laark as he curled into a ball. "The Red Devils will find Phalen in the burning sands, but they will never find him in his caves." He muttered to himself.

Happy Birthday Sailor!!!

GM As the group of Ul-Mor drew closer, Starshot recognized Athru in the lead of the group. Athru dismounted from his loper and moved over toward Starshot and established the telepathic link. This one is happy to see Star-the-Shot and his companions once more. Our thanks for helping ensure Kahai and Fonn-Ar returned as well. Following the cave in we continued through the caverns and set up camp, hoping that you would be able to find your way out as well. Now that you have, you may get some rest and then we will continue on to the Place of True Warriors so you can complete the ceremony to become part of the tribe.

GM Starshot lead the group forward, as they drew closer, the light grew more blinding and the air was dry and hot. Shortly they moved into the bright light of the Volturnus sun, stepping out of the cavern and out onto the surface once more. The cavern exited out into some rocky hills and just below them, the desert stretched out towards the north and northeast. It took a few moments for their eyes to adjust to the daylight, but once it had, Starshot saw a camp toward the northwest and quickly realized it was filled with Ul-Mor. In fact, a small group of Ul-Mor were riding towards the group on lopers.

APPROVED

Okay, pretty much everything looks good and adds up. Only thing we need is for you to indicate what the stats and features are for the two headquarters.

GM "Probably pirate." Soreen replied with a bit of a snarl to her lip. "Maybe even part of the same ones that shot us down, though, looks like he has been out here awhile. Banished maybe? Or maybe a rival gang?" Laark nodded at Starshot's question. "I can carry him." The large alien stated as he knelt down to bind the unconscious alien with some of the rope he had salvage from the boat after they had made landfall. Soon the group was moving once more, with Laark carrying the unconscious alien slung over one shoulder. The passage out of the cavern led to a four way intersection, but Starshot's HUD was able to give them guidance on which way was likely the best to follow. After a few kilometers, they had come to a number of other intersections and crossroads, making Starshot understand how the alien could feel lost in here. His HUD certainly was keeping that from happening, but without it things could be very confusing. Finally after about half another kilometer, they turned a corner and saw a bright light about a hundred meters ahead. Even the air in the passage smelled fresher than it had in the other parts of the cavern…

GM The alien did not calm down at Starshot's urging, so, a few shots of sedative latter the humanoid had stopped struggling and was drifting off the sleep. "Well, he's a pleasant one." Sorren commented sarcastically as she looked down at the unconscious humanoid. Studying the now still form, Starshot saw a red tattoo on Phalen's upper left arm through a hole in his tattered clothes. Examining the tattoo, Starshot saw it was a red devil like creature he had seen depicted by a number of space going races, and it was surrounded by white stars. Looking about Phalen's crude camp reveled a few pieces of advance technology, but upon closer inspection, it all appeared to have drained power cells. Only his blaster rifle appeared to be fully charged, but there was no sign of any spare power cells for the weapon. Based on the piles of bones in parts of the camp, it appeared Phalen survived by catching and killing some of the various creatures the group had seen in the cave system. He had a couple of canteens, both of which were nearly full at the moment.

GM The humanoid's eyes darted back and forth between Starshot and the others before fixing back on Starshot as a crazed look came to his face. "Phalen the Black will not be an easy prey beastie!" He yelled out as he launched himself at Starshot. But the space hunter was ready, and easily sidestepped the wild attack. A few moments later Starshot and Laark had managed to wrestle the humanoid to the cavern floor. He continued to frantically struggle, muttering all manner of gibberish as he did.

APPROVED

It looks good to me, but I am only counting 16 PP of Feats, no 18.

So, unless people want to keep fighting, we are generally out of combat (at least for the moment )

GM Barrier's forcefield spread out to provide separation between Kazzan's crew and the Voidrunners, but as it turned out Kazzan’s bounty hunters were not primarily focused on leaving the scene. Even as Barrier wondered about the station peacekeepers, more were coming into view, closing in from various directions toward the scene of the fight. The last of Kazzan's hunters climbed aboard the antigrav vehicle and hit shot off into the air, speeding down deeper into CoVic station. As it went, several peacekeeper antigrav vehicles came flying into view, some going in pursuit of the hunters, while a pair of others came to hover over the scene of the battle. Just as Barrier started over towards Bliss, two figures flew into view from the upper portion of the Spinal Core. They came down to land in Bliss' path and Barrier quickly recognized them as two of her fellow Praetorians that had once served the Delaztri Empire, Magnetar and Pulsar. "Barrier." Magnetar stated when he spotted the towering Lyankan. "It would appear you have brought the situation under control. It is good to see you again old friend." The other Praetorian looked over at Bliss, holding up one hand. "Hold right there. We still need to investigate what took place here. Besides, medical assistance is on the way as well."

Okay, Barrier is up. But unless she decides to continue combat, we are going to be dropping out of combat very soon.

GM With her head clearing, Bliss was able to climb back to her feet over where she had been knocked down after the last attack that hit her. The bounty hunter started to try to limp away from the fight once more, but was not able to make too far given how badly she had been banged up. Up on the opposite side of the Core, the sniper kept her sights focused on Roulette, particularly given the Zulistian had aimed an attack at her group’s escape vehicle. Taking a moment to reset her aim, she once again fired a shot across the several hundred feet that separated her side of the Spinal Core and the other side. But once again Roulette just dodged to one side as he fired, causing her blast to miss him completely. Over where the other hunters were, Kazzan Suul climbed up onto the antigrav vehicle, also taking aim at Roulette to try to further dissuade him from attacking their vehicle. The bounty hunter fired both his pistols, the twin blasts striking true as they knocked Roulette off his feet and down to the ground dazed. "Lets get out of here." He stated to the other hunters around him. The reptilian driver had been aiming his energy weapon at Roulette as well, but seeing his boss take the Zulustian down, he instead lowered his weapon and prepared to get them out of there once everyone was aboard.

GM “AHHHH!” The humanoid called out at the sound of Starshot’s voice. He dropped the bone he was using as a spit with the meat still on it into the fire as he turned and reached for his weapon. *CRACK* Starshot’s whip slashed out and wrapped around the blaster rifle, pulling it away from the humanoid and over near Starshot. Further surprised by the sudden loss of his weapon, the humanoid stumbled backward as he tried to move away from Starshot, tipping over some rocks and sprawling on the ground. He was mumbling something in a language Starshot did not understand as he tried to start crawling away. Now that he had a better look at the figure, Starshot could see his clothing was very dirty, with tears and rips in places, a few of which had been crudely stitched. Behind Starshot, Laark and Soreen came running up from the passage, the two Ul-Mor following after them.

Okay, I will cover that in my next post, that means: Round Eight 29 Sniper (unharmed) 27 Kazzan Suul (bruised) 24 Vitzh (unharmed) 21 Melee Bounty Hunter (unharmed) 19 Barrier (unharmed, 3 HP) 17 Jaas Bounty Hunter (bruised) 16 Bounty Hunter 2 (staggered, bruised) 15 Roulette (bruised 2, 3 HP) 15 Large Bounty Hunter (bruised 2) 13 Bliss (bruised 3, Staggered, 0 HP) The sniper might have disengaged, had not Roulette taken a shot at their ride, so she will take a shot at him! But she gets a terrible roll. Kazzan will take a shot as well as he climbs into the vehicle, hitting with a 30, so a DC 25 toughness save for Roulette. The vehicle driver will take a shot as well, but misses. So, just the one toughness save HGM.

They guy misses his notice check, so you can get right up behind him Cape.

GM Starshot snuck ahead of the others, who followed forward a fair distance behind him as best they could, trying to just keep him in sight without getting to close that any noise they made would betray him. About thirty more meters up the passage, it opened up into a larger cavern, close to a hundred meters long (from north to south) and about sixty meters wide. Another passage was located almost directly across from where Starshot was, continuing off in the northeaster direction. In part of the southern end of the chamber, a figure was sitting by a fire, apparently cooking something. The figure was humanoid, a race with grey skin and no hair that Starshot did not really recognize. It appeared to be male, and was dressed in sort of utilitarian clothing common among spacers. He was slightly turned away from Starshot as he sat by his fire, and there was a blaster rifle on the cavern floor next to him. Nearby the figure was a small pile of bones and there was a makeshift bed that appeared to be made of hides from some creature.

GM Seresk followed after his three teammates as they began moving out of the cantina and debating how they should react to the situation developing around them. At Sitara's question he turned his head slightly to respond. "We did not use any of the Praetorian craft, just a non-descript cargo shuttle. It can certainly get us into orbit, but would not last long in any sort of combat situation." Around them panic was starting to grip parts of the populace, as people were starting to rush towards the nearest shelters. A few members of the local law enforcement were visible, trying to direct people and otherwise provide some sense or order, but even they seemed slightly unsure of what was going on. Up in the sky, the Praetorians could see a light cruiser moving up towards orbit, followed by a number of small fighter craft.

GM Checking the supplies, Starshot, Laark and Soreen each still had a fair supply of the preserved rations they had taken from the Xeon when they had left it where it had crashed in the desert. In fact, only the Ul-Mor had been caught behind the cave in with only limited food supplies on them. But they were well enough for at least a day. The HUD really did not have much to choose from in selecting a direction for the group. The passage heading off the northeast was promising, even if it was continuing them away from the main passage where the cave in had occurred, it was at least heading in the general direction they had been traveling before the cave in. If that main passage changed direction to the east, they might interest it, or perhaps find other passages leading them back towards the main one. The group followed the northeast passage for about two kilometers, as it wound and turned, but generally kept in the northeastern direction. Then, as they continued along, Starshot heard a faint voice ahead, singing in Gal Standard… "Oh, we hijacked the ship and we took us guns, Li-dee-di-dee, li-dee-di-dee day-o. Came to Volturnus and drank some run, Li-dee-di-dee, li-dee-di-dee day-o." "Now I'm lost in the caverns, no place to run, Li-dee-di-dee, li-dee-di-dee day-o. Anything moves, I shoots it with me gun, Li-dee-di-dee, li-dee-di-dee day-o."

GM Once it seemed reasonably clear that the creature was not returning everyone began rowing once more, although as Starshot suggested they all kept a wary eye on the water for sign of any further danger and kept their weapons handy. It took a short while to correct the drift that had occurred when they were caught by the current, but soon they were squared with the opposite shore once more and making slow, steady progress toward it. Whether or not there were more of those creatures in these waters, no others appeared to harass the makeshift boat and soon they had reached the far shore. Once everyone was ashore they pulled the boat up onto the rocky bank and took in the area. The far shore was rather much like the one they had departed from, with plenty of the giant mushrooms growing along the rocks. It was less than half a kilometer long, but much wider than the other shore, close to two hundred meters wide at some places. Along the northern wall of the shoreline there was a passage that led off toward the northeast.

GM The others were still trying to get their weapons ready and put down their makeshift oars when the creature appeared to make an attack once more. Starshot spotted the creature breaking the surface about four meters away and was able to turn that way and deliver a strike with his whip even as the creature began to open its mouth for another chomp at the boat. The whip struck true, slashing through the massive fish's scaly hide and sending blood into the dark water. Although the attack did not carry a lot of kinetic force behind it, the sudden sharp pain of the attack was enough to cause the creature to pull back from its attack as it suddenly shifted its direction and splashed back into the water, spray cold water up on to everyone one on the boat. The creature disappeared back below the dark surface of the water and then Laark and Soreen snatched up their blasters and began to scan the area around the makeshift boat for any further sign of the creature. Several tense moments passed as everyone was fixated on the waters around them and the slight current took hold of the boat and began pulling it southward. Finally it appeared as if the creature had had enough, as it did not reappear for another attempt.