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Brisbane, 05-14-2132 Midnight Oil Inc's landlord, Claude Monie, wants his rent plus rent increases. He complains about a new local gang of kids (Los Lobos) who are vandalizing everything. The PCs swing into action catching a gaggle of the hoodlums with cutting edge police technology. They are lead to their "Legionnaire" leader, Sgt. Click. He turns out to be a low level con-man and thug (not a Legionnaire at all) and is promptly beaten and chased out of town. Everyone goes to Matilda's (local bluesy bar) for beer and pie. |
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Quezon, 06-03-2132 The team is called into action to aid one of Hick's CSA contacts, Chun Fe Fei. He tips the group off to a strange person who flipped out on a flight from Shanghai to Quezon City. Sounds boring, but the unmarked 50,000 he is putting up for the job is nice. The PCs meet up with Detective Marcos Camelo of the Quezon Police Force. He leads the PCs to Shi Fau, the perp. Under psionic observation, it appears Mr. Fau has some sort of biotech in his nervous system that sends out psi signals and changed his retinal patterns. Using smart computer savvy, Daily finds another person with identical retinal patterns, Carmen Vaquiero. When confronted, he spits out the name Illyan Topovich - a name Trip Farmer knows all too well (a supposedly dead VVZ thug who killed one of Trip's informants). After digging into UNWC files (now who has access to that?), Topovich is found to have connections to the infamous (and evil) Dr. Vladimir Krylov of the VVZ. Following Shi's brain waves, the PCs fight some Russian bio-thugs and recover Shia Gingco (after Trip shamlessly flirts with her). When recovering the last person, Martes Miercoles, the team runs into Topovich himself! Uh oh! After a great battle, where Topovich is revealed to be a tele-operation bioapp, all four experiments are recovered. The subjects and residual Russian biotech are turned over to Special Agent Kristofer Molotev and Agent Sye-Ping Todashi (friends of Dr. Iocaste) of the UNWC in exchange for a "favor" to be named in the future. |
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Brisbane, 06-15-2132 Australian metacorp Technodyne has lost some technology and needs to hire some savvy gumshoes to retrieve it. Midnight Oil will have to do. The perp in this instance is Philip Barclay, a Technodyne software engineer. He walked off with a highly experimental bio-protection app (the McGuffin Device) and disappeared. Jim Browning isn't surprised - stuff like this is why he left (read "was kicked out") Technodyne in the first place. After searching Barclay's apartment, and talking to the head of design, Dr. Shelah McGuffin, the team locates Philip through his bus pass. Philip just wants to go home to see his ex-wife and child. After a chase on land, air and VARG, Philip is stopped and returned to Technodyne to have the bioapp removed. |
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Nice, 06-22-2132 Midnight Oil is hired by wealthy Brisbaner Blanche' Duboir to undergo a secret mission. The job - go to the scrap town of Nice, France to recover the perfect bottle of wine for a party. The party meets their contact Beatrice Cardin' just as their beatnik bar is attacked by rival rich snob Rupert Cunningham III (in a VARG). The party battles Rupert, and the mutant (abberrant?) grapevine on the outskirts of town. The party decides to take Beatrice out of France and back to Brisbane. They also don't like the deal Duboir is pitching to them, so they go ahead and keep (and drink) the wine. |
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Peoria, 07-12-2132 Midnight Oil is hired by Decker T. Jones CEO, to break a strike at Centepede Heavy Machinery Corp. Plant workers are protesting the construction of the Centepede orbital factory (fearing they will loose their jobs) and teamed up with Chicago mobsters to affect the course of the company. While getting acquainted with the company, Trip Farmer has a run-in with his ex-wife Adeline Morris and adopted daughter Christina Morris. Christina has re-married Trenton Morris, a lawyer and Decker's right hand man (and unfortunately and nice guy). Infiltrating the union, the PCs learn of the involvement of the Dog Boyz, a gang of Chicago mob troubleshooters. Push comes to shove and the DB are caught trying to sabotage the Centepede factory. After some fighting and VARG shenanigans, they are defeated (yet most escape). Trip Farmer would like you to know that Trenton Morris was implicated as an accessory to the union scheme (for so called "ethical" reasons) and was taken away by CSA federal police. Midnight Oil returns home to find a manila folder with pictures of Oscar's PI dead. Uh oh. |
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Rio de Ganero, 07-14-2132 Midnight Oil checks up on Nathalie Holtzman - a girl Oscarve has been paying a PI to keep an eye on. She turns out to be OK and unharmed. As MO keeps an eye on her, bad things start to happen to MO's holdings. A terrorist / cult figure known as Otra Ganado, the self-styled avatar of chaos, is setting traps for Nathalie and MO and always seems to be one step ahead of everyone. As MO pieces this puzzle together, Oscarve begins acting weird. Beatrice informs MO that she keeps getting calls from Dr. Jose' Solaste - an Olsado clinic doctor in Rio. Heading to the clinic, MO meets Biel Escarvez, Oscarve's "little brother" from his Norca days who is apparantly suffering from a disorder. Dr. Solaste reveals that Ganado is none other the Oscarve's alter ego, brought about through psionic dysfunction. Oscarve is given drugs to supress his psionic abilities just as the clinic is attacked by Ganado's henchmen. MO escapes and thinks everything is well until MO members keeping an eye on Nathalie notice something odd. Ganado's men are in the process of kidnapping Nathalie and are going to take her away in his bio-blimp. Through derring-do and bravery she is saved and the blimp set ablaze. |
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Zydeco Colony, 07-30-2132 Midnight Oil is hired by Hick's former boss Rober Watts to act on behalf of the CSA. Intelligence says that eco-terrorist organization Greenpeace is planning an attack on the small FSA colony of Zydeco and the Zydeco Fishing Concern (see also lobsters) on the far away world of Zanzania. Since the corporate interests are small, neither the FSM or CSA can be mobilized. MO is transported to Zydeco by Star Crossed 'Porter Edgar Griffon, a local hero and the original 'porter for the colony. At the colony, they meet Richard "Benny" Bouchier, the town's mayor, and MO tours the lobster processing facilities. After learning some about the lobster trade, the PCs find Madame Sheia', a retired Sharifiyya seer and Oscar, Trip and Brittany get their fortunes read. Sadly, the PCs are no closer to figuring out how Greepeace is going to attack until. . . . !Attack of the Giant Lobster! Greenpeace terrorist Tycho uses his psi-powes to take control of the legendary lobster Zhou-da-hei. The lobster / psion duo damage the lobster processing facilities and proceed to the town of Zydeco with Midnight Oil in hot pursuit. Through a combination of cunning and heavy whistlers, Zhou-da-hei is vanquished. |
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Diamond Valley Blight Zone, 08-16-2132 A mysterious dame, Clair McMasters, hires Midnight Oil to recover some diamonds that a courier was supposed to pick up earlier - No questions asked. Arriving in the one bar town, the PCs learn that the diamonds were originally part of a trade between the CSA and the VVZ (and their agent Borris Smythes). Pushing more into the town's business, MO comes into contact with the wounded CSA sharpshooter Ajax Doherty. They learn that the CSA (under cover) was going to pretend to sell a serum to the VVZ in exchange for diamonds - but the double cross didn't go over well. Now both were lost. After doing some investigation, the PCs recover the diamonds from a VVZ limousine. MO tangles with some VVZ thugs with strange bionics and a difficulty with dying to recover the serum. |
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Brisbane and Petroplavsk, 09-01-2132 Midnight Oil's office is bombed (and Beatrice put in the hospital)- a victim of the VVZ. Borris (from before) is captured and tells the PCs there is a schism within the VVZ between the Vladivostok and Moscow factions. Borris explains that he is a high ranking member from Vlad who is loyal to the Moscow faction. He foiled the hit on the PCs as an excuse to get back to his master, Dr. Krylov. He then hired MO to take him to Petroplovsk. MO readies Rasputin and fly to Petroplavsk, being attacked by three aerospace fighters on the way. In Petro, MO is tracked down by Agent Molotev. He has been after Dr. Krylov himself. Eventually, Dr. Krylov beckons to the PCs to join him in his armored Winnebago. Inside is Aeon agent Brian Lagana and CSA agent Marie Swanson. Krylov explains to them that he does not want to rule to world, but merely want to be rich and live forever. This might not be possible if the world is destroyed. He explains that the Earth is threatened by a species of aliens who crashed in Siberia. These aliens (and choice technology) were recovered by agents of the Vlad faction, who were then infected. Not trusting the UN (with whom he is a wanted man) Krylov has been trying to cooperate with the CSA and Aeon in order to stop this threat. Krylov explains to Brittany that her mother works for him. Dr. Iocaste (the father) had run up great gambling debts to the VVZ. When VVZ agents tried to collect, he panicked and shot one. As a reaction Dr. Iocaste was shot down. Fearing for Brittany's life, Dr. Iocaste (the mother) offered to work off the debt if her daughter would be taken care of. The agent in charge (Borris, who had a family of his own) accepted. Borris then tells the assemblage that he was a spy for Krylov, keeping an eye on how the parasites spread. He displays some cryo-cases with samples of the aliens - one is given to each of the assembled people (including MO), along with biological data on the aliens. After a battle with the corpse-like infected humans, MO smuggles Krylov out of Petroplavsk. |
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Olympus / L'Orbital, 09-22-2132 Midnight Oil is hired by a secretive organization to protect a proxy from assassination - but they aren't sure which one. They are sent to meet with a contact at the Mare Ingenii Jumpship plant where strangeness has been afoot. There, amidst the construction of the Vatican's JS-25 Exodus, strange graffiti, visions and signs (spoiled food, clocks stopping, etc.) are noticed. In addition to being unsettling, they implicate a relation to Mikel Kravets, the murder of the late Proxy Otha Herzog (see history). MO tracks down the source of the grafitti to a technician, James Halson. James is able to escape capture when he is abducted by strange commandos in black vac-suits and impeccable timing. Of course all this action does not stop MO from stealing two construction VARGS. The party decides to pay Mr. Kravets a visit - even though he is currently being held in the high-security (and scary) Arkam Asylum. Posing and something (I forget what) the PCs make their way through the facility (which hurts 'sesative' psions) and through the flashbacks Oscar and Brittany keep having. Mikel fades in and out of a dream-like state, describing where he thinks he is. Someone recognizes the central chandelier in L'Orbital and MO is off! At L'Orbital, the party (now led by The Baron) confronts both Halson and his strange helpers. They turn out to be Ductrans who are instinctively following a "paramorphic entropic reality focality" - or something that seems to possess people and make them do bad things. Whoop Ass is distributed and L'Orbital (sans chandelier) is saved. |
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Kobe', 10-16-2132 In exchange for two Ramei lasers, Midnight Oil is asked to compete in the Great Nihojin VARG Races (oh, by Oscar's contact Emmo-Tan, a Nihojin expatriot who suffers from Total Allergy Syndrome)! Emmo-Ta wants a group of psions with bio-VARGs to beat Nihojin's best competitors (as a symbol). Team Cricket defeats adversaries such as Rainbow Fairy and Ninja Kitty and are doing well until the plotting of the evil ultra-nationalist Kato Tojo declares Midnight Oil to be unjust! Oh no! Charges are brought against Emmo-Tan and everyone is imprisoned! Luckily, Team Cricket built up a following amongst Nippon's youth and are able to escape. Although they aren't allowed to finish the competition, thanks to the team's pluck and helpful intervention of Oss-San (and Tea Kettle) they are allowed to return to their home (deported). Midnight Oil learns that the whole thing was rigged by Emmo-Tan, a psion and supporter of Psi-Nippon. |
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L'Orbital / Olympus, 11-02-2132 Midnight Oil is enjoying their vacation, when L'Orbital is assaulted by the forces of the UN Aberrant Command (UNAC). They are after Beatrice! Luckily, she is kidnapped by a teleporting asian cowboy, Billy Ray. After striking a deal with UNAC Colonel Sykes, MO tries to hunt down the pair of aberrants scrubs. Sadly, Rasputin is put into quarantine due to possible 'aberrant infection'. Midnight Oil tracks the pair to Olympus' downside where they run into the forces of The President (local mob boss). They are able to get a character reference from Dr. Krylov and find the aberrants just as UNAC forces arrive. Oh no! By a twist of fate, MO learns that these UNAC troops are infected by the strange parasites from Episode 9! The group makes an escape in a mob-chartered scow and hide Beatrice and Billy Ray at the undersea colony of Mariko Shima. |
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Mariko Shima / Xianggang, 11-05-2132 Midnight Oil escape Mariko Shima while being pursued by UNAC forces by stowing away on a submarine bound for Xianggang. There, they try to contact the Ministry, but are thrown in jail. MO passes on information about the parasites to Agent Long Wei and are released and sent (deported - again) to the AU. There, MO is tracked down by troops from UNAC. They are able to expose the infected UNAC Major Toshiro, who is then taken into custody by Colonel Sykes himself. Toshiro escapes, and is recaptured (and killed) by MO - thereby clearing them of all charges. |
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Orbital Impound Lot 23, 11-07-2132 As MO heads to the impound lot to pick up Rasputin, the shuttle takes them to the right parking orbit, but a different ship (also called Rasputin). While MO is dickering with the shuttle pilot, someone fires a missile at it. Luckily everyone escaped into the crappy Rasputin. MO evades the Red Eye Pirates, but become the target of Captain Xantas of the UAN Cutter Khalid. Xantas is evaded and the PCs hide at Resupply depot 14. There, they find a Chinese Tien Lung warhead hidden in the hold. The real Rasputin is tracked down on a auction block at L'Orbital. As MO arrives (and fucks up their parking job), they are simultaneously attacked by the Pirate vessel Tarantula and the Khalid. Xantes is informed of the situation, and the PCs (with the real Rasputin and VARGs) and Xantes destroy the Tarantula. |
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Calcutta, 11-30-2132 The group gets settled into their new digs in L'Orbital. A week has Many victims have chosen to leave the organization, having been scared away somehow. The local police have been unwilling to help: the group's non-Hindi, cultish beliefs and high percentage of foreigners have branded them as a cult. Khavi is willing to pay handsomely and wished to depart immediately. After some Q&A, the group sets off. Brittany, Oscar, and Trip travel with Khavi in his rented corporate hybrid, while John and Jim fly John's fighter craft, arriving separately to guard ! against detection by possible traitorous elements in the order. |
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And phat insurance claim to boot!
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Episode 16: The Public Eye Never Sleeps |
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Medelin, 2-02-2133 Midnight Oil is hired to help Genman reporter Alycia Bates break a story about pharmaceutical company abuses against human subjects in Columbia. Upon arriving in country, the reporter's contact Atilano Franciso, a high ranking Mednacionales executive, is killed by thugs. Digging deeper, a South American plot to distribute powerful addictive drugs to the FSA in order to curb aggressive expansionism is uncovered. The plot is foiled as Midnight Oil uses a high speed chase through Carnival celebrations nabs (kills) drug-kingpin Juan-Carlos "the Florist". |
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See OPNET article for more information |
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Episode 17: Three String Cowboy |
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Ankara, 3-06-2133 UNWC Judge Rujk Tarabin needs Midnight Oil to secretly exfiltrate his family from the Ankara Arcology before Ukranian forces invade. While inside the arcology, the Ukranian forces show up early and knock out power and hardtech with a sub-atomic yield EMP bomb. The arcology is held hostage and Ukranian forces continue to move in. Meanwhile, in space, a dozen I.C.E. freighters begin breaking orbit and positioning themselves around the globe. As the UN mobilizes to stop them, the plot thickens as the whole of the Norcan Order is implicated in what is going on overhead. Midnight Oil is able to get Rujk's family out. During a pitched battle at the spaceport Ankara is hit by a massive psi-wave followed by a devastating earthquake. Nearly all of the city, except the arcology, and the invading Ukranian army is laid to waste. See OPNET article for more information |
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Big Event
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Episode 18: Black Sunshine |
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Submersible Freighter Black Sunshine, 3-07-2133 After the massive psi-wave hits the Earth, massive disasters are triggered. National governments and international aid and rescue agencies are massively shorthanded as they try to cope. Midnight Oil is hired to stop a Megahauler submarine freighter that seems to be heading for Mariko Shima out of control. After taking a mini-sub to meet up with the giant ship, MO is attacked by the crew (damaging the coupling to the mini-sub). After meeting up with one of Trip's old friends (Andy Stalowski who was trying to sneak some biotech to the Psi-Nippon at the station) they are told a tale of a creature that has taken over most of the ship. After exploring the ship, MO finds some odd clues (and bodies) but they run into a water based being in the port reactor core. They discover that the psi-wave caused the ship's Captain to erupt into an aberrant, and he now thinks he is guarding his ship from some unknown attacker. MO also discovers that Andy's claims of radiation leaks and life support failures throughout the ship are false. MO fights the Captain while Oscar recovers a VARG from the cargo hold (there is much contraband going to help the Psi-Nippon at Mariko Shima). Andy comes down to fight the Captain and is found out to be an aberrant herself (with mega-manipulation which had kept MO from finding out). MO releases the cargo barges into the building storm (with the crew) while Black Sunshine goes down with the two aberrants aboard. |
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Episode 19: Space Time Shuffle |
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FSA, 4-01-2133 Brittany is sitting in her favorite bar on L'Orbital singing and playing a stirring rendition of "My Way" on the piano while Trip and John are getting sloshed, as usual, at the bar. During one of the more emotional segments, some operatives of Angel Enterprises walk in. One of them is Ethan McBrough who slips Trip a money card underneath a shot of brandy. Turns out to be payment from a tip MO gave them earlier. They leave quietly. Suddenly some haggard looking guy comes barging in looking at his minicomp like he's up to something. He walks over to Trip and John and convinces them that it would be a good idea for us to help him fly away from L'Orbital. So much for Bittany's big finale. The guy turns out to be Harry Potts which means nothing but he's peculiar in that he keeps looking at his minicomp and won't say why. On the way back to the ship we meet some heavys and Trip starts a fight with them. It turns out that they are from Aeon (shitty!) and that they want Potts for some reason. A cool battle ensues that involves a gun with tentacles that shoots goo and some Native American dude that must be a clear because he blocks most of our moves...and disappears! By the end of it, Brittany is only half clothed, has managed to hit the super fast guy once and Trip, John and the rest of MO have incapacitated the rest of the "Proteus Team Six" (done and done). MO hauls ass out of the station. Harry takes us on a flying road trip to Canada where we meet up with Robert Watts, Director of Operations at the CSA. He explains to us that Harry Potts is Dr. Harry Potts and MO need to take Harry Potts and track down a "Star drive" which MO thinks is on Harry's ship at L'Orbital. Brittany's attempts to get help from using psycometry and dowsing on Harry. We know we are looking for a black metal box about the size of a foot locker. Upon arriving back at L'Orbital MO notices that a ship is being stolen. The ship is?? MO finally finds the Star drive attached to the outside of the ship and Oscar goes out to remove it. Brittany goes to help him. We meet another ship and find out the Captain is afflicted with the same problem as Harry Potts. The entire scenario unfolds. Matt, explain ??? OK, ever since the end of the Aberrant War, the FSA was secretly siphoning a large part of its GNP (at great expense to its populace) into a secret project that researched advanced technologies ranging from terraforming to faster then light (FTL) travel - the idea being to reduce the country's dependence on Earth should the aberrants return. Apparantly, the fruits of one of these secret laboratories produced the Relative Inertial Field (RIF) generator. This device cancels out nearly all of a ship's inertia allowing it to travel faster then the speed of light. Unfortunately, as Dr. Potts and Captain Xantas found out, psi-fields are not similarily protected. If two psi-fields intersect, they can possibly rip each other apart in unexpected ways. Anyway, MO destroys the Star Drive and hands Harry and Captain over to UAN and AEON. |
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Episode 20: The Reich Stuff |
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Bavaria, 4-15-2133 MO is hired by Prime Minister Greta Schaft of the New Weimar Republik to assist her on a secret mission to meet with the powerful and egnimatic Baron Gruber Von Shtutz of the city-state of Bavaria. Posing as bodyguards and advisors, MO scopes his mountainous manse out but does not find anything out of the ordinary. All of MO meets with the Prime Minister and the leaders of all the German powers for a gala event (during which Alex charms the General Prelate Heinrich Gala of the city-state of Rammstein). The Baron reveals his intentions to take the best parts of the unique German states and create a unified Germany capable to face the growing Polish threat. The Baron's Germany would have the state control everything (down to and including the local crime bosses) under the Baron. After meeting with the leaders in secret (while bugged of course), he gives a demonstration of a secret VARG cache he has. He claims he has nearly 500 VARGs and pilots to compliment the various German infantry forces. This is a number that exceeds the mechanized ground military of the rest of Germany (and Poland as well). After the Baron is caught disposing of those guests who disagreed with him, MO snoops around his abode to find the source of his power. It seems that the Baron's estate lies on a secret World War II storage chamber for Germany's military forces. Before the shatter, Germany stored a large number of Rheinmetall VARGs here for safe keeping. After the calamity and government's collapse, the Baron carefully destroyed all records of them being transferred. Since VARG are very difficult to pilot, the Baron could not hope to get enough qualified pilots so he used a substantial amount of money to purchase a few hundred very advanced Nihojin SI controllers. Unfortunately, their most advanced work was not military, but civilian (for pets, assistants and so on). The Baron's technicians reprogrammed these as best they could and covered it up by buying a half dozen black market military controllers (that were buggy). Anyway, MO runs into the VARGs and are conflicted between destroying them and taking them home. Long story short, a big fight breaks out, VARGs get smashed, the Baron gets beaten by Trip in a duel, who then takes the Baroness hostage in another duel. The Baroness trades the lives of the captive leaders for hers with the caveat that Midnight Oil takes her somewhere safe so she can start a new life. For more information, see the related OPNET article. |
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Episode 21: Shadows of Things to Come |
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?, 5-7-2133 . . . . |
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