Running Traveller - Part 4: Session 1
The affair at the edge of the lake
Having escaped their pirate hideout Marvelous and pilot/captive Talas arrive on Pixie, a nearly abandoned planet after corporate sponsors cut their losses and only a languishing smuggling and black market to account for trade. They meet up with Krylon, a former fixer who struck it rich on a previous job of some kind and is now joining the Dot Over Yonder's crew to ply his talents elsewhere.
After a shabby meal at the starport diner, the depopulation of Pixie comes into full view. There is simply nobody here, and certainly no one immediately available to provide work for the crew. Turning to the bounty board, they are presented with:
- Truk Duggular, 18kcr, 0704, Aiding and Abetting, Alive
- Bront Chuff, 30kcr, Pixie, Robbery, Alive
- Brass Knuckle Bobby, 3kcr, 0504, DUI, Alive
A well paying bounty right here on Pixie! As it happens the source is familiar to Krylon, a local supremo named Horatio Chance. Horatio is also looking to skip town, but as his assets are much larger than most others, this is taking time. A final item on the list was tuning up his prize luxury speeder, which he entrusted to local mechanic Bront Chuff. For reasons unknown, Bront absconded with the speeder and is nowhere to be seen. Horatio is furious and naturally in hurry to leave the planet and so posts a generous bounty, both for an alive Bront and the speeder itself.
With some investigation at the Bront's shop, the crew tracks Bront and a friend to a lakeside camping spot a few hundred kilometers away. Pixie's atmosphere is thin and unpleasant, and the landscape has little to redeem it. The crew arrive at the lake where the luxury speeder is parked next to a simple environmentally sealed dome-tent. They plan a little duplicitous situation and feign mechanical trouble with their air/raft, before the innocent and naive Talas goes to ask for help from the pair in the tent.
As it happens they are in the tent fucking, and in surprise Talas is tackled and questioned. Both men are rightly upset at being interrupted, and while not necessarily believing Talas' story, decide to help her and resolve the situation as quickly as possible. Not knowing which man is actually Bront, the crew is forced to capture both and sort things out later. This proceeds without issue or harm to anyone, and they return to the starport to a very pleased Horatio.
Referee Notes Encounter, patron, and rumor rolls all came up zero this session. With a population of 2, there really is no one on this planet, and thankfully the bounty generator produced some interesting results.