"We are almost certainly going to be discovered. If we don't land in the middle but somewhere out of the way, it is going to take longer for them to find us. That's good, it gives us time to look around and gather information. I also think that having time to look around is going to be important in how the Mailman is going to deal with us. We could have placed bugs or explosives or something. The Mailman would be very interested in how we got here and what we did or saw in that time."

"Not quite. If we land somewhere out of the way, we have to move to find anywhere; and no information is going to be that easily found out of the way. The greater the risk of discovery, the more likely we are to find something useful."

The Draconian shook his head, and frowned thoughtfully.

"It's not so much whether we get discovered, it's how the Mailman reacts." A snort. "What kind of name is 'the Mailman' anyway?"

'So long as we can track back to the talkiphone box, we won't get caught in a mouse-trap. It's our peasy-easy fire-escape.' Smoke said, ever confident in the power of the talkiphone box. 'Anyhow, the Mailman is probly not expecting visitors all the ways here-out, so mayhaps won't be setting lots of mouse-traps or picture-takers or taking peoples to the cleaners. No need to eyespy the unoccupied apartments. We can make an unseen in-way and outlook first.'

She jabbed a finger at the screen, pointing to an innocuous and dilapidated side-building of the old mining camp. 'I think if we appear the talkiphone box here, we can make it our brainquarters, and start making unseen in-ways to other buildings to outlook and eyespy before we're eyespied. We can get some knowhow of these little buildings and the plans of the place before we outgo to these towers.' It was a Kangly plan, or a rat's plan: find a safe place, control it, then scurry back and forth between neighbouring places to learn the lay of the land, starting with what was familiar before growing bold enough to explore what was strange. It was time consuming, but safe. 'Ah, what Stan said.'

OOC: Some notes relevant to Smoke Alarm's strategy:

Some of the buildings have connecting passages between them and some do not; as noted earlier, it looks like some are disused and aren't having an atmosphere maintained in them.  The pylons in particular are separated from the heart of the base.  You can stick to safe areas or make trips in vacuum.  In the latter case Trav has basic space suits on board.  Normal space suit use doesn't take any rolls but if you need to try something fancy that may be Ingenuity + Technology or Coordination + Technology.

I mentioned radiation above and you should figure that the danger from that is negligible unless you get stuck in it for days.  Space suits would protect you as well.  Gravity is low but present -- you can ignore that unless you start doing some climbing, which would be both easier and more awkward.

If you're not all going to stay together, let me know how you'd be splitting up; also, if a given group is looking for particular things.

Rather than doing a step by step dungeon crawl, everybody can make some sort of roll to gather information, and that can be skill focused (e.g. Awareness + Science, Awareness + Technology, Awareness + Knowledge) or generalized "outlooking" (Awareness + Ingenuity).  If there's something particular you're looking to find out, let me know.

For every group, someone should make a roll for sneaking.  I'd figure this for Awareness + Subterfuge, since it mostly involves trying to watch for watchers rather than being quiet and hidden in this case.  Or you can make a case for a different roll, with an appropriate spin.

Trav nods. "Good as any then. Ok, we're going in!" She throws down the materialization lever!

As the travellers get a look around the interior of the outbuilding, they get a better picture of what they're dealing with.  There are a few pieces of machinery and electronic equipment within -- it looks like it may once have been a monitoring station -- but these look as if they're half-disassembled.  Contrariwise, the walls, floor and ceiling are festooned with snaking cables, metal panels and small component clusters that appear to have been placed almost at random, and all humming with power.  It's almost like a dilapidated cottage with its furnishings gone to rot, and its surfaces overgrown with mold and fungus and creepers, only rendered in mechanical growth rather than living flora.

There is an atmosphere in here, airlock hatches to the outside, and a hatchway leading toward the more closely clustered structures.

Trav is out first. "What a dump." Walking around like she owns the place.

She takes a clear look around, while giving everything a pass with the sonic. "Let's see what's interesting."

'Outlooks like home-sweet-home.' Smoke Alarm said, without sarcasm or affection, reminded of all the scrap and rubbish that got dumped in Fountain of Happiness Square. Mess wasn't something to be unbrave of; one could lose-and-find and recycle almost anything in a good dump. 'It's all intresting to someone.'

The Kang outlooked around the mechinery and puters, occasionally pocketing things, hunting and scavenging for anything that didn't belong. Like the cables and whatsits added all over the place. It had all come apart, but they didn't all go back together. She followed the maze of cables and gadgets, trying to eyespy the purpose of it. Someone was trying to fix up more than a broke Fizz-Ade dispenser.


OOC:
10:50, Today: Smoke Alarm rolled 15 using 2d6+7 with rolls of 5,3. awareness(4) + technology(1) + keen senses(2).

As Smoke Alarm pokes around the area, she starts to get a creepier and creepier feeling.  There are a lot of things she sees that she doesn't have the knowhowing of, but the similarity to Paradise Towers continues to grow on her, with one big difference.  Lots of the machines in the Towers had been broke-down and safe to ignore, so you only had to worry about Cleaners and things that you could see coming, but this room feels a lot like it's watching all the time.  Even though she can't identify actual spy-eyes around them, the feeling won't go away.

Trav's scan shows that the construction is nearly as haphazard as it looks.  She could probably spend hours and hours just deconstructing the functionality in this one room.  A lot of it is computational substrate for a deliberately decentralized system: there are sensor processing nodes without the sensors, power regulators running code for equipment that is nowhere in the vicinity, and the like.  The scan also indicates that there are nanobots in the room cannibalizing the building and the old machinery and laying down new electronics even now.  It's not taking place at a great rate of speed, but it's happening.

The whole thing has Trav nearly as edgy as Smoke Alarm.  She feels like she ought to recognize it, but she's seen so many things, it could be something she's long forgotten....

Trav is tapping her temples. "Damn it, old woman, this is familiar, familiar, familiar!" She's snapping her fingers. "Come on, middle aged brain!"

<OOC: How many SP would it cost to remember that fact?>

"Do you have any idea what those cables are for?" Stanley asks Trav. "And if we don't know what it is, isn't it dangerous for Smoke to poke around and steal stuff?"

OOC: Actually, I'm willing to give you one for Trav to continue not to remember it instead of rolling Ingenuity + Knowledge to figure it out.

A wry grin.

"I'll pretend I didn't hear that."

Hunting around, reaching under puters and climbing on mechinery, Smoke grew increasingly alarmed. Her hazard sense was tingling, like bugs crawling on her skin. She couldn't see any picture-takers or spy-eyes, but that didn't mean there weren't any, only that they were well unseen. If the outdoors outlook of the mining base in the grip of the weird pylons had disturbed Smoke Alarm, then actually being inside was making her jumpier than a long-haired Kang in a room full of Rezzies in rocking chairs. Or something like that. Like when Power Point had dared her to go down to the Basement — long after the Great Architect had gone, but his evil remained, always eyespying, always hungry.

'I don't like the outlooks of this.' she muttered, returned to Traveller's side and unwilling to get lost-and-found in this place. 'I think mayhaps we're being eyespied... It's a cleaner's nest. 'Ware cleaners.' she warned the others, who were not Kangs and not wise to the ways of lights-out rooms like this.

While everyone works at puzzling out what to make of their surroundings, Trav is the first to notice that the power being routed through the area has increased.  Some of the junction boxes and components start to show yellow and red warning lights.

According to Trav's readings, the increased power isn't dangerous to those in the room, and there isn't a discernible pattern of systems engaging or powering up.  What it is doing is making stressed power lines and components emit soft buzzes and hums.  These sounds start to shift and oscillate, changing in pitch, frequency and volume.

<OOC: So that gives me 6 SP right now - highest Trav has ever had. I hope she doesn't need them.>

This was the worst time to get memory blockage."You're right, Smoke. Let's trot. Thattaway." Trav starts a brisk walk towards the north. "Our pal probably knows we're here. Let's not get split up."

This always happened when he tried to be sneaky. A shake of his head.

"If he knows we're here; why not wait for him to come get us, hmm?"

'Then he'll be outcoming to us, all ready-steady.' Smoke Alarm retorted to Sereth. 'But if we outgo to him, we'll be ready-steady and can eyespy his carrydoors.'

At Traveller's direction, Smoke Alarm scampered ahead to the wayhatch that led deeper into the complex, intending to take point or whatever the Kang equivalent was. She sniffed around the wayhatch (literally!), outlooked through the window, worked out how to open it before heading into the carrydoor beyond. 'Traveller, can you mayhaps break so it doesn't lock closed behind us?'


OOC: Taking point, scouting ahead.
14:47, Today: Smoke Alarm rolled 17 using 2d6+9 with rolls of 3,5. awareness(4) + subterfuge(3) + keen senses(2).

Out past the hatchway, Smoke Alarm sees that the weird way that equipment is built up on the walls continues and is thicker down the long corridor that stretches off a long way ahead, until, she sees, it ends in a crossing "T" intersection.

Smoke Alarm can heard clacking noises echoing down the corridor, probably rebounding down from a long way away because she can't see any movement.  (She's reminded of the noises made by the spider-y cleaner living in the Tower back on New Vegas.)  There is sparse lighting ahead, placed randomly amid the construction, and the light is a harsh yellow color that turns orange and green if it hits her eyes in the wrong way.

The noises being generated around the travellers follow them as they move, continuing to change and shift with increasing speed.   They start to hear distinct tones and sounds taking shape.  Vowels.  Consonants.  Sibilants and fricatives.  They start to form whole syllables in a rasping whisper.  Finally everyone hears the voice being born from the walls around them hiss these words:

hhhhelp

mmeeeeee

Smoke Alarm sneaked down the carrydoor, quiet as a mouse, and getting increasingly tense and agitated. Brave and bold as a Kang should be. This was getting well weird. The puter parts and cables and wires seemed to grow along the walls like flowers and vines and creepers. And she the clickety-clackety of a spider-cleaner ahead. The Kang was reminded uncomfortably of the gardens and parks outside the Towers, growing wild and with dogs and cats hunting in the undergrowth. Her dog bite began to itch with the rememory. Could you get electricky gardens? Did puters and picture-takers grow from trees? Did cleaners prowl among them?

Then she started as the walls began to talk. Whatever they said, the Kang heard "Hungry!" The Great Architect!


OOC: I figured I should roll for courage: 16.
21:14, Today: Smoke Alarm rolled 16 using 2d6+7 with rolls of 6,3. ingenuity(3) + resolve(2) + Brave(2).

Trav replies to Sereth - "Because I don't like waiting on people. This asshole wanted a piece of Gallifrey, he'd going to get one, but a lot more than he or she bargained for."

As Trav gets up to the hatch that Smoke indicates, she nods. She sonics it, looking for the locking mechanism and locking it shut. She's not destroying it, in case they do run into something that they want to slam a door behind.

OOC: Ingenuity+Tech+Sonic?

"Uhmm..." Stanley takes a step back, unsure how to react to the unnatural voice. Is it a type of trap or an alarm? If it is a trap then it is a pretty good one, because someone or something is clearly asking for help and Stanley can't just ignore that.

The voice comes from all around them, so he just turns towards the nearest wall and begins to talk loudly and clearly, hoping that that person would be able to hear him.

"Hello? Do you need help? What's the matter? Where are you? I am a doctor so I might be able to help you. Just tell us where you are?"

Even as Smoke Alarm hesitates, she remembers that they'd beat the Great Architect.  Because of the braveness of Pex, yes, but also through Blue Kangs and Red Kangs and Rezzies and even Caretakers all with their own sorts of braveness.  And with the Doctor who held them together.

She can almost hear the oldster with the funny-sad eyes talking in the back of her head as she thinks of it.

"Goodness, Smoke Alarm, being afraid's nothing to be frightened of!  Bravery with nothing to be afraid of is no sort of bravery at all.  No, a Kang could be perfectly safe and never feel afraid, if she stayed all the time in her brainquarters, but Smoke Alarm, that's not what a Kang is for."
This message was last edited by the GM at 01:23, Wed 17 Sept 2014.

OOC: That works.  Nothing is actively resisting you at this time, but you can make a target in case it becomes important.

"Ignore it!" The Draconian snaps.

"Someone's playing games. Taunting, misdirection. What do you do when you make your home base? You make sure it's defended. If you can't defend it with troops; you make the enemy think it is, or you make them think what is not true. This isn't his trap. This is his defence system."