VWORP
VWORP
K-CHUNK!

When the TARDIS crew opens the door and peers out, they're greeted by a small yet motley assortment of passersby surrounding the police box.  Several are holding up their phones and taking their picture; there is a smattering of applause; and a number of people toss change of various types and denominations that ding onto the pavement around them.

As the audience slowly begins to disperse, they have a chance to take in the city around them.  It is night on the moon of Estanve Gastem, but the lights on the boulevard dazzle everyone.  Signs shout VALSHAZZAR CASINO and THE MOLHARAN THEATRE and THE NEBULA REGENCY, and the facades on many of the buildings project glowing, animated holograms of everything from rakish rockets to grinning cartoon characters to scantily clad humanoid silhouettes of several attractive genders and configurations.  A broad brilliant swath of green-blue gas stretches across the sky.

And on the ground, people of all shapes and sizes go past intent on their own diversion.  Meklinites and humans, a cluster of rodentlike Pakhar tourists, Bandrils and Thoot and many more.  Even Sereth is surprised by the array of sentients -- there are some here even he doesn't recognize.

Smoke Alarm's eyes widen as she looks at the towers blazing with their own light, reaching up into the sky, with illuminated walkways snaking between them.  She spots, a short distance up, a pair of flying machines no bigger than her head zipping down the street.  They have bulbous clusters of lenses like eyes on their front, and big blue and red lights on their top.

Although Trav had set the coordinates for Old Town, a few hours before the appointment with Alden, Ffinch and Snv, the TARDIS -- for reasons known only to itself -- has landed them here on the Strip instead, with two days to kill.

From a street corner off in the distance, there's the sound of a saxophone playing.

Trav takes a bow, and then passes her hat and also collects up her change,then passes it out to her friends. "I also do weddings and Bar Mitzvahs. Stan here does a great Elvis. Thank you, thank you!" She's rocking her little black dress with thigh boots. The fedora is gray with a black band. One must look their best in SPACE VEGAS.

Trav reaches back into the TARDIS and gets a OUT TO LUNCH sign, hanging it from the door. "Not bad. Kinda like Center. This place definitely seems like Corsi's kind of place."

"We have two days to kill. Let's walk down the strip, play some slots,and check this place out. I've never been here, should be fun!" Trav actually ponders getting a hotel suite.

She digs out her phone, and make sure people have downloaded visitor apps from the local tourism authority.

"Also, people, if you feel the need to gamble, make sure you're clear what you're gambling. I don't want someone coming back to the TARDIS without their head or the memory of their first real crush."

Trav hears the music. She ponders getting out her electric. It's been so long since she has played.

Trav forwards an e-mail to the law firm, indicating her arrival, and requesting a copy of the will so that she may review it in her role as executor.
This message was last edited by the player at 18:58, Wed 11 June 2014.

Footing out of the talkiphone box, Smoke Alarm smiled and waved to the crowd. After all, she was a silly-britty back on Arsuran. She picked up the shiny coins, so she could get a fizz-ade or chock-late bar from a vending machine later.

Then, as the crowd scattered, she outlooked up and eyespied all of Space Vegas. 'Icehot!' she exclaimed in awe. The Kang immediately ran in circles around the street trying to eyespy everything and anything, from the lights-on towers to the huge picture-spouts on them, to the fluffy rat-people. 'High fabshion!' She even tried jumping up to catch the flying cleaners, but they bobbed out of her reach.

The Blue Kang darted off to eyespy the being playing the honkophone, and tossed some nice coins in the hat, heedless of their value. 'There are no other colours without the blues!'


OOC: Pakhars! :D
This message was last edited by the player at 02:57, Thu 12 June 2014.

Trav is tossing a few of the coins she collected into the sax player's hat. The blues are eternal, it seems. She remembers Freddy Mercury telling her, after the horror they vanquished on Skaro, that music redeems and perseveres. That's why the Daleks were evil - they had no music.

She wishes Minmei could be here. She rolls her hips to the sweet sounds, and exclaims, "Decultcha!" in a Zentraedi accent. Originally used as a curse by full sized Zentran and Meltran when exposed to the decadent Micron culture, it was used by later generations of Earth Micronians and Earth allied Zentraedi alike to proclaim the beauty of music and other art.
This message was last edited by the player at 05:28, Thu 12 June 2014.

The player turns out to be human, a man getting into his middle years.  He's wearing a sharp if slightly rumpled suit, with close-cut hair and an elaborate green tattoo over the right side of his face.  He nods to Smoke Alarm, and as he pauses between sets, he flashes her a curious set of gestures with his hand, and tells her, "Testify, sister."

Shortly, Trav's phone indicates that there's a response from the firm, acknowledging her RSVP.  It appears to have been composed by an AI or quasi-AI agent processing incoming business.

Attendance Acknowledged.  Welcome to Estanve Gastem, Traveller.

Disposition of the estate of "The Corsair", AKA Ms. Calamity Kidd, AKA Mr. Morgan Reed, is sealed against the personal biometric authorization of the executor.

Summary Of Parties To Execution of Will:

The Traveller ACKNOWLEDGED
The Whittington Foundation (Current Trustee or Agent) ACKNOWLEDGED
Michael Nguyen-Parker, heir or assign
The Valbreco Family (Capo or Authorized Agent) ACKNOWLEDGED
Ruthdal's Raiders, Current C.O. Or Adjutant

Summary Of Witnesses Authorized By Registered Syndicate Petition:

Major Felicity Villanueve, Office of the Inspector-General, Callistan Kleptocracy ACKNOWLEDGED

Stanley follows the others outside, smiling politely at the group of onlookers. He waits for them to have dispersed, before correcting Trav, "Just for the record, impersonating Elvis isn't something I normally do. I swear it was the shark juice."

With the small crowd gone, Stanley takes the time to look at the wide variety of coloured lights and holographic advertisements. Space Vegas certainly looked like what he had imagined it to look like. Sort of. "Well, if we have some time to spare, I wouldn't mind visiting a casino. After all, it is not everyday you get to visit Space Vegas....You mean losing your head figuratively, right? They must have rules and regulations against that."

'I'm not going to take a test!' Smoke declared with a grin, but continued listening to the honkophone for a while, before skipping back to the group.

She checked her talkiphone and found some yawny app Traveller had load-upped to her. She preferred to get lost-and-found, rather than follow the tracks and maps. 'My head's on tight. What's a ca-see-no?' she asked, balancing on the back of a park bench.

"Chibi baby? Please pull for me precis records of everyone on this list except for me, OK, baby? Also have the scutters deliver some of those hydro-diamonds to the nearest commodities broker here so we some money to play with." She always felt wrong with sonicing cash out of ATMs, like Boobie would do. "And go and have fun running around in the casino clouds, but DON'T TOUCH ANYTHING. I don't need a bunch of Juldoon chasing us back to Sweet Boy because you had some fun rigging a schlemp race." Chibi was a somewhat exaggerated version of her second self, and when she wore glasses, she loved to hack. Hell, she still does.
This message was last edited by the player at 20:40, Fri 13 June 2014.

Trav slips an arm around Stan's waist. "Look at the app I sent to your phones, baby. On various worlds, you can gamble anything away. I'm fine with you guys throwing a few coins at one armed bandits, but I'd like to avoid for once having a crazy chase back to Sweet Boy as we escape with our lives." In response to smoke - "bright and shiny places where people play games for money. Bad and nasty places, they're big people traps.  Stan, just keep it reasonable... hey, stop giving me that look, you know what I mean!"

Trav catches herself thinking of Al Capone, one of the loves of her life. She remarks to herself that he *really* would have enjoyed this place, and might have never left.
This message was last edited by the player at 11:09, Fri 13 June 2014.

Trav jots into her phone - "note to self - I do not know where your pulse is, Callistans, and I did not help the Corsair steal it, and you can't prove anything. That's my story and I'm sticking to it."
This message was last edited by the player at 20:41, Fri 13 June 2014.

Trav giggles. She thinks that Smoke has just been given a gang sign.

In reply to The Traveller (msg # 10):

"Nice description." Stanley shakes his head and looks at the tourist information app. "You are right of course, but I still want to go..."

As Stanley is studying the app on his phone, he notices that he has an alert indicating an incoming message.

Looking at it, he sees that it details a discretionary fund account he hadn't known about, dating from his extremely brief stint as a deputized U.S. Marshal.  Even after multiple governmental crashes and currency revaluations over the many centuries, he sees that it has accumulated a number that seems to work out to several years' worth of salary from his attending physician position, back in the 21st century.

Looking back at the tourist app, he sees that it is now flashing an alert: YOUR COURTESY CREDIT SEARCH COMPLETE!

The data search turns up the following:

WHITTINGTON FOUNDATION: Benevolent association for the care and support of vagabonds, strays and orphans.

MICHAEL NGUYEN-PARKER: Unknown.

VALBRECO FAMILY: One of five Founding Families of the Gastem Syndicate, originally organized crime cartel; subsequently evolved into neo-feudal ruling conglomerate governing the Gastem Cluster.  See also: Ss'tenga Family, Ryzhkov Family, Belzeg Family, Bao Family

RUTHDAL'S RAIDERS: Regiment-strength private security organization operating out of the Gastem Cluster.  Chartered for pacification, punitive, and defense operations.  Exemplary record of adherence to the Laws of War established under the Brevas Compact.

CALLISTAN KLEPTOCRACY: Local stellar government governing four star systems.  Constitution characterized by Byzantine code of situational ethics.

Trav downloads their latest mission statement and bylaws.



Trav flags that. Their could be billions of Michael Nguyen-Parkers across time and space. She certainly doesn't remember Corsi taking companions. Maybe a boyfriend or something more? She doesn't remember him naming his parrots.



Trav remembers way way back when she was dating Al Capone in her first life. Al had only one word for the Gastem Syndicate - "fucking amatuers." This was back when she thought Corsi was a ghastly delinquent.



Trav writes into her phone - "Note to self - if Corsi thinks these guys are cool, build them giant robots and cool space fighters."



Trav downloads their abbreviated version of that code. Back when she and Corsi stole their Pulse at the behest of the Time Lords, Corsi handled all the ethically challenging issues. "I'm a pirate, beloved, you're not." She wonders what the beautiful 5th Corsair would think of her now. Boobie was very upset - that was back in his cape and ruffles day. "Carrying on with the Corsair, committing crimes like some delinquent? Traveller, I am frankly astounded. I thought you above such truancy!"

Trav snaps her hat - now it's a pirate tricorn, in the same style that the Corsair wore!
This message was last edited by the player at 02:25, Sat 14 June 2014.

Smoke Alarm heard "bright", "shiny", and "games", and was only made more curious. 'I'm not going to get caught in any mouse-traps!' she declared, brave and bold. 'And I can hit a one-armed bandit with a coin!' Smoke Alarm pretended to shoot her arrowgun at them.

The others were busy playing on their talkiphones, and Smoke Alarms feets were all bouncy, so she took off running down the street to eyespy what she could eyespy. 'Build high for happiness!' the others heard her call back, Doppler effect and all. She had a jingly jangly pocket full of coins and she was brave and bold as a Kang could be. What could go wrong?


OOC: Hey, what do I have to roll find trouble? ;)

As Smoke Alarm pelts down the street, she finds it hard to decide what to run to and look at next.  It's like every building is shouting at her, with bright-colored signs and a fascinating array of music and sounds all yelling "LOOK AT ME!  COME ON IN!"

Some are like the cat-see-no at the place that the TARDIS landed, with people continually going in and out, and from all of them there are sounds of people chattering and shouting, electronic sounds and other noises.

One of the buildings makes her stop and look for a moment: there are a pair of big glass tubes set vertically into its side among the dozen storeys of gleaming mirrored windows.  Through the glass of the windows, she sees people stepping into them -- and the people are whisked up in the one or down in the other, without any floors or cars like the alleviators that they had back in the Towers!  She can't see any way of getting into them, though.

She comes across a big, big picturespout set on the side of one of the buildings.  It looks like it must be playing recordings, because she sees it playing pictures of the TARDIS materializing and Smoke Alarm and her friends all popping out as the people watching threw their coins.

When she turns away from that, though, she spots something that is not shouting at her from the sides of the street.  Up atop one of the shorter buildings (one that is only eight storeys tall or so) Smoke Alarm sees a figure moving.  It's dark, almost like it is wearing something that sucks up all the light around it.  And it moves from spot to spot, from cover to cover, like a hunter.

OOC: In Soviet Russia Space Vegas, trouble finds you!
This message was last edited by the GM at 02:59, Sun 15 June 2014.

Scanning the additional detail on the Whittington Foundation, Trav finds the joker in the deck.  The Foundation turns out to be a Humane Society serving distressed cats of any and all planetary origins, genus and species.

Smoke Alarm outlooked at the floor-less alleviators for a while, though she'd have to sneak her way into the building first before she ride them up and down. Mayhaps later. She laughed to eyespy a ginormous version of herself on the picture-spout-tower, waving at all the world.

Then Smoke Alarm eyespied the dark-fabshioned roof-runner, wondering what they were playing at. Mayhaps they were exploring the towers like she would be? But they were they also playing hide-and-seek. Also like she would be, mayhaps. Mayhaps it was some kind of Space Vegas Kang?

Deciding to outgo say how-you-do, Smoke Alarm outlooked for a way up the tower, then went, over the bins and up the fire-escape, through the window, and up the alleviator. Then out the window again and scaling the drain-pipe.


OOC: An elevator is an "alleviator", back in "Paradise Towers". The more you know. :)