Recap 07: Enter The Maelstrom

Locations:

Invictus

Absalom Station

People:

Mysterious Woman

Malcolm Montgomery, Vesk, Brother to one of Tybar's late squad members.

Dr. Laura Chen - Astrophysicist, hired to remain on board by Vicky

Jackson Lee - Chief Engineer & Technomancer, hired to remain on board by Vicky

Kira Rodriguez - Medical Officer, hired to remain on board by Vicky

Dr. Jameson Reed - Biologist, hired to remain on board by Vicky

Action:

Aboard the Invictus, relationships are strained, the next steps we should take are fuzzy at best, and there are still too many people aboard that are unknown wildcards. Speaking of which, the mysterious woman we picked up moon side decided to show her hand. She grabbed Benny as a hostage and demanded we turn over the Bleeding Edge Armor to her. N.I.K.K. goes into his hostage negotiation protocol and having anticipated such an event, was able to save the day. N.I.K.K. had been able to disable her gun, protect Benny with a forcefield skin and let her fly away in Benny's newly acquired shuttle. Benny was none too happy about that, but we promised him we would get him a better one. Joy had to disable the neck bomb that the woman placed on him, and N.I.K.K. had thrown a couple of grenades into the settle before she took off, so there is a loud explosion just outside the ship. We can only assume she didn't make it. Which means she will probably show back up at a future date.

Ash decided she needs Vicky more than she needs to be angry. But Ash is still not ready to talk about her newly discovered past. She sends Tybar to the bar and asks him to give her some space while she sorts out her feelings. However, we still have a mission ahead of us, to try and rescue Ash's parents. Vicky requests that we go to Absalom Station to get the records of her parent's last mission and speak with Malcolm Montgomery. But first, we had to find him. We went to the market on Absalom station. N.I.K.K. visited a milliner and was impressed Joy knew what one was. Joy reminded him of her love for historical romance novels that took place in the 1800-1900s of Earth's history, how could she not know about milliners? Joy, decided to commission an android body for Vicky, after learning that Vicky had sacrificed her old body to help save Ash. Meanwhile, many of the extra passengers on the Invictus finally got a chance to disembark, but Vicky had secured the employment of three of them to help us rescue Ash's parents.

We eventually tracked down Malcolm, and he wasn't too keen to see Tybar, the man, er, Vesk, that he held responsible for the death of his brother. Tybar a little, ok a lot, drunk wasn't able to diffuse the situation, so a bit of fisticuffs broke out. Most of the crew stood around and watched the drama unfold, no one willing to step into the fray and put an end to it. Eventually, Joy persuaded Malcolm to help us despite his personal feelings towards Tybar. Malcolm called her a mouse of an individual and why should he help her? Joy tells him about an ancient folktale where a mouse was able to help a lion remove a thorn from its paw. And if Malcolm helps us, that maybe one day he will need us to help him. It didn't hurt that we then showed him the data tapes of the day his brother lost his life and showed him that Tybar was not at fault. Malcolm agreed to help us, as long as he could dress Tybar up as a girl and put him into a kissing booth. Tybar was too drunk to protest, so it was a deal.

We loaded up the Invictus with the supply list Vicky provided us and got ready to enter the Maelstrom to find Ash's parents. In order to succeed, we had to fly the exact course and speed as her parents in order to enter the precise location that they did. Which is difficult enough in itself, however, things couldn't possibly be that easy for the crew of the Invictus. No, instead we were approached from behind by an unknown starship, coming in fast with weapons powering up. The starship split into three vessels and attached. Vicky remained her course, while N.I.K.K. gathered the crew to take a stand in the hull. Meanwhile, we gathered anything explosive we could jettison out the back to dislodge their attack and keep us on course.

Join us next time to see if the crew of the Invictus is successful, or will they succumb to the Space Pirates.