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Tabletop Squadron Transcript, Season 1 Episode 20:
Loot and Scoot

Transcript by Tyler (Twitter: @Tyler_MoonSage)

## Intro

NICK: Hi everyone, and welcome to Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars: Edge of the Empire actual play podcast. I’m Nick, your game master. Every other Thursday our story follows a thief, a bounty hunter, and a slicer as they explore the galaxy helping a mysterious benefactor and each other.

Welcome back to our regular release schedule. We’ll be coming out with our next goal in a few weeks, but for now I just want to say Laura’s working on a secret project with some friends, and it’s going to be adorable and perfect. Keep an eye out for it soon. Until our next social goal, tell a friend about the show. It’s a great way to share our story, and if what we do is something you like I’m sure you know a friend who’d like it too.

Well, without further ado, we hope you enjoy the episode.

[musical chime]
Hi, I’m Lilit and I play Xianna’fan, a Twi’lek smuggler. I was going by an old name during this recording and while we have left the audio as originally recorded, I would request that you use my current name when discussing the episode. Thanks!
[musical chime]

##

NICK: Hello! Welcome to Tabletop Squadron, flying the friendly skies with the Afternoon Delight. Your cruising altitude will be 20 episodes. Yeah, so we’ll go around the table, say who you are, who you’re playing, and if you spent any experience since the last time we spoke let our listeners know what you spent it on. We’ll go to Cameron first.

CAMERON: hello!

NICK: Hi.

CAMERON: I’m Cameron, and I’m playing Karma Nailo the Nautolan bounty hunter. I purchased the third rank in Ranged: Heavy.

NICK: Ooh.

CAMERON: So I can shoot guns real good now.

NICK: Cool. Very neat. Up next we’ve got Laura.

LAURA: I’m Laura. Yes. That is who I am… and I am playing Xianna’fan, a Twi’lek smuggler. I bought Shortcut. During a chase, I can add a boost die to any checks made to catch or escape an opponent. So I can run away now.

NICK: Neat. I’m sure that won’t ever come up.

CAMERON: Well, it’s just her, though, so… (laughs)

LAURA: (smiling) It’s just me, which is fitting. I wasn’t gonna bring the rest of you with.

NICK: Alright. Last up we’ve got Hudson.

HUDSON: Hi, I’m last. I’m playing Tink, also known as full name Rallltinkraatatat, a Gigoran slicer~

NICK: Is it –raatatat or -raatakat?

HUDSON: … Rallltinkraatakat, thank you.

(laughter)

NICK: Ah…

HUDSON: No, Ratatat is a really good music group.

LAURA: Yeah!

NICK: Oh. Okay. Have you spent any experience this time?

HUDSON: No, I’m hoarding that shit so I can get something that’s worth 20.

NICK: Great, just like real life.

HUDSON: Yes!

CAMERON: (laughing) I wish people could see your facial expressions.

LAURA: We’re gonna have a Twitch stream where it’s just a Hudson camera, no sound because we don’t wanna give spoilers, just a Hudson camera.

CAMERON: You could just see what’s happening, though.

NICK: And I’ll GM like this…

HUDSON: (laughs)

LAURA: And we’ll have a little sign that we put on the chair that says… Oh, it has to be some stupid bathroom pun. “Gone to feed the Sarlacc” is an actual one they have used in books.

NICK: Yeah, that means you’re pooping.

LAURA: It means you’re poopin’.

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: Before we get started, let’s do the Destiny Roll.

CAMERON: One light side.

HUDSON: Two light side.

LAURA: One light side.

CAMERON: (gasps)

NICK: Ooh. Not giving me a ton to work with.

CAMERON: Four light side!

NICK: Alright. When we last left off you all had just finished a very large gunfight against the Black Sun Corporation. You were both after a droid. Sentinel had sent you to fetch it and warned you that some other people may also be attempting to do the same thing. When you arrived at the base you discovered that things were not going as you had expected. There were a lot of dead people, a lot of explosions, and the droid had actually been damaged in some way. You ambushed these poor fools and blew them apart. Tink, you got shot quite a bit, and we last left off with Tink saying, ‘I got your boots, Xianna.’ They were not good boots, but then Karma found very nice boots in your size. So, that was what you spent your light side points on last time.

LAURA: Yes.

CAMERON: It felt pretty safe at the end of the episode to do that. (laughs)

NICK: So, the boots were not the right size, but karma found someone wearing very nice boots that were a galactic standard 6 ½. The facility is smoking with blaster fire and the scent of char and blood fills your nostrils. Describe these boots.

LAURA: Ooh. SO they can’t have any buttons or things like that, because that’s not allowed in Star Wars, but they’re shiny, and they’re black, and they have a little bit of a heel. Not too much though, like riding boot level of heel. They’re knee high, and they probably have little bits of a snakeskin pattern that’s a slightly oil slick pattern.

CAMERON: Ooh.

LAURA: So not true metallic rainbow, but if the light catches it there’s a little bit of a rainbow gleam.

NICK: Nice. So you pull these boots off of this corpse. Do you just slap them on right there, put on your new boots, get rid of your old ones?

LAURA: Well I mean, do they have blood on them?

CAMERON: No, they wouldn’t, because it’s not off of a corpse, it’s off of one of the ones that I stunned, because I found them in my hallway.

NICK: Oh yeah. That’s fair.

LAURA: Oh, then yeah.

CAMERON: So they’re perfectly clean unless the guy stepped in something earlier.

LAURA: I just trade out the boots.

NICK: Cool. So you’re basically in the entry hallway of this facility. You made your way most of the way back to the main entrance when you were ambushing these people. Karma is towards the back in a hallway with a couple of stunned people that she took down. There are another five thugs in various states of disrepair scattered around this hallway. The walls are scattered with blaster fire. There’s smoke, remnants of explosions that were there before you came in, overall there’s just a haze in the air. People are dead on the ground. Tink, you are bleeding pretty heavily from the wounds that you took. Your leg is just a mess. Your kneecap is pretty much blown off at this point.

HUDSON: “(groans in pain)”

NICK: The droid that you came to collect is laying in the middle of the hallway with the body of a Black Sun gunman sprawled over it from where he dropped. What do you do?

LAURA: “Tink… Are you okay?”

HUDSON: “(groans)”

LAURA: “So no… Okay.”

CAMERON: “Your leg looks really messed up.”

LAURA: “We are going to have to get him to some sort of medic, pretty sure, because I don’t know what to do for that.”

CAMERON: “Tink? Hun? Can you stand?”

HUDSON: “I think I c—(groans) … No.”

CAMERON: (laughing) How are we getting him out of this?

LAURA: “So Tink… I know you said you are straightedge, but—“

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: “So hear me out. If I give you some impact, you will have the energy to get out and get to the ship, and then, you know, you won’t be on the floor, because I cannot pick you up.”

CAMERON: “We can also try some medical stuff beforehand, with no pain meds or anything, just tourniquets basically, I think, at this point.”

LAURA: “Oh, I will not.”

CAMERON: “Actually, hold on.” Karma starts looting all the dead people.

NICK: Okay. So, you did last time, you pulled patches off of everybody.

CAMERON: Yes. I have all of their patches, and I take the patches from the guys still living too, but I leave them with like… their stuff. I’m just now totally looting the dead guys.

NICK: So, you leave your friend bleeding in the hall, and you are looking for what? Weapons, pockets? How deep of a search are you doing here?

CAMERON: I am trying to find stim packs, basically.

NICK: Alright. I would say looting the bodies would be a Skulduggery kind of move, don’t you think?

CAMERON: “Hey Xianna, come help!” (laughs)

LAURA: “Okie! I was going to loot the bodies as well, not looking for stim packs.”

CAMERON: “Oh. Well, if you find any stim packs—“

LAURA: “(huffs) Sabos owed me three stim packs.”

CAMERON: “Those would be real handy right now…”

HUDSON: (whining) “Sabos~?”

LAURA: “They would—No! No one said anything!”

HUDSON: (whining) “Okay… Did you say impact?”

LAURA: “Oh! Do you want the impact right now?”

HUDSON: “No. No… Come closer. I can’t- I don’t have the energy…”

LAURA: She does the thing where she kneels down next to him and is doing that deathbed thing. “(solemnly) Yes…? What is it?”

HUDSON: (weakly) “I gotta keep the edge…”

(laughter)

LAURA: “Okay, but like, it will make you feel good. In a fun way. Heh.”

HUDSON: “No. I’ll just rely on the stim packs.”

LAURA: “I think I might have some whiskey.”

CAMERON: “We have to find them first. Hold on. Xianna, come on.” (laughs)

LAURA: “Okie.”

HUDSON: “I believe in you~!”

CAMERON: ‘Tink, can you tie a tourniquet around your leg?”

HUDSON: “yeah. I learned about that.”

CAMERON: “I figured your medical book probably taught you.”

HUDSON: “Yeah, it’s called a tourniquet because you turn it… on your leg.”

CAMERON: “… Uh-huh. Yes.”

NICK: Well, technically French doesn’t exist in Star Wars, so…

CAMERON: That is why it’s called a tourniquet, because you turn it… on your leg.

LAURA: Difficulty?

NICK: Average. Are you both doing individual or are you helping each other?

CAMERON: If I help you can have another yellow.

LAURA: yeah.

CAMERON: Let’s do that. I’m assisting.

NICK: Cool.

LAURA: Also, Xianna would be looking for more than just stim packs. She’s looking for binders, and weapons, and drugs, and any like fun snacks they have, like if they have some cool granola bars, like if one of them was the mom of the group and definitely had a bag full of baby wipes and snacks.

CAMERON: (giggles) We want that bag.

LAURA: Oh, and Band-Aids. There’s always the mom of the group. We want to find the mom of the group. (laughs)

NICK: Well, now I’m picturing this team as like an eight year old soccer team, so that’s great.

CAMERON: Ooh. If they have Capri-Sun, I want one.

NICK: Great.

LAURA: So, one success, one advantage.

NICK: Interesting. You find a couple of things. They have guns, because they were shooting you with them.

CAMERON: (laughing) exactly.

LAURA: Yes.

NICK: They all have light blasters except for the head honcho guy who had a carbine rifle.

CAMERON: I’m taking every single gun that these guys have. Not the stunned ones, they still have a life to live.

NICK: Three of them were stunned, and there were nine total, so you get five light blasters and one carbine.

CAMERON: And you want a light?

LAURA: Oh no, Xianna’s gonna take one from one of the stunned guys. She doesn’t care.

CAMERON: Oh, okay.

NICK: Okay, so you can have those. They’re just standard, nothing fancy. You do a pretty cursory job patting them down with a success and an advantage. You’re not really getting up in there or anything. I would imagine that patting down blaster killed corpses is not the most pleasant of experiences. How used to doing this are Xianna and Karma?

CAMERON: (laughs) Some of them are axed.

NICK: Yeah…

CAMERON: (laughing) Some of them were worse.

LAURA: Again, Karma is ONLY searching through the dead ones, for some reason. Xianna’s also going through the living ones. She steals from people. She doesn’t care. If anything she thinks it’s weird that Karma’s only taking from the dead ones. Like, ‘they’re dead, ew.’

CAMERON: Karma’s pretty okay with the death and gory stuff, because stuff happens when you’re bounty hunting. You know, like the person you’re chasing goes off of a chasm and you have to go down there, and it’s real nasty when you get down there, but you have to bring them back, so… She’s probably very clinical about it, and is trying to not get super dirty, but if she has to move a limb she isn’t very concerned.

NICK: Okay.

LAURA: Xianna probably would care too much either, being from an Empire occupied planet where there is an active resistance. Stormtroopers just kind of patrol and shoot people when they feel like it.

HUDSON: Just real quick, out of character, this whole time I’ve been trying to think of a Black Hole Sun pun and it just hasn’t been working.

NICK: Wash away the pain?

HUDSON: I was thinking Black Hole Sun, wake them up, and they better not complain. That was as close as I got, but that’s not…

LAURA: No, that’s nothing.

HUDSON: Nope. Never mind, I give up.

NICK: It was a good effort.

CAMERON: How many total badges did I get? There’s nine with the dudes right here…

NICK: Plus there were the additional…

CAMERON: There were three or four last time?

NICK: Four. Yeah.

CAMERON: So there’s 13 total?

NICK: Yep, 13 anonymous Black Sun badges. You get two stim packs, you get those assorted blasters, that’s about it. They traveled pretty light.

CAMERON: Wound-wise, what are you at, Hudson?

HUDSON: Five.

LAURA: Out of what?

HUDSON: Seventeen. Five left, sorry.

CAMERON: Okay. we will stab you with one of the stim packs and get you back up to 10.

HUDSON: Alright.

CAMERON: Your leg is still gonna be messed up because of the crit.

HUDSON: Okay.

CAMERON: Feeling better…?

NICK: Just to remind our listeners, what is the damage to your leg?

HUDSON: Sure. So my leg is jacked up. It got shot up, and kriffed up, and it’s just all kinds of mess. As far as my critical injury chart goes, I’m crippled. One limb is impaired until healed or replaced. Increase difficulty to all checks using that limb.

NICK: Great. You’re injured. You all found some stim packs. What are you gonna do?

LAURA: We gave Tink a stim pack.

CAMERON: Gonna stab him with the stim pack.

HUDSON: (pain noises)

CAMERON: So, you gain 5 wounds back. “Xianna, you can have the other stim pack, because you seem to need it more.”

LAURA: Yes~ “I do. I am, how you say, squishy…”

CAMERON: “Fragile?”

LAURA: “Squishy!”

CAMERON: I load up all my guns and my patches.

HUDSON: I crawl over to assassin bot.

NICK: Mm-hmm?

HUDSON: After I crawl to assassin bot, I check to see how many restraining bolts it has.

NICK: What an interesting idea to check the droid that you came to see. So, the droid is the size of an average man, about 5’11” or 1.8 meters tall. The torso is heavily armored with rounded shoulders and well-defined limbs. I realize that this is not what you asked, but I wrote this description and I’m gonna read it, damn it. The entire thing is covered in rusty, red-colored armor plating. The face has an upright rectangular panel where the mouth would be on a human with a sloping forehead and skull-like sunken cheeks. There are two short, thick antennas sticking out of the back of the head. There’s a lot of carbon scoring on the armor of the droid, evidence of the battle it had with the Black Sun syndicate. One thing particularly stands out—well, two things. There are no restraining bolts on it, and can you make me a Mechanics check, please? You should be good at that.

HUDSON: I’m okay at it.

CAMERON: You’re real smart, though.

HUDSON: I’m real smart, though. What’s the difficulty?

NICK: It’s gonna be average.

HUDSON: Oh. Three successes.

NICK: Lovely. One thing particularly stands out. There is a neat hole in the left side of the chest. You crack open the armor plating and pull it open, and you see that the central processor on this unit is actually kept in the torso—most of the time it’s in the head, this one has it in the torso—and there is a smoking hole in the middle of the central processing unit. Basically that’s the brain of the droid, most of its memories and personality are kept in there, and that thing is totally blown. With that amount of successes you would know that you either need to find an identical central processing unit, which would be pretty difficult to do since you’ve never seen a droid like this before, or some sort of powerful program AI type thing that you could plug into it to run.

HUDSON: Oh… I look down at my Rancore Protocol.

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: (laughing) Do not plug that in right now!

HUDSON: By the way, out of character, I know you just made an awesome description for that robot, but all I can think about it looking like is that droid from Hoth that goes and inspects things and has all the really skinny legs and the round head.

CAMERON: So nothing like that.

LAURA: But nothing like he described.

NICK: (laughs)

HUDSON: Exactly. That’s all I can think of, because that’s how I pictured it before.

NICK: Think like a red metal dude.

HUDSON: Yeah, I…

NICK: Do you want me to pull up a picture of him so you can see?

HUDSON: Oh, do you have a picture of it?

NICK: Yeah.

CAMERON: Think HK47 from KOTOR.

CAMERON: He doesn’t play KOTOR. That doesn’t mean anything.

HUDSON: I played it when I was a kid. I don’t remember very well.

CAMERON: It looks like a scary, red robot man.

HUDSON: Cool. Okay.

NICK: Now that you’ve seen the picture, wasn’t my description great?

HUDSON: Yeah, I liked it.

NICK: Yeah, I thought it was awesome. So, Tink, you pull out your Rancore Protocol and you’re holding it in one hand and part of the droid in the other, and favoring one leg that isn’t bleeding, and Karma says—

CAMERON: “Do not plug that in right now.”

LAURA: “Tink, what are you doing?”

HUDSON: “I mean, the operative phrase that she just mentioned was right now.”

CAMERON: “Yeah, later. Later.”

LAURA: “Okie. Tink, you are bleeding out everywhere. Maybe we should just get things on the ship, get out of here in case more people come.”

HUDSON: “Listen—“

CAMERON: “Do you remember how the last time you plugged that into a droid it turned into a [murder robot? Murder droid?” (laughs)

HUDSON: “Vaguely, but to be honest I’ve lost a lot of blood, so I’m just gonna go with what you guys say, because I don’t remember any murder droids.”

CAMERON: “Okay. Cool. Don’t plug it in. we will do that later.”

HUDSON: “Alright.”

CAMERON: “Let’s get back to our ship.”

HUDSON: “Okay. we’ll go back to the ship. Can I crawl?”

CAMERON: “I think you—Hmm.”

LAURA: “Whoa. How are we going to do this?”

HUDSON: “I know I can crawl, but should I crawl?”

CAMERON: “Okay. Xianna, if you grab the gun and let Tink put an arm around your shoulder…”

LAURA: “I will fall to the ground. (laughs)”

CAMERON: “Yeah. Tink, do not put a ton of weight on her. I can carry the droid. I can’t carry the droid and be a crutch for Tink.”

HUDSON: “Why are you avoiding the most obvious solution, which is finding a mine cart for the track?”

LAURA: “Oh, that would help.”

CAMERON: “Hold on!” Karma turns around and goes back into that big room, because there was a speeder in there.

NICK: That’s true. There was a speeder in there.

CAMERON: I go back in there.

NICK: So, the speeder… The thing about this place is the speeder is too big to come through those hallways. There is a garage door that swings up, but when you look it actually goes out on the far side of a hill, further than you would expect. You would need to swing it around to get it back to the front, if you could find the keys to turn it on. There is a little hover cart full of tools, because this is a mechanics place.

CAMERON: Is it like a hover cart that say, I don’t know, Tink and a droid would fit on?

NICK: One or the other, it’s probably not big enough for both.

HUDSON: What if I hold it in my arms?

CAMERON: (loudly) Is it a hover cart that maybe Tink, and the droid, and the gun would fit on?

NICK: Hey, listeners…

CAMERON: Flipping a light side point. (laughs)

NICK: Yeah, so, Cameron flipped a light side point. So, you see this little hover cart, it’s got some hydrospanners on it, and a hammer, and it’s pretty small. The camera zooms in on Karma scratching at one of her head tentacles, and then she kind of shrugs, and then the camera goes a foot to the left and there’s a much larger one with some padding that looks like it’s for a person. It’s like a medical gurney and it looks like it’s for two people with a cargo slot underneath. You have a perfect thing that could carry both Tink and the droid, and the gun.

CAMERON: Cool. While I’m in here, is there anything else that looks nifty? (laughs)

NICK: That would be a Skulduggery check. Your friend is bleeding out in the other room, but if you want to try and loot that is fine.

CAMERON: I gave him a stim pack. He’s fine. What’s the difficulty?

NICK: He’s “okay.” (chuckles) This one’s gonna be hard to find anything useful.

CAMERON: As I’m walking back… Wow, interesting. Two successes, three threats, and a triumph.

NICK: So, you fall prone while you’re searching. (dramatic bass noise)

CAMERON: I use my Jump Up talent to get back up as an incidental. (prone sound rewinds)

NICK: Ooh. Oh-hoh. Fancy.

CAMERON: (laughing) For no reason.

NICK: (laughing) So, we get this shot of Karma, the legs sticking out of a crate kind of kicking in the air, and there’s a loud bang as she falls forward into the crate, and then a really cool legs-first jump out of the crate on the other side. Super important. Besides that, with that triumph, I think you find a small case of weapons mod parts.

CAMERON: Nice.

NICK: Technically in Star Wars each modification, in this game, needs its own very specific equipment. What we’re going to say is this is kind of a wild card that you can plug into something. The only one I’m gonna say out of hand that you’re not gonna be able to turn that into is Masterwork, because that’s very expensive.

CAMERON: No Masterwork.

NICK: But that’s the parts for modding a weapon, if you would like to install a mod later on.

CAMERON: So one weapon?

NICK: Yeah. It’s just a little carrying case with some tools and some little doodads and things. It looks like a weapon maintenance kit you might be able to repurpose.

CAMERON: Cool. I pop it into the cargo section of the gurney and hover back over to my friends.

NICK: Sure. (whoosh noises)

HUDSON: “You got a hover bed!”

CAMERON: “I did, and it’s for you, Tink!”

HUDSON: “It’s exactly what I told you to get. I’m so smart.”

(snickering)

CAMERON: “Yup! Come on. Can you get in it, or do you need help?”

HUDSON: “I can roll…”

CAMERON: “Well, it is not on the ground, it is—“

HUDSON: “No, I can roll to it, and then I can climb.”

LAURA: “Okie.”

CAMERON: “Okay cool, okay. I’ll hold it right here. You go ahead and get in.”

HUDSON: “(groans) Do I take the robot?”

LAURA: “No, no, no.”

CAMERON: “No, leave the robot on the ground. I’ll put—(laughs) Leave the droid on the ground. I’ll put the droid in.”

HUDSON: “Alright, just like I’m putting out a fire… (whispering) That one time…” I roll, and roll…

LAURA: “Tink—What?”

(laughter)

HUDSON: And I just roll all the way to the gurney-mobile.

LAURA: “Did anyone else hear Tink say that?”

CAMERON: “Yeah, stop, drop and roll. Obviously he caught on fire at some point.”

LAURA: “No—What? (exhales) Oh… I think I’m just coming down in a very not-so-good way.”

CAMERON: (giggles)

LAURA: “Is there room in there for me, Tink? Because… Oh boy.”

HUDSON: “How much do you like getting blood on you?”

LAURA: “I mean, I would not say that I like it, but I was going to take a shower anyways.”

CAMERON: Karma puts the droid and the gun on it while they’re talking.

NICK: After Tink flops into the cart it noticeably sinks. It was hovering about three quarters of a meter off the ground, and it goes down to about half a meter. With the droid on, it goes down to about a third of a meter off the ground, so you have to actually lean over a little to push it. You could try and see if it would fit. Also, you do remember that big gun they were carrying, right?

CAMERON: Yeah. I put the gun and the droid on.

NICK: Okay. The gun is reasonably heavy. Taking a second to look at that more closely, it appears to be some sort of long distance blaster rifle. It doesn’t have any sort of electronic scope on it, though. It has iron sights, and it also has multiple barrels underslung on the bottom, kind of like a mini gun or something, attached under the sniper barrel that also appears to attach to the power source. This is a very strange gun you haven’t seen before.

CAMERON: Huh.

NICK: Yeah. Another thing you notice about the gun is it doesn’t have a trigger, which is very interesting. The place where  normally a trigger and a trigger guard would go is just a little slot in the side of the gun and that’s it.

HUDSON: Ooh, wireless.

CAMERON: “Huh. That’s interesting.” And I just pop it on the cart.

LAURA: For the droid.

HUDSON: Ohh…

CAMERON: Eyebrow wiggle.

NICK: Eyebrow wiggle. (laughs) Okay, so do you leave? Is there anything else you wanted to look at? You’ve got the droid and Tink loaded up into the cart…

CAMERON: “Should we get him medical attention, or do you want to go in that other room that the stunned guys came from?”

HUDSON: “I vote medical attention.”

LAURA: “(sighs) Yes.”

CAMERON: “I’m kind of feeling like that’s the better option.”

LAURA: ‘I vote medical attention as well.”

CAMERON: “Okay.”

HUDSON: “I’m offended you even had the choice.”

LAURA: “I mean, we did have a choice, like…”

HUDSON: “No, I mean that you explored the options.”

LAURA: “… Why?”

CAMERON: I start pushing the cart.

HUDSON: “I’m so hurt right now~!”

LAURA: “I mean, we picked You.”

NICK: So, we get Karma pushing the cart. It’s running pretty low. There’s a pretty bright glow coming from underneath it as it is working overtime with all the weight that’s been piled onto it.

LAURA: Xianna is trudging along, because it is after an encounter. Previously all post-impact encounters have just been sitting around talking so it hasn’t been an issue yet…

CAMERON: But now she has to move.

LAURA: …but I do have negatives after encounters if I take impact, so I’m just slow and sad.

NICK: Okay. Xianna is trudging along, harassing Tink, and we get a low shot from behind as little drips of blood are coming off of the cart from Tink. You go outside. The crew sees the blockade runner ship that had the face paint job and the lightning bolts on it lifting off and taking off for orbit really fast.

CAMERON: “Hmm.”

LAURA: “Oh… Huh.”

NICK: So that ship’s leaving.

CAMERON: Bye~

NICK: Besides that, you can see a few nerfs calmly grazing. A couple of them galloped away from the ship as it took off, and as soon as the ship got more than 50 meters into the air they just stopped and started eating again. You can see the low ridge which your ship is parked behind. Do you go to the ship?

CAMERON: Yup.

NICK: Alright. You go to the ship. When you say you’re seeking medical attention… what are you all thinking, exactly?

LAURA: I was assuming a city.

CAMERON: We’re gonna need to find a town or something, with other people more talented than us.

LAURA: I was picturing finding a true city, that would have a real doctor, and other shops, and possibly robotic pieces in case we decide he has to just lose the leg.

HUDSON: Um…

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: Okay. This is not in character.

(laughter)

HUDSON: I know.

CAMERON: Tink looks real concerned all of a sudden.

LAURA: In case you couldn’t tell by the voice difference.

NICK: Okay. Are you looking to leave Engibo 5 and go to a nearby planet, somewhere with some civilization on it? This one mostly has settlements. It doesn’t have anything particularly large.

CAMERON: Probably, yeah, then go to one that actually has people’s living on it.

NICK: Great. So you go back to the ship, you lift off, and you start flying to orbit.

CAMERON: Can we take our cart with us?

NICK: Sure. Yeah. Toss it in the cargo bay or whatever.

CAMERON: Yay! We have a cart in the cargo bay. I’m gonna write it on our ship sheet.

NICK:  got a holo-gurney.

CAMERON: Holo-gurney!

NICK: A hover gurney, I mean.

CAMERON: (laughs) it’s a holo-gurney. It’s just a blue image of a gurney.

LAURA: But it works. (laughs)

NICK: (laughs) If you believe.

CAMERON: How do you spell gurney? (laughs)

NICK: G-U-R-N-E-Y.

LAURA: That’s—I think that’s right.

HUDSON: That’s right. That’s what I was about to say.

CAMERON: Okay. My brain was just like… I don’t know!

NICK: We’ve had trouble with spelling today.

HUDSON: J-U-X-R…

NICK: (laughs) Don’t stop believing. So! We get a shot of the planet down below looking like a golden ball, the ship flying up, as you clear the atmosphere you see the blockade runner ship that belonged to the Black Suns jump to hyperspace. It was very much just booking it out. They didn’t know what happened, but most of the people who were in there were dead so whoever was still on the ship decided to cut their losses. You see there’s a couple of planets nearby, some of them with cities. There are some good options. As you’re starting to calculate it there’s a loud bang, and from outside the ship you see the ship actually lurch in space, and one of the emitters sputters and goes dark, and a big piece of paneling just floats off of it, and a bunch of alarms start going off in the cockpit.

CAMERON: “Tiiink!”

LAURA: Oh no.

HUDSON: “Waaah!”

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: (laughs) “I thought you fixed the ship.”

HUDSON: “You know, the operative word there is fixed, and I would say I thought it was fixed.”

CAMERON: “Okay… I’m seeing hull float away…”

NICK: (“woop” alarm noises)

CAMERON: “…and everything’s beeping at me!”

LAURA: “Tink, I’m just going to roll you in there. Okay?”

HUDSON: “Okay!”

CAMERON: “I’ma have to land again…”

LAURA: Xianna runs over to Tink’s room with the hover gurney, the hover cart, and helps toss him in there and then runs it up to the computer cockpit area. “Okay. You fix now.”

HUDSON: Do you walk away? Are you looking at me?

LAURA: I kind of just stand there expectantly. “You, you fix, okay you go.” (laughs)

HUDSON: Alright. I look left and right to see if anyone else is around.

CAMERON: I’m in the cockpit too.

HUDSON: You’re in the cockpit, and you’re like, beside me?

LAURA: Yeah.

HUDSON: I just like quickly press the mute button on the alarm, and that’s all I do right then.

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: “Tink, that is not helpful!”

LAURA: “Tink, you just pressed the mute button. I could see you. I am right here!”

NICK: (“woop” alarm noises)

HUDSON: “Alright. Alright. Wait, it’s—“

NICK: (noises abruptly stop)

HUDSON: –Oh.

(laughter)

LAURA: ‘Tink! Fix it!”

HUDSON: “Alright, fine.”

CAMERON: “I just saw plating float away. I don’t think that’s something he can fix with the computers. I’m landing.”

NICK: The ship is also lifting pretty hard to the port, as if half of it stopped {propulsing}, so it’s kind of doing a weird spinny thing.

CAMERON: Yeah, I’m going back down.

HUDSON: Yeah, there’s nothing I can do. (laughs)

NICK: Okay. A couple of things happen at that point. As you head back down you do a scan of the planet and you see that there is a decent sized settlement on the far side that y’all missed on the way in because you all failed your Planetary Knowledge check. Xianna super did not remember this place even though—

LAURA: Nope.

NICK: Maybe she didn’t go there.

LAURA: Who knows.

NICK: Maybe she… did something else. Hard to tell. Your data pad, Karma, that you have in a seat in the cockpit pings at you once.

CAMERON: I look at it.

NICK: It’s an Imperial missive.

CAMERON: Cool. I disregard for the moment, because it’s not good to look at your data pad while you’re flying.

NICK: What great advice. So, you start to head back towards the planet. The ship is struggling pretty hard. I’m gonna need a hard Piloting check from you to bring this in under control, as you are flying under half power trying to re-enter atmosphere.

CAMERON: (nervously) “Xianna…?”

LAURA: “yes?”

CAMERON: “Do you know how ships work?”

LAURA: “I mean, not really, but…”

CAMERON: “Can you follow instructions if I give them to you?”

LAURA: (cheerfully) “Maybe.”

CAMERON: (laughs) “Okay. Come sit up here.”

LAURA: “Okie.”

HUDSON: “I can fly it.”

CAMERON: “We don’t have time to get you into this seat.” (laughs)

HUDSON: “(huffs)”

LAURA: I slump down into the chair. “Okie. What do I press?”

CAMERON: “Pres that button.” Karma points at something, “and pull that lever.”

LAURA: “Okie.”

CAMERON: (laughing) I want a blue die for her helping.

NICK: Okay.

LAURA: Yeah, do we need to do any checks?

CAMERON: Yeah, probably Piloting: Space?

NICK: yeah.

CAMERON: Okay.

LAURA: Does it do anything if I would have a black die to that roll, since I’m just helping her?

NICK: There’s two ways that this can work. I’m open to either, it’s up to you. One, you can do a Co-Piloting check, which will let you add any successes to her roll which is pretty cool, or you can both contribute to the Piloting check which would give her a blue die.

LAURA: Because I’m pretty agile.

CAMERON: Yeah. Try a Co-Pilot check, and we’ll see how it goes. (laughs)

LAURA: You know what, I’m gonna flip a light side point.

NICK: Aw, you beat me to it.

LAURA: Ha-ha. What’s the difficulty?

NICK: Hard.

CAMERON: Oh no.

LAURA: Oh no.

NICK: (laughs)

LAURA: Shit. Yeah, so four failures. Just four failures. Yup.

CAMERON: You know what, I did so much better, and I only have one failure and one threat.

NICK: Alright, so we’re coming in hot.

CAMERON: Coming in hot!

LAURA: Oh wait! No! Four failures and an advantage. I can’t read.

CAMERON: Ha-ha! It improved so dramatically!

NICK: So, you can get rid of the threat.

LAURA: Cool.

CAMERON: So just five failures, total, between the two of us?

LAURA: Oh boy…

NICK: I’ll just say if you fail at a CO-Piloting check I’m not gonna do the thing where it does minuses.

CAMERON: Okay, so, a failure.

NICK: Yeah. (laughs) So, what does the scene look like as Xianna tries to help you and just does the opposite?

CAMERON: Both of our yellows were blank. That is bullshit.

LAURA: I imagine that Karma would say like, okay press that red button, and Xianna would press like a pink button way off to the side, like ‘Okie!’

CAMERON: Karma goes into full teen learning to drive mom mode and is like phantom pressing things as Xianna pushes the wrong things, and is doing the freak out bracing herself in the seat, and it’s just very distracting and does not go well.

NICK: There’s a lot of yelling. The ship goes rattling down.

LAURA: “If you keep reaching in front of me I can’t press the buttons that you tell me to press!”

CAMERON: “But you’re pressing the wrong ones!”

LAURA: “And I know that, I know I’m pressing the wrong buttons but I cannot help it! I do not know how to fly! The last time I flew I crashed the ship into a lake, and if you just, you just keep yelling at me, and I am very stressed out, and I am not having a good time. I’m coming down from the impact and I am so stressed out!”

HUDSON: “Uh… This doesn’t sound good. What’s going—“

LAURA: “You stay out of it, Tink! You stay out of it!”

HUDSON: (weakly) “Okay…”

CAMERON: “Tink, Tink, just breathe. We’re gonna be fine.”

HUDSON: (dramatic labored inhale)

CAMERON: “Yup. Good job, sweetie.”

NICK: (laughs)

LAURA: “I do not think that is how you breathe.”

(laughter)

HUDSON: (dramatic labored inhale)

CAMERON: “Tink, you’re breathing wrong.” (laughs)

LAURA: “Tink, please just let me give you some impact. I promise it is all fun.”

HUDSON: “Nooo. Keep, the, edge!”

(laughter)

NICK: So, we get an outside shot of the ship careening down out of the atmosphere. As you start to crash down you pass the terminus of the planet where the sun is rising, and you go to the night side, and you see this settlement lit up beneath you. It has two very distinct parts that you can see lit up. It looks like a wooden monster eating a durasteel snail. The space port that is the planet’s connection to the greater galaxy is nestled in the west, but you can see a majority of the settlement is made of wood and stucco buildings. It sprawls away from the space port in neighborhoods and slums, and the ramshackle part of the settlement stretches around the space port. Everyone can make me a Knowledge: Outer Rim check that’s looking at this place if they would so choose.

CAMERON: Is there difficulty?

NICK: Average.

CAMERON: Oh shit. A success and a threat. Karma knows something. This is crazy.

HUDSON: One advantage and five successes.

CAMERON: Okay. Karma doesn’t know that much.

NICK: Damn.

HUDSON: And this, I used all green.

LAURA: Two advantages, and two failures.

NICK: Whatever Xianna did on Engibo 5 she does not remember much of it. For those of you who succeeded, you actually have heard of this place before now that you see it. Tink, it really rings a bell, it’s something that’s come up as a place to hide out and recuperate in some of the underground circles. This settlement is called Nerftown.

We see the ship come streaking towards the space port. As you get closer to it your com starts to go off very stridently as someone attempts to hail the ship.

CAMERON: “Hello?”

NICK: Beep. Beep. Beep.

CAMERON: “Hello—Stop beeping ship! I pressed the button!”

LAURA: “I did not press anything!”

NICK: The ship comes streaking in. You hear, “Unidentified ship, you are approaching too quickly. Peel off and approach at a normal vector.”

CAMERON: (assertively) “We are trying, trust me.”

NICK: “Oh, is this some—“

CAMERON: “This is going down!”

NICK: ‘Emergency procedures in effect!”

CAMERON: “Thank you.”

NICK: And you can see the space port starts to scramble and some search lights hit the ship. You are coming in hot, and there are some snub fighters, they look like little X-wings with no guns on them that come up and start spraying fire retardant spray all over the outside of the Afternoon Delight. They scramble very quickly.

HUDSON: (laughs)

LAURA: (laughs)

CAMERON: (laughing) Tink makes a really excited face, because it looks like we’re going through a car wash on the windshield, and he’s very excited.

HUDSON: Yes. That’s exactly what happens.

NICK: The ship comes in and there’s a sickening crunch as it bottoms out. So, it’s a space port so there isn’t a runway, because ships land—

CAMERON: Ships shouldn’t come in like this!

HUDSON: (laughs)

NICK: But there’s a big, round parking space, and you smash into the ground and kind of start donut skidding through it, and you’re getting really close to another yacht, and the ship is grinding and there are sparks going everywhere and bits of metal are flying off, and it’s getting closer and closer to this other yacht… Can y’all roll me a force die, please?

CAMERON: (reluctantly) Yeah…

LAURA: All of us, or just one?

NICK: No, just one.

CAMERON: Two light side.

NICK: Ooh. So, the ship is skidding and starting to slow down. Some of the anti-fire spray is sticking to the ground. The ship’s leaving this big black streak behind it, and it gets to within a couple of inches of this other ship and stops. You can actually see the cockpit of the Afternoon Delight is right up next to the cockpit of this other ship. It’s got all these delicate spires coming off of it in this twisty architecture. It’s definitely a pleasure vessel. You see two Duroses staring open mouthed into your view screen as they are sitting in the cockpit of this vessel.

LAURA: Xianna pops up, because she definitely at some point fell onto the floor. “Oh, hello~!” and waves at them.

CAMERON: Karma puts up a tentative (laughs nervously) wave, and then just drops her head back in the seat. “Oh my gosh…”

NICK: There is a Duros sitting in the pilot seat who was doing stuff, and there’s a Duros standing behind the pilot seat who is leaning over, and the Duros that was standing looks really upset and angry, and the Duros that was sitting looks just shocked and tentatively waves back, and then gets slapped in the back of the head by the guy standing behind it. But the ship has landed.

LAURA: “Okay Tink, you said you fixed this.”

CAMERON: “Oh my gosh.”

HUDSON: “You know, what if it was something other than the thing I fixed? We’re not sure, are we?”

LAURA: “So, that is why you should be checking these things. You do the mechanics.”

HUDSON: “I can’t predict everything that could possibly go wrong.”

CAMERON: “I lost all power to the port side of the ship.”

HUDSON: “… That could have been a crazy coincidence.”

(laughter)

CAMERON: “Really?”

LAURA: “I mean, I think you just didn’t do something you are supposed to do.”

HUDSON: “We can point fingers all day, or we can get my fucking leg fixed.”

(laughter)

NICK: Alright. We’re gonna get a swipe cut on that line to you all stumbling down the access ramp. Is Tink still in the gurney or is he limping?

CAMERON: Yup.

LAURA: Yes.

NICK: Okay, we’re pushing Tink in the gurney.

CAMERON: We set up the droid in probably one of the lounge seats.

NICK: Okay, and you just left it?

CAMERON: yeah, we’re just leaving it on the ship. Well, are we gonna carry this droid around this whole time?

HUDSON: No, but…

LAURA: I mean, do we have any… Oh.

CAMERON: Can we lock it in one of the bedrooms?

NICK: Sure.

LAURA: Does the 0G relaxation table that this ship has, do you think that has restraints?

CAMERON: (laughing) Restraints for the 0G table?!

NICK: Uhhh…

LAURA: Because it’s a table! Okay, I’m imagining a table you strap yourself to.

CAMERON: Uh-huh…

LAURA: That’s what I’m picturing. Also, we do somewhere have a sex room, and I’m sure there are restraints in there.

HUDSON: So, with droids we have restraining bolts, and no one has asked me to put them on the droid yet.

LAURA: Wait, we have those?

HUDSON: I have some lying around.

NICK: Yeah. He pulled some off of another droid earlier.

LAURA: Okay.

HUDSON: Yeah. So before we go can I put some restraining bolts on this thing?

CAMERON: “Before we leave: Tink, is this droid going to get up?”

HUDSON: “I can’t predict the future, but in case it does I can put a bunch of restraining bolts on it so it wouldn’t be that violent.”

NICK: I will say, the droid’s brain is blown out. It looks super dead. If you’re worried about it coming back to life or having some sort of backup because it’s a combat droid then restraining bolts are an option. You could tie it up. The 0G table I’m picturing is like a square pad that you float above.

LAURA: Oh…

CAMERON: No, that’s not fun.

NICK: Well what else would it be?

HUDSON: (laughs)

LAURA: A table you strap yourself to.

CAMERON: You know what it is!

LAURA: And then the table floats!

HUDSON: Yeah, you know what it is.

NICK: … The table floats?

(laughter)

LAURA: Yeah!

NICK: God. For the listener, the book says that this ship has a 0G relaxation table. The internet does not know what that is. It’s not in Wikipedia. We can’t find it anywhere. So, the word is out. Maybe that will be some sort of stretch goal, we’ll draw the table, but for now we’re just gonna leave that delightfully ambiguous.

LAURA: I mean, if we draw the table there will be two different variations.

CAMERON: Yeah.

LAURA: One that everyone else agrees on, and then the version that Laura agrees on, and that’ll be a thing that will have to be censored in some way.

HUDSON: There’s two canons.

LAURA: … Yeah. Heh-heh. You know. (laughter) That’s how you strap yourself in.

NICK: Oh… I was gonna make a gunnery joke. I didn’t—

CAMERON: No, this ship does have two medium laser cannons.

HUDSON: Ohh.

CAMERON: yeah.

HUDSON: Learn something new every day. I should really know the ship better. (laughs)

CAMERON: Yeah, you should, mechanic!

NICK: So, do you install these restraining bolts on the droid?

HUDSON: Yes I do.

NICK: Roll me a Mechanics check, would you? Easy. They’re basically like sticking command hooks to a wall.

HUDSON: Three successes, two advantages.

NICK: Cool. How many do you want to stick to this thing? One should do it in any conceivable format.

HUDSON: Two!

NICK: Great.

(laughter)

HUDSON: If it wakes up it’s not gonna move.

NICK: Yeah. No, that’s fine. You can set a restraining bolt to completely make a droid immobile.

HUDSON: If you put three does it wrap back around and become real violent?

(laughter)

LAURA: Yes.

NICK: You just very easily strap those restraining bolts on. Your muscle memory is going right now because you have lost a lot of blood, and you actually find yourself trying to stick a restraining bolt right where the hole in the droid is, and then go oh, and move it a couple inches to the left and stick it on.

CAMERON: Eh. Maybe we should just toss it in the closet.

NICK: You just did the equivalent basically of chaining a corpse down, but if it makes y’all feel better then go right ahead.

CAMERON: Well, I’m gonna take the droid and go pop it in our costume closet, just like underneath all the capes and stuff.

NICK: We get a funny shot of Karma, she has the droid in a fireman carry over her shoulders, and chucks it into the closet with a clang, and she walks away and right before the door slides shut you see a floppy, big hat on the droid’s head and a feather boa wrapped around its neck, and then the door slides shut over it.

CAMERON: Mm-hmm.

LAURA: Yes.

HUDSON: The reason for having the droid hidden is if someone has to come on the ship to repair it other than me.

CAMERON: To repair it. I just don’t want an assassin droid chilling out in the open.

NICK: Yeah, that’s a pretty good idea. Makes sense.

HUDSON: “Where’s your drugs, Xianna?”

LAURA: “I mean, on me?”

CAMERON: ‘Do you want some?”

HUDSON: “No, if someone comes into the ship to repair it.”

CAMERON: “Oh no, they’re on her.”

LAURA: ‘Oh, no, no. All I have in my room is some empty alcohol bottles, some Twi’lek totems, they probably won’t steal those, and some weird mask in a box. I don’t know, I’m keeping it. It’s mine now.”

HUDSON: “Is it haunted?”

LAURA: “Probably.”

HUDSON: “Okay.”

LAURA: “But no, I keep my drugs in my pockets.”

HUDSON: “We’re just gonna skip the mask thing. Let’s head out.”

LAURA: (laughs) “Cool.”

CAMERON: “Tink, do you want medical attention?”

HUDSON: “yeah, that would be real nice right now.”

CAMERON: “Okay. Let’s go.” Push the gurney off, pop the ramp down.

NICK: Yeah. You pop the ramp down and you push the gurney off. When normally your exits are accompanied by the cool atmosphere mist, this time there’s just a lot of smoke and foam. You can see one of the landing gear is snapped off, the ship’s canted at a weird angle. Actually, as you roll out, the camera pans up to one of the pit droids from Episode 1 with the little boopy noses, and there’s a fire on top of the ship in some wiring and it’s spraying it with a fire extinguisher. As you come down the ramp you see an Ardennian mechanic waving at you from the tarmac. Ardennians are the four-armed little aliens with the kind of monkey faces that are in Solo, the pilot guy is an Ardennian.

CAMERON: (hushed) Yeah!

NICK: He’s wearing a bright orange jumpsuit that leaves his arms bare, and he has a firefighter helmet on his head, but he has it pushed back now that the disaster is over. “Well, that was certainly an entrance. Hi, and welcome to Nerftown space port.”

CAMERON: “Thanks.”

NICK: “You’re gonna wanna leave your financial information with me.”

CAMERON: “Yeah…”

LAURA: “Um…”

NICK: “Looks like your ship needs some repairs.”

LAURA: “Yeah…”

CAMERON: “Yeah. See that part?” Karma points to the giant missing area that should have plating over it. “That just fell off.”

HUDSON: “And we have no idea why.”

LAURA: “He did not fix it.” And I point at Tink.

NICK: The Ardennian looks very patient, like he’s listened to crew argue about whose fault it was many times. The part of the ship that appears to be missing is some sort of rear stabilizer flap, but you can also see there’s a pretty decently sized crater blown in the rear hull plating as if it had taken a hit from a turbo laser at some point.

CAMERON: Weird. (laughs)

NICK: And the engine module on that side, the ship has multiple engines, but that part of it looks pretty bad. The Ardennian goes, ‘Ah. Well there’s your problem right there. It appears that you’ve been hit by some sort of turbo laser.”

LAURA: “yes. We know.”

NICK: “So, I’m guessing you’re looking for some mechanic work.”

CAMERON: (reluctantly) “Yes please.”

LAURA: “Uh-huh. Yes.”

NICK: “Alright. Well, if you step into the office I’ll do a quick inspection and I’ll get back to you with some estimates.”

CAMERON: “That would be fantastic, mister—Sorry, what’s your name?”

NICK: “The name’s Zubo. I’m the mechanic, well the head mechanic anyway.” One of the droids is chittering at him from on top of the ship. “Well hurry up and let’s get some estimates for these fine people!” He flips up into the underside of the ship with one arm and then flips over and climbs up on top. He flips down some glasses like Mozz wears in Return of the Jedi and starts—not Return of the Jedi.

LAURA: What?! (laughs)

NICK: The Force Awakens—and starts flipping different lenses down, but you can see some of them are electronic like he’s looking through the hull at some of the wiring and stuff. “I’ll be in there in a jiffy. Hang on.” He starts climbing all over the ship.”

LAURA: “Okay, so… How about I take Tink to go get medical attention, because you know he is bleeding…”

CAMERON: “Yeah, yeah.”

LAURA: “…and you stay with this Zubo and get the ship fixed, because you are the captain?”

CAMERON: “Okay.”

LAURA: “yes.”

HUDSON: “What if we find a real cool café that we all wanna eat at?”

LAURA: “We will hold a table, and then we will—“

CAMERON: “Everyone. Did you take your coms with you?”

LAURA: “yes!”

HUDSON: “yeah…”

CAMERON: “Okay.”

LAURA: “So, we will just get a table for three, and then com her, have her come by.”

HUDSON: “Okay. I guess that’ll work.”

LAURA: “There will probably be a wait anyway, so by the time she gets there our table will be ready.”

CAMERON: “And it’s probably going to take a while for them to fix your leg up, so by the time you’re wrapping up there I should be done here.”

LAURA: “yeah, and then we will find a lovely café to eat at and have, uh, brunch or something.”

HUDSON: “Everything you’re saying is working out, but everything’s getting real dark.”

LAURA: “yes. That is why I’m going to go take you to a doctor.”

CAMERON: “yeah. Okay.”

LAURA: “Okay.” I start wheeling Tink away, and once I’m out of earshot of Karma I lean down and go, “Okay Tink, after we get your leg fixed, let’s just go shopping instead! No café. We tell Karma the wait for the café is way longer than it actually is and instead we go shopping!”

HUDSON: “But, but, what if we want Karma to go shopping too?”

LAURA: “No. Heh. She does not go shopping with us. We do fun shopping!”

HUDSON: I say okay, but hold onto my com link and give myself a wink—(laughter) I don’t tell her why I just winked.

LAURA: And then I do try to find a doctor. I don’t know.

NICK: That would be a Streetwise check. I’m gonna go ahead and give you a black die to that, though, because you can’t remember this place. Also you may have a reputation here.

LAURA: I mean, okay… I’m going to remove the black die.

NICK: How come?

LAURA: Because I have Street Smarts!

OTHERS: Street Smarts!

LAURA: Okay, so let me see what roll that is.

NICK: This will be average. Are you looking for an underground street doctor kind of thing or like a hospital?

LAURA: I’m looking for more of a real doctor. I think at this point he needs true medical attention. If we already established where the town vet was that helps with mob injuries—you know, there’s always one of those. I don’t know why it’s vets in those mob movies that they always take them to.

NICK: Because they have, like, medical-ish.

CAMERON: Well, because they’re actually better doctors, right?

NICK: Yeah. What do you call a vet that only knows how to work on one species?

CAMERON: A doctor!

NICK: A doctor. Boom. I’m cutting out the part where I was mean to vets and instead we’re gonna talk about how great vets are.

LAURA: Suck it!

CAMERON: Oh, we’re just gonna be mean to doctors. (laughs)

NICK: I know at least one doctor.

CAMERON: … (laughs) That’s awful.

LAURA: I know at least one doctor.

CAMERON: No, it’s okay, I don’t hate doctors, one of my friends is a doctor.

HUDSON: I know Dr. Seuss.

NICK: (laughs) I have a friend who’s a doctor.

LAURA: Uh… So I still also have a black die because of the impact. I’m gonna still say I’m sad and all hung over.

NICK: Okay.

LAURA: yeah, so just three advantages. That’s it.

NICK: Oh. So you push your cart through these rather busy streets. The area immediately surrounding the space port where you’ve set off from is like a tarmac and an airport kind of look. It’s a lot of durasteel and, what is it called, is it called duracrete?

LAURA: Duracrete.

NICK: Duracrete buildings. It’s all very prefabricated. It looks like some big corporation dropped this here. As you progress away from there there’s a sudden line and it goes to dirt roads with wooden boardwalks and kind of ramshackle buildings that are put together, some nicer than others, and you’re wandering around. Tink starts by talking to you about shopping and being excited and then pretty quickly starts to trail off, looks pretty tired. That blood loss is getting pretty bad. There’s a point where his leg is hanging off the gurney at a really unnatural angle, and you grab it by the toe and put it back, like oh I’m sure it’s fine.

LAURA: “It’ll be fine.”

CAMERON: He has a tourniquet on.

NICK: yeah, that’s always great for long term health. Tourniquets, you know.

CAMERON: yeah. (laughs) The best.

NICK: You’re going around and around, and you realize you find a small drop of blood that’s probably still like a cup of blood, a decent amount of blood, and you’re like ‘hmm, that looks like Gigoran blood. I think I’m going in circles.’ At that point a street urchin appears next to you. It’s a small Human girl with really dirty pigtails. She says, “Uh, you look like you need a doctor.”

LAURA: “yes. I do.”

NICK: “For 30 Credits I’ll take you to one.”

LAURA: “Five.”

NICK: “Uh… 40 Credits.”

LAURA: “Five.”

NICK: That sounds like a Negotiation roll.

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: Okay! Let’s see. What do I have?

NICK: That’s gonna be hard. No… yes, hard.

HUDSON: (laughs)

CAMERON: This little girl knows her shit!

HUDSON: (laughing) It’s against a little girl.

CAMERON: yeah. This is her job, Hudson.

NICK: ‘Say that to my face, you big, hairy Wookie!’

HUDSON: (grumbles in nervousness and confusion)

CAMERON: (giggles)

LAURA: (mimics Hudson’s noises)

HUDSON: That’s me when I’m trying to talk to people while I’m out.

LAURA: Two threats.

NICK: “Like I said, 50 Credits.”

LAURA: “(huffs) Fine! This better be a good doctor. If this is a fake doctor—“ I point at her. “If this is a fake doctor I might stab you. I am at that point. I will stab a child. I will do it.”

NICK: (laughs) We get a shot of this little girl, and she’s got dirt smudged on her face, and she’s wearing sack cloth robes. She looks at you and does the most smug Lando Calrissian style smirk you’ve ever seen. “Yeah okay, sweetheart,” and leads you off down a very narrow and dark alley.

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: I whisper to Tink. ‘Tink, have you ever killed a small child before?”

HUDSON: “… I have a small child?”

(laughter)

NICK: We’re cutting away on that. We cut away from that. Karma.

CAMERON: Yeah?

NICK: You’re sitting in a waiting room.

CAMERON: I take out my data pad and I look at that ping that I got.

NICK: Great. It’s an Imperial missive. As you open it, it’s actually an invoice for services rendered, and you have been transferred 7,000 Credits for bounties returned. There’s also an inquest that you report to your nearest Imperial office to report anything you might know about the scuttling of the ISD Vengeance.

CAMERON: Cool. I do a quick holo search and see if that blockade is off of Ithor yet.

NICK: So, you are connected to the Star Wars Wi-Fi of a Star Wars mechanic’s office so it’s very slow. It first brings you to a page that’s like, “What do you need to know about getting your ship breaks checked?” Once you accept the terms and things it does eventually load. It looks like the blockade is gone, but the Empire has started ground patrols.

CAMERON: Cool.

NICK: Not big ones, but police action is currently going on.

CAMERON: Just wanted to make sure that me being off of the planet was an acceptable thing at this point.

NICK: Oh. Yeah. That makes sense.

CAMERON: Because if I went and reported to an Imperial office and they were like ‘but there’s still a blockade’ it would have been awkward.

NICK: Yeah. You also know from your experience that you can delay that kind of request for quite a while. They’re not gonna arrest you for not doing it. There is a different level of urgency that would happen if you were being summoned. Not arrested, but what’s the word when you get served? Subpoenaed. If you got subpoenaed for something it’d be a lot bigger. This one is like a professional inquiry kind of thing since you were near the area when it happened. But yeah, you’re 7,000 Credits richer now from your bounty.

CAMERON: Nice.

NICK: It looks like there’s a lot of legal jargon around them contemplating paying you less since the bounties are now dead, but there’s a lot of language that’s basically like ‘in light of your service to the Empire we have decided not to,’ and they’re trying to use that to leverage you to come in.

CAMERON: Okay.

NICK: So, you have more money. As you’re flicking through that the Ardennian comes walking into the office. The bell above the door dings. This is literally—There’s a holo-screen on the wall playing a thing about ship maintenance. There’s a little coffee table with really old holo-pads of old magazines. The chairs are uncomfortable. It’s dusty. There’s a counter with a really bored looking Gungan receptionist, and she’s polishing her nails and didn’t say anything to you as you came in.

CAMERON: I’m sitting in one of the chairs, I got my legs crossed, I’m looking at my data pad, and I have like a Styrofoam cup of the cheap, shitty caf that they have for free while you’re waiting.

NICK: It has the taste of caf that has been in that machine for at least a week longer than it was designed to do, but the caffeine is still good.

CAMERON: Yeah. At this point she just needs something, because that was a stressful landing.

NICK: For y’all, specifically just for y’all, I’m picturing the Jiffy Lube right up the street, like it’s that waiting room.

LAURA: Yeah!

HUDSON: (laughs)

CAMERON: Nice. Okay.

NICK: So, the Ardennian, Zubo, comes walking in. his arms are longer than his legs so he tends to keep them kind of {kiltered} out as he’s walking, which looks like he’s always gesturing like Jerry Seinfeld about like ‘what’s up with this?’

CAMERON: ‘Hello~ Welcome.’

NICK: Yeah. He says, “Well, it looks like your ship’s got a pretty decent amount of repairs to be done. We’re gonna have to fix that propulsion unit, we’re gonna have to replace some of the plating, your landing gear snapped off, and honestly most of the fluids in your hyperdrive needed to be cycled about, uh… a long time ago.”

HUDSON: Do they bring out the air filters and show you how dirty it is?

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: (smiling) Not on this one. The body shops don’t tend to do that.

CAMERON: They don’t do that if you got in a wreck.

HUDSON: (laughing) True.

CAMERON: (laughing) Which is what just happened to us.

NICK: I really like that, though. But yeah, so he says, “Well, you got a few things. One, the parking fee for this space port is 50 Credits a day. It’s pretty light. Repairing the ship’s damage will be 3,000 Credits for parts and labor, and then there’s another 1,000 Credits for damage to the space port.”

CAMERON: “yeah…”

NICK: “So that’s gonna be our rate. If you could go ahead and pay that, that would be awesome. Parts are gonna be about 2,000 Credits. I’m guessing labor is about 1,000, plus or minus a little, but that’s gonna be your best bet. I’d say you could go to a competitor, but honestly we’re the only people here.”

CAMERON: “And getting the ship to a competitor would probably not be worth my time at this point.”

NICK: ‘I can tell you the towing fees would be more than the repair.”

CAMERON: “Yea. You know, I’m not surprised by that.” Throughout the time that he was talking about the prices of stuff Karma was trying to make it look like, while she was sitting there thinking through it, okay this is fair, I’m not happy about paying this amount which is true, but wants to look slightly more stressed than she probably actually is. She just got 7K in bounties, she can cover the ship, it’s not a big deal, but doesn’t want to seem as if she has a lot and it’s no big deal that it’s that, because that’s still a substantial amount of money.

NICK: Right.

CAMERON: “Do the services include a ship wash for all of the foam?”

NICK: “So, it doesn’t, but considering you didn’t hit that other ship I’ll throw one in.”

CAMERON: “Awesome.”

NICK: “We’ll just take it off. Honestly, we’ll have to remove most of it to get to where we need to anyway.”

CAMERON: “Yeah. I figured you probably need to in order to get to the ship, so…”

NICK: “Yeah. We’ll just… I like you, so we’ll just make that happen.”

CAMERON: “Alright. Cool.”

NICK: “You know, for another 400 Credits we could give it a paint job too, if you want.”

CAMERON: “You know, I think my crew’s rather attached to it.”

NICK: “It being the ship?”

CAMERON: “No, it being—There’s… If you look on the other side, you can’t see it from here, but there is an artistic rendering on the ship.”

LAURA: (laughs)

NICK: We get a quick jump cut to that, and it’s the Afternoon Delight with the pin-up girl Imperial painted on it, but it’s smudged and there’s still some sparks all around it and it’s very battle damaged, and the smoke has smudged on it in such a way that the girl looks very frowny face right now.

CAMERON: Oh, well.

NICK: And then it jumps back to karma.

CAMERON: “I’d have to confer with my crew for color choices and stuff, so can I give you an answer on that after we get the wash and see what it looks like? Once it’s repaired, see how much it really needs it?”

NICK: “Yeah. There’s no rush. I also noted that several of the modules on that ship are pretty outdated. If you wanted to upgrade we could do that here too.”

CAMERON: “Hmm.”

NICK: “You know, it’s just services we offer.”

CAMERON: “I’m obviously going to get the ship repaired, all of the things you listed, yes I want those so that my ship flies. What timeframe would I need to get you any upgrades we wanted if I wanted to?”

NICK: “Well, they’ll take some time to install depending on what you want, but the repairs are probably gonna take about three days, so within 24 hours or so?”

CAMERON: “Okay, yeah. Okay. Yeah, we can do that.”

NICK: “Great.”

CAMERON: “So let’s move forward with the repairs and the wash right now, and then maybe add on some other stuff, depending.”

NICK: “Great, sounds good!” So, his top set of arms are all making very friendly gestures, his bottom set are rubbing the hands together right now. He doesn’t give off an air of someone who’s trying to screw you, just someone who’s excited to get that kind of work. He holds you out a data pad for you to make the credits transfer. “If you’ll just sign here please we can move on.” As Karma reaches to sign, it zooms in on the blue of the data pad, and then zooms out on a time wait estimate screen of a hospital as Xianna comes pushing Tink into a hospital.

HUDSON: So, you forgot the tree air freshener scent for her to pick one.

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: They do that at the end!

NICK: That’ll be when you pick it up.

HUDSON: That’s when you pick it up? Oh. Okay, you’re right. You’re right.

LAURA: yeah. Duh~

NICK: The street urchin says, “Well, thanks for the credits, sucker,” and just takes off into the street.

LAURA: “(huffs) I hope she gets run over. Okay, Tink.”

HUDSON: “Huh?”

LAURA: And I wheel him in. I’m assuming there’s like a front desk area with a reception droid.

CAMERON: (laughs) Tink, do you have your insurance card?

NICK: Yeah. It’s not a droid, it’s a Human.

LAURA: Okay.

NICK: It’s a Human guy. He’s pretty bulky. He’s got his head shaved. He’s wearing Star Wars scrubs, which are just normal scrubs. He has a data terminal in front of him and there’s a data pad sitting on the lip of the counter on the way in. this is a waiting room that looks oddly similar to the waiting room that Karma was in earlier, it’s just bigger, but the exact same uncomfortable chairs, exact same data screen which weirdly is giving tips about ship maintenance, there are data pads on the tables that are very dated that are talking about senatorial elections that happened decades ago.

The guy says, “Hey, just sign in. we’ll get to you in a minute.”

LAURA: “Okay, but uh…” And I just point into the cart. (laughs)

NICK: He stretches up to look over the counter. “Hey, if you could just make sure that no fluids are dripping into the waiting room, please.”

LAURA: “I mean, they are dripping into the cart, but…”

NICK: ‘I just noticed this trail on the way in,” and there’s a little mouse droid that’s just (squeaking).

LAURA: “Okay, well he is bleeding out, his knee is practically gone, what do you want me to do?!”

NICK: ‘Look. We do everything triage by order of severity of the wounds,” and he looks at the screen and there’s three names that are already on the screen that are bright red and then a bunch of names in Aurebesh that are blue…

LAURA: “(huffs)”

NICK: …and then two of the names get red Xs through them. “But it looks like two of the people ahead of you in severity have just died, so if you’ll just wait a little longer we’ll get you in to see the doctor in a minute.”

LAURA: (exhaling) “Okay. What forms do I need to fill out?”

NICK: Well, here in Star Wars we have a single payer system.

(laughter)

CAMERON: Okay. I guess I’ll list myself as his emergency contact.

NICK: That was a shitty joke. I don’t like it. (laughs)

LAURA: Well, you’d still have to list emergency contact, name and species… You don’t have to fill out health insurance information, but you would need to put like known allergies, why are you here today. (laughs)

NICK: Yeah. He just kind of grunts and knocks a data pad towards you, and you get stuck trying to ask Tink these questions.

LAURA: “Okay Tink, do you have any allergies?”

HUDSON: “(grumbles) … Macadamia nuts.”

LAURA: “Okay. Macadamia nuts. Okay…”

NICK: Oh yes, Macadamia, that planet in Star Wars. (laughs)

LAURA: “Tink, are you on any medications?”

HUDSON: (winded) “No.”

LAURA: “Any drugs?”

HUDSON: “Heh. No.” I do an X.

(laughter)

LAURA: “I mean, I figured, but just making sure.”

CAMERON: Is there a history of heart disease on your father’s side? (laughs)

LAURA: “Do you have a history of heart disease on either side of your family?”

HUDSON: “A history of art disease? No, nothing about that disease.”

LAURA: “Heart! You know the thing that beats in your chest.”

HUDSON: “You just said art.”

LAURA: “I have problems with the Hs.”

HUDSON: “Oh, it’s a hurt degree…”

LAURA: “… Yes. Okay. Do you have any long term illnesses?”

HUDSON: “Uh… I’ve had bad dandruff for a while, all over my body.”

LAURA: “Okay, dandruff. Okay, reason why you are here, knee gone.” (laughs)

NICK: And on that, another red X appears on the screen. (buzzer noise) There’s a nurse that comes out of the back. It’s a Dugg. That’s the kind of alien that’s Sebulba that walks on its hands and uses its feet as hands, and it’s holding a data pad. “Well, that was Mr. Smith. I guess he won’t be needing our services anymore, so up next we have…” and you hit Enter on the data pad and your name shows up in flashing red. “I guess that would be a… hmm, I’m just gonna say Tink on that one. If you could come on back, the doctor will see you now.”

LAURA: “Oh! That is us. Okay Tink,” and I push him.

NICK: You roll back through the double doors, and as they slide shut that’s gonna be the end of the episode.

LAURA: Ba-naaa~!

OTHERS: Ba-naaa~!

LAURA: (singing) Waa-oh~

LAURA & HUDSON: (singing) For the longest time~

## Outro

CAMERON: Thanks for listening to Tabletop Squadron. If you’ve enjoyed our show please consider logging into iTunes and giving us a five-star review. Five-star reviews will help new listeners to find the show and give the squad warm fuzzies when we read them.

Xianna’fan is played by Laura Penrod. She can be found on Twitter at @cheerio_buffet.

Tink is played by Hudson Jameson, and he can be found on Twitter at @hudsonjameson.

Karma Nailo is played by me, Cameron Robertson. You can find me on Twitter at @midnightmusic13.

Our game master is Nick Robertson, and you can find him on Twitter at @alias58.

Our intro song is Space Jam by Pablo Ribot.

Additional music by James Gunter.

Follow the podcast on Twitter and Instagram at @Tabletop_Squad. For real, we’re real people and we want to talk to anyone who listens to the show. Reach out! See you next time.

Word document download: Episode 19 Black Hole Sun

PDF download: Episode 19 Black Hole Sun

Read in browser:

Tabletop Squadron Transcript, Season 1 Episode 19:
Black Hole Sun

Transcript by Tyler (Twitter: @Tyler_MoonSage)

## Intro

NICK: Hi everyone, and welcome to Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars: Edge of the Empire actual play podcast. I’m Nick, your game master. Every other Thursday our story follows a thief, a bounty hunter, and a slicer as they explore the galaxy helping a mysterious benefactor and each other.

Still not many announcements. We hope you enjoyed the Jedi Adventures with Moa and Rae, and look forward to our first set of bloopers next week.

Even though we’ve met our goal, come join the squad on Twitter at @Tabletop_Squad and talk to us about Star Wars, or leave us a review on iTunes. If you want to make people happy with five minutes of your time, it’s an easy way to make everyone on the squad smile.

We hope to talk to you soon, and we hope you enjoy the episode.

##

NICK: Hello! Welcome to Episode 19 of Tabletop Squadron! Thank you so much for joining us. We’re really glad to see you. Pull up a chair, metaphorically, because we’re in a podcast. We’re gonna go around the table real quick and talk to everybody. Introduce yourselves and say who you’re playing today, starting with… Laura.

LAURA: Hi. I play Xianna’fan, a Twi’lek smuggler… and I mean yeah, it’s gonna be fine. Gonna go great.

NICK: Yeah. Everything’s fine. Up next we’ve got Hudson.

HUDSON: Little tidbit here, even though I do this every single episode, I still turned over my sheet to make sure that I remembered everything about me.

CAMERON: (laughs)

HUDSON: So, I’m Hudson and I play Tink, the Gigoran slicer, it says right here.

NICK: (laughs) Great. You know, it’s that commitment to quality that’s gotten us all the way to Episode 19.

HUDSON: (sarcastic) Heh!

(laughter)

LAURA: You also had me write it down on your sheet so you could actually read it.

HUDSON: You have good handwriting.

NICK: (laughing) Up next we’ve got Cameron.

CAMERON: Hello!

NICK: Hi.

CAMERON: I play Karma Nailo, the Nautolan bounty hunter.

NICK: Wonderful. See, like that, Hudson.

(laughter)

CAMERON: It’s okay. Because Hudson brought it up, I glanced at my sheet as I was talking too.

HUDSON: There we go!

LAURA: Guys! Guys. I just now realized that there is actually a small section on our character sheets for Player Name.

CAMERON: Oh yeah. I have Cam written in it.

HUDSON: I don’t have anything in mine.

LAURA: Oh, I didn’t. I assumed I would recognize my own character sheet! (laughs)

CAMERON: I just wanted everyone to know that it was mine.

HUDSON: What if it gets lost when we’re out and about on the city?

NICK: I’ve always put my name on my character sheets. Now that we’ve updated everybody on our handwriting situation…

CAMERON: It’s important!

NICK: It’s very important. Let’s go ahead and do the Destiny Roll!

CAMERON: Two light side.

LAURA: One light side.

HUDSON: Two light side.

LAURA: (sings magical/angelic note)

HUDSON: Whoaaa~

CAMERON: Okay. we need to actually use these this time.

LAURA: We won~!

CAMERON: We have five light side points. (smiling)

HUDSON: What could we have possibly used these for last episode?

CAMERON: We could have just like made shit occur.

HUDSON: … Okay. (laughs)

LAURA: We could have just flipped it and had any room we wanted.

CAMERON: And been like, this is a thing now, Nick.

NICK: Sentinel farts.

HUDSON: (laughs)

LAURA: We’re not gonna make him fart. It would have been Tink.

HUDSON: Sentinel comes in for a deep kiss.

CAMERON: Whoa.

LAURA: I mean yeah, we should’ve done that.

NICK: Hey. Even with light side points you still need consent, guys. Come on.

HUDSON: What would be Tink and Sentinel shipped? That would be what?

NICK: (snorts) Tinkinel?

OTHERS: Tinkinel! (laughter)

LAURA: Um… Sink!

CAMERON: Sentinink.

NICK: Sink?

HUDSON: Sink! I just like Sink.

NICK: Alright fan artists, get at us. Sink, make it happen.

CAMERON: Oh no.

LAURA: (laughs)

NICK: Alright. Last episode, you flew away from a ball, got to know each other a little bit better, really touched base, really had a soul meeting I think. Then you went and you saw Sentinel, and he told you that he had found a murder droid, an assassin droid that you were going to need to boost your survivability, and that also Black Sun, the Star Wars crime syndicate, had also gotten a line on this assassin droid and had sent an entire enforcer squad to go and get it, so that you are in a race against the clock. You jumped to hyperspace, and that’s where we ended last time.

We’re gonna jump right in as the ship jumps right out of hyperspace above Engibo 5. Engibo 5 is a golden ball floating near its red giant sun. as you come in to land you see that most of the planet is covered it tall, golden grass. Gentle breezes rustle miles of the plains at a time. You scan from orbit and you can see that there are several small settlements and single homes spaced far around this quiet world. One thing especially catches your eye, some sort of heavy fortification  on the equator. It’s mostly underground, but the ship picks up heavy starship plating. Nothing else on the planet is built like that. Can I get a Perception check please?

CAMERON: Sure!

LAURA: Can do!

NICK: This would be from anyone in the cockpit, or being near sensors, or being on the lookout as you come out of hyperspace.

LAURA: Oh, then no.

HUDSON: I think I would be on sensors. Yeah.

CAMERON: What’s the difficulty?

NICK: Average.

CAMERON: Average…

LAURA: Heh…

NICK: It’s the first time we’ve rolled in three episodes.

HUDSON: Ooh! Two successes and three disadvantages.

LAURA: Threats.

HUDSON: Three threats! What is disadvantage from?

LAURA: Uh, D&D?

HUDSON: Oh. Okay.

CAMERON: Ooh, shit! Okay… A success and a triumph!

NICK: Nice. Think about what that triumph is. Tink, where are you that you make this Perception check? You see a ship that is also going through landing procedures. They’re ahead of you.

HUDSON: I’m watching a screen ear the electronics room.

NICK: Do we have a server room in this…?

LAURA: There could be a server room. Yeah.

HUDSON: I’ve been to it before to fix stuff…

CAMERON: The engine room!

NICK: Engine room.

LAURA: Okay. There we go.

NICK: It’s more makes it go-go, less computers, but…

HUDSON: Yeah, yeah.

NICK: Okay. you get a sensor alert that shows a ship. You turn to go inform the rest of the crew and you fall prone (dramatic bass noise), so that’s happening. You trip over the doorway. It has the like battleship doors in this part of the ship. The rest of it is all very nice, they’re swooshy doors, this one though has the metal door with the corkscrew wheel in the middle and you trip over the bottom of it.

HUDSON: “Oh kriff!”

LAURA: I mean, nothing really bad happens, you fell in non-combat, except Xianna saw it and starts laughing at you.

HUDSON: I just look embarrassed.

CAMERON: Aww.

LAURA: “Ha. You fell.”

NICK: I’m gonna tell you what you see, and then Karma if you wanna tell me how you want that triumph to go let me know. You see a blockade runner, like the Tantive IV from A New Hope, Episode 4 of Star Wars. It’s like a hammerhead shaped ship—wow, that’s hard to say—hammer head shaped ship that is about a third rocket boosters. It is faster than you and it got here before you, so you figure it’ll probably land about 20-30 minutes before you manage to set down even if you’re pushing the ship. It’s breaking the lower atmosphere, and then it drops off the sensors. It looks to be headed for that heavily armored fortress type thing.

CAMERON: I want them to not see us…

NICK: Sure. Done.

CAMERON: …and then monitor as they’re going down to try and make it so that I’m not landing in sight of them.

NICK: Sure. With the triumph we’ll say that as you get close to landing there’s kind of a divot in the land that’s about 50 yards away. You’re able to cut the thrusters so that the sound doesn’t go towards them, and you’re able to drop right out of sight.

CAMERON: I want to be a surprise.

NICK: Yeah. You’ll totally be a surprise. As you land in that hollow you see the grass has been flattened in a wide radius. The blockade runner has a grimacing face painted on the forward cockpit with red lightning bolts streaking over the hull. It’s been obviously patched and repaired dozens of times. This is a working ship, not some diplomatic pleasure cruiser. Ahead of you is a massive set of doors sunk into the side of a rolling hill. They are closed. You do not see any people around as far as you can tell. It looks like you landed without being detected.

CAMERON: Ha-ha! “Guys, I think we landed without being detected.”

LAURA: “What? Oh. Okay, cool.”

HUDSON: “Looks that way.”

CAMERON: “Oh, Xianna, there’s another ship here.”

LAURA: “Oh. I was not near a window.”

CAMERON: (laughing) ‘Yeah, that’s why I’m telling you.”

LAURA: “I know. I am just telling you why I did not see the other ship.”

CAMERON: “… Okay. we can wrap up this conversation. This is fine.”

HUDSON: (laughs)

LAURA: “Okay. I will get dressed.”

CAMERON: “Everybody gear up!”

HUDSON: (laughing) Has that ever been said before?

CAMERON: (laughing) Nope!

LAURA: Magical Girl Transformation!

CAMERON: Yeah~!

NICK: We get a cool quick shot montage of gun belts being snapped into place, vibro-swords and vibro-axes being slotted, coat being thrown on and buttoned up but just enough to look cool. Is there anything specifically you all do to prepare for this situation?

CAMERON: The vibro-axe looks very shiny and clean now.

HUDSON: I thank Karma for prettying up my vibro axe. “It looks beautiful.”

CAMERON: “Yeah, no problem. I sharpened it too.”

HUDSON: “Oh…”

NICK: That’s not how that works at all. (laughs)

CAMERON: (laughing) Yeah it is. I just said so.

LAURA: Would I know any pertinent information about this planet? Can I make an Underworld check, maybe with a boost die since we said I had been here before?

NICK: You can have the boost die, but it’s not gonna be Underworld. It’s going to be Outer Rim, because everything you would know about this planet doesn’t actually have much to do with crime.

LAURA: Okay… What difficulty?

NICK: Average. I’d flip a dark side point to make it harder, but (halting screech).

CAMERON: Ha-ha!

LAURA: What is that? So, two failures and three advantages.

NICK: Oookay. Do whatever you want with those advantages.

LAURA: I don’t know shit.

NICK: Yeah, you don’t.

LAURA: Only crime stuff!

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: Yeah, I just don’t remember much. I was too high, it was a while ago, someone else was leading the crew I was on at that time.

NICK: Well, and you remember this planet being particularly boring, you landed in one of the larger settlements, but even that is, like, think small Western town. Not a lot there. There whole planet is these sweeping grasslands. Anybody wanna do anything else before you leave the ship?

LAURA: No. I think Xianna would just put clothes on, boots on, that’s it.

NICK: So, you keep saying ‘I’ll put clothes on.’ Are you just mostly naked on the ship usually?

LAURA: Okay. I don’t know if I’ve ever figured out what’s on underneath the coat. She definitely doesn’t have pants on. It’s coat that goes down to like mid thighs and then boots.

NICK: Uh…

LAURA: No, no, no. She’s just usually in the hot tub. (laughs) It’s either she’s in the hot tub or she’s in her room napping, so that’s why.

NICK: I’ve just always pictured Xianna under the coat is wearing Lara Croft clothes, so like shorts with holsters and a tank top kind of situation.

LAURA: I’m sure there is tiny dance shorts, but then I’m picturing more of the really just standard, traditional Twi’lek wrap bra thing…

NICK: Oh… yeah.

LAURA: …that’s just not practical as an actual top, and should be worn as a bra, but for some reason is a top.

HUDSON: Does it look like Leeloo Dallas Multipass? Like the wraps?

LAURA: I was imagining more of what Aayla Secura wears.

NICK: It’s kind of like sports bra and lingerie had a baby.

HUDSON: Okay.

LAURA: But I would imagine Xianna would probably pick one a little bit more like the Leeloo Dallas Multipass, that has a bunch of useless straps that are just there for decoration

NICK: We can just say Twi’leks are aliens, and that kind of clothes is more comfortable for them. it makes perfect sense.

LAURA: Star Wars!

NICK & CAMERON: (half-enthused) Star Wars!

LAURA: Yay~ (musically) Practical female clothing!

CAMERON: Karma removes her headband.

NICK & HUDSON: Ohh…

LAURA: My scanner goggles are broken!

NICK & CAMERON: Oh yeah.

NICK: It’s a bummer you didn’t have a bunch of downtime with a mechanic to get that fixed.

CAMERON: (laughing) Yup!

LAURA: Shit! (groans)

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: You were too sleepy. You slept and forgot.

LAURA: I mean, you know what, thinking about it that’s just more in character, because Xianna would have stuffed them in a pocket… That’s probably what she did. She stuffed them in a pocket, and then was on the down side so she was not thinking about that, and then sleeping a bunch, and so she probably didn’t even remember again until she was getting dressed to get off planet here, and was like ‘aww, shit.’

CAMERON: Yup. So karma’s just a regular Nautolan now.

NICK: Hmm. Interesting. So, we get a shot of the ramp to the Afternoon Delight coming down. The crew exits. Nobody notices, nobody says anything, except for you see some nerfs that have already gathered under the ship and are eating grass. The first one that you notice is one that comes up behind Xianna and licks the back of her head. You see the lekku come up and then fall back down, and they look kind of slimy.

CAMERON: Eww.

LAURA: “(sighs) Eww… (groans)”

NICK: Nerfs, for people who don’t know Star Wars, are like yaks with five horns basically. They’re very hairy. People who herd them tend to be scruffy looking. You never see them in the movies, they just get talked about a lot, but it turns out that they just look like big old yaks. This planet, Engibo 5, is famous for their herds of nerfs.

LAURA: (smiling) It’s canon that Han Solo actually herded nerfs into the Millennium Falcon, and that’s why Leia calls them that.

NICK: When I researched it, the only picture is of Luke and Han in the cockpit of the Millennium Falcon surrounded by these giant yak things.

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: (laughs) Yeah. It’s in the comics. Read the Star Wars comics. They get bonkers.

NICK: Yeah. So yeah, you get licked by a space cow.

CAMERON: Karma locks the ship, but not with the remote lock. She presses the button to lock it so it’s quiet.

NICK: So it goes… (quietly) boop-bweep.

CAMERON: (whispering) It goes… boop-boop.

NICK: (laughs) It does the quiet boop-boop.

LAURA: Oh. Xianna’s loudly going like, “Ew! Gross! Tink, come over here!”

HUDSON: “Shh!”

CAMERON: (whispering) “Xianna, shh!”

LAURA: She starts rubbing her lekku on Tink’s fur to try and get any of the slime off. (laughs)

HUDSON: “Ew. No, no, no. Get off.”

LAURA: “What? You never-? You pissed yourself a few days ago! Like you care.”

HUDSON: “Uhh… No. That never happened.”

CAMERON: (whispering) “Xianna! Xianna, we’re being sneaky right now.”

LAURA: “For who?”

CAMERON: (smiling) “The nerfs.”

LAURA: “The nerfs know we are here.”

CAMERON: ‘Remember I said there’s another ship?”

LAURA: “Okay. So the ship is going to hear us?”

CAMERON: ‘No, like the 20 bad guys who got off the ship are gonna hear.”

LAURA: “Ugh. Whatever. Okay, I’ll be quiet. Eh…”

CAMERON: “Okay. Thank you.”

LAURA: “You’re not my mom…”

(laughter)

NICK: You come up over the rise, you don’t see anyone, the other ship appears to be deserted, and these big doors that are going into the side of a low hill look to be closed. As you get closer you see that there is actually a panel placed into an alcove next to the door.

CAMERON: “Tink?”

LAURA: Oh. Xianna already is up and like pressing it.

NICK: Pressing it, it goes ‘bee-berp,’ and doesn’t do anything.

LAURA: Aw.

LAURA & CAMERON: “Tink?”

HUDSON: I go and inspect it.

NICK: (laughing) Okay. What are you looking for?

HUDSON: To see if I can do anything to make it open.

NICK: Yeah. You could probably slice it or something if you wanted to.

HUDSON: Yeah, let’s do that.

NICK: That would be a Computers roll.

HUDSON: Which I just upgraded, last time I was able to upgrade things.

CAMERON: Hey, hey!

LAURA: Nice~

NICK: This is gonna be easy, actually.

HUDSON: I have two successes and three advantages.

NICK: Great. I’m gonna go ahead and spend those advantages for you.

HUDSON: Great.

NICK: So, you see Tink, he goes over, he plugs his data pad into it and he presses some buttons. It goes boop-boop, and the door goes (heavy clunk, whooshing, long buzzing) and opens. It’s a very thick door. It’s probably three feet thick, solid durasteel. You look down and there’s a trench that goes down. The doors seems to fall flush. It’s like this thing was designed to survive a bombardment. Tink, with those advantages, you notice this door has been sliced. This was way easier than it should have been to get open. It was locked, but you just followed somebody else’s footprints electronically and got into it, no big deal, but you do know that the slicer did not close the doors again. Something else made the doors close behind them. So, that could be concerning.

CAMERON: It was one of the yaks.

NICK & LAURA: Nerfs.

CAMERON: (giggles)

NICK: The door opens, you get that kind of stale smell of a cave that’s been closed for a really long time without a lot of air circulation. There’s a little bit of dust on the ground, but you can see multiple boot prints going further in. the building gets kind of dark, and that’s all you can see from here. Do you go further in?

LAURA: Can Xianna just hold her scanner goggles up to her face? It was just the strap that was broken.

NICK: Yeah. It’s just a black die.

LAURA: Yeah. Okay.

NICK: You wanna do a perception?

LAURA: yeah. Is the black die for the strap being broken, or…?

NICK: We’ll say… We’ll do it this way, because weirdly the book doesn’t have anything for broken elastic.

(chuckling)

LAURA: Yeah.

NICK: We’ll say you won’t get a black die for the Perception check, but if you want to use them and do anything else it will give a black die to that action, like if you’re in combat or something trying to wear them.

LAURA: Yeah, if I have to hold it to my face with one hand that’ll be something. I just want to hold them up for this moment and look in.

NICK: Sure.

LAURA: Difficulty is…?

NICK: Average, with two black dice for darkness, which you ignore, so then take those away.

LAURA: yeah. That would be three successes and one advantage.

NICK: Great. About 50 meters down this hallway, it’s built like a bunker so you know there’s lots of long stretches in case there was an explosion or some sort of burning gun fight, you see two bodies lying face down and a crater blown in one of the walls. Beyond that you can see a couple of doors, and that’s it. That’s about the furthest you can see with your goggles.

LAURA: “Oh. There is some sort of crater, maybe from some explosion, and two bodies.”

HUDSON: “What kind of bodies?”

LAURA: “I don’t know, like on the floor? Just two bodies, probably dead.” Human-ish? Or at least humanoid.

NICK: Humanoid. Yeah.

LAURA: Okay, but not obviously something non-humany.

NICK: You see like an ear cone sticking up out of one of them. They’re lying down.

LAURA: “Um, fairly human-ish? I mean, I can’t really tell from here.”

HUDSON: “That’s enough information.”

LAURA: “So, I mean, we should be extra sneaky then. Like actually sneaky.”

CAMERON: “(whispers) Okay. Let’s sneak.”

LAURA: “So, stick to the wall, crouch, be quiet, and look for traps. Okie?”

HUDSON: “I’m not the one who was yelling around nerfs.”

(laughter)

NICK: With that, it sounds like you all want to make a Stealth check, probably?

CAMERON: Yeah.

LAURA: Yes.

HUDSON: What’s the difficulty?

NICK: This one’s gonna be average.

HUDSON: Two advantages.

NICK: Mm.

CAMERON: Karma got two successes and an advantage.

NICK: Great.

LAURA: One success, a triumph with its success, and one advantage.

NICK: Okay. I have a thing for y’all’s advantages we’ll use in a minute. Xianna and karma, you’re able to blend into the shadows and traipse down the hallway without any problems. Tink, you’re not super quiet but you’re not super loud, you’re just kinda following, making some noise, kicking stuff, running into some things, but you’re not yelling or anything. You make it to the bodies. There is a Human and a Rodian. One of them is face down, the Human is face down on the ground, and then the Rodian has been clearly smashed into a wall. There’s a red splatter of blood into a crater that was obviously made by the body, and on the opposite wall it looks like there’s a crater that’s been blown in the wall like there was a mine or something there, some sort of booby trap that took at least that one out.

HUDSON: I check for signs of life.

NICK: (laughs) Okay. The Rodian’s super dead. You roll it over and you see most of the face is missing from where it smooshed into the wall. It’s real gross. It makes a shlorpy noise. You roll the Human over and you see that it’s a Human man with dark hair, and his torso is just completely riddled with blaster bolts.

HUDSON: You don’t need all that in there. I check for a pulse.

NICK: (smiling) Okay. Make me a Medicine check.

LAURA: “(whispering) Tink! What are you doing? They are dead.”

HUDSON: “(whispering) I’m the doctor here.”

LAURA: “You do not need to check them.”

HUDSON: “(angrily) I’m the doctor here!”

LAURA: “They are obviously dead!”

HUDSON: “Shh!”

LAURA: “you get back here right this moment.”

HUDSON: What’s the difficulty?

NICK: (smiling) Easy.

LAURA: ‘I will leave you in this hallway!” (laughs)

CAMERON: It would be so funny if you weren’t successful.

(laughter)

LAURA: He’s not! Wow.

HUDSON: (laughing) Five advantages.

LAURA: (laughing) Jesus. What?!

CAMERON: (laughing) Oh no…

HUDSON: Everything… I don’t know what they are, but I have so much other good stuff happening.

NICK: Yeah. You’re able to stop the bleeding. The pulse is faint, but you’re pretty sure you can feel one. Yeah, you have this patient. Are you gonna leave them here? You’re not sure if he’s stable yet.

HUDSON: You don’t leave anyone behind.

CAMERON: Oh god.

NICK: (laughs)

LAURA: (through gritted teeth) “Tink! That man is obviously dead. Get, back, here!”

HUDSON: “I feel a pulse. I feel a pulse. I’m bringing him with.”

LAURA: “No you do not!”

HUDSON: “I’m bringing him with.”

LAURA: ‘He has no chest anymore! (laughs) He is so dead! Tink, do not make me go over there.”

HUDSON: I pick him up and I start carrying him along. “No. I fixed the bleeding. Let’s go.”

CAMERON: While they’re having this argument, since I guess Tink picked up the Human, Karma goes over and checks the Rodian for an ID badge or something.

NICK: They’re wearing orange jumpsuits with brown vests over them. on the vest you can see, it’s like the only part of the Human that’s not been obliterated, the Black Sun symbol. Besides that there’s no ID.

CAMERON: Okay. I’m gonna rip the patch off, and I’ll walk over to the Human and take the Human’s patch too. I’m just gonna start collecting Black Sun patches to turn in for bounties.

NICK: Hey! Good idea. You take those. Yeah. Y’all wanna move on? You’re carrying your new Human friend.

CAMERON: Our new pet.

LAURA: Xianna’s just shaking her head and just continuing to argue with Tink in whispers as we move forward.

HUDSON: Yeah.

NICK: Okay. So, as you continue on from there, there is a section of wall on your right that has been hit with some very heavy blaster fire. You can see a lot of dents and scorches on it. It looks like somebody just really laid into it. Off to your left you see a swooshy door that has been propped open. It looks like it was sliced and then someone jammed something into the track.

HUDSON: Okay… I’ve had a general purpose scanner this whole time. Sure.

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: You ever wanna use that? (laughs)

NICK: What does that do?

LAURA: It says what it does right there.

HUDSON: Motion sensor, lifeform tracking, up to 0.5 kilometers. Metal detection and intercepting standard frequency com transmissions, up to 1.5 kilometers.

NICK: That’s super useful.

CAMERON: We’ve had this the whole time?!

NICK: (laughs)

HUDSON: I’ll remember that this time.

CAMERON: Do you wanna scan for life signs?

HUDSON: Lifeform tracking… I guess it would be able to, but I already checked and it’s alive.

CAMERON: No, no, we’re not worried about your dude.

HUDSON: Oh.

NICK: Just the building in general?

CAMERON: We’re worried about the other 18 people.

LAURA: I imagine this happens, Tink walks a little bit ahead of Xianna, and Xianna’s like, “Tink… What is- Is that a scanner in your…”

CAMERON: (laughing) Sticking out of his backpack.

LAURA: “…in your little backpack?”

HUDSON: “Yeah. It’s just a general purpose scanner.”

LAURA: “We should use that! Does it not pick up lifeform sensor or something?”

HUDSON: “Ah. Yes, that is one of its many features.”

LAURA: “(huffs) So use it~”

HUDSON: “Great. Great. Hold on.” I take it out and I use it.

NICK: Sure. You find about nine lifeforms further into the area. You’re not sure exactly where, because you’re in a metal-lined underground bunker. It does mess with the sensor a little bit, but you can see a good pile of blips, looks to be about nine of them further in.

HUDSON: “There’s about nine figures further in to this hallway.”

CAMERON: “Okay. Keep us appraised.”

LAURA: “Yes. That is useful.”

HUDSON: “Alright. I mean, I’m dealing with, you know, this person right now, and the general purpose scanner, there’s a lot going on…”

LAURA: “He is so dead.”

CAMERON: “I’m not concerned about this person.”

LAURA: “So dead.”

NICK: I’m picturing this sensor as like the heartbeat scanner from Aliens. That’s what I think it looks like.

LAURA: Okay. Yeah.

NICK: It looks like a store scanner with little BBs.

LAURA: Yeah. I would imagine it’s that really standard Star Wars 70s-ish tech, so it’s not a digital readout screen, it is just…

NICK: Lights.

LAURA: …a few lights that light up on a little grid or something, so it’s not super informative.

NICK: Yep. Anyway, so you see the blaster fire on the walls. You can continue onward and you see a door that looks like they sliced it open electronically and then wedged something into it so it would stay open. In that room you see another body laying down, kind of around the corner, and then it looks to be some sort of lab. You can go and look in there, or you can continue onward.

CAMERON: I wanna get that badge.

NICK: Okay.

CAMERON: “I gotta go check out this body.”

LAURA: “Okay. Tink, you stay at the door, you keep watch, and then we will go in and get the badge I guess.”

HUDSON: “So, if this guy comes back to life, he’s our new squad mate, right??

LAURA: “Sure, why not. Uh-huh.”

CAMERON: “Mm-hmm.”

HUDSON: Alright. I’ll make sure that he’s kept safe, and I protect you guys too.”

CAMERON: “Great. Thanks.”

LAURA: “Got it. Okie.”

CAMERON: Sneak, sneak, sneak.

LAURA: And, sneak.

NICK: Yeah. As you enter through the doorway you see that the body is actually sliced in half. It looks fully cauterized, so the part of the body that you saw was torso to head and the legs are on the other side of the door. It is another Black Sun operative. I’m gonna go ahead and spend all those advantages you had earlier to just tell you, hey, this room is trapped. There’s traps in it.

CAMERON: Whaaat? Oh shiiit.

NICK: We’ll say, Karma, off of your advantages and probably Xianna, this looks to be some sort of motion detecting laser situation.

CAMERON: This looks to be a murder room.

NICK: Could be, yeah. Actually, when you look at it, it looks like a robotics lab. (laughs)

CAMERON: “A murder room.”

LAURA: “Is a murder room. Yes. Okie.”

CAMERON: So, for traps, do we make Perception checks as we go?

NICK: yeah, or Skulduggery. Probably Skulduggery for traps.

CAMERON: Oh. That’s not that much worse than my Perception.

LAURA: (musically) What is my thing for Skulduggery…? Skulduggery… What do I have in Coordination…?

CAMERON: What was the difficulty check?

NICK: This one’s gonna be hard.

CAMERON: Err, okay. Can I have—So this isn’t exactly what my talent does, but I want to argue for a blue die for it.

NICK: Okay.

CAMERON: Okay. For my Expert Tracker talent, I can remove black dice from checks to find tracks or track targets. I want to try and track the cut in half person’s path through the room to try and help me identify where the trap sprung.

NICK: Okay. I buy that, except that removes black dice.

CAMERON: yes, I know. I’m saying it doesn’t exactly fit, (laughs) but I’m looking for traps, and I’m trying to use the fact that I’m an Expert Tracker to do that.

NICK: Yeah, sure. If the blue die is your only success I’m gonna throw a monkey wrench in there, but otherwise go ahead.

CAMERON: (deep breath) Okay… It’s not my only success.

NICK: Okie-dokie. For our listeners at home, that’s absolutely not how that works, but I’m doing it anyway. Eh.

LAURA: Ooh. One success.

CAMERON: One success, one threat.

NICK: You’re able to see that the laser emitter isn’t in the walls like you expected. It’s a small box that’s actually sitting on one of these work stations. In this laboratory there’s a bunch of cybernetic parts in a rack along the wall, and you can see a kind of pillbox looking head sitting in a glass locked case up against another wall. There’s a computer terminal, and there is a small box with a laser emitter sitting on one of these work benches. There’s four work benches. It appears to be slowly tracking back and forth. It looks to be some sort of high powered weapon of sorts. You found it. Good job.

CAMERON: “(whispering) It’s that box.”

LAURA: “(whispering) Yes, it is that box. So, yes? You wanted the patch off the body?”

CAMERON: “I do. Yeah.” I want to try to get to where I’m behind its field of vision when it tracks to the other side, if it’s tracking back and forth.

NICK: Okay. it’s tracking back and forth. As you enter the room, the body is probably about two meters inside the room, and as you enter… I’m gonna need a Coordination check.

CAMERON: Ooh. Okay.

NICK: This one’s gonna be hard.

CAMERON: That’s okay. I have two blue dice on my Coordination checks.

NICK: Due to your Stalker talent!

CAMERON: Yup. I’m sure it’ll be fine.

LAURA: (musically) It’ll be fine.

CAMERON: yeah! Ys, wait… Ha-ha! One success. (laughs)

NICK: As you enter the room, you reach for the patch, you’re able to grab it, and then you see that laser emitter is a motion sensor, and the motion sensor must be in the box somewhere not on the laser emitter part, because as soon as you enter the arc where the body was cut in half it snaps to you and shoots a purple laser beam at you. It’s about as thick as your forearm. You snap your hand back and it blows a hole in the corpse, and it smells really bad. As you scramble backwards, using your threat from earlier, it actually fires again at you and goes over your head and hits the computer terminal, and the computer terminal catches on fire and shuts down. So, yup, but you got the patch. Good job.

CAMERON: Ah-ha!

LAURA: “Okie. Let’s get out of here… Let’s go! Okie!”

NICK: Tink, from where you’re sitting you hear them kind of crawl and then you hear a really loud BZZT, BZZZT, and then they come walking out. Karma is crouching pretty low on her way out of the room.

HUDSON: “What? What happened?”

CAMERON: “There’s a laser.”

LAURA: “There was a laser.”

HUDSON: “Oh. Oh… You know, I really should have mentioned that I actually have a mode for motion sensors on my general purpose scanner. It could have been useful, maybe. This has a lot of features.”

CAMERON: “But…”

LAURA: “I don’t think that’s how that works…”

HUDSON: Wait. Did they not go through a motion sensor?

CAMERON: No, we did, but…

NICK: It senses motion.

CAMERON: Does your motion sensor sense motion sensors?

LAURA: It’s motion sensor / lifeform tracking.

HUDSON: Oh!

(laughter)

NICK: It senses motion.

LAURA: It doesn’t sense motion sensors. It senses motion! (laughs)

HUDSON: (laughing) I thought it sensed motion sensors and I got really excited.

NICK: Actually, nope, canon. His senses motion sensors. He got the weird off-brand one from Tatooine.

HUDSON: (laughs)

NICK: Yeah. That’s official. That is now what that does.

CAMERON: You should walk in front with that then.

HUDSON: (laughing) The problem is now it doesn’t actually sense motion.

NICK: (laughing) yup.

HUDSON: It just senses motion sensors. (laughs) That’s so much less useful.

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: (laughing) It still senses life signs though, so that’s okay.

LAURA: It senses life signs, but it doesn’t tell you exactly where they are. It just tells you like a number, but it will sense motion sensors.

NICK: I love that so much.

CAMERON: Gosh.

NICK: Whatever electromagnetic pulse comes off of those, yours senses it.

HUDSON: Yup.

LAURA: I mean, it’s written on his character sheet now.

NICK: Yeah. I can’t wait until you walk into somewhere with technology. That’s gonna go great. It’s just gonna shut down.

LAURA: Okay. We continue down the hallway.

NICK: Great! So, as you continue down the hall you come to a small alcove. There is another Black Sun member. He has his back up against the wall. He’s a male Twi’lek, looks like he was gut shot, there’s a wound and he’s got one arm wrapped around it, and he’s leaning back, maybe unconscious, maybe dead. It looks like he took cover there and his compatriots left him. Looking into the alcove you can see some security monitors and what looks like some janitor stuff. It’s like a security monitor / janitor closet situation.

CAMERON: “Alright. The dude who was cut in half makes sense: lasers; all the people being shot are confusing and concerning me.”

LAURA: “No, no, no. So like, someone came in here with the exact same intent we have, just ahead of us, so they are killing the Black Sun members they encounter.”

HUDSON: “What if it’s someTHING?”

CAMERON: “I thought they WERE the Black Sun members?”

LAURA: “No, no, no. Somebody else.”

CAMERON: “There’s multiple groups in here?!” (laughs)

LAURA: “So, from what I think is happening, another group came in here and is killing the Black Sun members they encounter. I’m going to call them the B Team. The B Team is the ones who are sneaking into here. They are the intruders. The Black Sun members are just the collateral damage for them trying to get to the assassin droid as well.”

HUDSON: “Alternate theory.” I raise my hand.

CAMERON: “Okay. Yes? Yes Tink, please share.”

HUDSON: “Alternate theory: So, what if it’s the assassin droid with a gun?”

LAURA: “No.”

CAMERON: “See, that’s what I was thinking.”

LAURA: “But why would the assassin droid be going further into the building?”

HUDSON: “What’s its one function?”

LAURA: “I don’t know!”

CAMERON: “Assassinating!”

HUDSON: “Assassinating things.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: ‘I think it might actually have more than one function.”

HUDSON: “It’s the only one we know about right now.”

CAMERON: “We don’t know what its programming is.”

LAURA: “I mean, assassin, but…”

CAMERON: “Well, yes, but like skill-wise. Obviously assassinating, but what else? We don’t know what its programming is, if it’s supposed to defend the base. Is this a base? I don’t know.”

HUDSON: “What if it really doesn’t like Black Sun?”

CAMERON: “That’s true. Yeah.”

HUDSON: “Maybe it like, I don’t know, hurt its family. You know what, this is all speculation at this point, but I’m pretty much 100% sure it’s the assassin bot.”

LAURA: “Okay, so it is the assassin bot. What? I don’t… (groans)”

HUDSON: “let’s just keep going, and then we’ll find out.”

CAMERON: “Okay. I’ma take this badge.” (laughs)

NICK: You grab the badge. The body slides to the ground with a thump leaving a thick red streak behind it on the wall.

CAMERON: Do they have a blaster?

NICK: No, actually.

CAMERON: Dang! Guys, none of these guys have had weapons.

LAURA: “Actually, that makes no sense.”

CAMERON: “Yeah.”

HUDSON: How’s my buddy doing?

NICK: Um, kinda soggy. You did stop the bleeding, you used  a lot of tourniquets and things, no more blood is coming out, but pretty blood drenched in general. You can make a Medicine check to check on him again if you’d like.

CAMERON: We’re adopting a gang member. (laughs)

LAURA: “Tink! That body is dead!”

HUDSON: “It’s not dead.”

LAURA: “Even if not, they are Black Sun.”

NICK: It’s going to be easy again, but with two black dice because you’re very convinced at this point.

LAURA: “We do not need this in our lives.”

HUDSON: “They’ll be so relieved that they’re alive that they’ll have to join us.”

CAMERON: “Hmm…”

HUDSON: Three successes, one … threat?

LAURA: Yes.

NICK: So, while they’re busy trying to loot this dead Twi’lek, you sit your buddy down and you feel for a pulse. You don’t feel anything. You get concerned. You check for other life signs. He’s not breathing. He’s got no pulse. It seems that he slipped away since you saved him earlier.

HUDSON: Without yelling or anything, because that would be too emotional, I do the actions like I’m yelling and slam my fist onto his chest.

CAMERON: (laughs) In agony.

LAURA: “Tink! We told you. He was already dead!”

NICK: There’s a soft crunching noise…

CAMERON: Ew.

NICK: …because you’re real strong. The body jerks a little, but yeah.

LAURA: “Tink, I swear to the goddess, I fi have to come over there and just shoot you I will.”

HUDSON: I take my two fingers and close their eyelids.

NICK: They go down and then they pop back open, because that’s super not how that works.

HUDSON: (laughs)

LAURA: yeah, that is not how that works in real life. It’s difficult.

NICK: Yeah. Eyes, once they stay open they’re open.

HUDSON: It didn’t work, so I’m just like “Okay,” and then I leave the body.

NICK: (laughs) Okay. there’s a crunched, no longer bleeding corpse in the hallway.

CAMERON: “That was an admirable job you did there, Tink.”

HUDSON: “Thank you. I wish more people appreciated my work and long hours to become a doctor.”

LAURA: (through gritted teeth) ‘He was already dead, and you are most certainly not a doctor! You didn’t even graduate from just computer school.”

HUDSON: “Whoa. Hit me at the core here.”

LAURA: “Yes! You have to go to school and get some sort of license to become a doctor!”

CAMERON: “Not if he’s a con artist doctor. I mean, he knows his medicine. That much is obvious.”

HUDSON: “I do know my medicine. I read a book.”

CAMERON: “He knows that if you’re trying to remove glass, if you push on the skin around it the glass just pops out.”

LAURA: “(sighs) I mean, Tink, are you an… Okay. We used to have this conversation with Sabos. Are you a con artist as well?”

CAMERON: I feel like it’s very obvious to Xianna that Karma’s being sarcastic, and I feel like Tink does not get it. (smiling)

HUDSON: No. (laughs) “Con artist? Depends on your definition. (exhales)”

LAURA: “Okay, so no.” Xianna just turns around and starts walking away. “I am so done with this.” You can just hear her, like… ‘I don’t understand why this keeps happening to me. No. Just, why can’t I get competent crew members?”

CAMERON: Um, excuse me. (laughs)

NICK: So, you continue down the hallway. The hallway branches in kind of a Y shape. You hear some blaster fire, and you hear someone yell “Get it! Get it! Get it!” There’s gunfire as you’re approaching. You’re not sure which direction it came from, but you can make me a Perception check if you want.

LAURA & CAMERON: Okay!

NICK: This one’s gonna be hard because of the acoustics of the room. That’s not really a thing I thought I would say.

CAMERON: Karma got a success and two threats.

LAURA: Two failures and three advantages.

HUDSON: Three successes and three threats.

NICK: Okay… Here’s what happens. Xianna, you’re pretty sure that the gunfire must have come from the left. It’s a more narrow corridor. There’s a lot of crates and stuff lining it for cover. If there was a gunfight it must have come from that way. Karma and Tink, you’re pretty sure that the gunfire must have come from the right direction which is a wider empty hallway that curves around a corner and you can’t really see what’s further that way.

LAURA: “Okay, so it is the left.”

CAMERON: “Right.”

HUDSON: “Mm… Right.”

CAMERON: “No, no, not left.”

LAURA: “Yes. Correct.” (laughs)

CAMERON: “No. Not correct. It is the right hallway.”

HUDSON: “I agree with Karma.”

CAMERON: “Not the left hallway.”

LAURA: “yes, the left hallway is the right hallway.”

CAMERON: “No. No, no, no. Not the left hallway.”

LAURA: “But yes, the left hallway…”

CAMERON: “Nope. We’re gonna go down the correct hallway which is the right hallway.”

LAURA: “Tink!”

NICK: Tink falls prone. (dramatic bass noise)

(laughter)

LAURA: No!

NICK: He had three threats. He falls prone.

LAURA: “Tink.”

HUDSON: ‘Whoa!”

LAURA: “Okay. Which direction did you hear?”

CAMERON: “What are you doing, Tink? Get up.”

LAURA: “What are you even doing?”

HUDSON: “I… I fell. Listen, I—“

LAURA: “How are you-? Why do you fall all the time?!”

CAMERON: “We were just standing here!”

HUDSON: “Coordination…” I literally have nothing in Coordination.

(laughter)

LAURA: “Just stand up! It is not that difficult! Which direction did you hear?”

HUDSON: ‘Right.”

CAMERON: “Right!”

LAURA: “(sighs) Okay, right.”

HUDSON: “Right!”

CAMERON: “yeah! Correct.”

NICK: Alright. So you go the right fork?

CAMERON: Yes.

LAURA: Whatever the successful people were told.

CAMERON: (laughs) The right fork.

LAURA: The right fork.

NICK: Okay. You continue down that hallway. It’s surprisingly long before it turns. The corridor makes about a 45 degree turn to the left. You see two corpses littered with blaster fire right there, like stuff stuck in a grease trap in a sink, just kind of smooshed up against the wall. You hear a loud explosion, and you turn around the corner and you see what looks like a motor pool. It’s a wide open room, it’s got a speeder in the far left corner, and then large toolboxes with a lot of tools and parts on it. There’s about four of those scattered around. You see five Black Sun members. One of them is standing over a fallen droid. It’s rust colored, it’s kind of spindly, but has an armored front chest plate and has kind of a bug-like looking head with little slits for eyes and two antennae sticking off the back that are kind of short. The droid is smashed up against the wall and appears to be down. The guy kicks it and says, “Well, it’s no good to us dead.” That’s the scene that you walk up to.

CAMERON: I’m gonna say we don’t step around the corner. (laughs)

HUDSON: Yeah, let’s chill here for a second.

CAMERON: Yeah. (laughs)

NICK: Do you guys get the three heads peeking around the corner Scooby Doo style?

LAURA: Oh yes, certainly.

CAMERON: yes, but Tink is on the bottom.

HUDSON: Yeah.

CAMERON: It doesn’t make sense what order our heads are in.

LAURA: Yeah, it goes Tink, karma, Xianna.

CAMERON: yeah.

LAURA: That’s how that works.

NICK: Well that’s what I was picturing.

LAURA: Yeah!

CAMERON: yeah. I mean, that’s the only way we could have done it.

NICK: Okay. So you look around the corner, you see that, and the guy who was poking at the droid… They’re all wearing those orange jumpsuits with the brown vests. He is a Human with blonde hair that’s kind of spiked up. He turns around and they start arguing with each other about what they’re gonna do now.

LAURA: How close is the nearest pile of boxes? In my head I’m imagining like… crates?

NICK: Yeah, but they’re like the really big, metal ones that don’t make a lot of sense.

LAURA: Yeah, but so like a large 5 by 5, kind of?

NICK: From where you are in the corner you’ve got probably 30 meters into the actual room and then another 10 meters to the first set of boxes to hide behind. It’s a decent distance.

LAURA: A decent trek to the boxes.

NICK: yeah. One might even say you are at a long range band from them right now.

CAMERON: Ooh.

LAURA: “Okay, so…”

HUDSON: “I have an idea.”

LAURA: “My gun does not shoot very far. Tink, you do mostly the close quarters combat. So Karma is the only one really who does the long range.”

HUDSON: ‘I have a thought.”

LAURA: “yes?”

CAMERON: “yes? What’s your thing?”

HUDSON: “So, my idea is that we actually don’t engage yet for once, and we just wait and see if they come to us or if they keep going down the corridor and leave the robot.”

CAMERON: ‘if it’s no use to them dead, it is use to us dead.”

HUDSON: “What’s a robot? They leave the droid.”

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: ‘I was just gonna bypass that weird term you used, but yes.”

LAURA: “yes, I’m not sure what a robot is. If they just said it is no use to us dead, that is probably the droid they were trying to get, meaning the droid we were trying to get.”

HUDSON: “What if we wait until they walk away?”

LAURA: “But they probably won’t walk away if that is the droid they are here for.”

HUDSON: “Ohh.”

LAURA: “Do you understand that they are probably arguing over what to do now that they think it is broken? So, I was thinking we would sneak to the boxes, they are pretty far away but it would be cover, and then we shoot them.”

CAMERON: Does there look to be an exit from this room, or are they gonna have to come back down this hallway?

NICK: It’s hard to tell, because you’re in a narrow corridor and the room spreads out. You can’t see any doors from where you’re at. It’s pretty obvious from the trail of bodies at this point that they came this way.

HUDSON: “What if we cause a distraction by throwing something down the hallway so they have to come this way, and then I just get them all with my vibro-axe, like bang, boom, bang.”

LAURA: “Okay, so there are five of them. Maybe if we made a slight distraction we can pick them off one by one, but all five would probably be a bit of a difficult situation.”

CAMERON: “If we want to hide, we think they’re gonna come back this way, we can duck back into that other hallway that had the boxes in it where they wouldn’t see us. Then they’d walk past us to get to the exit. Their ship’s over by that exit, so they’re probably gonna walk back this way. Running into this giant room when they all have blasters and we’re not the most heavily equipped blaster-wise just doesn’t seem all that bright to me. It’s something Sabos would have done, so I’m kind of cautious against it.”

HUDSON: “I may have been distracted for part of that, so I’ll follow Karma to the end of the earth.”

CAMERON: (laughs) Perfect.

LAURA: “Okay. So let’s go back to that like janitor closet, go in there, maybe there will be something useful, and then wait for them there? Is that it?”

CAMERON: “Somewhere back along the hallway where they’re gonna have to walk past us, behind a crate or something. If we can get cover and be in cover as they come towards us this is ideal.”

LAURA: “Assuming they come back this way. Yes.”

CAMERON: ‘Yes.”

NICK: So, you’re going towards the hallway with the crates, or you’re going to the janitor closet?

CAMERON: Probably janitor closet first.

NICK: That’s further away. Is that okay?

HUDSON: Oh, it is?

NICK: Yeah. The janitor closet was before the fork. The hallway with the crates is at the fork.

HUDSON: Oh.

LAURA: “Assuming they have to come back here, if we go now before they come back it probably won’t matter too much which.”

CAMERON: “Okay, here. I’ma go setup behind one of the crates in the other hallway so that I’m here at this fork in the hallway. If y’all wanna go look at the janitor closet and then melee it up, Tink, you can do that.”

HUDSON: “Alright.”

CAMERON: “I’m gonna have my blaster out though and just be sitting here and wait.”

HUDSON: “Alright. I can go with this plan.”

CAMERON: “And I can com y’all when I hear them coming.”

LAURA: “Okay, so yeah. You can flank them! Wait for them to walk a little bit, and then you are behind them… and then you can shoot them, in the back. Yes! Okay. Tink, you and I, janitor closet.”

HUDSON: “Janitor closet!”

LAURA: “Janitor closet. Go!”

NICK: As you take off down the hall, Karma you’re a little bit behind them, you hear the leader of the group go, “Well, I guess we’ll take it with us. Maybe they’ll be able to salvage something.”

Two of them try and pick it up and go, “Aw man, it’s heavier than it looks.”

The leader says, “Well, grab that weird gun too, because I think that’s important.” And they start to head down the hallway.

CAMERON: Since I’m at the corner, and you said it’s a fair distance to get to where we were at the corner, I probably waited until they started moving to head to the other hallway to get cover so that we had more of a range of knowing closer to when the time was.

NICK: Sure. You come to the fork…

CAMERON: “They’re coming down the hallway now.”

LAURA: “Okie!”

NICK: The first crate is about 15 meters from the fork. You can see it’s a narrow hallway with crates. They’re just wooden crates full of (mumbles). They stagger left and right down the hallway so it’s kind of a windy path. You set up. Can I get a Stealth check, please? This one’s gonna be average.

HUDSON: Who’s doing the Stealth check?

NICK: karma is. Don’t worry about it.

CAMERON: I’m sure it’s fine… One success, four advantages.

NICK: Alright. I’ll say you can use those advantages to boost your potential initiative roll after you ambush them, so remember that. You’re able to duck quietly behind some of the crates, and you hear something further down the hallway but whatever it is doesn’t seem to notice you.

CAMERON: (whispering) “Guys, I think there’s something in this hallway.” (laughs)

LAURA: ‘I mean, you are in the hallway.”

CAMERON: “I mean, obviously it’s not me.” (laughs)

LAURA: ‘Is it the Black Sun? You know they are here.” (laughs)

CAMERON: “I don’t know~ We’ll see. I’m just gonna watch both directions.”

LAURA: “Okay~” (laughs)

NICK: Around then you start hearing the clip-clomp of gangster feet as people come around the hallway.

CAMERON: (whispered) “They’re coming!”

NICK: They make it to the fork. You can hear them arguing about who has to carry this stupid droid, it’s so heavy, they stop and trade out. Everybody seems to be carrying either the droid, or you see a long looking rifle but it has a lot of different barrels on the front and they’re not all the same length, and it appears to be fed with a different kind of power pack. It’s a very weird looking gun. It also looks kind of like a prototype, like it’s not a finished product, it’s just a thing. They stop there for a minute. Do you do anything, or do you let them continue on?

CAMERON: I let them continue on until they all have their backs to me.

NICK: Okay. They continue down the hallway. I’m gonna need Cool checks from everybody.

LAURA: Cool!

CAMERON: Hey.

HUDSON: Oh no…

(laughter)

NICK: This is how well you do ambushes.

LAURA: Any difficulty?

NICK: A Cool check, it’s just initiative.

CAMERON: Karma got three successes and two advantages.

NICK: Nice.

LAURA: Xianna got three successes and two advantages.

NICK: Wow.

LAURA: I’m cool~

HUDSON: Rolling two green, I got two successes and two advantages.

NICK: Wow.

CAMERON: Nice!

NICK: Can you roll me two yellows and a green?

CAMERON: Two successes, two advantages.

NICK: Can you roll me a yellow and a green?

CAMERON: One success, two advantages.

NICK: And two green?

CAMERON: A success and an advantage.

NICK: Alright. Let me throw this initiative order together real quick. We got Player, Player, NPC, Player, NPC, NPC. That’s how it’s gonna work. Y’all have about five advantages to work with here. Is there anything you would like to add to this setting or scene that you would like to use in your favor.

HUDSON: Can I happen to have something, maybe like a robot defibrillator?

CAMERON: (giggles)

HUDSON: Sorry, a droid defibrillator, something to revive a droid.

LAURA: I mean, that would just be like a toolkit.

HUDSON: yeah. I feel like I just would have that. Right?

CAMERON: Yeah, you just have that.

LAURA: If we get to the janitorial closet…

NICK: There’s probably  a bunch of tools and stuff in there. Yeah.

LAURA: …there’s gonna be toolkits.

HUDSON: Perfect. Okay.

LAURA: I would like there to be some sort of can of grease or oil that we can pop back out of the closet and throw further down the hallway so that when they walk that way it’s slippery.

NICK: (smiling) Sure. There’s a big can that says Star Wars Lube.

CAMERON: Yes!

LAURA: (laughs) Just an industrial tub of KY jelly.

NICK: It says Star Wars Lube, Danger: Flammable.

HUDSON: (laughs)

LAURA: Yes!

NICK: Okay. That’s probably three of them. you got two left. Want to spend something, Cameron?

CAMERON: Um… I have cover already. What range are they at from me now, having walked a little bit past me to be in front of me?

NICK: Medium.

CAMERON: Okay.

NICK: The other thing you’re gonna run into is if they make it all the way to the janitor closet there’s gonna be a wall in the way, you’re not gonna be able to see them from the crates, so you may have to move up. Right now you can still see them. they’re about half way between your hallway and the closet.

CAMERON: I guess if there’s some sort of pipe we could shoot to have steam go everywhere or something.

NICK: Oh yeah. The whole facility has those all over the ceilings.

HUDSON: (laughs)

CAMERON: Yeah. I just want some pipes that we can make steam go to make visibility a little more difficult for them.

NICK: Sure. That’s there. You identify it quite handily from your experience. So, there’s a player slot first. They’re about half way between the two of you, probably at medium range to each. Who wants to go first.

LAURA: Tink and Xianna are in the janitor closet waiting. Before this all goes down as we’re just on the com setting things up, Xianna’s just sitting there shaking her leg up and down. ‘Uh… Okay. I’m just gonna go ahead and do this.” She reaches into her pockets and pulls out a bag of impact, and takes it, and is just… “Okie. Heh. I’m a lot better. That is, uh, going to help.”

HUDSON: “Good for you.”

LAURA: “yes. You want any?”

HUDSON: “No. you should know by now. No.”

LAURA: “I mean, I also have some glitterstim. That will really mess you up. Yes.”

HUDSON: “Ugh. I need to be focused. I need to be on my game.”

LAURA: “yeah, so the impact.”

HUDSON: “No…”

LAURA: “it really helps you focus. It does.”

HUDSON: “Uh… N- I’m- … I am drug-free, I’m proud to say.”

LAURA: “I mean, okay.”

CAMERON: Dare to be drug-free!

HUDSON: (laughs)

LAURA: ‘I will respect that, but you know, if you want it I have it. Cool.”

HUDSON: “Cool.”

LAURA: “Okie. Let’s kill some people!” (laughs)

CAMERON: Probably since they’re in the closet and Karma can see the Black Sun members, she probably goes first so that her blaster shot lets them know hey they’re in position.

NICK: Okay.

LAURA: I would imagine that.

HUDSON: And if they turn around I can come from behind.

CAMERON: And then they turn around to face me, and Tink can axe them in the back.

NICK: Sure.

CAMERON: Since Karma’s already in cover, she’s going to use her maneuver to take aim at the gang member who’s carrying the big, weird-looking gun.

NICK: Okay. You’re at medium range, so that would be average.

CAMERON: Mm-hmm! And I got my blue die. That is two successes, two advantages.

NICK: How much damage does that do?

CAMERON: Eleven~

NICK: Phew. Okay. Yeah, so you pop up from cover and shoot that guy. You hit him right between the shoulder blades and he just drops. Yeah. He goes down, the gun goes skittering down the hallway in front of him, and people start to turn around and try to see where the gunfire came from. Yeah, so that guy is down, good work.

CAMERON: I did shoot with stun. My gun is default to stun.

NICK: Right, so you stun that guy. Okay.

CAMERON: And my advantages, I want them to be that everyone turns to look at where the blaster came from, so whichever one of Tink or Xianna goes next gets a blue die, because they’re now coming from behind.

NICK: Yeah, that makes sense. You confuse them. Up next is another player slot.

LAURA: Xianna will go next since we are shooting. She’s gonna lean outside the janitor closet and… medium range?

NICK: Yup.

LAURA: Okay, and shoot just whichever one is closest.

NICK: So mechanically there’s the grunts, there’s three of them, and then there’s the leader guy. He’s got his own slot. Do you want to shoot at the group or the leader?

LAURA: I’ll do the group.

NICK: Okay.

LAURA: That’s two?

NICK: Should be, unless yours is short range. If it’s short range then it’s…

LAURA: The range of my gun is medium, but I do increase the difficulty by one for beyond short range.

NICK: Okay, so then it’s three I guess.

CAMERON: I thought it was within short range, or less.

NICK: Hers is because it’s a short range gun, or it’s a medium range but she filed it up.

CAMERON: Oh, okay.

LAURA: Yeah. I have a filed frontsight so I get innate Quickdraw, but it means anything beyond short range is increased in difficulty.

CAMERON: Okay. I thought it was flipped. I thought it was anything less than short range was increased difficulty.

NICK: No, that’s you. Your gun gets harder if you’re closer.

CAMERON: Well yeah, it’s big. (chuckles)

LAURA: I would also aim since I’m not taking any other maneuvers.

NICK: Sure.

LAURA: Oh shit. Heh… There’s a triumph but no success, one failure, and three advantages. (pause) yeah.

(laughter)

NICK: So… Since it’s group combat I’ll say you can use the triumph to take one down, because that’s how that works. If you’d like to do that you can.

LAURA: Yeah. I’ll do that for the group, and then I’d like those advantages to be passed, that my laser blaster kind of ricochets so they don’t actually look back at the janitor’s closet, they’re kind of looking the other direction because they think that’s where it came from.

NICK: Sure. They’re confused.

HUDSON: (laughs)

LAURA: Yeah. They’re just confused about where the laser fire actually came from, which would give Tink a blue die, because they might not expect him to come from that direction.

NICK: Sure, makes sense to me, and I don’t have any dark side points to play with so this ambush is going very well for y’all so far.

CAMERON: Ha-ha!

LAURA: Ha-ha.

NICK: So yeah, you drop him, Tink’s gonna have a blue die on whatever he chooses to do, but it’s an NPC slot right now. The leader of the group is going to pull a blaster rifle off of his back and he’s going to see that Karma has leaned out from behind cover and taken a shot at him. He is going to do a really cool action roll forward. ‘They’re trying to shoot us!” And takes a shot at Karma.

CAMERON: How observant. (laughs)

NICK: He is two yellows and a green, and it’s medium range so it’ll be two, but he’ll get a black die because you’re in cover.

CAMERON: Hey, good job, Cameron. That’s two failures and one advantage.

NICK: Great. The advantage… don’t worry about it. The failure, he shoots at you but his action roll was so cool that he didn’t actually aim particularly well. His maneuver is he is moving towards you, but he misses, so that’s his turn. Now we’re up to another player slot. Tink, whatcha gonna do?

HUDSON:  Alright. I haven’t fought in a while. Maneuver, and then I get to do an action?

NICK: Yeah. You can do an attack or a main action, you have a maneuver, you can do little things no big deal, and if you take a strain you can do an extra maneuver if you want.

HUDSON: Got it. My maneuver’s gonna be running towards them.

NICK: Yeah. For medium range, if you maneuver and then take a strain to do another maneuver you can close with them, you can be in melee range in one go and hit them.

HUDSON: Okay. I’ll do that, actually.

NICK: Okay, so take a strain, because it’s one to get from medium to short and another to get from short to engaged.

HUDSON: Okay. I’m going to go to the group and just try to axe one of them in the back. I don’t think they were facing me.

NICK: (smiling) Everybody made their advantages that people weren’t going to wonder what was going on with the janitor closet, so you’re able to basically just activate your axe, run right up to them, nobody knows you’re there… which is a little messed up.

CAMERON: And you get a blue die.

HUDSON: Ooh, yeah, I do. And the difficulty is?

NICK: Two.

CAMERON: Always two.

NICK: Always two, but they’re not exactly wearing body armor, so…

HUDSON: Oh my. Three successes, three threats.

NICK: How much damage does your axe do? I think it’s three plus your Brawn.

HUDSON: Yes, so six.

NICK: Plus the successes, so nine?

CAMERON: Plus another three.

HUDSON: Yeah.

NICK: Cool. The two guys from the group who are still standing are carrying the droid. How do you want to cut one of these guys up? What are you aiming for?

HUDSON: I only get to cut one?

NICK: Yeah. You only kill one of them. They have a decent amount of health.

HUDSON: Dang it. Alright. I do this cool anime jump with both of my legs in the air, knees bent, and come downwards and cross it across the top right corner of his head all the way down through his torso.

CAMERON: (laughing) Oh gosh.

NICK: Okay. You bisect this guy pretty cleanly. We get that horrible shot of the body sliding a little before it collapses.

HUDSON: Just like from that Star Wars movie when the ship’s like cut open.

(laughter)

CAMERON: I gotcha. Yeah.

NICK: And then the legs of the droid get dropped, there’s a really loud clang, that guy is very down, and this group is having a rough time. Good ambush, y’all.

CAMERON: We did so good at planning! (smiling)

NICK: Yeah! You do that. The final guy holding the droid says, “Kriff this!” and drops the droid, and pulls out a blaster pistol. He is very close to Tink, but he is going to try and shoot him in the face real quick.

HUDSON: (feigned fright) “Nooo…”

NICK: That is one green die. It’s only one purple though, because he’s at short range and he’s got a pistol.

CAMERON: Okay. Do you wanna roll it, Hudson?

NICK: Yeah, that’s it.

HUDSON: Really?

NICK: Yup.

HUDSON: One advantage.

NICK: Yeah, great. So, he shoots and the head honcho man sees that you are there, Tink, and he is now thinking quickly and tactically. Also, down to the next slot, three people from further into the box hallway having been alerted by all the gunfire and the threats that my characters have rolled, poke their heads up and go… “What the kriff?!” and they start to shoot at Karma. They’ll have cover this time. They’re going to spend their maneuver to get up to the first row of cover. They’re running and gunning so we won’t mess with that, but next time you’ll have to pick who you’re gonna have cover between.

CAMERON: Okay.

NICK: They are going to shoot at Karma. I need you to roll one yellow and two green. For those at home, I’m using the Mass Combat rules for groups of henchmen. It’s pretty great.

CAMERON: They’re at medium, so it’s two?

NICK: Yup.

CAMERON: Two advantages.

NICK: (huffs) So much for my high-stakes fight, huh? They shoot some more, there’s some lovely pyrotechnics, you all are protected by your plot armor…

HUDSON: (laughs)

NICK: …and the head honcho boss guy is wondering what he pays these people for.

CAMERON: We’re being protected by our great planning skills.

NICK: Well, that too.

LAURA: And the dice.

CAMERON: (smiling) And the dice, the dice liked us.

NICK: In fact, the head honcho boss man says, “What am I even paying you all for?” And we’re back to the top of the initiative with a player slot.

LAURA: Xianna will shoot the head guy this time.

NICK: Okay. He’s at medium range.

LAURA: She’s gonna aim, and I’m gonna go ahead and flip a light side point for that.

NICK: Might as well.

LAURA: Because might as well.

NICK: Ah-ha-ha. … Oh, swap one of those purples out for a red. He has Adversary 1. I forgot to mention that. You can pick which one you want to get rid of since I didn’t tell you soon enough.

CAMERON: A despair. (laughs)

LAURA: Thank you!

(laughter)

LAURA: Two successes and a despair that has no failure.

NICK: Okay. Hey, one of the despair things I can do is ‘ranged weapons run out of ammunition.’ Isn’t that interesting?

LAURA: Cool…

NICK: Another one is ‘ranged attack hits character engaged with target.’ He’s not technically engaged.

CAMERON: No one is currently engaged with him. (laughs) They’re still in the courting phase, not engaged yet.

LAURA: Yes.

NICK: Yeah… So, what I’m going to do is, that initiative slot is now being used last in the initiative order. That’s one off the sheet. Isn’t that cool? That doesn’t mean you get to reuse it. It means if it goes to another round it’ll go down. What that looks like is, Xianna pops around the corner and she takes a shot. How much damage does she do?

LAURA: That would be eight damage.

NICK: Woo-hoo. He does not like that. It hits him pretty good. It hits him in the back of the arm and he drops. Xianna starts to get real, real, real jittery, and kind of has some muscle spasms going on and some double vision, and has to duck back around the corner and collect herself, and loses some time trying to get back in the zone.

CAMERON: Auto Zone.

LAURA: (laughs) Yeah.

HUDSON: God.

CAMERON: (giggles)

NICK: But yeah, that fun side effect brought to you buy Fantasy Flight Game, Star Wars: Edge of the Empire roleplaying game. You hit him, he did not like it, it appeared to do some pretty solid damage to him… and we’re to another player slot.

CAMERON: “Y’all got this, right?” Karma says, turning away from the fight that she was fighting in and facing the guys coming down her hallway now.

HUDSON: “Yeah.”

LAURA: ‘Maybe. I think so! Maybe. (giggles) Sure!”

HUDSON: “Of course.”

CAMERON: She’s gonna run from the crate she was at to the one in front of her so that she’s still shooting over a crate and has cover, but is now just having cover the other way.

NICK: Sure.

CAMERON: And she’s going to shoot at those dudes.

NICK: Okay. You’re at close range, because they’re also running towards those same crates. Is that going to negatively affect you?

CAMERON: I don’t know. Hold on.

NICK: What are your weapon’s trait things?

CAMERON: Ranged heavy, medium, stun setting.

NICK: Yeah. I think you can just shoot them, so it should be easy.

CAMERON: Okay, but do they have cover currently if they’re running towards the boxes, or are they in between at the moment?

NICK: We’ll say they’re up in the air.

CAMERON: If I ran up to get cover again, that was my maneuver. Right?

NICK: Yup. You could take a strain to still aim if you wanted to.

CAMERON: Nah. I’ll flip a light side point though to really upgrade this.

NICK: Great.

CAMERON: (laughs) Three yellows against one purple. Four successes.

NICK: How much damage is that?

CAMERON: Thirteen.

NICK: Ooh. Yeah, you got enough to roll out. You take out two of the dudes.

CAMERON: Ha-ha!

NICK: What does that look like? You shoot them in the face with your stun setting?

CAMERON: Well I shoot one of them, as he’s running towards me he kind of does a thing where his upper body falls backwards but his legs keep moving for a second, and his blaster comes up and he just smacks his friend in the face and it breaks his nose into his brain and he dies.

NICK: Oh. Great.

HUDSON: (laughs)

NICK: That’s pretty intense.

CAMERON: Yup! (laughs) But it wasn’t Karma that killed him, his friend killed him, so it’s okay!

NICK: I think Karma probably killed the drug lord.

CAMERON: Eh, it’s fine.

NICK: Get it? Like karma, like karmic justice. I made a joke. (smiling)

LAURA: No.

HUDSON: Nuh-uh.

CAMERON: What?!

NICK: No?

CAMERON: I don’t think that was a joke, babe.

HUDSON: (laughs)

NICK: Oh… Okay. Anyway! That brings us to an NPC slot. Boss guy is going to level his gun at Tink who is at close range and try to shoot him while Tink is busy dealing with the guys standing over the fallen assassin droid. That is two yellows and a green. Can you flip me a dark side point to upgrade that to three yellows, please?

CAMERON: It’s one purple, because you said close?

NICK: Yes. This might hurt real bad.

CAMERON: I’m sure it’ll be fine. … Oh shit, no. That is three successes and a triumph.

HUDSON: Egh…

NICK: So that’s 13 damage, because he’s using Karma’s gun.

CAMERON: You get soak.

HUDSON: Yeah.

NICK: And I would like to roll a crit please, with my triumph.

LAURA: We have a chart.

CAMERON: It’s a 96.

NICK: OOH!

LAURA: OOH! Bye Tink! (laughs)

HUDSON: Nooo!

CAMERON: No, it’s not 140-something.

NICK: Crippled: One limb is impaired until healed/replaced.

HUDSON: Not my typing arm!

CAMERON: Shit! (laughs)

NICK: Plus one difficulty to all checks using that limb. I’ll let you pick. What limb do you want to be impaired?

HUDSON: My left leg.

NICK: Your left leg. Any kind of moving that you’re doing, and I’m gonna say attacking with your axe you probably attack with your legs for more strength, so it applies to attacks too. He rolls towards you, and from very close range he sets the gun to burst, and he says, “I’ve always hated Wookies!” He shoots a three-blast into your kneecap and just tears it up real bad.

LAURA: (shouting) That is racist!”

CAMERON: (shouting) “He is not a Wookie!”

NICK: “Uh- Oh, really?” And then we’re gonna go to the next initiative slot. (laughs)

CAMERON: “Learn yourself!”

NICK: I guess it’s Tink, actually.

HUDSON: Yep. Give me a second, I’m writing down ‘left leg goners.’

CAMERON: Yup. (laughs)

NICK: Crippled. You didn’t actually lose it. It’s savable.

HUDSON: So, I’m like, “(shouts and groans in pain).”

NICK: “See, a Wookie!”

CAMERON: (smiling) ‘No!”

HUDSON: “No, I’m a Gigoran you kriffin’… (grumbling snarl).” Alright. Am I close? Am I like short range to him?

NICK: You can do a maneuver to get to that guy if you want.

HUDSON: Yeah, I want to get to that guy in particular.

CAMERON: (laughs) He’s got a purple and a red, right? Because he’s Adversary?

NICK: Yeah, one of those purples is a red.

HUDSON: Oh. That’s right, because from now it’s that way.

NICK: Well, yours is an extra purple, so it’s two purples and a red, because it adds a difficulty and the red is because he has Adversary which means it’s harder to attack him. Those are for like big bads. He’s just not that big or bad.

HUDSON: Three threats and two successes.

NICK: Okay… You hit him, it does eight damage. Ooh. He takes it in the shoulder, he looks like he’s in very bad shape and he’s not doing well. There’s a lot of blood and he gets a look on his face of someone who’s thinking, ‘I’m at least gonna take one of these suckers with me.’ He kicks out at you as the axe bites into his shoulder and hits you in your injured knee, and you fall prone. (dramatic bass noise)

HUDSON: “Ow! This always happens to me!”

LAURA: “Your center of gravity is just off.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

HUDSON: “No, this was a leg this time!”

LAURA: “I know, but I think your center of gravity is also off! Maybe you should try some yoga or something, maybe center yourself!”

HUDSON: “Where’s the lube?! Knock them prone, all of them!”

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: “We do have that yoga studio if you sink the hot tub!”

LAURA: ‘Wait, are we inviting them back? Is that why the lube is…?”

CAMERON: “No!” (laughs)

LAURA: “Oh no! Yes! We were going to throw it down the hallway! It is too late for that!” (laughs)

CAMERON: ((laughs)

HUDSON: (weakly) “Alright…”

NICK: We are up to an NPC slot. We’re going to do the one dude left facing Karma. He’s going to actually get up close and pull out a vibro-knife and try and stab Karma. “You shot Morty!”

CAMERON: (snorts, giggles)

NICK: He only has one green, because you took out all his buddies.

CAMERON: Aww. Nada.

NICK: Yeah. How do you stop him from stabbing you, like a cool person?

CAMERON: So, I have my carbine on a harness, so I’m gonna let go of my carbine for a second and I want to turn and pull out my vibro-sword slightly and catch his knife on my vibro-sword.

NICK: Ooh, very cool.

HUDSON: Ooh.

CAMERON: Yep.

NICK: Then do you re-sheath it or do you draw it?

CAMERON: I re-sheathe it.

NICK: (laughs) Okay. You just (sound effects of unsheathing, blocking, and re-sheathing), and then grab your gun again?

CAMERON: Yeah.

NICK: Cool. Well, he’s useless. We’re back to the top of the order with a player slot. Right now we have one guy engaged with Karma, one guy standing over the assassin droid just waving his gun around looking useless, and the big boss man who just kicked Tink down to the ground and is standing over him with an assault rifle.

LAURA: Xianna’s gonna lean out of the closet and shoot the big baddie by Tink, help him out. She’s gonna aim and everything. Let’s see…

CAMERON: Two purples for the distance.

LAURA: Yeah.

NICK: Yes! Yes!

LAURA: (nervously) Okay!

(laughter)

NICK: Here we go.

LAURA: So what I have is a despair and a triumph. I don’t… I would assume the success of the triumph cancels out the failure of the despair.

CAMERON: Yes.

LAURA: So I have a failure-less despair and a success-less triumph.

NICK: Here’s what the despair is going to be. I was reading it earlier. Ranged attack hits character engaged with target. So you’re gonna hit Tink. You didn’t have any successes so it’s just going to be the base damage.

HUDSON: Nooo.

NICK: What’s the base damage on your pistol, Xianna?

LAURA: Six.

NICK: That’s six damage going at Tink. Are you still conscious?

HUDSON: Oh yeah. I have five left.

NICK: Oh bummer.

CAMERON: He’s strong.

HUDSON: I’m stronk.

NICK: Oh I know, he can take it.

CAMERON: (mimicking Xianna’s accent) ‘Oh sheet! You are just so beeg!’ (giggles)

LAURA: “Tink! Stop being so big. You are in the way. It is your fault.” (laughs) “Sorry Tink! Sorry~!”

HUDSON: “Ow!”

LAURA: “I did not think you were going to be there!” (laughs)

HUDSON: “I was literally- How did you not think that?”

LAURA: “I don’t know, honestly.” (laughs)

NICK: At this point you can just hear the boss guy going, “Heheheheheh.” That was a player slot, now we’re to an NPC slot, and it’s going to be him. He is just going to shoot Tink. He gets a black die because Tink is prone. He is two yellows and a green.

CAMERON: One advantage.

NICK: Okay. He misses.

HUDSON: Ha-ha!

NICK: I’ll give a blue die to Knifey McKnife or whoever goes next. How do you dodge this guy shooting you at point blank?

HUDSON: I do a roll and roll over my very, very injured left leg and go, “Aghhh~!”

NICK: “See! A Wookie!”

CAMERON: “Still no! That’s incredibly … speciest?”

HUDSON: (growling through pain) “I’m. A. Gigoran!”

NICK: With that, we are to a player slot.

CAMERON: Alright. Karma’s gonna take it. I want to look at the guy who just tried to stab me. “Sorry babe, you’re not worth my time,” and turn around and walk away and go shoot the boss man. (laughs)

NICK: Okay. We’ll say you use a maneuver to get out of the hallway and back to where you can see him. It probably puts you at medium range.

CAMERON: Cool. That’s a red and a purple?

NICK: Yep.

CAMERON: (laughs) That’s just a threat. (heavy exhale)

NICK: Okay. You do that. I think the guy goes, “Hey!” and shoves you from behind as you’re shooting, and your shot goes wide.

CAMERON: Two of my dice came up blank.

NICK: That’s a bummer.

LAURA: Why are we like this?

NICK: (laughs) I don’t know.

CAMERON: I was doing real good before I tried to help y’all.

LAURA: I mean, I just keep rolling the weirdest shit, just… a triumph and a despair! Because why not.

NICK: No, that was fun. That was a player slot, so we are to an NPC slot. We’re gonna say the guy who shoved Karma is going to stab her again since she faced away. He was able to bump into you so that you couldn’t shoot his boss, Karma, and now he’s going to try to follow that up with a stab. He gets a blue die, because you were obviously ignoring him.

CAMERON: One success.

NICK: Yay! A vibro-knife does two, he has two Brawn, and one success, so that’s five damage.

CAMERON: (smiling) Karma soaks all of it. (laughs)

NICK: Yeah, so he drives a knife into you and… you’re the combat character, and it does nothing.

CAMERON: I look over my shoulder. “Oh, are you still here?”

HUDSON: (scoffs) Oh dang.

CAMERON: (giggles)

NICK: (laughs) Roll for sad.

CAMERON: (laughing) Alright. What’s that gonna be?

NICK: The last one is the guy standing over the assassin droid who is still up because everyone has decided he’s not important. He’s actually going to use his maneuver to get to close range with Xianna, and he is going to shoot Xianna.

LAURA: Okay. I have some cover from the closet. I also have one defense for ranged.

NICK: Great. That’s two black dice, and he only has one green.

CAMERON: So it’s a green, a purple, and two black?

NICK: Yeah. Let’s flip a dark side point though. He’s really motivated.

CAMERON: Ooh, it’s a yellow.

NICK: I only need one crit. I’m gonna shoot her in the foot again.

(laughter)

LAURA: If you take my foot! (laughs) I will only come back more powerful!

CAMERON: One failure.

LAURA: (quietly) yes!

NICK: Alright, so he comes running around the corner, and he sees you. “Ha!” Then he reenacts that scene from Pulp Fiction where he empties the clip of his blaster pistol, even though they don’t have clips, and it goes all around you and does not hit you at all, and you end up just kind of staring at each other awkwardly for a second. Now we are at the bottom of the initiative order where the player slot that used to be at the top is. That’s Tink.

HUDSON: Yeah, I’ll go. I’m lying there. I just dodged a bullet, or a laser blast, a sblaser.

CAMERON: Blaster shot.

HUDSON: A blaster shot.

NICK: A sblaser. (laughs)

HUDSON: A sblaser. So, I grab my vibro-axe and I go after boss man.

NICK: Okay. Do you stand up?

HUDSON: I could just do it from the ground. Does that give me a disadvantage?

NICK: Yeah. That would give you a black die to do it.

HUDSON: For the theatrics, sure.

NICK: Sure.

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: Do you want to flip a light side point?

CAMERON: Yeah!

HUDSON: Yes.

LAURA: That adds a green.

NICK: I will say, it won’t add another purple, because if you’re swinging from the ground you’re not using your legs so you won’t get that crit issue. All upper body.

HUDSON: Three successes.

NICK: Whoa… Alright. How do you wanna kill this guy?

HUDSON: Oh. I don’t even need to give you damage, do I?

NICK: No, you got him.

HUDSON: I’m on the floor, and I swing around and I cut him off at the knees and watch him scream in pain, and then cut him off the middle.

NICK: Phew. Tink has a vendetta there. Yeah, you silence him. He is done. If you, with that description, can you roll me a green versus two purples please?

CAMERON: A threat.

NICK: Just a threat?

CAMERON: Just a threat.

NICK: Okay. They’ll have a black die, but they’re not gonna totally break. I was thinking these two henchmen were probably like super done, they don’t get paid enough for this, but apparently they’re very loyal to mister now has a hole in his chest. Up next is a player slot. We’ve got a goon standing near Xianna, we’ve got a goon standing near Karma.

LAURA: Yeah, Xianna will shoot the goon.

NICK: Okie-dokie.

LAURA: The goon is at what range?

NICK: Close range.

LAURA: Close range? Okay. I don’t have to upgrade~

NICK: Yeah, he came to you.

LAURA: I’m gonna also aim, since…

NICK: Weird.

LAURA: …I can.

NICK: (musically) Playing Star Wars.

LAURA: Yes. Two successes and two advantages.

NICK: That’s how much damage?

LAURA: Eight damage.

NICK: Yeah, you kill him.

LAURA: yeah!

NICK: You just shoot him in the face?

LAURA: Oh, I shoot him in the neck.

NICK: You shoot him in the neck? Oh, so we get that lovely—

LAURA: oh. There’s that gigantic just Monty Python level blood spurt, where it just goes, and he falls, and it keeps going. (giggles)

NICK: So, for the listeners at home who wonder why our combat usually ends pretty quick, it’s because when I let this team get going it gets real bad. He drops, you get his boot heels rattling on the ground as he suffocates under his own blood. Thank you so much for that. My mom listens to this show.

LAURA: Hi Nick’s mom!

NICK: Hi~!

LAURA: (smiling) I shot a dude in the neck. I’m sorry.

NICK & CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: Not really. (laughs)

NICK: Yeah, me neither. Well, that was his thing, so another player slot.

CAMERON: Can I have a blue die from your advantages?

LAURA: Sure! I’ll say that the blood spurt was so dramatic that it just was going so much, and the guy made a horrible yelping noise that it distracted the goon that Karma is facing, and he did that wide-eyed stare giving Karma a bit of an advantage.

CAMERON: (laughs) Alright. I’m gonna flip another light side point to upgrade again, because we got them so might as well.

LAURA: (musically) We wanna kill them.

CAMERON: I’m going to back up from the dude again, “You can do better than this,” and shoot him. (laughs)

NICK: (sad laughs)

CAMERON: Because my gun’s on stun, so he’s gonna be okay.

NICK: Maybe.

CAMERON: We’ll see. That is one success, one advantage.

NICK: That’s what, 10 damage?

CAMERON: Ten damage.

NICK: Yeah. You shoot him with that blue, weird ringy thing. He does a fun electrocuted hand gesture and collapses to the ground, and the building falls silent.

CAMERON: I stand up and start collecting badges.

NICK: Alright. You get badges from all of them.

CAMERON: Ah-ha!

HUDSON: I crawl with my broken leg over to the one that’s really bloody that Xianna shot in the neck and I just slowly pull off their boots. “I got boots for you, Xianna.”

(laughter)

LAURA: “Those boots are not my size.”

HUDSON: ‘You haven’t even looked at them yet. What is your size?”

CAMERON: “Yeah. What size do you need? I’ve got three guys over here.”

LAURA: “I wear a galactic 6 ½ women’s.” (laughs)

CAMERON: Can I flip a light side point for one of the guys to be wearing a galactic 6 ½ women’s, and they’re very nice boots?

NICK: Sure… and that’s how we’re gonna end the episode.

CAMERON: “Oh hey! This guy’s got a pair!” (laughs)

LAURA: “Oh! Fuck yes!” (laughs)

CAMERON: ‘They’re nice, too!” (laughs)

NICK: End of episode!

ALL: Ba-naaa~!

CAMERON: Yay~!

NICK: Gosh.

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: (singing) …ooh-ooh, for the longest time.

## Outro

CAMERON: Thanks for listening to Tabletop Squadron. If you’ve enjoyed our show please consider logging into iTunes and giving us a five-star review. Five-star reviews will help new listeners to find the show and give the squad warm fuzzies when we read them.

Xianna’fan is played by Laura Penrod. She can be found on Twitter at @cheerio_buffet.

Tink is played by Hudson Jameson, and he can be found on Twitter at @hudsonjameson.

Karma Nailo is played by me, Cameron Robertson. You can find me on Twitter at @midnightmusic13.

Our game master is Nick Robertson, and you can find him on Twitter at @alias58.

Our intro song is Space Jam by Pablo Ribot.

Additional music by James Gunter.

Follow the podcast on Twitter and Instagram at @Tabletop_Squad. For real, we’re real people and we want to talk to anyone who listens to the show. Reach out! See you next time.

Word document download: Episode 18 A Performance Review

PDF download: Episode 18 A Performance Review

Read in browser:

Tabletop Squadron Transcript, Season 1 Episode 18:
A Performance Review

Transcript by Tyler (Twitter: @Tyler_MoonSage)

## Intro

NICK: Hi everyone, and welcome to Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars: Edge of the Empire actual play podcast. I’m Nick, your game master. Every other Thursday our story follows a thief, a bounty hunter, and a slicer as they explore the galaxy helping a mysterious benefactor and each other.

We don’t have many announcements this week. Next week will be the last episode of this set of Jedi Adventures. After that we’ll have one more bonus episode: a chunk of bloopers. They’re pretty funny, and really open a window into what it’s like recording with the squad. Spoiler Alert: We’re all very interesting and funny people.

Even though we’ve met our goal, come join the squad on Twitter at @Tabletop_Squad and talk to us about Star Wars, or why houndstooth is a bad pattern. We hope to talk to you soon, and we hope you enjoy the episode.

##

NICK: Hello! Welcome to Episode 18 of Tabletop Squadron! Here we are, back again, doing the same old stuff… except different! We’re gonna go around the table real quick, talk to everybody, introduce yourselves and who you’re playing this week, starting with Cameron.

CAMERON: Hello! I am Cameron, as Nick just said, and I am playing Karma Nailo the Nautolan bounty hunter.

NICK: Have you spent any experience since the last time we played?

CAMERON: Oh, I spent a lot. Let’s see. What did I do? I upped my Negotiation skill to Rank 1. I bought the Good Cop talent on my bounty hunter Skiptracer tree which allows me to spend two advantages from a Charm or Negotiation check to upgrade the ability of an ally’s subsequent social check against the same target a number of times equal to the ranks in Good Cop. I bought Expert Tracker on that same tree, so I can remove a black die per rank of Expert Tracker from checks to find tracks or track targets, and I can decrease the time to track a target by half. And, I bought another rank in Stalker on my Assassin skill tree, so I can add another blue die for all my Stealth and Coordination checks.

NICK: Wow. Alright, well up next we’ve got Hudson.

HUDSON: Hi. I’m Hudson, and I’m playing Tink, a Gigoran slicer, which is kind of like a Wookie slicer but a Gigoran. I ranked up in Computers to Rank 3, Deception to Rank 2, and Melee: Brawl to Rank 3.

NICK & CAMERON: Ooh.

NICK: Nice. That will probably come in handy.

HUDSON: Oh yeah.

NICK: Oh yeah. Up next we’ve got Laura.

LAURA: Hello. I play Xianna’fan, a Twi’lek smuggler, and I only remember what I purchased today. I don’t remember what I purchased with points in the past.

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: That’s fine.

LAURA: I bought a rank in Stalker, and then I also moved up to Rank 2 in Ranged: Light so that I can shoot good.

NICK: Good plan! Alright. Before we get started, let’s go ahead and do our Destiny Roll.

CAMERON: Two light side!

LAURA: (gasps) Two light side!

CAMERON: (gasps)

HUDSON: Cocked, right?

LAURA: Um…

CAMERON: Mm… Yeah, it’s sideways.

HUDSON: Yeah, definitely.

CAMERON: Unless it’s two this time.

HUDSON: Same result pretty much. One dark side.

CAMERON: Four light side, one dark side!

NICK: Alright. With that all lined up and ready to go, we’ll jump right into it.

When we last left off you all had just hightailed it out of a fancy party pretty quickly. All of you have sort of varying knowledge of what happened at that formal ball as you all split up and collected different information. long story short, Falx invited the three of y’all—and by invited I mean blackmailed you into—attending an Imperial event. You attended, he claimed that you were supposed to be protecting him from potential assassins, but when the violence happened instead other people ended up dead: a specific Governor Silpin, someone who had a run-in with Xianna in the past, and… a lot of things happened. Tink almost got arrested by an Imperial Inspector. Xianna got noticed by a System Marshal who was out to arrest her. You all fled into the distance fleeing a platoon of stormtroopers and various law-abiding agents at this point. Yeah?

HUDSON: I think it’s a murder of stormtroopers.

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: I do not think it’s a murder of stormtroopers. (laughs)

LAURA: I don’t think that’s it.

CAMERON: I like that though. Can it be that?

NICK: Those are the deathtroopers, the ones with the shiny iridescent armor.

CAMERON: Oh, okay.

LAURA & HUDSON: Yeah.

NICK: Those are a murder.

CAMERON: So, you have to have the black, shiny armor so that it looks like crows.

NICK: If anything, a stormtrooper is a gaggle of stormtroopers.

CAMERON: (laughs)

HUDSON: Makes it sillier.

CAMERON: A flock, it’s a flock of stormtroopers.

HUDSON: Yes.

CAMERON: A memory of stormtroopers?

LAURA: No…

HUDSON: What? Is a memory an actual-?

LAURA & CAMERON: Of elephants.

HUDSON: Oh.

CAMERON: Yeah. How stupid is that?

LAURA: I mean, a lot of them are real stupid.

CAMERON: A school of stormtroopers?

NICK: Uh… We’re getting there. I think platoon fits pretty well.

HUDSON: Platoon fits fine.

(laughter)

CAMERON: It’s not nearly as fun.

LAURA: Squadron and platoon, and… you know, all of the words they used in the actual shows.

NICK: Practically a regiment. Yeah. The camera snaps to the Afternoon Delight flying away from the planet of Mustafar backlit with flowing lava. You are rapidly preparing the ship to go to light speed, and the camera behind you shows a U-wing, a large tuning fork-shaped ship with a cool red and yellow custom paint job also rising up through the atmosphere trying to meet you. We get a quick over the shoulder shot of Karma flipping switches getting ready to jump with proximity alarms going off, and just as target locks start showing up on the main screen karma throws the ship into hyperspace and you snap away.

The first question I have for y’all is where are you going?

CAMERON: Probably back to Sentinel.

LAURA: Yeah, that would be a question for Karma.

CAMERON: I probably didn’t really think about it a lot and just flipped to the most recently searched place in the navicomputer, which would’ve been the place that we met Sentinel at, and just jumped there, because I knew that Jorus was chasing us.

NICK: Okay. That’s fine. It’ll probably take about five hours to get back to where you’re going. It’s about as long as it took you to get where you were. How do you spend your time?

HUDSON: I catch everyone up on my little adventures back where I grabbed the droid and accidentally stuck the Rancore Protocol into it causing it to become a murder bot very quickly.

CAMERON: (laughs)

HUDSON: “I escaped the inspector.”

CAMERON: “Yeah, we saw you run off. Well, I did, I don’t know if you did, Xianna.”

LAURA: Oh, Xianna is certainly sitting there pretending like she’s listening but is every so often just falling asleep.

CAMERON: Great. (laughs)

LAURA: And then wakes up like, “(sleepy groans) No, I was listening, yes. Okay…”

HUDSON: “You need a nap, Xianna?”

LAURA: (weakly) “yes…”

HUDSON: “You look like you had all the adrenaline chemically drained out of you or something.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: “No, yes, I am how you say… hung over. Yes.”

HUDSON: “Ah.”

LAURA: “On the downward slope. Yes.”

CAMERON: “From the drugs.”

LAURA: “Oh yes, uh… the drugs.”

HUDSON: “Whatever you wanna do, it’s none of my business.”

LAURA: “I mean yeah.”

CAMERON: “Maybe next time just don’t tell an inspector that you’re on drugs. Did you say that you did that?”

LAURA: “I mean, I never interacted with an inspector. I believe I’m… I do not think I said anything specific to the marshal. I might have though. I don’t know.”

CAMERON: “This was before Jorus showed up. You told me the stormtroopers weren’t gonna let you leave.”

LAURA: “I mean yes, but he died, so it does not matter. Heh.”

CAMERON: (laughing) Do we know he died? We never saw the body.

HUDSON: No, Xianna saw the body.

NICK: Sila did drag the body out to look at it and everything, so it would be possible.

CAMERON: I don’t know what we all know independently.

HUDSON: It’s not like Xianna’s not on the run already from a million other things, so this would just be another little blip.

LAURA: “I think I did tell… I don’t know if he was an inspector. It was someone in the Empire. He had ranks. I think I did tell him I was doing drugs, but to be fair I thought he was also doing drugs. He was in a way, just for actual medical purposes. But yeah, he died, so it doesn’t matter.”

HUDSON: “I thought you were a good judge of character. I guess I’m wrong.”

CAMERON: “What gave you that impression, Tink?” (laughs)

HUDSON: “I just might trust people too much. I don’t know. I need to be a little introspective after this whole ordeal.”

NICK: Great, so…

LAURA & CAMERON: … ‘Kay.

(laughter)

NICK: You still have some time. You touch base. You all become very rapidly aware that there was more going on at that shindig than you probably know about. You piece bits and pieces of it together, and you probably know as follows:

Governor Silpin is dead. He got stabbed.

CAMERON: (gasps dramatically)

NICK: Yeah, everybody knew that. Falx probably had something to do with it since you saw him run out of the ballroom wearing handcuffs being chased by an Imperial Inspector. The inspector that Xianna talked to at the bar is also dead. You saw him dragged out from under the table by Imperial Inspector Sila Rowe. The Rancore Protocol is perhaps a little less stable than you originally thought seeing as you plugged it into a droid and it started shooting everywhere. You also were able to recover the Rancore Protocol, which is good. Tink, did you tell them that you gave the inspector your “I did it and here’s how” notebook?

HUDSON: No, I didn’t mention that. ‘Hey guys…”

LAURA: (weakly) “Yes?”

HUDSON: “So I may have lost my personal diary with a lot of our previous endeavors written inside of it in a lot of detail, including very personal thoughts and feelings I’ve had, which I mean the value of that is immense to myself but maybe not others. Either way, I gave away something important.”

CAMERON: (smiling) “You keep a diary?”

LAURA: “Okay… Did you use real names?”

HUDSON: ‘I mean yes, until I came up with nicknames for you guys.”

CAMERON: “Okay. What are our nicknames?” (laughs)

NICK: (laughs)

LAURA: “Okay, so you put Xianna, and then later put a fake name?”

HUDSON: “Yeah, like Xixi.”

LAURA: “Ohh… fuck.”

CAMERON: (smiling) “Oh, I like that one.”

HUDSON: (chuckles)

LAURA: “Okay, so… (sighs) Next time you decide to start a journal, use fake names from the start.”

HUDSON: “I mean, it’s less personal that way, but I’ll do it.”

LAURA: ‘Yeah!”

CAMERON: “Less personal is good if it’s an object that can be lost like that.”

LAURA: “That is the point.”

HUDSON: “Why don’t we just all use code names all the time? I mean, I have a suspicion that you already do, Xianna, but…”

LAURA: “Have you not noticed that I’m always giving fake names to people?”

HUDSON: “True. How do I know Xianna’s your real name?”

LAURA: “I don’t know. You can just trust me? It is a very Twi’lek name.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: “If we want to get really into it, technically my name is not even Xianna. that is just a name I use, because for some reason humans always think it is Xianna when they see it written down, because of the apostrophe. It is really Xiann.”

HUDSON: “Ohh. Y’all don’t actually know my real name, do you?”

CAMERON: “I believe you’ve said it once, but honestly it was long and I forgot and just went back to Tink.”

LAURA: ‘Yeah, I think someone said it, and it was very long.”

HUDSON: “It’s Rallltinkraatakat.”

CAMERON: “Yeah, that’s why I stuck with Tink.”

LAURA: “Yeah. I am not saying that. Nope.”

HUDSON: “I mean, it’s a mouthful, but it is my birth name.”

CAMERON: “That’s fine. If you want me to try and call you that, Tink, I will, but it’s gonna be a struggle.”

HUDSON: “You know… I’ll save you the trouble.”

CAMERON: “Okay. I appreciate that.”

LAURA: “Good. I was not going to call you that even if you wanted me to.”

HUDSON: “Hmm.”

CAMERON: “I was really gonna try, and I was gonna be wrong every single time. (laughs) You said all of the information was in the journal?”

HUDSON: “Our previous adventures from the last few weeks.”

CAMERON: “Did you include anything about Sentinel in the journal, or did you not write it because we only had a five hour jump before the party?”

HUDSON: “Yeah, I hadn’t gotten that far yet.”

CAMERON: “Okay, that’s good.”

HUDSON: “These things get delayed by a number of days.”

CAMERON: “Oh, okay. Well you need time to reflect on it. That makes sense.”

HUDSON: “yeah!”

LAURA: “(sighs)”

HUDSON: “Hey, why are you sighing? That’s a good thing.”

CAMERON: “That is a good thing! But the whole fact that it’s an issue altogether, it’s just that you wrote stuff down and now it’s no longer on your person.”

LAURA: “You not having Sentinel in the journal is like saying you stepped in shit, but oh well, you can clean your shoes off later in the day. It doesn’t really help too much at the moment.”

HUDSON: “On a different note, do y’all wanna know what Rallltinkraatakat actually means in my home language?”

CAMERON: “yes.”

LAURA: (simultaneously) “No!”

NICK: (laughs uncontrollably)

HUDSON: (laughs)

CAMERON: “Xianna, don’t ruin this for me. Yes.”

HUDSON: ‘It means bringer of peace and food. Actually, just kidding, not the food part.”

CAMERON: (laughs) “Oh, I loved the food part, though.”

HUDSON: “No, no, it’s just bringer of peace and harmony.”

CAMERON: “Oh. Aw…”

LAURA: “Oh… Uh, I mean, that is wonderful character building and all—(laughter) I am more interested in exactly what was in your journal, you know, everything that incriminates us. Like, did you have the name the Afternoon Delight in the journal?”

HUDSON: “Yeah, because it’s a great name.”

CAMERON: “Oh god.”

LAURA: “Okay, but now our ship name is known, and they know everything about it.”

HUDSON: “Like we ever go into an actual landing pad giving the real name.”

CAMERON: “It’s painted on the side of the ship!”

LAURA: “Have you not seen it? There is a half-naked woman on it and everything.”

HUDSON: “Yeah, I mean… Listen. You don’t have to say half-naked. It’s classy. It’s not half-nekkid, it’s like…”

CAMERON: “Half clothed?”

HUDSON: “Half clothed.”

LAURA: “It is a pin-up girl. It is not THAT classy.”

HUDSON: “If it was pinned up we’d have actual pins in it. It’s painted.”

CAMERON: Oh my GOSH… (laughs)

LAURA: Oh… (groans, sighs)

CAMERON: “Anyway. Yes, we don’t necessarily use our ship’s name as we’re landing but once we get there it is very obvious that we are the Afternoon Delight.”

HUDSON: “Well, we just have to hope that this doesn’t come up later.”

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: ‘I’m sure it’ll be fine~’

NICK: As everyone turns and just looks at me. Great. Yeah.

CAMERON: Yeah, make sure that doesn’t come up, Nick.

NICK: Or the opposite of that.

CAMERON: “So…” (sighs) Oh gosh.

LAURA: “So anyways… Karma.”

CAMERON: “yes?”

LAURA: “You knew that marshal.”

CAMERON: “Yes, and the marshal knew you.”

LAURA: “I mean, I do not KNOW him in any of those senses, but he may have been trying to get me for some sort of bounty? I don’t know how that works.”

CAMERON: “He was 100% trying to get you, not necessarily for a bounty, but probably for an—“

LAURA: “Oh! Is he single?”

CAMERON: “Uh… Actually, he told me he was married. That was one of the conversation points we had.”

LAURA: “I mean, that has not stopped me in the past.”

CAMERON: “But he was probably trying to bring you in for an arrest warrant wherever the hell he’s marshaling. So it probably wasn’t a bounty, as he’s ‘gone official.’”

LAURA: “I mean, that does not narrow it down.”

CAMERON: “He did not know your name.”

LAURA: “I’ve been arrested at least five times, that I remember.”

CAMERON: “Okay, hold on.”

LAURA: (laughs)

CAMERON: I look up Jorus Kreel on bounty hunter Facebook.

NICK: HuntersOnly?

LAURA: HuntersOnly!

CAMERON: HuntersOnly.com, yes.

NICK: (smiling) HuntersOnly.com. Alright. I was imagining this conversation took place in the main lobby of the ship. The hot tub is closed, but you all have like nice couches and chairs and stuff kind of scattered around.

LAURA: Yeah. Xianna is lounged in a whole couch, one that is definitely supposed to seat three people, and she’s holding a cup of caf and very much trying not to spill it because she’s real shaky probably.

NICK: Do you pull out a data pad, or head to the cockpit?

CAMERON: I just take out my data pad.

NICK: You pull out your data pad and you search for (emphatically) Jorus Kreel, System Marshal. You’re able to find him in your mutual friends list, because of course you’ve electronically kept in touch.

CAMERON: Yeah. We’re definitely friends.

NICK: But like the ones where it doesn’t really suggest them in the search very often, I would imagine, since he was able to tell you things you didn’t know.

CAMERON: Yeah. I mean, he’s on my friend list. I probably just got annoyed and unfollowed him a while ago, but we’re still bounty friends.

NICK: Bounty buddies!

CAMERON: Bounty buddies. Yes! (smiling) We’re bounty buddies.

NICK: That’s what the friends list is called in HuntersOnly.com, bounty buddies. Great. Yeah, what are you looking for with him?

CAMERON: So, wanting to know where he’s marshaling…

NICK: Ooh.

CAMERON: …to try and figure out which one of Xianna’s arrests he could be going after specifically.

LAURA: yeah, pretty much where the source of this possible arrest came from.

NICK: So, we know he’s a System Marshal on the outer rim…

CAMERON: Mm-hmm.

NICK: Coral 2, it’s the system of Coral, the main planet is Coral 2.

HUDSON: T-O-O or T-W-O?

CAMERON: (giggles)

NICK: (laughs) T-W-O.

HUDSON: Oh.

NICK: Generally the number in a planet, and this isn’t just Star Wars this is like sci-fi in general, means how many planets away from the star it is.

HUDSON: Oh, didn’t know that.

NICK: Yeah. So, now you do.

LAURA: Or it could be a moon.

NICK: Or it could be—if it’s named after the main planet, yeah. He is the System Marshal for the system of Coral. It’s a ten planet system way out on the outer rim, and it’s the second planet so it’s a dry, kind of dusty world. Karma, you’ve heard of it before. It’s a place where a lot of criminals like to go to ground because it doesn’t have a lot of law enforcement, the Empire’s not particularly interested in it, but that has kind of slacked off a little in the last few years as Jorus has taken over that area. He’s really made a name for himself as a marshal.

CAMERON: “Xianna, have you ever been to the Coral system, or anywhere there about”

LAURA: “I think so… Was that…”

CAMERON: I realized as I said that I went slightly country with my voice. (laughs)

NICK: (laughs) You super did. Thinking of Jorus is contagious.

CAMERON: This was a big problem I had when I was doing my apprenticeship with Deathfetti and Jorus was my buddy, was that we would just go on missions and I would just slowly acquire his accent, and it’s catching back up to me looking him up.

NICK: Just a little dash of southern comfort.

CAMERON: Yup. Karma’s not a fan. (laughs)

NICK: (laughs)

LAURA: “Um… I think that might have been the doorway incident… Yes. Yes.”

CAMERON: “I think you’ve talked about this one before.”

LAURA: “Oh yes! It is a wonderful story. So, my partner and I decided to do a robbery, as you do, for some very nice jewels and gems. We had mapped out the route that the security droids took, and everything was going great until we figured out that the droids had changed their route earlier that day, which means we could not go out the same door that we had come in, which was a problem because my partner was an Herglic, and they are very large. The front doors were very wide, she could make it through, the back door not as wide. So, we try and go out the back door, she gets stuck, I try to push her through the door… I get stuck. So then we are both stuck in the door.

We get stuck at like 11 in the evening. The store does not open up until like 8 in the morning. By like 1:00 we had broken up, then by 3 we were back together. (giggles) Then again by the time they found us we had broken up again. Uh, yeah, and that is how I got arrested, I think for the third time. Yes. Some of them blur together, some of them are a little hard to remember, you know, heh, impact.”

CAMERON: “Yup. Yup…”

LAURA: “A little bit of glitterstim. Lots of alcohol, too. Yes. Uh-huh.”

HUDSON: “Your life is a trip.”

LAURA: “yes. If you ever want to have a very fun party go find a Hut. (laughs) Their palaces are crazy. There’s just people sleeping on the floor every single night. It is really weird. I mean, they do like do the whole slavery thing and they eat weird little frog creatures… very weird, but fun.”

HUDSON: “I like to keep a clean, simple lifestyle.”

NICK: Oh fuck.

(laughter)

LAURA: Oh my god. Ahhh…

HUDSON: (laughing) No one’s gonna know what that means when you do this later.

NICK: Note for our listeners: Hudson did the straightedge hand gesture. (laughs)

HUDSON: (laughing) What are you writing down after I did that?

(laughter)

LAURA: I’m not specifically writing down anything you did.

NICK: It says “Tink – straightedge.”

HUDSON: (laughs)

LAURA: No, I have a list of all the times I’ve been arrested, because I figured that probably should be a thing I have.

CAMERON: (laughing) It’s a thing you should keep track of.

LAURA: It’s a thing I should keep track of. I at least have the Herglic ordeal, and then there was a generic burglary that I described at some other point.

CAMERON: Then there was the Silpin and his wife.

NICK: Except she didn’t get caught on that one.

CAMERON: Oh.

LAURA: I didn’t get arrested for that. I got found out, but I wasn’t—

CAMERON: Yeah. They put a bounty out for it, but she didn’t get arrested.

LAURA: I don’t believe I was fully arrested.

NICK: You weren’t.

LAURA: The other one was a generic burglary where they just came home half way through, and then the other three I don’t have anything for yet.

CAMERON: We shall see~!

LAURA: We’ll see!

NICK: Yeah. Did you have anything else you wanted to look up about Jorus besides where he marshals?

CAMERON: I’m just gonna read his last couple status updates, get a look into how his life’s going.

NICK: Okay. You scroll up like a page and a half and you see a few statuses like “Proud to be the System Marshal of the Coral system,” a public post, and then some friend’s post of him kind of wondering if going straight is really for him but mentioning that he wants to do it for his family, and then two statuses ago is some just really dark poetry, like “My life is an unending abyss of which I will never escape. The Sarlac of my heart will never be sated.” That kind of thing.

CAMERON: Wow.

NICK: Yeah. The one right after that is “Got a lead on a new mission. I’ll take pictures once I’ve nabbed them.” That’s the last one that you saw. So, very roller coaster. Good stuff, bad stuff.

CAMERON: (inhales) Great.

NICK: Also, his profile picture is him with an Ewok that looks like a mini Wookie with lots of scars branded into his arms, and he’s got the beard that’s braided and has beads in it and stuff. It’s a pretty intimidating looking little guy. They’re both holding big tankards of Corellian ale.

MYRA: “Aww. He married an Ewok.”

NICK: (laughs)

LAURA: “Good for him.”

HUDSON: “No judgment here.”

CAMERON: “This Ewok looks super badass you guys. Look!” (laughs)

HUDSON: “Whoa!”

LAURA: “Oh wow~ It is.”

HUDSON: “What are those tattoos?!”

LAURA: “I mean, I would marry that Ewok.”

CAMERON: (laughing) “It’s a good looking Ewok.”

HUDSON: “I’m intimidated, and they’re not even here in person.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: Cool. Anything else you wanted to know about that?

LAURA: While Karma’s looking through some stuff, Xianna just suddenly goes, “Oh kriff! Falx took one of my sets of binders!”

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: “Was it the fuzzy ones?”

LAURA: “Oh no. Heh.”

CAMERON: “Oh, okay.”

LAURA: ‘I did not want to give him the fuzzy ones. We were in public, and I have SOME decorum.”

CAMERON: “Why did he have your binders?”

LAURA: “Uh…” Xianna’s kinda looking up a little bit trying to remember. “Oh… Oh! No. He had Governor Silpin killed.”

CAMERON: “Oh!”

LAURA: “yeah.”

CAMERON: “Oh, that makes sense.”

LAURA: “Yeah. I do not… The party is a very big blur, but yes. He killed Silpin, pretty sure, and then had hired us to either take the fall or just act as an alibi… I’m not really sure. I don’t even know where he went, just that he ran away at one point.”

CAMERON: “With your binders.”

LAURA: “With my binders. I am now down to two pairs. And—Ohh! (angrily) Sabos owed me three stim packs! Ugh!”

NICK: (laughs)

HUDSON: (delicately) “Sabos…?”

CAMERON: “Xianna, please stop bringing this up.”

LAURA: (laughs) “But I do not have any stim packs anymore! I am all out!”

NICK: I get this image of Xianna declaring Sabos owed her stim packs and she’s on the couch and like throws her arms dramatically into the air and then falls back in sort of toddler petulance at that point.

LAURA: Yeah.

HUDSON: A single tear falls from Tink’s face.

CAMERON: “He owed you new boots too, right? No. Tink owed you new boots.”

HUDSON: “What?”

LAURA: ‘Yes. Tink does owe me new boots.”

HUDSON: “Whaaat?”

LAURA: “You will buy me new boots. I found these in the closet. I don’t know who had this ship before us, but they had a lot of clothes.”

HUDSON: “Do they even make boots for your situation?”

LAURA: “Twi’lek feet?”

HUDSON: ‘No…”

LAURA: “I mean, they make boots that fit Twi’leks. We have very similar feet to humans.”

HUDSON: “No. No, the… The missing, um…”

CAMERON: “Appendages?”

HUDSON: “Appendages… The little ones.”

LAURA: “(sighs)”

CAMERON: “It’s when you get extra toes is that it becomes an issue fitting into shoes. Losing toes you just stuff some socks in there.”

LAURA: “I just put a little bit of fabric in that spot.”

HUDSON: “Got it.”

LAURA: “Yes, but I would really like a new pair of boots. I do not wear much as far as clothing, so boots are the main thing I do besides the coat.”

HUDSON: “The next time we see a boot seller of some sort or fashion I will get you new boots, I suppose.”

CAMERON: The next time we see a space Cavenders we’re gonna go in there and get some boots.

(laughter)

NICK: Speaking of which… Do you have any interest in getting your foot looked at?

CAMERON: (laughing) Do you want ACTUAL medical attention?

LAURA: yeah. About this time Xianna goes, “Where are we going?”

CAMERON: “Oh. Just back to Sentinel’s scary empty place.”

LAURA: ‘Yeah… After that, can we go to a populated place with, you know, real stores… and medical people, that are not Tink, and a shoe store…”

CAMERON: “Yes. Let’s go to Sentinel, since that’s where we’re going right now, and then we’ll get our money and then we can go shopping.”

HUDSON: “Ooh, money.”

LAURA: “Cool.”

CAMERON: “Buy some stim packs, and boots.”

LAURA: “yes.”

HUDSON: ‘I could use a nice scarf, something with a little zing.”

CAMERON: “And a new journal for Tink.”

HUDSON: “yeah!”

CAMERON: “Where he will use fake names.”

HUDSON: “It could just be like an encrypted journal.”

CAMERON: “If you want to do code that’s even better. Still fake names in code, though.”

HUDSON: “Got it.”

CAMERON: “Yeah.”

HUDSON: “But what if—“

CAMERON: “No.”

HUDSON: “Okay.”

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: I don’t know how everybody else is doing, but I don’t have money, so…

LAURA: I have 304 Credits.

CAMERON: I have 70 Credits.

LAURA: I also have a bottle of whiskey.

HUDSON: I have 254 Credits.

NICK: Is there anything else you wanted to spend your downtime with? Any catching up you needed to do?

LAURA: Oh. Xianna fell asleep while Karma and Tink were speaking. The moment she stopped speaking she’s like on the couch asleep, and no one really knows how she didn’t spill the cup of caf. She’s holding it in the most perfect way so it doesn’t actually fall over, like she does that a lot or something.

CAMERON: Karma’s gonna go through and clean all of her weapons again. It’s been a while since she did that.

HUDSON: I’m going to get a snack.

NICK: Okay. (laughs)

CAMERON: Karma takes Tink’s blaster and cleans that too.

HUDSON: I haven’t used it, have I?

CAMERON: No, but this is a calming thing karma does.

HUDSON: You can clean my vibro-axe. It probably has so much blood on it.

CAMERON: (laughs) That’s true. Yeah. Karma’s just doing a deep clean of all the weaponry.

NICK: When you do that, where do you see yourself setting up? Do you bring everything back to your quarters?

CAMERON: Dining room table.

NICK: You spread it out on the dining room table? There’s a 14 seat table. That’s definitely something this ship has. This ship is very big. From the outside, and this isn’t a TARDIS situation it’s just the way they designed it, it’s like Millennium Falcon sized, a little bit bigger.

LAURA: Which is a TARDIS situation.

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: Well, the Millennium Falcon is, but—Fuck that. It doesn’t matter. With this one, in all of the space that you would normally have storage and auxiliary systems and things they just stack luxury features. There’s a large formal dining room that opens out onto the mess, but then above that is one of the bedrooms. It’s all just fitted in. the way the local gravity sits you don’t have to do a lot of stairs, you just find yourself in different rooms depending on what angle you go. There’s a lot of stuff.

HUDSON: What’s the most ridiculous luxury feature we have on there that we’ll just never use?

NICK: Well, you have a holo-theater but you’ve used that.

CAMERON: We have a hot tub, but we use that all the time. We have a room of requirement that will have some luxury in it later on.

LAURA: When we flip a light side point.

HUDSON: I have one. We have a space wine cellar…

LAURA: (gasps)

HUDSON: …except along with the wine, because I don’t really.. I mean, I drink but not super heavily. Crap, I can’t be straightedge now.

CAMERON: (snorts)

LAURA: Yeah.

HUDSON: Because I don’t drink that often, instead of filling it with wine or alcohol I filled it with like… popsicles?

LAURA: So, we had found various wet bars but they were pretty low level stock. Did you find this hidden wine cellar and knowingly replace the wine with popsicles and sodas?

HUDSON: Absolutely.

LAURA: So you got rid of the wine?

HUDSON: Well yeah, because I needed to make room for the popsicles and soda.

NICK: (laughs)

LAURA: This will absolutely be a plot point later on when you go to use that and Xianna’s there. (laughs)

HUDSON: So I basically dropped it all through the airlock.

NICK: Airlocked the wine—Oh no. (laughs) So, the space wine cellar is actually the biggest of the mini bars. The fridge actually has an elevator function so it can cycle through, and you figured out where the switch was to do that. You’re like, ‘Oh, this is great! There’s plenty of room for popsicles if I just get rid of this stuff. Who’s gonna need that anyway?’ So yeah, the expensive wine collection is floating through space probably somewhere near Ithor. (laughs)

LAURA: (sighs)

CAMERON: (breathy) Great.

LAURA: I’d say most of the other stuff that I would think of we already have; rotating beds, disco balls, a hot tub… I mean, unless there’s just a room full of drugs, what else?

CAMERON: Unlikely.

LAURA: Yeah…

HUDSON: Where did we get the ship from again?

NICK: Sentinel gave it to you.

HUDSON: “I could have drugs…”

LAURA: I mean, it does now.

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: Maybe a yoga studio.

HUDSON: A hot yoga studio?

CAMERON: No.

HUDSON: Just a yoga studio.

CAMERON: Just a yoga studio.

NICK: I think the main lobby serves a lot of functions, in that the hot tub can sink into the floor and you can use it as a yoga studio.

LAURA: Yeah. I’m assuming there’s a few just pretty empty all-purpose rooms that aren’t designed as bedrooms or anything, just extra spaces to do what you want with them.

NICK: Yeah.

LAURA: Have we found a naughty room yet? (laughs) Have we done the whole, we open the door and it’s just swings and masks, and everyone’s like (gasps dramatically), and Tink’s like ‘oh, what’s that?’ (giggles)

CAMERON: Clooose the door.

LAURA: And Xianna just slowly closes the door, and she’s like ‘oh, don’t worry about that room.’ (giggles)

HUDSON: “What’s the dress up room for? Why can’t I go in?”

LAURA: “Don’t- You don’t need to go in there.”

HUDSON: “Alright.”

CAMERON: “All the costumes that are gonna fit you are gonna be in the closet.”

LAURA: “Oh no, some of those could have fit him.”

HUDSON: “Are you calling me fat?”

CAMERON: “No. I’m just saying you’re very tall.”

HUDSON: “Oh, okay.”

NICK: So I think that room is actually off of Sabos’s cabin which is why you didn’t find it.

LAURA: (laughs) We never found it.

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: You were digging through there looking for something during the trip, and you opened the door and yeah. We get that scene of Karma just full-body pushing Tink out of the room, like ‘no, no, no, it’s fine.’

CAMERON: Nooo, no, no, no, no, no, no.

LAURA: No, no, no.

NICK: Is there anything else you all wanted to do on the ship before you arrived?

CAMERON: I don’t think so.

LAURA: I mean, Xianna’s passed out for…

NICK: Several hours.

LAURA: Probably at least four out of the five hours.

CAMERON: Karma’s gonna log in and see if Sabos and Xianna are showing up as turned in.

NICK: Uh…

CAMERON: To see if the Vengeance…

NICK: …the Vengeance actually logged it?

CAMERON: Actually logged it.

NICK: So, when you look in the Imperial bounty database the database shows Processing, so it looks like they logged that they had it but that the process may have stopped half way, or it’s at Imperial headquarters going through approval. I would imagine that the loss of the super star destroyer kind of shut down a decent amount of Imperial bureaucracy.

CAMERON: It distracted them from my 7,000 Credit total bounty just a little bit.

NICK: Yeah, a little bit, a little bit, but it does look like they sent it off.

CAMERON: But Xianna’s not currently showing as being captured, or is she still an available bounty?

NICK: The bounty section is showing Processing. Sabos and Xianna are both showing as Assumed Deceased actually.

CAMERON: Okay, cool.

LAURA: Ooh.

CAMERON: I wake Xianna up, and I show her profile page.

LAURA: “What?! Huh? What? … Oh cool~! I am dead now. Yes. (laughs)”

CAMERON: ‘I wouldn’t get too excited, because Jorus does know you’re alive, but he doesn’t know you’re Xianna, so…”

LAURA: “I mean, yeah… so, eh.”

CAMERON: ‘We’ll see.”

LAURA: “I mean, he is a backwater marshal. They don’t have quite the same pull. And if he does not know my actual name…”

HUDSON: “With all this talk about naming, I think I need a new hacker name. I recycle those every once in a while.”

CAMERON: “Was that in your book too?”

LAURA: ‘Oh, you certainly need a new name. Yes.”

HUDSON: “yeah, I know, but like when I sign off on code I write and stuff.”

LAURA: “Yes!”

CAMERON: “You’re signing off on code you write?”

LAURA: “Wait, what?!”

NICK: (laughs)

LAURA: ‘Nooo. You don’t do that.”

HUDSON: “No, you do that.”

LAURA: “Like, if you live behind a calling card you make it like a sexy little thing that is not your real name, you know, you like leave a little note card with some lipstick kisses on it… if the inspector is a really cute one.”

HUDSON: “No, it’s not my real name. So, hackers have that in the scene, and it’s just a handle that they use. Before I’ve been Prodigy, I’ve also been Leetness, like L33tn3ss.”

CAMERON: “Oh gosh.”

LAURA: “But, but why?”

HUDSON: “Because that’s the name I went by. It’s cool. It’s a cool thing to do.”

LAURA: “No…”

CAMERON: “No, but see, Tink, if you’re using the same name every time and every time you hack into something you’re logging that name there, then you are just leaving a trail of exactly where you’ve been—“

HUDSON: “I recycle!”

CAMERON: “Mm… How long-! Okay. What name were you using most recently?”

HUDSON: “I was StarDestroyer1.”

CAMERON: “How long have you been using StarDestroyer1?”

HUDSON: “Six months.”

CAMERON: “See, that’s WAY, way too long.”

LAURA: “Oh, that is way too long.”

HUDSON: “But then you don’t develop the credibility!”

LAURA: “But no! At most you leave like your calling card for like a month, and that is only if you know the main detective is really attractive and you have like a weird sexual tension thing… and then you do it just so that they know that they have to take that case.”

HUDSON: “Sexual tension will never be in the hacker space.”

LAURA: “That’s how you avoid getting arrested! Most of the time.”

CAMERON: “Tink, I’m a bounty hunter. Okay?”

HUDSON: “When did Xianna wake up?” (laughs)

CAMERON: “Oh, I just woke her up.”

LAURA: “Yeah, she woke me up. Yeah.”

HUDSON: “Oh, okay.” (laughs)

CAMERON: “I woke her up. The Empire said she’s dead, and that was cool, so I shared that. I am a bounty hunter. If I were after the bounty that’s open on StarDestroyer1, the fact that every time you hacked in somewhere you left that means that I can find you.”

HUDSON: “Oh no, I understand that. I’m just saying, that raises the stakes and makes you more credible in the scene. So… that’s what I’m doing.”

LAURA: “No…”

CAMERON: ‘I do not want our stakes raised.”

HUDSON: “No, no, no. Not yours, just mine, digitally.”

CAMERON: “No! You are with me!” (laughs)

LAURA: “yes, but you are with us!”

HUDSON: “Okay. Okay. I will recycle it every three months.”

LAURA: “Eh, yeah.”

CAMERON: “(sighs)”

LAURA: “I am cool with that amount.”

CAMERON: “Okay. No. I have a counter offer. Pick three new ones that you have not used before. Every time you log into something and you feel the need to sign it, use them in rotation, so you’re not doing three StarDestroyer1 in a row, you’re doing StarDestroyer1, Ewok2, and Jettison5 or whatever, and rotate through those three so that there’s not a prolonged trail.”

LAURA: “Why do you even need a calling card if you are not trying to get the attention of a specific person?”

CAMERON: “I would think you would use it if you were trying to pick up elicit contracts for hacking jobs. You could list it on your resume? Do you have a resume?”

HUDSON: “That’s part of it, but it’s the fame. It’s all about the fame, the credibility, and the scene.”

CAMERON: “To get new jobs, or just to be cool?”

HUDSON: “Just to be cool.”

CAMERON: “Okay…” (laughs)

LAURA: “I mean, do you get free things for being cool?”

HUDSON: “You get… You get… You’re just cool. You’re just a cool guy. Everyone wants to be cool.”

CAMERON: “I think you’re cool anyway without getting us tracked by the Empire.”

HUDSON: “Well thank you, but not to everyone else. I just want to be known, to be heard.”

LAURA: ‘I mean, and having every Imperial know who you are, yeah. So maybe don’t leave the same calling card every single time.”

HUDSON: “Okay. So what I’m gonna do is I’ll have three different names, I’ll rotate them every three months. The names may be related so that they can kind of be tied together to one identity, like Huey, Dewey and Louie.”

LAURA: “No! Do not make the names related. They will track you easier.”

CAMERON: “You can pick three equally badass names that are not related to each other.”

HUDSON: “Alright.”

CAMERON: “If we’re doing that you can keep them longer than three months…”

HUDSON: “Ooh.”

CAMERON: “…but you would need to use one, then use the next, then use the next. If you hacked three times in a day you would use all three.”

HUDSON: ‘So it’s like a guild. I make my own guild of one person.”

CAMERON: “yes. You’re making your own club, but you are yourself.”

HUDSON: ‘Ooh. It’s not called a club.”

CAMERON: (laughing) “I’m sorry.

NICK: (laughs)

HUDSON: “I’m making that. Great. Okay. So, I could be PlanetAnnihilator2…”

NICK: (laughs)

LAURA: Well, you know PlanetAnnihilator1 is already taken.

HUDSON: “Alright. Alright. I’m gonna workshop the names a bit, but they’re just gonna be real cool. You’ll see them pop up later. Don’t worry.”

CAMERON: “Okay. well, I wrote down PlanetAnnihilator2.”

HUDSON: “Yeah, exactly. Do you have any suggestions?”

LAURA: “Ooh… xx_HardcoreGigoran_xx.”

(giggling)

HUDSON: “Yeah.”

LAURA: ‘No, three Xs.”

HUDSON: ‘CosmicBrownie~!’

NICK: (laughing) I don’t understand what you’re referencing.

HUDSON: No, that’s not a reference, that’s just a really bad name I came up with. CosmicBrownie would be the worst tag.

LAURA: Hudson just likes cosmic brownies.

CAMERON: I like it! If you’re going for cool, that ain’t gonna be it.

HUDSON: (laughs)

NICK: Alright. So, you wander your way through space and eventually you come out of hyperspace near Sentinel’s darkened, secret lair that’s floating in the middle of nowhere. Lights click on to the ship as you approach, and the station has changed very little in the day or so that you’ve been gone. You are led through the hallways that turn on as you walk through and turn back off as you go away, back to the same holo-theater where you were brought the first time. The protocol droid who served as your guide is waiting by the door. Sentinel is seated nearby. He looks very put together and calm.

“Well, glad to see you didn’t lose another one. That’s very good.”

LAURA: ‘Yeah. Can we stop doing things for Falx?”

CAMERON: ‘Oh. I thought you were gonna ask if we could stop bringing up the fact that we lost Sabos.”

LAURA: “Oh, I do not really care at all. Can we stop doing things for Falx? I mean, he kind of was trying to, I don’t know, frame us or use us as an alibi. I don’t know. He definitely murdered the governor. Also, I’m not too angry about that, because it does benefit me a bit, but he did take my binders.”

CAMERON: “See, but Xianna… The way that blackmailing works is that it’s not necessarily we’re just wanting to do something for him, it’s that he’s blackmailing you.”

LAURA: “I mean… Yeah.”

NICK: “I agree with Karma. It was not my decision really, but I have a feeling that based on some of the rumors I’ve heard, he won’t be much of a problem. He seems to have lost some of his influence.”

LAURA: (strained) “Okay, good.”

HUDSON: “Like all of his influence as a person, or…?”

NICK: “I’m not sure if he’s dead or not, but I did see that they are appointing a new governor to the Unroola Dawn region, so whatever happened to him he is no longer in power.”

LAURA: “None of us killed him, right?”

CAMERON: “I did not.”

HUDSON: ‘I didn’t.”

LAURA: “Okay. Just making sure.”

CAMERON: “I would have told y’all.”

NICK: “It’s a shame. He’s gotten a lot less helpful lately. If you do run into him again, know that I no longer consider myself in his debt. If you want to finish him off that’s fine with me.”

LAURA: “Got it.”

NICK: “With extreme prejudice, as they say. That’s a thing that people say.”

CAMERON: “yeah.”

NICK: “Okay.”

LAURA: “Sure.”

CAMERON: “I think we can manage that at this point.”

HUDSON: “We’re not in court.”

NICK: (laughs) “I was able to liquidate some assets to put together your fee. A lot of it’s tied up in military operations right now, but I was able to pull it out. What did I say it was, 15,000 Credits?”

CAMERON: You know, honestly Cameron doesn’t remember. (laughs)

NICK: I think it’s more than that.

LAURA: I think it was 20…

CAMERON: I feel like it was 25. One sec, let me see if I wrote it down!

HUDSON: Was it really—Oh, I guess people get mad when you’re like wrong about stuff on podcasts. I forgot.

CAMERON: Yeah, I didn’t write it down… Hmm.

HUDSON: (laughs) I was like, this isn’t a big deal, we’ll just be off by a couple thousand. I’m like, no, wait.

LAURA: (laughing) Turns out the people listening to these remember things. It was evenly dividable!

NICK: Oh yeah, it was!

CAMERON: It was 24. It was a weird number so that it would be three… yeah.

LAURA: Well, because it was divided, dividable by… divisible by three.

CAMERON: (giggles) Dividibidible.

LAURA: (smiling) Divisidible.

NICK: (garbled similar sounding word) Okay. So, he says…

CAMERON: Hold on. Let me get back to my page. (laughs)

LAURA: (musically) Nine, three, nine is divisible by three.

NICK: “What was it that I said, 15,000 Credits?” He smirks a little bit.

LAURA: “Um, no…”

CAMERON: “I believe it was 24.”

LAURA: “yes, 24.”

CAMERON: “Thousand, Credits, not just 24.”

NICK: “Twenty-four…”

CAMERON: “…thousand Credits.”

LAURA: “Yes.”

NICK: “…thousand Credits. Yes. Ah, I do recall that being a little more accurate. We’ll get that transfer started right away.” He gestures to the protocol droid, and the protocol droid takes a data spike and sticks it into a data pad and starts typing stuff in.

It brings the data pad over and says, “Excuse me,” and holds out the data pad for somebody to initiate a transfer, because a thing you can do in Star Wars is just touch stuff together and then money goes. That’s a thing that happens sometimes.

LAURA: Xianna’s like right there.

CAMERON: We do the weird phone thing where I touch my data pad to that data pad and we both tap it and it just does things weirdly.

NICK: Yeah. You verify the funds are transferred. The crew of the Afternoon Delight is 24,000 richer.

CAMERON: Woo!

HUDSON: “Divide that into three?”

LAURA: “Yes, that is the plan, Tink.”

NICK: “I don’t care who your treasurer is. Deal with the money as you will. I have more important things to worry about.”

LAURA: “And do you want to tell us why we are here again?”

NICK: “Well, I was planning on reaching out to you by com, but since you arrived back that means we’re a lot more secure. I can give you a lot more details. So, I managed actually to track down a fourth compatriot for you. CP over here calculates that with a fourth member your odds of success increase dramatically in the coming months.” The protocol droid does that little head bobble that protocol droids do. The chime raises a finger like it’s going to cut in but Sentinel just keeps talking over it. “Unfortunately it looks like someone else found your compatriot before I could. You’re going to have some competition on this one. You can find your quarry on the planet of Engibo 5 on the outer rim. It’s only a short hop from here. Unfortunately, it looks like you won’t be the first to arrive, but if CP’s calculations are correct you won’t be too far behind.”

LAURA: “What does any of that mean?”

NICK: “I found somebody to act as your firing supports per the actual large mission.”

LAURA: “yes?”

CAMERON: “Mm-hmm?”

NICK: “I need you to go get them.”

LAURA: “Okay but… Who are we going to just be behind, and… What?!”

CAMERON: “They have another offer?”

NICK: “Oh.”

LAURA: “Did they get arrested?”

NICK: “You’ll have to forgive me. I’ve been working in the shadows for a long time and I’ve really been doing the vague, not enough information, but I feel like you have proven that I need to be a little more forthcoming in information since I’ve already put it all on the table.”

CAMERON: “yes please.”

NICK: “I found you an assassin droid.”

CAMERON: “Ohh. Retrieval makes more sense now.”

NICK: “It’s a prototype assassin droid. They are extremely hard to find. It was made during the Clone Wars and were never mass produced. Unfortunately, Black Sun is also interested in it and they got the coordinates before we did.”

CAMERON: “Oh shit.”

LAURA: “Okieee. Cool.”

NICK: “I need you to go quickly. I think they’re sending an entire enforcer squadron, so that’s gonna be a problem.”

LAURA: “Okay, yes. We do not want to really get involved with them.”

CAMERON: “How many people would that be in that squadron?”

LAURA: “Ooh. Egh.”

NICK: ‘Probably between 10 and 20.”

CAMERON: “Oh great.”

LAURA: “They will send a good amount of people.”

NICK: “Black Sun, as they say in the outer rim, doesn’t mess around.”

LAURA: “They do NOT.”

CAMERON: “Oh, I am aware, having brought many of them in.” (laughs)

NICK: “Ooh, yeah, maybe don’t go announcing who you are. That may not go well.”

CAMERON: “I don’t normally do that…”

HUDSON: “I did a few jobs for Black Sun in the past.”

NICK: “How’d that go?”

HUDSON: “I mean, they never knew my real identity, so… It went alright.”

NICK: “But you did have a standard moniker you used so you could become more famous on the scene, right?”

CAMERON: “Oh my gosh. Not you too.”

LAURA: “This is not a thing.”

HUDSON: “Yes! Exactly! I was trying to explain this earlier.”

CAMERON: “Don’t encourage this…”

LAURA: “What is this nonsense?!”

NICK: “That’s how you get more cred. That’s how you’re cool and famous. Everybody knows that.”

LAURA: “But what happens when you steal from them? Then they know your actual moniker. When I stole drugs from Black Sun I did not use my real name.”

HUDSON: “No, no, no. You leave a note that says, in my case, “Prodigy was here, lul lul lul lul lul lul lul lul lul,” because that’s what you leave on the site.”

LAURA: “Oh, I mean, I did leave a note actually.”

HUDSON: “So yeah, that’s my note I leave, except it’s a message on their hacked website.”

LAURA: ‘I mean, I did leave a little flimsy note that said, “XOXO, Ella,” because that was the name I was using, and I left it in the box that they kept their drugs in. Heh.”

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: (exasperated) “Oh my gosh, you guys.”

NICK: “Anyway. This is all extremely interesting, but the only way you stand a chance of retrieving this droid on time is if you go right around now. They’re jumping from further, but they already started.”

LAURA: (reluctantly) “Okay…”

HUDSON: “Let’s head out!”

NICK: “Alright. Go, go, go.”

CAMERON: “Oookay.”

LAURA: “We go. Yes. We go, go, go. Got it.”

CAMERON: “Is this assassin droid activated currently? Are we going to have to convince the assassin droid to come with us, or is this a droid that is turned off that we can pick up and run off with?”

NICK: “So, it’s unclear.” He’s rolling with you. He’s actually in a hover wheelchair kind of situation. He’s rolling with you as you walk quickly, very West Wing style, down the corridor. “What we actually found, and it seems the information was sold to multiple parties simultaneously, is a production facility on Engibo 5. There should be at least one working, that was the guarantee, but I don’t know if it’s turned on, or in storage, or some assembly required. I’m not sure, but I don’t have time to find a trustworthy mercenary, and these droids are supposed to be top-notch, so it’s our best bet.”

LAURA: “Okay, so we will just wing it. Okie. Cool.”

CAMERON: “Alright. While we’re walking, I have a question on the Rancore Protocol.”

NICK: “Okay?”

CAMERON: “Tink plugged it into a droid and it kind of turned into a weird…

CAMERON & HUDSON: “Murder bot”

CAMERON: “…and um… What?!”

NICK: “Yeah. The Rancore Protocol, I sent you after it because I figured it would be a tool, but having heard that and some other rumors… It’s a very old program…”

CAMERON: “Mm-hmm?”

NICK: “A couple thousand years maybe. It’s possible that it’s a rudimentary AI, and that it could have been a little cranky. I’m not really sure what happened with a murder bot situation. That doesn’t sound right at all.”

(pause)

LAURA: “Okay, got it.”

CAMERON: “Okay, cool! Thanks.”

LAURA: “yeah, okay. No idea.”

CAMERON: “That’s… great.”

LAURA: ‘Okay. We go now. Bye!”

NICK: Okay. we get a cool slow-motion shot of everyone urgent jogging onto the ship, the ship takes off, and that’ll be the end of the episode. Da-naaa~!

HUDSON: Da-naaa~!

LAURA: Ba-naaa~!

CAMERON: (starts Super Mario Bros. theme)

LAURA: (joins in Super Mario Bros. theme)

## Outro

CAMERON: Thanks for listening to Tabletop Squadron. If you’ve enjoyed our show please consider logging into iTunes and giving us a five-star review. Five-star reviews will help new listeners to find the show and give the squad warm fuzzies when we read them.

Xianna’fan is played by Laura Penrod. She can be found on Twitter at @cheerio_buffet.

Tink is played by Hudson Jameson, and he can be found on Twitter at @hudsonjameson.

Karma Nailo is played by me, Cameron Robertson. You can find me on Twitter at @midnightmusic13.

Our game master is Nick Robertson, and you can find him on Twitter at @alias58.

Our intro song is Space Jam by Pablo Ribot.

Additional music by James Gunter.

Follow the podcast on Twitter and Instagram at @Tabletop_Squad. For real, we’re real people and we want to talk to anyone who listens to the show. Reach out! See you next time.

We have reached the final week of popsicles! Finishing us out are Karma’s tropical chia seed popsicles. These icy treats are relatively healthy and make a great summer snack for children or the adult criminals you think of as children. They have 2 types of fruit, are just barely sweetened, and are full of nutritious chia seeds.

3 popsicles decoratively layed out, 1 has a bite taken out of it.

This recipe uses only 5 ingredients! well, 6 if you count the pinch of salt, but that’s barely an ingredient. Coconut milk, sugar, mango, açai puree, and chia seeds. My grocery store had little packets of açai puree in the frozen fruit section, but if you can’t find it you can substitute it with an equal amount of red dragonfruit, raspberries, papaya, or whatever other tropical fruit you’d like.

Clockwise from top left: measuring cup with mango chunks, measuring cup with coconutmilk, measuring cup with acai puree, small metal whisk, tiny bowl with sugar, small bowl with chia seeds
The ingredients

Combine the sugar, a pinch of salt, and coconut milk.

Add 1/4 cup of the sweetened coconut milk to the mango and blend or process until smooth. Set aside.

Add 1/2 cup sweetened coconut milk to the açai puree and stir.

Left to right: measuring cup with blended mango coconut milk mix, measuring cup with coconut milk, tiny bowl with chia seeds, measuring cup with acai coconut milk mix, silicone popsicle mold
The mango has been blended and the coconut milk sweetened.

Add 1 tablespoon chia seeds to the sweetened coconut milk, 1 tablespoon chia seeds to the mango coconut mix, and 1 tablespoon chia seeds to the açai coconut mix. Let sit for 20 minutes. This will let the chia seeds absorb the liquid.

Foreground: R2-D2 kitchen timer.
Middleground: measuring cup with acai coconut milk, measuring cup with coconut milk
Background: silicone popsicle mold
Set your droid for 20 minutes.

Pour the mango mix evenly among the popsicle molds; mix should reach up 1/3 of the mold. Next, pour the sweetened coconut mix. Top with the açai coconut mix. I got 7 popsicles with our mold.

3 popsicles decoratively layed out
Look at those layers

Tropical Popsicles with Chia Seeds [makes 6-10 popsicles depending on the mold]

1 (13-14oz) can coconut milk
1-2 tablespoons sugar
Pinch salt
200g diced mango (about 1 cup), frozen or fresh
100g açai puree*
3 tablespoons chia seeds, divided use

Combine the sugar, a pinch of salt, and coconut milk.

Add 1/4 cup of the sweetened coconut milk to the mango and blend or process until smooth. Set aside.

Add 1/2 cup sweetened coconut milk to the açai puree and stir.

Add 1 tablespoon chia seeds to the sweetened coconut milk, 1 tablespoon chia seeds to the mango coconut mix, and 1 tablespoon chia seeds to the açai coconut mix. Let sit for 20 minutes.

Pour the mango mix evenly among the popsicle molds; mix should reach up 1/3 of the mold. Next, pour the sweetened coconut mix. Top with the açai coconut mix. Place sticks in the mold and place in the freezer for 4-6 hours.

*Note: açai puree can be substituted with an equal amount of red dragonfruit, raspberries, papaya, or other tropical fruit puree.

Word document download: Episode 17 There’s Been A Murder

PDF download: Episode 17 There’s Been A Murder

Read in browser:

Tabletop Squadron Transcript, Season 1 Episode 17:
There’s Been A Murder

Transcript by Tyler (Twitter: @Tyler_MoonSage)

## Intro

CAMERON: Hi everyone, and welcome to Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars: Edge of the Empire actual play podcast. I’m Cameron, your substitute introduction reader this episode because Nick went on a business trip without recording it. Every other Thursday, our story follows a thief, a bounty hunter, and a slicer as they explore the galaxy helping a mysterious benefactor and each other.

Hey y’all, you probably heard this update in the first bonus Jedi episode that went up last week, but just in case you missed that one, y’all unlocked our social goal! We reached 125 Twitter followers and we’ll be meeting our new blue Gungan friend, Web-Web Kebob, who by the way is a circus acrobat who loves Sabacc and making jewelry… just as soon as Nick can figure out how to put such a deep and fascinating character into the campaign. All of those marvelous traits were decided by listeners like you, which kinda feels like I’m doing a public broadcasting pledge drive announcement. Web-Web Kebob is brought to you by you, our listeners.

Anyway. We will be releasing more bonus Jedi episodes on off-weeks as well as our first ever blooper reel! Even though we’ve met our goal, come join the squad on Twitter at @Tabletop_Squad and talk to us about Star Wars. It’s one of our passions~

Okay, last housekeeping thing: These episodes were recorded LIVE AT GENCON. The squad made a pilgrimage up to Indianapolis and we brought our gear with us. The audio’s pretty clean, but you may notice we have a bit more of an echo than you’re used to. The room had different acoustics, and there wasn’t a ton that Nick could do about it. It’s pretty minor so hopefully it’s not that distracting.

Also, that wasn’t the last thing. (laughs) We had guests on the show! Drew and Aly from the Welcome to Warda podcast were with us in Episode 16 and they join us again this episode. Warda is one of our absolute favorite worlds and podcasts, and Aly and Drew are amazing performers and super cool people. You can find out more about Warda at welcometowarda.com or at @WelcomeToWarda on Twitter. Check it out.

Okay, now I’m actually done. Thank you for listening, and we hope you enjoy the episode.

##

NICK: Hello! Welcome to Tabletop Squadron, Episode 17, back again. We’re still live at GenCon. We’re gonna go around the table and introduce everybody, our two special guests who have managed to stay with us for more than a session—that’s very exciting—and then we’ll jump right into it. Start off with Hudson.

HUDSON: Hi. I’m Hudson, and I’m a Devaronian pizza boy. (laughter) I’m a Gigoran slicer, actually a Gigoran slicer. You may continue.

NICK: Great. You had me panicked for a second there. I was gonna have to change the plot. Coming up next we got Laura.

LAURA: I’m Laura, and I’m playing Sabos- Wait, no.

ALL: Aww…

LAURA: (laughs) No. I’m playing Xianna’fan, a Twi’lek smuggler, and everything’s gonna go great.

NICK: Yeah, everything’s fine~ Great.

LAURA: And I’m happy to be here.

NICK: Up next we’ve got Cameron.

CAMERON: (giggling) Hi. I’m Cameron. I am playing Karma Nailo, a Nautolan bounty hunter. I know my script, and which character I’m playing.

ALYSON: Yo.

DREW: Oh snap.

CAMERON: (smiling) So I’ma stick to it.

NICK: Shots fired.

HUDSON: I feel burned.

NICK: Yeah, you should. Wonderful, starting the team dynamic off strong.

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: Up next we’ve got Drew.

DREW: Hi! I’m Drew Mierzejewski, and I’m an actor and stage combatant, and writer, and creative in general out of Orlando. I do such things as the Warda—

ALYSON: TM, TM, TM.

DREW: –podcast, which comes out weekly on Wednesdays.

ALYSON: Oh yeah, it does, on Wednesdays.

DREW: Yeah, that’s me. I’m playing Jorus Kreel, a Human smuggler / Marshal for the outer rim.

NICK: Wonderful. Last but not least we have Aly.

ALYSON: Hi everybody. It’s Aly. I am Drew’s other half both legally and creatively~

NICK: Ooh.

DREW: And betterly.

(laughter)

ALYSON: Together we’ve created Warda which is an original fantasy podcast that is also an actual play, and we are also building a fiction library in that world, and we’re also building original RPG mechanics.

DREW: It’s like the Marvel MCU.

ALYSON: Yeah, it just keeps getting bigger.

DREW: Bigger and bigger.

ALYSON: It’s just getting bigger all the time. But yeah, that’s what we do.

NICK: Great! Welcometowarda.com and wherever podcasts are sold!

ALYSON & DREW: Yeah.

NICK: We love Warda, so you guys should definitely check it out.

LAURA: It’s great.

CAMERON: What character are you playing?

ALYSON: Oh yeah. I’m playing Imperial Inspector Sila Rowe. I feel like there’s a Frau Blücher moment where there’s lightning in the background.

(lightning crashing noises, whinnying, laughter)

NICK: Great! We’re gonna go ahead and jump right into it. When we last left off you were at a fancy party. Falx had invited the crew of the Afternoon Delight to protect him, because he was afraid someone was going to murder him at this party. Sila had seen several suspicious characters and was here pursuing a lead on a mysterious slicer who had been cracking Imperial systems. Jorus as busy trying to find some sort of a master thief with a seductive streak that he had heard from a friend of a friend may be at the party. The lights went out, shots were fired, and a regional governor is dead in the middle of the floor. We are going to jump right into it, but first a reminder: We are not going to reroll Destiny Points because we are still playing the same session, so we are currently standing at…

CAMERON: Four light side, three dark side.

NICK: We’ll have those sitting on standby, and here we go.

We’re gonna start with the camera aimed at that little stage that was in the back of the ballroom. Again, the ballroom has clear glass that looks down onto roiling lava pits below on the planet of Mustafar. The doors have all been closed, the crowd is panicking a little bit, and we see Regional Governor Falx looking kind of sweaty, a little panicked. You’ve never really actually seen him break like this. One of the stormtroopers that has been shot is draped over the podium, and he (grunts), thump-thump, tosses the body onto the ground and pounds on the podium to get everyone’s attention.

“No one is gonna leave this party until we get to the bottom of what happened. Stormtroopers have been called from orbit, but it will take some time for them to get here and they will maintain order, but before anyone is allowed to leave this murderer must face Imperial justice.” There’s a lot of harrumphing and tittering from everyone in the crowd.

With that, he nods to himself self-assuredly, steps back, and hops down off of the podium. You are all left to your devices to deal with this situation as you will.

LAURA: How long were the lights out?

NICK: About 15 seconds.

LAURA: Oh, so definitely enough time for hyped up Xianna to put her scanner goggles on, at least for the last few seconds?

NICK: Sure.

LAURA: To maybe see which direction the shots came from, or anything like that.

NICK: Yeah. What an interesting fact you have unearthed, if you make me a successful Perception check.

LAURA: Oh, I’ll try.

NICK: At a difficulty of hard, but I won’t add any black dice because you are wearing scanner goggles, but it’s like your ability to quickdraw night vision goggles.

LAURA: They let me see in dark/obscured conditions.

NICK: yeah, go figure.

LAURA: That is one threat.

NICK: One threat you say… and the counter goes up to- Well, no, there is no counter. We’re gonna say that the threat is that the elastic on the goggles actually snaps as you try to quickdraw it.

LAURA: Oh. Yeah, I was imagining that I’m just shaky enough, I get twisted up in them, and I like pull it the wrong way and it starts pulling on my actual headgear, and the straps twist up into the headgear, and I have to pull it out and one of the straps snaps.

NICK: Yeah. It snaps, and it also gets tangled up, so that when the lights come on one of the goggles was over your eyes so you get a sharp flash, which being hyper sensitive as you are right now having taken a bump of impact in a crowded area full of people and law enforcement officials, that was a good decision, that hurts, that is extremely uncomfortable. Until you get those repaired you’re gonna have to hold them up to your face. They’re not gonna be as effective.

LAURA: Got it. Into the pockets they go.

NICK: Yeah. What’s going on from our law enforcement officials?

ALYSON: As soon as it goes dark, Sila would have called for Whist. In all of the shouting and screaming and whatnot, she would have immediately called for Whist. Presumably, now that the lights are back up and this announcement has been made, she turns to him and says, “What just happened?”

NICK: “It appears that the lights were cut, marm.”

ALYSON: “Yes, and?”

NICK: “And there are multiple casualties on the floor. I count four stormtroopers.”

ALYSON: “Any civilians?”

NICK: “Well, if you haven’t spotted Governor Silpin with his new vibro-appendage I’m a little worried about your perception.”

ALYSON: “Thank you for that, Whist. Of course I’ve seen Silpin.”

NICK: “As far as I can tell, he’s a civilian.”

ALYSON: “That’s not what I meant by civilian, but thank you for your input.”

NICK: “Always, at your request.”

ALYSON: “I need a complete scan of the room, vital signs of everyone who’s extant from this incident, I want a readout on Governor Falx, and tell me where Tarstin Moon is.”

NICK: Ooh. Okay. Make me a Perception check, but I’m gonna give you two blues because you’re using your sensor droid to figure that out. It’s gonna be hard.

ALYSON: That’s Perception, you said?

NICK: Yep, Perception, which you are very, very good at. You need three purple dice.

CAMERON: That’s a big handful of dice.

ALYSON: That’s three successes and one advantage.

NICK: Wonderful. I’ll let you think about the advantage. Here’s what happens. We get a camera shot of directly behind Whist which does kind of a Flight of the Bumblebee thing. He swooshes around the room, and he swooshes around the room closer, and then he starts buzzing people’s heads. You get a lot of crowd noise and people ducking out of the way. He’s being pretty obtrusive which is weird for him. Then he starts going under tables, and after a little while he comes back to you. “Good news and bad news, marm.”

ALYSON: “Go on.”

NICK: “I’ve found Inspector Tarstin Moon.”

ALYSON: “And?”

NICK: “And his life signs might be what you would call negligible.”

ALYSON: “Take me to him.”

NICK: Alright. He floats at head height and leads you over to one of the large tables off to the side. Do you want to flip the table or do you want to duck under and look?

ALYSON: She’ll drop to a knee and look under the tablecloth first.

NICK: Okay. Whist lifts the tablecloth with one of his pincer hands for you so you can see. You see that Tarstin Moon is also dead. He is shoved under a table by the wall, and that a pool of blood is seeping, it’s starting to soak into the underside of the tablecloth. You probably would have found him eventually. You can make me a Knowledge check of your choice for what was the cause of death. That could be Inner Rim, Outer Rim…

CAMERON: Education.

NICK: Ooh, Education might be good if you have that. I would do Education. That sounds like CSI-ing stuff. This will be average, so that’s only two purple.

CAMERON: (laughs)

ALYSON: Five successes and two threats.

NICK: Great. I’m gonna keep those threats in my pocket for now. I know exactly what to do with them (grinning). Five successes… I think Sila was particularly talented in the Imperial Academy with cause of death and analysis. What about that class spoke to her and made her an expert in that field?

ALYSON: To her, it’s like being able to look at a painting and understand the iconography in the painting.

NICK: Ooh.

ALYSON: Like, she understands, if it was a Renaissance painting she could look at that painting and know those are cupids, they’re attached to arrows, but they also symbolize this; this is a pastoral scene which symbolizes that; this is this nymph, this is that god, blah, blah, blah. She can just sort of see it all as one picture, and that’s what a crime scene looks like to her.

NICK: Alright. You’re gonna gain some knowledge here that I’ll have to politely ask everyone not to metagame with, because this is going to be a pretty big deal. A couple of things: The wound was made by the same knife that you saw in Silpin. That’s pretty clear. It’s a vibro-stiletto, it makes a really round puncture but causes a lot more bleeding than you would expect for the size. You’ve seen it a million times. People like to do it a lot. Using the iconography of the way Tarstin was shoved under here so quickly and the way the blood was spreading, he was the one that was stabbed first. He was stabbed more expertly as if someone made sure that he was going to go down and stay down, which is also why the blood is a little less, and he was shoved under the table very quickly as if someone was just trying to buy some time. With all that going on, you’re 100% sure that he was the primary target. The other one was to raise a stir and distract people.

ALYSON: Mm-hmm. “Whist.”

NICK: “Yes, marm?”

ALYSON: He had previously been floating above the room, and there wasn’t a lot of movement in the room at that point. People were milling about, but it wasn’t like everyone was taking an Austenian turn around the room. People were kind of stationed places?

NICK: Mm-hmm.

ALYSON: What she wants from him is a little holo readout of what the bird’s eye view of that room looked like before the lights went out, or as close to that time as he has, because now people have moved.

NICK: Sure. I will give you at the time of the lights going out if you flip me a dark side point to give you that information.

ALYSON: Okay. Those advantages I’m sitting on…

NICK: You don’t have to spend those for that. You can keep those. So, Whist is able to give you two snapshots. Whist gives you 30 seconds before the lights go out, and you see that there is a purple Twi’lek that was near him as though they had a conversation. The Twi’lek looks nervous, and Tarstin looks unsettled during all that. As the lights are going out, the scene has shifted quite a bit as if there was a lot of movement right away. Tarstin was very near to this table, and Silpin, the regional governor with the cool mutton chops was standing right where his body dropped. You see a couple other things. you see that Regional Governor Falx was booking it. He was moving very quickly, and up until that point he had been a stately ship.

ALYSON: Moving slowly? Yeah.

NICK: Yeah, moving at the proper pace. With this one he was moving quick, surprisingly fast, almost as if it was someone who takes expeditions into the jungle for fun and knows how to move. He was moving towards the half of the room that had Tarstin in it. You also notice that a couple of Imperial officers that you don’t recognize were going for blasters at their hips as the light was going out, and that someone was messing with the lights, the Devaronian was messing with the lights, and that the two Rodians are doing something with their ears. Besides that, everyone else is very stationary, talking, posing at a party, but there’s a lot of movement that happened all at that point.

ALYSON: Okay. She stands up and she looks around. Now that the room has completely shifted into chaos, she’s looking for these people; she’s looking for the purple Twi’lek, she’s looking for the Devaronian and the Rodians, she’s looking for the officers that were reaching for their holsters.

NICK: Okay. I’ll give you where they are, and then we’ll jump to somebody else. The two officers are leaning up against the wall by the door that Jorus came in originally, the side exit. It looks like they’re securing the exit, kind of, but they don’t really look like they’re on guard duty. Their holsters aren’t latched, so they’re unlatched, and they’re looking pretty nonchalant, but you also notice most people with weapons have them kind of handy at this point.

ALYSON: Got it.

NICK: The Devaronian is in the corner losing his mind. He is sweating. He’s super nervous. The Rodians, it’s really hard to read a Rodian face because in Star Wars their faces are made of rubber, very deadpan, not really gesturing much, look very Zen-like. Falx is in the middle of the crowd talking to people. You see some members of the crowd he’s calming down, other ones you see him talk to them and they get more nervous, he’s like playing puppet master here with a lot of different emotions.

With that, Jorus, you have witnessed a murder, a surprisingly familiar one probably of a knife in the back. What is your response?

ALYSON: That old chestnut. That old space chestnut.

CAMERON: Yup.

DREW: So, the lights go out, and Jorus goes, “Oh kriff…”

NICK: (laughs)

DREW: He hears the blaster fire, but he doesn’t move a muscle. He just stands there, and all we can see is the light of his felusian cigarette light up his face as he takes a deep drag on it. When the lights come back on he goes, “(exhales) I promised I wouldn’t do this again.”

NICK: (laughs)

DREW: He immediately walks over. I imagine that people are freaking out and stuff, what’s-his-bucket goes over to calm people down, so the first thing that Jorus does is he goes and he inspects the body.

NICK: Okay.

DREW: Vibro-blade to the back, pretty standard, no imagination. I understand. What do I roll to see what I get from this body?

NICK: You could hit me with a Knowledge: Underworld. You could hit me with a Perception. I would say one of the Knowledge checks would give you more about the murder weapon, Perception would give you more about the way the body has fallen, maybe the situation going on with that.

DREW: I will go with the Perception then. That’s gonna be two yellows and a green?

CAMERON: Yes. You have three Cunning.

NICK: With your background, I’d say this is an average check. Like you said, it’s that old chestnut.

DREW: Two purples… and I have three advantages. Can I use a blue?

NICK: You can have two blues if you want to burn all of them.

DREW: I’ll get two of them. The advantages on this are the fact that one, it’s this old chestnut, and two, the vibro-knife is a knife that I’m familiar with. It’s the brand and style that’s used on the outer rim.

NICK: Yeah. For sure.

DREW: So, it’s three successes, and five advantages.

NICK: Ohh…

ALYSON: Ooh…

CAMERON: (laughs) The good roll.

NICK: So, it turns out that our Imperial Investigators are very good at investigating things.

ALYSON: Weird!

DREW: It’s like it’s our job!

(laughter)

LAURA: What is it like as the listeners to hear characters who are competent?

NICK: (laughs) So, a couple of things: The way the body fell, this was a surprisingly expert stab, just once. Normally you see some nicking or some hesitation, just straight in. it went into a lung, which is why you didn’t hear any masculine screaming, and also why there’s as much blood as there is. Like you said earlier, some of your advantages were generated by knowing what the blade was, which means I get to tell you about that too. It is a Corellian vibro-stiletto.

DREW: Aw man.

NICK: Yeah.

DREW: And I pull out my Corellian vibro-stiletto, (laughter) just to make sure it’s still there. Yeah, it’s still there. Okay.

NICK: Yeah. There is a very noted foundry, bounty hunters really like to use them. Also, the aristocracy tends to use them, they like to use them as letter openers, but you have seen this done in succession-type shenanigans in the past. There was almost no struggle, but the way the body landed it’s like he was turning to try and look behind him and still got it in the back and dropped like a sack of potatoes.

CAMERON: Space potatoes.

NICK: Space-tatoes.

ALYSON: Spatoes.

CAMERON: yeah, spatoes.

NICK: Spatoes, that’s much better. (laughs)

DREW: Interesting. Interesting.

ALYSON: I’m a published author, so…

NICK: Yeah, you know.

DREW: I reach in and I pull out a handkerchief and I wrap it around the end of the blade, and I pull out the blade.

NICK: So, now that the vibro-knife is turned off… Ooh, another thing. Vibro-blades make a really high-pitch whining noise like a dentist drill when they’re turned on. These don’t. They are silent. How handy, for stabbing people.

DREW: Hmm.

NICK: This one, since it is off, makes a really gross ‘shplort’  noise as it pulls out.

DREW: I imagine it looks like- Have you seen those knives that are corkscrewed?

NICK: Yeah! (others ooh and groan) That’s how it is now. That’s way better. (laughs)

DREW: Yeah. It’s a corkscrewed blade that also vibrates, which is terrifying. Okay…

NICK: Oh, it’s like an immersion blender in people’s insides, it’s not good.

DREW: Oh yeah. So, I pull it out and I look at the length of the blade knowing the depth of the human body. I’m like, ‘uh, that’s lungs, that’s heart, and that’s why he fell so quick. Alright.’ I don’t care for the rug, I don’t care for any of this, so I just flip him over and I check his pockets.

NICK: Ooh.

DREW: I loot the body~

ALYSON: Is anyone coming to like make sure he’s allowed to do that?

(laughter)

LAURA: We’re not!

HUDSON: We don’t care.

NICK: I think the people who would’ve been most concerned about it were the stormtroopers who are dead, and Tarstin who is also dead, and you are elsewise already under a table.

ALYSON: That’s right.

DREW: I feel like some people would come over, like ‘excuse me,’ and I would flash my badge with my hulled-out blaster. “Don’t worry, I got this.”

CAMERON: (feigned fawning) ‘Ooh! He’s a marshal~!’

ALYSON: (feigned fawning) ‘Oh! A marshal~!’

CAMERON: (feigned fawning) ‘Wow~!’

DREW: “… Ma’am.”

(laughter)

LAURA: Xianna’s like spinning around trying to figure out her googles like “Woo! A marshal~”

(giggling)

ALYSON: There’s like a montage of everyone going ‘ a marshal?’

LAURA & CAMERON: (oohing and awing)

NICK: So, you are looting his pockets. In his pockets you find some very nice… I think he has some snuff. I think he has a pouch of very expensive snuff in a box. Do you want to open that box up?

DREW: Oh yeah.

NICK: I would imagine so. You find some very small gemstones in it, which is interesting. You also find a cred-stick, some—

DREW: I’m taking that.

NICK: –yeah, some keys to his speeder.

DREW: I’m taking those too. (laughs)

NICK: No weapons, which is a little surprisingly, and then a note, a perfumed letter that’s been folded and refolded several times.

DREW: Is there any identification on him?

NICK: On him? So he has the Imperial bars, those little boxes and things that mark him as a governor which is… eh, they’re green. You never see that in the movies, so they’re green boxes to show that it’s a civilian position, and he has a data spike. It’s kind of like a USB plug that he could use to key into things.

DREW: Yeah. I take those as well.

NICK: Yeah. Great. No one’s gonna think that’s weird. That’s fine.

DREW: Yeah. (laughs)

NICK: You’ve thoroughly intimidated most of the people who would have something to say about it, or they’re otherwise involved. I think Falx turns from his crowd management and sees what you’re doing, and you see him flinch a little, and then he—

DREW: Oh. He gets the eye. He gets the Jorus Kreel, like he goes to move and Jorus watches him, and there’s this moment, that complete Western like (whip crack noise) to the eyes, to this noise, and the slight twitch.

(laughter)

NICK: Falx raises his finger, and he opens his mouth. He’s about 20 yards from you. “Yeah…” He turns around and goes back to what he was doing and kind of shakes himself out a little bit, leaves you to what you’re doing. That’s what you mostly find there.

DREW: Cool, cool, cool. So, I have his cred-stick, his keys, I have his data spike, his code cylinders, snuff box with gems which is interesting… Have I missed anything, or is that all of it?

CAMERON: Perfumed note.

DREW: Ah, the perfumed note.

NICK: Yeah.

DREW: Which I obviously open and read, out loud.

NICK: Oh boy!

CAMERON: (laughs)

ALYSON: To yourself, like (mumbles)?

DREW: ‘My dearest love…’ What is the date on this?!

(laughter)

NICK: This is from, gosh, about a month and a half ago.

DREW: Interesting. This is on paper?

NICK: Yeah, well flimsy in Star Wars, but yeah.

DREW: it’s on flimsy, and from a month ago? Is it well folded, and read, and folded and read, and folded and read?

NICK: Oh yeah. Yeah.

DREW: … What’s his first name again?

NICK: Cornelius. It’s gotta be Cornelius.

DREW: “Cornelius… It seems that we have come to an impasse,” and I’m reading this out loud. (laughter) “It appears we have come to an impasse. My heart is no longer my own. Though you were false to me, know that I was also false to you.”

(giggling)

NICK: At this point, I think a lot of the gowned women are starting to drift over, like ‘oh, interesting.’

DREW: As they come around, Jorus stands up a little bit more. (louder) “For we had but a brief season where we were together, and our lives were as one, but no longer for I have found another. Though she found solace in your arms she has found more solace in mine, and we have… Oh my. Uh…” (laughter) “We have burned with the suns of Tatooine, that we might be together is my only wish and hope. I can no longer find in my heart that you make it thump-thump much like she makes mine. For this Cornelius, I say onto you, farewell. Do not look for me, do not weep for me, for I am happy. Signed, your loved wife, Mazelda.”

NICK: Xianna, I think you overhear that letter.

LAURA: (laughing) Oh, I absolutely do. When he pulls the note, I smell the perfume off the note, and I do that complete Urkel, ‘Did I do that?’ (laughs) Then he starts reading it and she’s like, ‘Oh yes, that was me~ I’m…’ and she starts scanning the room, picks out Karma, and starts putting her hands in the air, like ‘uh, Karma! Karma! Um. Yes.’ And starts pushing her way through the crowd over to Karma and goes, “Okay. So, Karma…”

CAMERON: “Yes?”

LAURA: “Um, uh, oh… Heh. I forgot why I came over here. Um…”

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: “Oh! Did you do any of that, by the way?”

CAMERON: “No…”

LAURA: “Okay. Just checking. I figured it was not Tink, and almost certain it was not me…”

CAMERON: (laughing) “I really hope it wasn’t.”

LAURA: “I mean, I do not have a knife on me. I do have a gun. But, oh, there might be some issues. Haha!”

CAMERON: (laughing) “Uh-huh? Why did you come over here?”

LAURA: “Okay, so issue one: Oh wait, no… Wait, no, yes. Issue.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: “So… I did talk to a man at the bar about drugs a little bit. He did tell the stormtroopers not to let us leave the party…”

CAMERON: “Okay?”

LAURA: “But- Ohh. Oh, but wait, he is dead, and some of the stormtroopers are dead… and no one is allowed to leave anyway, so that might not be an issue to begin with. Oh, but Silpin was definitely carrying a note that his wife, ex-wife, had written to him that may implicate me in the breakdown of their marriage.”

CAMERON: Karma’s just been staring at Xianna, kind of open-mouthed, as she meanders her way through sharing this information. She’s been twirling one of her head tails around her finger. “O-Okay… So, Silpin’s wife left him for you?”

LAURA: “Yes.”

CAMERON: “Have you seen her since that?”

LAURA: “(laughs) Oh, no! I was seducing her in order to steal from her. You know, like I do.”

CAMERON: “I forgot. Did you get arrested that time, or did you make a getaway that time?”

NICK: You didn’t get arrested.

LAURA: “Oh, no, I did not get arrested.”

CAMERON: “Oh, okay.”

LAURA: “Not that time, at least.”

CAMERON: “Okay. So…”

LAURA: “I mean, I have been arrested a few times so I am most likely in some system somewhere…”

CAMERON: “We checked that. You’re definitely in the system, but not for that one. Okay. Interesting.”

LAURA: “And I mean, Silpin is dead now, so…”

CAMERON: “Yeah, so that’s less competition, I guess.”

LAURA: “Realistically, no one knows necessarily that I am the person being referred to in the note… except Falx.”

NICK: I think we get a cut- Would it be safe to say, Jorus, that you were performing this note to see if a reaction happened from people?

DREW: Oh definitely, yeah.

NICK: I think it would be safe to say we get a cut of the (whip crack noise) Western thing of Jorus’s eyes again watching Xianna go ‘… Karmaaa!’  and like run across the room.

(laughter)

LAURA: ‘Space mom~!’

DREW: He goes, “That’s what I thought.”

NICK: (smiling) Okay. Continue.

ALYSON: Perfect.

DREW: He also puts the note out and one of the ladies takes the note, a bunch of the ladies are waiting to read it, some of the gentlemen too, because they’re around there trying to read it closer.

NICK: You hear one of them go, “Ooh, he really censored that.”

(laughter)

DREW: “Yes. Yes I did… Look at the back.” There’s this shot of Jorus over here to the left, to the right there’s a gaggle, and you hear a flip and a gasp.

(laughter)

NICK: Yeah.

DREW: But Jorus does start making his way through the crowd towards the purple Twi’lek. He does take out a little notebook, and in it he’s got “Red ?, Yellow ?, Green X, Purple… Circle, circle, circle.” (laughter) That’s what he’s on his way to do.

NICK: Great. Karma, is there anything specific you wanted to be working on right now? You probably have about two minutes before he gets across.

CAMERON: Well, so I’d been following Falx when the lights went out. It was 15 seconds you said that the lights were out, but was there a significant jump once he started moving faster and I started chasing him where when the lights came back on he was in a drastically different spot than I was expecting him to be in?

NICK: Yes. He was headed towards the middle of the room, but when the lights came back on he was much closer to the stage, so it’s like he ended up about 45 degrees off of where you would have expected him to be, like he had changed direction when it was dark.

CAMERON: Okay.

NICK: There was gunfire. Obviously he must have taken cover.

CAMERON: Yeah, and continued moving, so that you’re more likely to get shot.

NICK: Yeah.

CAMERON: Yeah.

NICK: Hmm. Maybe. I don’t know if that’s how guns work.

CAMERON: (smiling) I think it is.

NICK: Okay great.

CAMERON: That’s how Star Wars guns work.

NICK: Sure. Absolutely.

CAMERON: Well, if they’re trying to hit you… (laughs)

NICK: Uh-huh. Yeah, for sure.

CAMERON: Yeah. Okay, so when Xianna ran over I had been watching Falx making rounds. He didn’t end up dead and he was concerned he was gonna die, so I’m watching him to see what reactions other people are giving him for if potentially he was supposed to be one of the targets that died. Since I’m doing that, I want to roll a Perception check and see if I see Jorus mark Xianna and start coming after her.

NICK: Ooh. Yeah, I think Perception is probably the way to go. We’re getting tangled webs now. I think you’re doing this Perception as Xianna is freaking out a little bit and kind of rambling. You’re listening with one ear, and on the other—Ooh. Do we get a (whip crack noise) to Karma?

DREW: (laughs)

CAMERON: Yes. (laughs)

NICK: (laughing) This is the theme of this episode now, just the tie-dye.

CAMERON: (hums Western tune)

NICK: Yeah. So, game recognize game, I guess.

CAMERON: Alright. What’s the difficulty on that Perception check?

NICK: Would you say you’re trying to be subtle at all, Jorus?

DREW: Oh, Jorus is not a subtle man.

NICK: This would be easy.

DREW: He’s making a B-line. He’s like, “Pardon me. Excuse me. I need to be over there. Excuse me.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: This is the walk down the street in Tombstone with the coat flapping situation.

CAMERON: Alright. (laughs) Holy shit.

ALYSON: What?!

DREW: Wow

LAURA: Whoa.

CAMERON: Okay. I got three successes and two triumphs.

NICK: Ooh. Okay…

LAURA: She knows the day he was born… the color of his mother’s eyes…

CAMERON: (giggles)

NICK: So, let me make a suggestion for these triumphs. Karma has a storied history as an experienced bounty hunter. Do you just know Jorus?

CAMERON: Yes!

DREW: Oh… Do I know you? I definitely know you.

CAMERON: (laughs) Probably.

DREW: I used to be a bounty hunter in my young days.

CAMERON: Then yes.

LAURA: Ooh! I imagine you’re facing Xianna so you’re seeing the back, and then she kind of turns a little bit and you see the full face, and that’s when you do the little (whip crack)  noise and you realize you know each other.

NICK: This IS a triumph, so it’s a good thing for you, so let that shape y’all’s relationship. Here’s what I wanna do. I want Karma—I’m taking the reins a little bit, but if you want to change your mind let me know.

CAMERON: That’s fine.

NICK: I want Karma to intercept Jorus because she recognizes this walk, and she puts things together very quickly, and I want y’all to talk out what’s going on a little bit. Before that, I’m gonna let y’all think about it a little bit… I wanna jump to Tink, because Tink has been doing stuff over in the background this whole time.

CAMERON: Okay. You said you were like 35?

DREW: yeah. I’m like 35, 36.

CAMERON: Okay, so we’re about the same age.

NICK: So you probably started bounty hunting around the same time.

CAMERON: Around the same time. Alright.

NICK: So, Tink, a lot of stuff has happened. There’s a droid that is not even trying to be sneaky a little bit, and there are some computer panels on the walls and some security systems, and there are a lot of suspicious, angry people. What would you like to do?

HUDSON: So… Where’s Whist?

NICK: Whist is… Ooh. I think Whist is currently hovering about five meters from Sila, kind of back behind her unobtrusively, and he is about head level. His comfort zone of floating is at like human height so that he can relate to people and things. He doesn’t get to very often, but he likes to.

HUDSON: I notice the droid and I think about it, and just think… I could just nab that, but it is audible, so it would notice and put out an alarm, so I’m not gonna do that. I look around. I see computer panels, you said?

NICK: Mm-hmm.

HUDSON: Alright. I walk towards the computer panels. Do I see anyone guarding them?

NICK: Actually, interestingly enough, you see a Rodian who is actually wearing light battle armor, kind of like a pilot suit and has a blaster, and he’s leaning against the wall near the light panel. He doesn’t necessarily look like ‘don’t come over here,’ but there’s a dude with a gun standing by it.

HUDSON: Alright. I walk over and say hi to the Rodian.

NICK: He looks at you and kind of tilts his head a little bit. (oddly): “Hi.”

HUDSON: “All this that just happened, you know anything about it?”

NICK: “I don’t not know anything about this.”

HUDSON: Alright. Do I kinda like check to see—

(laughter)

NICK: Yeah!

HUDSON: Alright. Perception?

NICK: Yeah, perception would work, or Charm if you wanna just try and be friendly with this poor pilot. Why are all my NPCs a mess?

HUDSON: What’s the difficulty?

NICK: Easy. He’s not supposed to be talking to people. I did not cast him with speaking lines.

HUDSON: Ooh. Okay. That is one threat and one success.

NICK: Okay. You’re being very friendly and everyone else at this Imperial gathering has been really nasty, so it’s kind of like hanging out somewhere where no one speaks the same language as you and finally finding someone who speaks your language. “Oh gosh, I’m so glad to see you. I don’t know a lot about this. I was just hired to fly some people here.”

HUDSON: “Well friend, what if I said I understand you and I know what’s going on?”

NICK: “I would love an explanation. I was promised no one was gonna get hurt, and here we are, and I can’t leave.”

HUDSON: “Oh… Really? So this means you are involved.”

NICK: “I didn’t expect to be involved, uh, although I guess thinking about it bringing all these rough and tumble characters to an Imperial gala was not the best idea. They just said go to Mustafar. Mustafar is a mining planet. It’s where these kind of people hang out. Why were there so many Imperials?”

HUDSON: ‘Listen. You can calm down. I just need to do some checks, so just get out of my way real quick,” and I try to move him out of the way to get to the computer system.

NICK: Do you just like shoulder bump him?

HUDSON: Lightly, not like super aggressively.

NICK: Okay. he bumps out of the way. “Oh… Um, okay…” and walks off.

(laughter)

HUDSON: Wow. This was a lot easier than I thought it was gonna be to get the NPC out of there.

NICK: Yeah. He doesn’t wanna be here.

HUDSON: Okay. I go to the computer. Does it have security cameras that are dark vision?

NICK: No it doesn’t. You see two things. You see a security feed. These are industrial security cameras. They do snapshots every 15 seconds, and they are just straight color, so it’s not going to be able to see in the dark. Next to that panel you see the light controls, and there’s a data spike jammed into it.

HUDSON: Alright. I pull out the data spike.

NICK: Alright. You have a data spike.

HUDSON: I inspect it.

NICK: Alright. I’m gonna need a slicing check for finding out something about this here data spike.

HUDSON: By slicing you mean—

CAMERON: Computers.

NICK: Computers check! Close enough. Eh, whatever, it’s just rules.

HUDSON: What difficulty?

NICK: Average.

HUDSON: Okay, so I have… Wait, those cancel… Alright, carry the two…

CAMERON: (laughs)

HUDSON: I have one success and four advantages.

NICK: Okay, so be thinking about those advantages. It is a pre-loaded program that will cut the lights for about 15 seconds. It’s one of those auto-run ones that you jam it in there and it’s gonna happen. It’s a nice program. It is a traceless program. Just to use some of your advantages for you, it is extremely sloppy that someone wouldn’t have pulled the spike out afterwards. If I can spend a few more of your advantages…

HUDSON: Sure.

NICK: …you notice that Devaronian from earlier that’s been freaking out keeps looking at you, and when you pull out the spike you hear him go “aw kriff,” and then he just starts rocking in place. He’s having a little bit of a breakdown here.

HUDSON: I look over and see where Karma is.

NICK: Okay. I guess we’re jumping back to them now.

HUDSON: Yeah.

NICK: You see the marshal who you probably noticed before because he was making a show of himself, and he and Karma are about four meters away from each other walking straight at each other very purposefully. We’ll jump to them.

CAMERON: Okay. When I see him, I turn slightly to Xianna and say under my breath “Xianna, you’ve been made. Move.” And I like push her into the crowd and start walking towards him. (laughs)

LAURA: “What? What?! Okie. I am going to go find Sabos and Tink. Wait. No. Just Tink.”

NICK: (groans)

CAMERON: (laughing) Karma looks crestfallen for a second and then continues walking towards Jorus.

DREW: So, as the Twi’lek moves Jorus tracks on the Twi’lek, so the eyes don’t meet Karma exactly until Karma is almost right in his field of vision, and she gets so close so suddenly that he reaches for his blaster… but then sees Karma and goes, “Well, kriff. Karma? That you?”

CAMERON: (cheerfully) “Yes! Hi!”

DREW: (enthusiastically) “Karma~!”

CAMERON: (laughs) They hug it out.

DREW: And they hug—Yeah. This big hug.

(laughter)

CAMERON: “What are you doing here?”

DREW: “Oh, you know, just working.”

CAMERON: “Same here. I’m not… I got hired to help not get one of the people who didn’t die killed, so I guess I did that good.”

DREW: “Well, well done, well done.”

CAMERON: “Yeah.”

DREW: “Well done. I’m here to just, you know, pick up somebody.”

CAMERON: (smiley) “Yeah. That makes sense. What have you been up to?!”

DREW: “Aw, you know, this, that and the other, a couple of scrapes but nothing too big. I went legit in the end.”

CAMERON: “(gasps) Nice!”

DREW: “Yeah, yeah, you know, benefits. Dental. And health.”

CAMERON: “Yup, that is helpful.”

DREW: “Yeah. It’s very nice, very nice to have.”

CAMERON: “Yeah. My boys are still on my parents’, because that was just way easier.”

DREW: “Oh yeah. Always good. It’s always good to do that. Yeah. I got married!”

CAMERON: “Oh! Congratulations!”

DREW: “Thank you! Thank you very much.”

CAMERON: “Yeah!”

DREW: “Yeah, it’s been nice, it’s been nice.”

CAMERON: “That’s great!”

DREW: “Yeah. Uh, hey! Hey, you wanna help me out?”

CAMERON: (laughs) “Sure!”

DREW: “Yeah?!”

CAMERON: “Yeah!”

DREW: “Okay! So there’s a purple Twi’lek, alright?”

(laughter)

CAMERON: “Yeah?”

DREW: “Yea. So there’s this purple Twi’lek, alright?”

CAMERON: “Uh-huh.”

DREW: ‘Now, I’m not entirely sure yet, but she might be a thief of some kind, and I’m supposed to track her down and bring her in for a couple of things. Now, it might be… where did she go… that one, there. So, if you wanna help me, the reward, for old times’ sake we’ll go 50/50.”

CAMERON: “Okay.”

DREW: “Alright?”

CAMERON: “Alright.”

DREW: “Alright”

CAMERON: “Do you want me to go chat her up, or…?”

DREW: “Yeah! Yeah.”

CAMERON: “You kind of have an aura going where like, I was seeing that you were getting a lot of attention as I was walking over here, so I may be a little bit more under the radar. Yeah?”

DREW: “Oh. Do you wanna pull a Corellian Shuffle? You wanna pull one of those?”

CAMERON: “Definitely. Yes. Let’s do that.”

DREW: “Alright. Let’s do one of those. Alright. You go chat her up, I’ll loop around. Alright. Here we go.”

CAMERON: “Alright. Okay!”

LAURA: So… Xianna would’ve been making her way towards Tink, maybe not all the way there by the time Karma catches back up with her.

CAMERON: “Hey~”

LAURA: “Oh. Yes?”

CAMERON: (tone drops) “You’ve definitely been made.”

(laughter)

LAURA: “I mean, yes, I am the only purple Twi’lek, so…”

CAMERON: “Uh-huh, yeah, and he’s after you. He knows you’re a thief. He’s a very good bounty hunter.” (laughs)

LAURA: “Yes. Yes. Uh-huh. Okie. Um, so, problem, we can’t leave. What do you want me to do about that?”

CAMERON: “Uh, try and hide somewhere. Go to the bathroom and then just do something.”

LAURA: “I am a Twi’lek. What am I supposed to… I’ll just stand behind Tink.”

CAMERON: “Find a purple plant to blend in with. I don’t know.” (laughs)

ALYSON: (laughs) Oh my gosh.

CAMERON: “But I’m chatting you up right now, just know that.”

NICK: So, Sila, you’ve probably solved the mystery by now. What are you working on with the information that you have?

ALYSON: So, she studied the body of Tarstin Moon, she studied the readouts that Whist gave her, she stood up again and scanned the room herself, she’s got several options running in her head as possibilities. I would like to say with the advantages that I’ve stockpiled that she saw Tink go to the lighting panel…

NICK: Absolutely.

ALYSON: She saw this yuppie search the other body—

DREW: I beg your pardon.

(laughter)

ALYSON: –and ruin, RUIN that crime scene that she didn’t even get to look at in its entirety.

DREW: Don’t worry, I took care of it.

ALYSON: And she also saw the purple Twi’lek flit over there, and then flit back over there, and then now she can see the purple Twi’lek talking to someone else.

NICK: Mm-hmm.

ALYSON: She’s seeing these pieces starting to come together.

NICK: Mind palace.

ALYSON: yes, but one of the things that Inspector Sila Rowe really likes about solving these things is that there are so many possibilities, and she doesn’t like to spoil it for herself by flipping to the end of the book, so she likes to let them fall… like, she likes to let the moment die on its own before she goes ‘this is what happened.’

NICK: Ooh.

ALYSON: I think what she does is she stands up and says, “Whist.”

NICK: “Yes, marm?”

ALYSON: “I want a readout on Regional Governor Falx.”

NICK: “A new one?”

ALYSON: “Yes, an updated one, and compare it and contrast it to the last three.”

NICK: “By your command,” and he goes up high and does one straight down so it’s a lot less obtrusive. Are you looking for like body chemistry?

ALYSON: Yeah, and I wanna know what he’s done in this room in the last bit. He’s definitely been looking around and keeping an eye out, tapping his foot waiting for the stormtroopers to get there, but I’m assuming he doesn’t know I’m in the room.

NICK: No. I don’t think he’s noticed, or he may have marked you as someone he wasn’t expecting but he didn’t process all the way. He’s got a lot of plates in the air right now and you definitely use that to your advantage.

ALYSON: Mm-hmm. Cool.

NICK: Yeah. Make me a Perception check. This one’s gonna be hard, but you can have those two blues again because you’re using Whist. What a useful item I have created.

CAMERON: (laughs) How convenient.

NICK: So that’s three purples? Hard, yeah.

ALYSON: That’s two advantages and a triumph.

NICK: The way that’s gonna work is… Whist is unable to really get a read on what Falx’s deal is. Whist went for a pretty high depth scan trying to check footprint patterns and track his way through the room and what he was doing, and you have been experimenting with a really high level algorithm that can kind of calculate motive that way. It can’t handle this many people in the room, it’s not done yet, but with that triumph something else really useful and good can happen. I’m gonna leave that up to you. You can basically pull another piece of this puzzle in incidentally.

ALYSON:  Whist, I want you to make yourself useful to the Gigoran.”

NICK: “Interesting gambit, marm. Did you have anything particular in mind?”

ALYSON: ‘Just be useful, and keep me posted.”

NICK: “Yes marm, by your command,” and he descends down from the ceiling where he was scanning. You know there is a particular head swivel thing that he starts to do when he’s frustrated and his algorithms aren’t working. Tink, you feel the telltale feeling of a droid setting down nearby on a repulser. “Hello, my name is Whist. I couldn’t help but see that you’re trying to do some computer technician work. I happen to be particularly suited to that type of work. How can I help?”

HUDSON: “Oh, I don’t need any help. Thank you.”

NICK: “Oh, no, I must insist. I am programmed to be helpful.”

HUDSON: I look at it and just kind of squint my eyes a little bit, very suspiciously.

NICK: This is obviously an Imperial droid.

HUDSON: Yes. Am I near a hallway?

(laughter)

NICK: Yeah. I think the light panels are near an offshoot that go to the bathrooms, which people haven’t really been using.

HUDSON: I look left, and look right, and regardless of what I see I grab Whist and run to the hallway.

(laughter)

NICK: I won’t even make you roll for that. I like that a lot. So, yeah, you just straight pull him into the hallway.

DREW: ‘Am I being helpful?’

ALYSON: I do feel like there is a little blip that goes off for her that he’s been grabbed. They’ve got proximity alert set up so that she knows what’s going on.

NICK: Oh yeah, on your com unit, which you can have actually on a cool wristband if you want.

ALYSON: yes.

NICK: A little distress light turns on because it’s the 70s, so there’s a little yellow lightbulb screwed in.

ALYSON: “M-hmm.”

NICK: “Distress!” But yeah, you’ve got him in the hallway.

HUDSON: Yeah. I want to make sure- I knew that there would be a distress signal because I’m used to Imperial droids from my background, so basically, I may have to flip a point for this, but have a data spike that can shut off that signal and put the bot under my control.

NICK: Yeah, for a light side point you can, absolutely. That’s just in your bag of tricks?

HUDSON: Yeah. So I pull it out, stab it with the spike…

NICK: Ooh… Don’t make him flip that light side point. Flip me a dark side point instead. You think you grab that one, but instead you jab the Rancore Protocol into this droid.

HUDSON: Oh my…

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: Yeah. So, the distress light goes off, it turns off and you’re like ‘oh, I guess he’s fine,’ and then it goes (buzzing, pop) and it breaks, like through some overload. The link is totally cut. The droid appears to be deactivated right now.

HUDSON: I push the on button.

NICK: It turns on, it looks at you, and goes, “Filthy human, I’ll destroy you for this!” All the arms come up, and there are corkscrews, and blasters…

ALYSON: And like scissors, yeah. (laughs)

NICK: Yeah. A magnifying glass for some reason.

ALYSON: (smiling) yeah, yeah, definitely.

NICK: And we’re gonna cut away from you.

DREW: (laughs)

NICK: Jorus, what is the Corellian Shuffle?

DREW: So the Corellian Shuffle…

ALYSON: (laughs)

DREW: …is where one of the bounty hunters distracts the prey, and while they are being distracted the other bounty hunter gets behind them and then distracts them, and then the other bounty hunter that was originally talking to them takes the person.

NICK: Okay. Ooh, okay. So…

CAMERON: The reason Karma agreed to it is because she would be the person who grabbed her in the end, so she feels like she still has control over the situation.

NICK: (laughs) Okay. It’s really interesting to me that Xianna is the wounded gazelle in this situation, because that’s not normally how this plays out.

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: So yeah, I think we can pick it up right with… Jorus, I think you may overhear, ‘I’m talking you up right now,’ and then you’re right behind her. We’ll go from there.

DREW: “Excuse me, ma’am.”

LAURA: ‘Oh, uh… Ello. (laughs nervously)”

DREW: And so she turns around, and that is the cue for you to do what you’re gonna do. He goes, “I can’t help but notice that you seem to be out of sorts. Are you alright, ma’am?”

LAURA: “Oh, I am just fine. You know, just, there was a murder in case you did not see. I am just very nervous because of the murder, and I’m afraid I might get murdered again…”

DREW: “A-Again?”

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: “Not again, not that I am getting- I have never been murdered. I am afraid that uh, what is, how uh… that the murderer will also strike again and that I will be murdered.”

DREW: “Here, have some water, uh, sit down…”

ALYSON: She’s like freaking out. (laughs)

CAMERON: Karma’s standing behind her and has binders in her hand and is trying, but Xianna is gesticulating so much…

DREW: “Ma’am, ma’am…”

LAURA: “Uh, yes, yes?”

DREW: “I just need you to calm down. I want you to put your hands behind your back. It just helps with the circulation.”

NICK: So, one thing I also want to throw in, you recognize some symptoms of she has very clearly taken impact which is like space cocaine, like recently.

DREW: (seethes) Okay, then it’s double circle…

(laughter)

LAURA: She puts her hands to her side and is kind of scanning the room to see if she sees Tink, and if Karma is still behind her.

CAMERON: Karma is still behind you.

LAURA: Would I see that Karma is now holding up binders?

NICK: I think the way the Corellian Shuffle is designed is that unless you completely turn around karma is very much in your blind spot, so I don’t think you’re gonna catch that.

LAURA: Okay. Yeah.

NICK: But when you look for Tink, I think from the hallway you hear like, pew-pew, pew-pew-pew, and Tink comes running out of the hallway with a gesticulating Whist going around the room and saying, “There’s been a murder!” Pew, pew-pew, pew-pew-pew!

(laughter)

LAURA: And Xianna’s just like, “Oh… Huh. Oh, found Tink. (giggles) Hello~!”

NICK: Tink goes running into the room.

CAMERON: Karma gets distracted by the droid that’s shooting.

DREW: Jorus also gets distracted by the droid.

(laughter)

LAURA: Xianna tries to meld back into the party while Jorus is distracted by Tink and them. If you need me to roll Stealth or Skulduggery, or I have Streetwise!

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: I’m thinking that’s a Stealth to do an Assassin’s Creed here.

ALYSON: Oh yeah!

NICK: I would believe that your critical injury to your foot may affect that a little bit.

LAURA: Oh, yeah, it will.

CAMERON: Can I give her a boost die for adding more distraction towards the droid, because I’m right next to him?

NICK: Okay, yeah, take a boost die.

LAURA: What would be the difficulty?

NICK: We’re gonna say hard. Jorus is a tough cookie. Space cookie.

ALYSON: Spookie.

(music cuts)

DREW: … Spookie?

CAMERON: (laughs) Yup.

NICK: (laughs)

ALYSON: You heard me.

DREW: Oh, wait, wait… What kind of space cookie is Jorus, do you think? Like, oatmeal, chocolate chip?

CAMERON: Like oatmeal raisin.

DREW: (gasps)

LAURA: Mmm.

ALYSON: With walnuts.

DREW: I accept it.

LAURA: That would be three successes and two advantages.

NICK: Okay. Is there anything you want to spend the advantages on?

LAURA: When I get back into the crowd I want to see the green Twi’lek, and Falx is like right behind me, so I’m far enough away from Jorus and Karma that they won’t hear me and Falx, but that I don’t have to travel that far to run into him.

NICK: Okay. I think you meld back into the crowd and Falx is right there. You hear, “Whoa!” and you bump him, and he spills his martini into a lady, and it’s the yellow Twi’lek.

“Well I never!”

“Oh, you’re fine, sweetheart!” And then he turns around and goes, “Ah, Xianna! Everything appears to be going swimmingly as I am not yet dead.” In the background… Pew, pew-pew, pew, pew-pew-pew!

ALYSON: ‘There’s been a murder~’

(laughter)

NICK: A lot of the crowd is screaming and ducking under tables and jumping out of the way. Falx and a few of the others seem very nonplussed by this, for instance the scruffy Imperials by the wall are just kind of nudging each other. You see that most of the people with weapons visible see that Whist is only shooting up and instead see this as fun. The people who are ducking out of the way are people who are not used to gunplay.

LAURA: Yes.

NICK: Except for Tink who’s just sprinting across the room right now.

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: I would like to link arm-in-arm with Falx and do the hand into my pocket, gun poking into his side, are you happy to see me deal.

NICK: “Oh wow. This really escalated, didn’t it?”

LAURA: “yes. So um, did you have anything to do with this? You know, the murders and the shootings? The pew-pews? You know.”

NICK: “I don’t really know why I would admit one way or the other, to be honest.”

LAURA: “Well, I mean… Eh. You might as well. No one is going to believe me.”

NICK: “Ooh, that’s true. I didn’t think about that. I honestly trust you and respect you as a professional.”

LAURA: ‘Oh thank you!”

NICK: “yeah! Put the gun a little higher. That rib’s a little bruised. If you could…”

LAURA: “She pushes it more into the bruised rib.”

NICK: “(groans, seethes)”

LAURA: “You do realize you are blackmailing me, so… heh.”

NICK: “Well I mean, it seems a little uncouth to complain about being blackmailed when you have a gun on someone.”

LAURA: “I mean, you already heard me saying we should just let you die, or murder you ourselves, so…”

NICK: “Yea. I really overestimated the good will from our last meeting, come to think of it.”

LAURA: “I mean yes, you know, have you met me? (laughs) So, did you murder them, by the way?”

NICK: Um… Roll me a Charm check. I’d love to just give this to you, but I feel like some sort of roll needs to be in order there.

LAURA: Yeah.

NICK: Unless Intimidation is something you would rather do.

LAURA: Oh no, I am not intimidating. What would be the difficulty?

NICK: Hard, but I think a gun to someone’s side is probably two blue dice.

CAMERON: Do you wanna flip a light side point?

LAURA: Eh, no. Psh.

CAMERON: Okay.

NICK: Don’t give them ammunition.

LAURA: Three advantages. I probably should have flipped that point.

NICK: “I am not going to admit one way or the other, but—“

LAURA: “Okay, so yes.”

NICK: “—I will tell you that the bounty hunting gentleman over there, well I guess he’s a marshal now, but he definitely wants to arrest you.”

LAURA: “Okie. I already knew this. Can you give me like information I can use right now?”

NICK: “Those scruffy Imperial-looking gentlemen definitely shot these stormtroopers. I heard them talking about it.”

LAURA: “Okie. Did you hire them?”

NICK: “I can neither confirm nor deny!” He smiles really self-assuredly there.

LAURA: “So… So yes.”

NICK: “I can neither defer- (gibberish)”

LAURA: “(sighs) Oh my goodness.”

CAMERON: He’s been drinking too much.

(laughter)

LAURA: She would like to let go of the blaster and grab a pair of binders, and slap them on him, and I’m assuming that will be an Agility check of some sort.

NICK: Eh, I’ll just let you do it. I think it’s interesting.

LAURA: Okay.

NICK: While that’s going on… Sila, your droid has been freaking out a little.

ALYSON: So, the little yellow alert goes off like he’s in distress, and she goes, “huh,” and then it (makes noises) and explodes, and she goes, “Hmm…” (laughter) Then, the next thing is Tink running back in with Whist behind, ‘there’s been a murder~’ and pew-pew-pew, and the Imperials giggling about it and the people being like, ‘Oh! Woo! Oh my gosh. Blah, blah, blah,’ and Tink is like ‘Ahh!’ running through. (laughter) Sila goes to intercept but also has one eye towards Falx and sees the purple Twi’lek again. She makes some calculations, shifts some of the puzzle pieces in her head, and goes for Tink instead. She intercepts them, walks directly towards Tink so that he has to step around her as he’s fleeing, and reaches out and says something to Whist to the effect of, “Authority Override 016.” She’s reaching for that data spike.

NICK: So, you give the override, and Whist says, “Yes marm,” and half of his arms go limp, and then he starts to power up again. When you wrap your hand around that data spike you actually get a very powerful charge. Something people might see, a powerful shot comes out of the robot, it makes a pretty impressive light show, it goes around Sila, and it actually outlines a thin barrier around her like some sort of personal shield. Anybody who’s been dealing with the outer rim or anything know that’s super rare, extremely expensive technology that shouldn’t exist. It flickers for just a second. The spike actually just drops to the ground between you all, and Whist drops to the ground as well. You see—gosh, it’s Star Wars—so there’s no screen, but you see a bunch of cogs start to spin and what you recognize as his reboot situation.

ALYSON: Mm-hmm. She picks up the data spike and turns immediately to Tink.

HUDSON: “Was that your droid?!”

ALYSON: “Do you have a moment to speak with me?”

HUDSON: “Uh… I need to catch my breath.”

ALYSON: “Over here?”

HUDSON: “Uh… Sure?”

ALYSON: She does what Xianna basically did, links arms with him holding the data spike in her other arm and leaves Whist to reboot in the middle of the floor, and drags Tink across to a corner.

HUDSON: “I’m a little flustered here. What do you need?!”

ALYSON: “What do YOU need?”

HUDSON: “I need to get away from the murder droid, but I guess you deactivated it.”

LAURA: (laughs)

ALYSON: She waggles the data spike. “Is this one of yours?”

HUDSON: ‘No.”

ALYSON: “Really?”

HUDSON: “Yes.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

HUDSON: “Really… Wait, no, yes! Really! It’s not really mine, no, not at all.”

ALYSON: “It came from you.”

HUDSON: “No it did not.”

ALYSON: “You put it in the droid.”

HUDSON: “Nooo, that droid had it in there.”

CAMERON: (laughing) It seems like you’re lying.

NICK: I would like a Deception check versus Sila’s Perception.

HUDSON: Yes, I was waiting for that.

NICK: Oh gosh, what’s your Perception? It’s gonna add to his difficulty. This is gonna go really bad.

ALYSON: I have three little things filled in on Perception.

LAURA: Aw.

CAMERON: (laughing) So it’s gonna be three reds and a purple.

NICK: So it’s gonna be a purple and three reds versus your Deception which is a green and a yellow.

(laughter)

HUDSON: Yeah, probably a light side point there.

NICK: You can try. I think this ship has most assuredly sailed.

CAMERON: Do it. Yeah. Upgrade something.

HUDSON: So, I upgrade this to a yellow?

LAURA: Yes.

ALYSON: Do I have to roll too?

NICK: No. In contested rolls the one person’s stats…

ALYSON: It’s against the skill? Okay.

NICK: You get to be the negative ones.

ALYSON: Got it.

NICK: Oh…

HUDSON: Oh my.

NICK: Oh good.

HUDSON: Seven disadvantages, two advantages.

CAMERON: So five threats?

HUDSON: Five threats is what I meant. Yeah.

NICK: Wow. Alright.

ALYSON: Woof.

NICK: Here’s what we’re gonna do. Wonderfully enough for the roleplaying that kind of comes to a dead end, nobody will admit anything, everyone’s very stubborn about it. Tink, you fall prone. (dramatic bass noise) You are perspiring a little, you just straight slip. He falls out of your grasp. He just prat falls hard. You roll to get to your feet, and I think you’re just at a complete disadvantage right now. Would you like to spend any of those disadvantages to make your situation easier to interrogate at this point?

ALYSON: yes. I want proof that he’s the one I’m looking for. I know he’s the one I’m looking for, but I need proof because paperwork.

NICK: (laughs) What do you think that proof looks like, that you’re StarDestroyer1?

HUDSON: Oh, okay, the one that she’s after.

NICK: Mm-hmm. Remember, because you left that signature in a bunch of star destroyers that suddenly had bad things happen to them.

HUDSON: Oh man. Yeah, I actually keep a small notebook, like a little diary on me, and it has my signature on it like on the leather part that I’ve etched out for some reason, because I’m real cocky.

(laughter)

LAURA: Oh yeah.

NICK: It says StarDestroyer1 on it?

HUDSON: Yeah.

NICK: Oh gosh.

ALYSON: So you fall prone and you’re like ‘blegh,’ and she sees it slide half way out of your pocket or whatever. Is it your fancy belt that it pops out of the pocket of?

HUDSON: Yeah.

NICK: (laughs)

ALYSON: Cool. Yeah. She reaches down with her gloved hand, picks up the notebook, looks at you… “Nice belt.”

HUDSON: I grab the data spike and run.

(laughter)

NICK: Okay! Now we’re getting into the fun part. (rubs hands together) A lot of things happen at once. This is the part of the mystery where everything goes bonkers. A couple of things happen. Stormtroopers land outside in a carrier ship. You can see them, you hear them, it rattles the windows. This is one of the very big military ones. Thirty stormtroopers pop up and they start lock stepping up that walkway into the room. As soon as they hit the door, the Imperial officers with the loose guns freak out, flip a table, and start shooting at the stormtroopers.

ALYSON: Cool.

NICK: (laughs) yeah. Falx laughs a little, breaks free from Xianna, and just starts to book it out of the room. You’re running for the door. The party is over, ladies and gentlemen. What do we do?

ALYSON: Sila sees the shooting start and sees Falx start to run. She takes after Falx and hits a button on the wristband for Whist to follow so that they can go get Falx.

LAURA: And Falx is in binders.

NICK: Oh yeah. He’s definitely doing the run, like he’s got his arms together and he’s kind of wiggle running, but he’s surprisingly fast, again, like someone who does jungle excursions as a hobby. He takes off down that hallway towards the bathrooms. Whist is close behind him, and Sila is physical test jogging, like the speed that she has to in order to pass the yearly exam, but she knows Whist has got it. They’re out, they’re gone, we’re gonna come back to that scene. I really like that a lot.

ALYSON: Cool.

NICK: What is everybody else doing?

DREW: Okay, one, taking in that there’s now Imperial officers shooting at stormtroopers. That’s not my job. My job is the Twi’lek, so I’m gonna chase after the Twi’lek. I’m going to pull out of my pocket my communicator to press for my ship to come to where I am.

NICK: I have a question. Those ships I described earlier are all fair game if you like one of those, or you were late, so what is your Nightrider style ship?

DREW: There is a… It’s my personal modified U-wing.

NICK: The VW bus of Star Wars.

DREW: Yeah!

ALYSON: Absolutely!

LAURA: Aww…

CAMERON: (laughs)

ALYSON: Jorus…

NICK: It’s got those wide kind of spatula fins on the front that can snap in and out for speed settings. It’s got the short body on the back. It looks like a tuning fork of a ship. What does the paintjob look like?

DREW: It is painted red and yellow, but like a maroon and a mustard yellow, and the highlights are white, so it’s those three colors.

NICK: Okay.

DREW: It’s uh… Ah. Of course I’m gonna call it this. It’s called the High Noon.

(laughter)

NICK: That’s a good ship name.

DREW: It’s got ‘The High Noon’ on the side.

NICK: Does it have a pin-up girl painting on it?

DREW: Oh yeah, definitely.

ALYSON: “Classy.”

NICK: They ALL do. Ours does to.

DREW: But she’s modestly dressed, and she’s reading a book… (laughter) and she’s got spectacles, but she’s very attractive, and it’s in a pin-up pose.

NICK: Man. Okay. You call your ship, you’re running after Xianna and Karma. Tink, I’m imagining you hit the door, manage to barrel through the stormtroopers, we’ve got a Wyatt Earp situation, laser blaster all around you but they’re like burning holes in the sides of your fur but you’re not getting hit. You’re through the formation. They’re kind of ignoring you because your axe is on your back luckily and not in your hands and there’s people shooting at them. you start to go down the walkway. Karma and Xianna?

CAMERON: I was standing next to Jorus when he took off after Xianna.

NICK: Uh-huh.

DREW: Oh, and real quick, Jorus yells as he runs back, “It’s alright Karma. You’ve been out of the game a while. I know. It’s alright!”

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: Ooh…

DREW: “Don’t worry. We’ll get her!” As he runs out.

CAMERON: Psh. I already turned in this bounty. I’m not worried about it.

(laughter)

LAURA: Xianna hears this and is like, “Wait, what?!”

CAMERON: Karma gets on the coms. “Yeah, Xianna, run. I’m not gonna chase anymore.”

LAURA: Xianna’s so confused. Falx just broke free. She’s not really sure what the green Twi’lek’s doing back here. She really hopes she’s not the actual murderer. I mean, that would be crazy. She sees Jorus coming for her, and she’s going to make a B-line for the bar and try to get on the other side of that to also avoid any stray laser fire.

NICK: Okay, so you’re running for cover rather than the ship.

LAURA: Yeah. I think at this point going for cover would be easier than getting to the ship, because there’s officers outside the doors?

NICK: Mm-hmm.

CAMERON: And she can’t leave until we get there. (laughs)

LAURA: I don’t fly… Karma has the keys… (laughter) Our ship has keys, I guess.

CAMERON: I ba-bwoop it every time I get off, so there’s gotta be a key fob.

LAURA: Well yeah, because there’s Imperial officers outside the door there’s no way I’d get past all of them to get to the ship.

NICK: Okay.

LAURA: So I’m going to get behind the bar and actually pull out my blaster and hope that maybe something good will happen. I don’t have grenades, do I?

NICK: Oh gosh.

DREW: Oh goodness.

CAMERON: (laughs) Don’t throw a grenade in here.

LAURA: No, I just have bantha cakes.

NICK: This is a ballroom!

LAURA: I do have four bantha cakes in case anyone needs snacks!

NICK: Great. Okay. (laughs) We get a really cool shot of Xianna, I think at this point your cloak has blown free, and underneath she’s wearing a trench coat. It’s a very Blade Runner looking one. It’s very tubular. It’s got lots and lots and lots of pockets on it.

LAURA: You only see a few pockets. It HAS  a ton of pockets, but you can only see a few of the pockets.

DREW: Oh, okay.

NICK: Some of your associates like these kind of smuggler’s coats. You know that there’s probably a bunch of stuff in there that is not common. So, we get a cool shot of the boy Duke slide over the bar, glasses go everywhere, and Xianna’s down behind it. We’re gonna go to Karma next. What are you doing?

CAMERON: I’m gonna go assist the stormtroopers, but I’m gonna come up behind the shifty officers who flipped the table and start chucking them over the table.

NICK: (laughs) Um, we don’t need to roll for that. You grab one of them by the scruff and by the pants and just chuck them over. Before they hit the ground they are peppered with fire. Only stormtroopers fire that accurately. That guy’s done.

CAMERON: (chuckles)

NICK: And then you grab the other one. He goes, “Hey! What are you doing?!” And he goes to swing at you. Do you chuck him over too?

CAMERON: Mm-hmm!

NICK: Alright. You toss him up and it’s like skeet shooting, the guy’s just peppered and he’s down.

CAMERON: Was that it back behind it?

NICK: Yeah, it was just the two guys.

CAMERON: Alright. I do finger guns at the stormtroopers and walk off.

NICK: Okay. The stormtroopers go, “Well, that was really helpful. Uh… Thank you, ma’am.” We get a shot of these formations. They got the line kneeling, the line standing behind it, they’ve got the firing line, and they all kind of look at each other and shrug. You hear the armor clacking, and they start setting up perimeter around the room. You can tell they’re looking for whoever’s in charge.

DREW: “Trooper, that’s me.”

NICK: “Oh, uh… Right away, sir.” It’s one with a shoulder pauldron, it’s got red and black stripes on it because they’re on Mustafar and they’re color coordinated, and he lock steps over to you. “Secure the perimeter!” He comes up to you and says, “What exactly is going on here?”

DREW: “Jorus Kreel, Marshal, outer rim. Here’s my security codes.” And I hand him the governor’s security codes.

(laughter)

NICK: Yeah. You can see, it’s hard to read a stormtrooper, but his head cocks a little. He doesn’t report to Marshals usually, but he takes the cylinder that you had taken from Silpin, plugs it in, and the whole thing lights up. It’s basically every security clearance, listen to this guy, he’s in charge. “Oh… Uh, right away, sir. A pleasure to meet someone of your stature. What do you need us to do?”

DREW: “There’s a purple Twi’lek behind the bar. I want you to secure her.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: “Right away, sir.” And they all turn and start shooting at the bar.

DREW: “No! No! Don’t kill her!”

(laughter)

NICK: With that, we’re gonna jump to Sila real quick. I think that Whist has caught Falx on a walkway outside. It is out of the comfort barrier that they have, so it’s roiling hot, there’s ash, smoke and sparks flying everywhere, it’s very the end of Episode 3. His clothes are singed, he’s sweating and breathing heavily, and Whist has him around the legs. Falx is doing that dragging thing when a toddler holds onto it, trying to get further away, and you catch up to them there.

ALYSON: “Regional Governor Falx.”

NICK: “Oh, uh… I’m afraid we haven’t been introduced.”

ALYSON: ‘No, we haven’t. If we had you would’ve made sure that I wasn’t at a party that you were committing a murder at.”

NICK: “Yes, well, since you don’t have an invitation I’m sure you’ll see yourself out.”

ALYSON: “I’m sure you’ll see yourself out wearing those binders that someone put on you for me.”

NICK: “Oh… What exactly are you going for here, uh, Inspector, was it?”

ALYSON: “Imperial Inspector Sila Rowe.”

NICK: You see him physically blanch at the name drop, and he drops a lot of the pretense that he’s had this whole time. “Ah. Things seem to have gone a little topsy-turvy, haven’t they?”

ALYSON: “I should say so.”

NICK: “If you could have your droid release me I think we could talk about this in a more civilized manner.”

ALYSON: “I think, I can have my droid drag you back inside where you have a cooler head, and then we can talk about it.”

NICK: “Well, see, the thing is… Those stormtroopers, while accurate, are not particularly specific with the things they bring down, and I would rather not have additional holes added to my person at this time. I have a personal shuttle around the corner. I could escort you to your next place.”

ALYSON: “It’s very hot out here, Regional Governor. I suggest you talk quickly before you get too warm.”

NICK: “Hmm. This sounds like some sort of intimidation check, doesn’t it?

ALYSON: Absolutely.

CAMERON: Coercion.

NICK: Coercion! That’s the stat.

ALYSON: Okay, yes, vocab. Good.

CAMERON: Yes. (laughs) I was like, that is not a word on here. What is it called?

ALYSON: I super don’t have that~

NICK: You can twist it any other way if there’s something you would like to do.

ALYSON: I do have Negotiation, and there’s Streetwise too. I don’t know what you think is better.

NICK: I think a Negotiation would work here, probably, but you can have two blue dice because I know you still have some advantages in your pocket, and also he is at an extreme disadvantage at this point.

ALYSON: yes.

NICK: It is going to be hard. Yep. He has three Willpower. I gave this guy stats. You could flip a dark side point to upgrade that green to a yellow if you’d like. You should make it, statistically, that would just make it more likely.

ALYSON: Burn ‘em if you got ‘em.

CAMERON: That’s just a wash.

ALYSON: Really?

CAMERON: Yup. That’s nothing.

NICK: Eh. Ooh. My NPC lives to fight another day. So, here’s what we’re gonna do. I am going to flip a light side point actually, and Falx is going to monologue for a second.

ALYSON: Cool.

NICK: “Well… I guess the only thing I miscalculated was your presence, my dear. Surprising… I don’t know how that happened, except if I invited you. Did you find your hacker friend?”

ALYSON: ‘I did.”

NICK: “Hmm. I noticed you went after me instead of him. I don’t expect your superiors will be particularly happy about that.”

ALYSON: ‘Don’t worry. I have what I need.”

NICK: “For now. They’re surprisingly slippery. Here’s how this is going to go. I’m going to get on my ship. I’m going to leave, and you’re not ever going to find me.”

ALYSON: “Really?”

NICK: “Yes. See, I believe my time with the Empire is probably officially over seeing as I just killed a regional governor and an inspector who was on my tail, and that ship is pretty much over. Now, I will say that I was trying to burn some of my associates at the same time, and that might be why I invited several members of the law attempting to hunt them. I’m a little disappointed in how that worked out, honestly, but I’m going to get on my ship, you are going to go arrest the people who will get you promoted, and I’m going to disappear into the outer rim never to bother you again. How does that sound?”

ALYSON: Alright, flip one of those suckers. She holds up the recording device…

(laughter)

LAURA: Yes~!

ALYSON: …clicks the button. “That sounds fine. Whist!” And Whist is gonna shove him over into the fucking lava.

NICK: Yes! Yeah~

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: Yeesss~!

NICK: So, Whist drops back. You see he has a little tick that you’re not used to. Some of his lights are glowing red instead of the usual yellow they have.

ALYSON: Mm-hmm. Okay.

NICK: And his voice sounds different. He says, “Extrapolation: I just hate you organics.” And he shoves him. We get the slow-motion shot of him wide-eyed and falling backwards.

ALYSON: With the bracers on his hands still?!

CAMERON: Yeah!

NICK: Yeah. It goes straight back, it’s like he wanted to do the arms outstretched pose and couldn’t—he’s very dramatic—and he falls back, and there’s a moment of quiet, and explosion of lava comes up, and then a Lambda class shuttle rises up from below the walkway and he’s kind of splayed on the windscreen. He hits his elbow even with his arms bound together on the screen. “And I think that’s my cue to leave.” And they fly away.

LAURA: He’s so extra…

(laughter)

ALYSON: So, she watches him fly off, her expression shifting imperceptibly, then she looks down at Whist. “What happened to your voice?”

NICK: “I’m not sure at all what you mean, marm.” And he’s back to normal.

ALYSON: “Hmm. We have a lot to discuss, Whist. This was a very educational outing.”

NICK: “I look forward to learning more from you.” We’re gonna do a swipe cut.

LAURA: I would like to… When the fire first starts, Xianna does do the thing where she pops her head up, gets shot at, ducks back down, but then reaches up onto the bar, grabs a bottle, and pulls it back down with her.

NICK: (laughs) Okay.

LAURA: I want to flip a light side point and have there be a door around the corner of the bar that I can crawl to and hopefully get into that room without Jorus noticing me from the position he’s at.

NICK: Okay. Yeah. We get the shot of the stormtroopers all firing and Jorus going ‘no, no, no, I need them alive!’ Karma, you see that going on. Do you walk nonchalantly to the ship figuring that she’ll make it there? Are you gonna try to help your friend?

CAMERON: Karma throws a casual salute at a couple of the stormtroopers and just walks past them, because well she helped them so they’re just gonna let her leave now, and walks out the main door. Instead of heading directly towards the Afternoon Delight she heads around to the side that the bar would back out to and sees if there’s a door over there to try and come in from the other side to get Xianna. I don’t know if that is the door, if she finds the door and is like ‘ah-ha, I can help,’ and Xianna’s like ‘oh, hello’ and walks out.

NICK: Yeah. You walk hands in pockets, just casually over. There’s a lot of gunfire inside.

CAMERON: Hands in cloak.

NICK: Hands in cloak. You can hear through the walls Jorus yelling at the stormtroopers. They’re very enthusiastic about shooting.

DREW: They are very enthusiastic. They’re good boys. They do what they can.

NICK: “We mean well, sir.” Then, you walk around to the side, there’s a door, and you go ‘huh…’ and then it goes BANG and Xianna comes action rolling out, but not with a gun, with a bottle of whiskey in one hand. She holds it up triumphantly, and y’all make a break for the ship. I think Tink is in the cockpit flipping switches, but he doesn’t really fly regularly, so the hot tub is on, there’s some strobe lights going, it’s a very It’s My Birthday scene.

LAURA: Oh yeah.

NICK: Karma slides into the cockpit, flips the switches down, and the ship goes quiet and then lifts off and starts to go. Jorus, I think we get a scene of you looking over the bar with all the smoke and the shattered glass and everything, and you see the door kind of cracked.

DREW: “(heavy sigh and groan)” He sees that, looks over, he jumps over the bar, looks around the corner, and he opens the door, and he can see the ship going. He sighs, looks back at the troopers, and goes, “Drink your fill, guys.” He shuts the door just as the High Noon comes down, and it doesn’t even land. It’s kind of on this hover as the side door opens and he rushes to it to jump in. his pilot is an Ewok by the name of Jubs, (laughter) and he’s this grizzled, old Ewok whose got scars and tattoos, but the tattoos are just like burns in the fur in different designs. He’s got this grizzly, almost Wookie-looking beard, and he’s got a Wookie-looking bandolier on him. Jubs was raised by Wookies.

NICK: Oh okay, great. We need a whole podcast about Jubs.

ALYSON: You got it!

(laughter)

DREW: He goes in and goes, “Jubs! Jubs, I want you to follow that shuttle. You got that, Jubs?” He rushes up as the ship begins to take off and he jumps in the co-pilot seat. We see on his side, because he doesn’t fly, Jubs flies, because Jubs is a freaking amazing pilot… We see there’s a picture of a woman, he looks at the picture, kisses the picture, and goes, “Don’t worry, Erma. We’ll find ‘em.” It says ErmaKreel, birth date such and such, death date this year.

SEVERAL: Aww.

NICK: Jubs looks at you and goes, “Yub nub!” (laughter) And they take off. The final shot we get is the High Noon pulling up out of atmosphere and the Afternoon Delight is just ahead, and in the Afternoon Delight we get a shot in the cockpit of proximity sensors going off. Jubs flips some switches in the cockpit and pounds a button and we get just 90s anime amounts of rockets coming out of this U-wing and they’re all arching at it. The proximity alert gets louder and louder and louder. Tink is in the engine room preparing to repair whatever horrible disaster is about to happen, (laughter) and right before the missiles hit Karma throws it into hyperspace and snaps away, and all the missiles hit and there’s a huge explosion.

DREW: It jumps back to Jorus in the cockpit, and he goes, “(sighs) … Drinks?”

NICK: “Jub nub!”

DREW: “Alright.”

(laughter)

NICK: That’s the end of the episode! Ba-naaa~!

(cheering and clapping)

NICK: Oh boy. That was so much fun, y’all.

CAMERON: (laughs)

## Outro

CAMERON: Thanks for listening to Tabletop Squadron. If you enjoyed our show please consider logging onto iTunes and giving us a five-star review. Five-star reviews will help new listeners to find the show and will make the squad feel special when we read them.

Sila Rowe is played by Aly Grauer. She can be found on Twitter at @dreamstobecome

Jorus Kreel is played by Drew Mierzejewski. He can be found on Twitter at @worldstoforge.

Xianna’fan is played by Laura Penrod. She can be found on Twitter at @cheerio_buffet.

Tink is played by Hudson Jameson. You can find him on Twitter at @hudsonjameson.

Karma Nailo is played by me, Cameron Robertson. You can find me on Twitter at @midnightmusic13.

Our game master is Nick Robertson, and you can find him on Twitter at @alias58.

Our intro song is Space Jam by Pablo Ribot.

Jorus’s theme is Glueworm Evening Blues by Lobo Loco.

Sila’s theme is Albinoni’s Concerto for 2 Oboes in F Major Opus9 no3, 2 Adagio – performed by the Advent Chamber Orchestra.

The “dramatic letter” song is The Gate of Evermore by Livio Amato.

The “there’s been a murder” song is Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No 3, 3 allegro performed by the Advent Chamber Orchestra.

Additional music by James Gunter.

Follow the podcast on Twitter and Instagram at @tabletop_squad. See you next time.

For part two of our popsicle series we have Xianna’s Creamy Caf Popsicles! These popsicles have never been directly referenced on the show, but they are heavily influenced by Xianna’s well known love of caf (with and without added whiskey). This caffeine-filled treat has a creamy vanilla layer and a rich chocolate and cold brew layer.

All the ingredients

For the creamy layer we have half-and-half or creamer (we’re using an almond milk creamer), sugar, vanilla bean paste, and a small pinch of salt.

For the mocha layer we have sugar, cornstarch, cocoa powder, chocolate, cold brew coffee, milk or dairy alternative, vanilla extract, and a pinch of salt. We used homemade cold brew and unsweetened almond milk, but store-bought cold brew works great and any dairy or dairy alternative should be fine.

Creamy layer mix

Mocha layer mix

Everything for the creamy layer gets mixed together and then distributed evenly amongst the popsicles molds. Place the mold in the freezer for them to set.

While that layer freezes we’ll make the mocha layer. Heat the sugar, cornstarch, cocoa, chocolate, coffee and milk in a saucepan over medium heat, stirring constantly until until the mixture thickens. Remove it from the heat and whisk in the vanilla extract and salt.

Both layers in the mold

Once the mocha mixture has cooled down fill in the molds. Place the popsicle sticks and put the mold back in the freezer until fully set.

Xianna’s Creamy Caf Popsicles [makes 8-12 popsicles, depending on mold size]

1 cup creamer or half-and-half
3 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste
Pinch salt

1/2 cup sugar
2 tablespoons cornstarch
3 tablespoons cocoa powder
3 tablespoons chopped chocolate
1 1/2 cups cold brew coffee
1 cup milk or dairy alternative
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Pinch salt

In a large measuring cup or bowl, whisk together the half and half, sugar, vanilla bean paste, and salt. Fill up the popsicle molds with about 1 to 2 ounces of cream mixture. Place the pops in the freezer to let this layer firm up for 30 to 60 minutes.

Heat the sugar, cornstarch, cocoa, chocolate, coffee and milk in a saucepan over medium heat, stirring constantly until until the mixture thickens. Remove it from the heat and whisk in the vanilla extract and salt. Let the mixture cool to room temperature.

Once cooled, remove the molds from the freezer and finish filling each mold with the cold brew mixture. Freeze the pops for 4 to 6 hours.

We all know Tink loves his popsicles. They’ve appeared over many episodes and a whole room on the Afternoon Delight was filled with them at one point. So today we’re making Tink’s flavor of choice cherry, but with a creamy yogurt swirl.

Be on the lookout over the next month for Karma’s and Xianna’s popsicle recipes.

This recipe is only 5 ingredients, and outside of the freezing only takes about 5 minutes to make (if you’re using frozen or pre-pitted cherries).

First we puree the cherries with 2 tablespoon of the honey and a pinch of salt. The final texture can be as smooth or as chunky as you want.

Then, mix the yogurt, another pinch of salt, the remaining 4 tablespoons honey, and vanilla extract or paste, if using. We’re using nonfat Greek yogurt and a little bit of both vanilla extract and vanilla bean paste.

Next we pour half of the cherry mix between the molds. Layer the yogurt mix on top, and then the rest of the cherry mix.

To swirl the mixes together take a butter knife, a thin spoon, a chopstick, a popsicle stick, or anything thin and flat and stick it into the popsicle mold. Move it up and down in a sort of zig-zag pattern. Do it only a few times for chunky layers, or really go at it for a finely marbled popsicle.

And then freeze! After 4 or so hours, depending on your freezer and mold size/shape, your popsicles will be ready.

Cherry Froyo Popsicles [makes 8-12 popsicles, depending on mold size]

3 cups fresh or frozen cherries; pits and stems removed
6 tablespoons honey
3 cups Greek yogurt (any %fat)
2 pinches salt
2 teaspoons vanilla extract or vanilla bean paste; optional

Puree the cherries with 2 tablespoons honey and a pinch of salt.

In a separate container combine the yogurt, remaining 4 tablespoons honey, a small pinch of salt, and vanilla, if using.

Divide cherry mix between popsicle molds. Top with the yogurt mix. Use a spoon, butter knife, or stick to gently swirl the two mixes together.

Place in the freezer and allow to fully freeze, about 4 to 6 hours.

Word document download: Episode 16 Blackmail and Bacchanal

PDF download: Episode 16 Blackmail and Bacchanal

Read in browser:

Tabletop Squadron Transcript, Season 1 Episode 16:
Blackmail and Bacchanal

Transcript by Tyler (Twitter: @Tyler_MoonSage)

## Intro

NICK: Hi everyone, and welcome to Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars: Edge of the Empire actual play podcast. I’m Nick, your game master. Every other Thursday, our story follows a thief, a bounty hunter, and a slicer as they explore the galaxy helping a mysterious benefactor and each other.

Starting off, I want to remind everyone about our current Twitter drive. We’re currently at 116 followers, which means we’re 9 away from a whole bunch of bonus content. When we reach 125 followers we’ll be doing our final Twitter poll for the creation of our blue Gungan friend, who by the way is a circus acrobat and loves Sabacc and making jewelry. (laughing) These were all decided by listeners.

If you haven’t joined this crazy internet party you really should. It’s been a ton of fun. Jump online and say hello. Also, we’ll be releasing more bonus episodes on off-weeks after we get there, and our first ever blooper reel, so there’s lots of reasons to help us reach our next goal. Please follow @Tabletop_Squad on Twitter.

In addition to all that, I’d like to thank PirateRowan for their thoughtful and comprehensive review. PirateRowan, your enthusiasm and engagement online has been extremely fun and we appreciate the review.

Okay, last thing: These episodes were recorded LIVE AT GENCON. The squad made a pilgrimage up to Indianapolis and we brought our gear with us. The audio’s pretty clean, but you may notice we have a bit more echo than you’re used to. The room had different acoustics, and there wasn’t a ton I could do about it. It’s pretty minor so hopefully it’s not too distracting.

Also, we had guests on the show. Drew and Aly from the Welcome to Warda podcast will be with us the next few episodes. Warda is one of my absolute favorite worlds and podcasts. You can find them at welcometowarda.com or @WelcometoWarda on Twitter. Check It out!

With that done, thanks for listening, and we hope you enjoy the episode.

##

NICK: Hello! Welcome to Tabletop Squadron. This is Episode 16 coming to you live from GenCon. Go around the table, introduce everybody and the characters they’re playing, and we have a couple of special guests today we’re super excited about. Let’s start with Hudson.

HUDSON: Hi, I’m Hudson, and I’m playing Tink, a Gigoran slicer.

NICK: Lovely to have you with us. Up next we’ve got Laura.

LAURA: Hello. I’m Laura, and I’m playing Xianna’fan, a Twi’lek smuggler.

NICK: Awesome. Up next we’ve got Cameron.

CAMERON: Hello! I’m Cameron, and I’m playing Karma Nailo, a Nautolan bounty hunter.

NICK: Wonderful. Up next, the first of our two special guests today, we’ve got Drew. Drew, tell us a little bit about yourself.

DREW: Yeah. Hi, I’m Drew Mierzejewski. I am an actor and creative based out of Orlando, formerly Chicago. Me and my wife Aly do a lot of things. We do Warda, we do game design, we do fun stuff to, you know, pass our hours until we die. (laughter) And that’s what we do.

ALYSON: Wow. Amazing.

NICK: Great. And who are you playing for us today, Drew?

DREW: I’m playing Jorus Kreel, a Human smuggler.

NICK: Wonderful. Up next, as Drew mentioned, we’ve got Aly.

ALYSON: Hi! This is Aly. Drew an I are the co-creators of Warda, which is a podcast, an actual play, and an upcoming roleplaying game that we’re working on.

DREW: I always forget that, yeah.

(laughter)

ALYSON: Yeah, that thing that we’re doing. We have a podcast that you can find on all your podcatching apps and devices. It is set in an original fantasy world that we created together, and it’s full of mystery and romance and adventure, and social commentary, and social conflict, and society… and parties. It’s a lot of fun.

DREW: It’s a lot of fun. And clothes, lots of clothes.

ALYSON: So much fashion.

DREW: So much fashion.

ALYSON: We elevator pitch it as a mixture between Game of Thrones, Downton Abbey, and Agatha Christie. I mean, in my opinion, that’s the perfect cocktail.

DREW: Yeah, that’s a great show.

ALYSON: Right there. Yeah.

NICK: (laughs) Great, well we’re glad to have you with us. Who are you playing today?

ALYSON: Tonight I am playing Sila Roe, a Human Imperial Inspector.

NICK: Wonderful. Looking forward to seeing how this plays out. Last time we were with the crew of the Afternoon Delight, you were on a secret space station in the middle of nowhere. You finally met your mysterious benefactor, Sentinel, face to face. He gave you kind of a run-down on what your actual mission was, which was that you were going to destroy potentially a fleet to clear the way for a Rebel mission of some kind. Then, as he was getting ready for you to do productive things, you got a call from a Mr. Falx, Regional Governor of the Empire, who essentially blackmailed him into sending you all to a completely different location and do something completely different.

Am I missing anything? That sounds about right, where we left off.

CAMERON: That sounds about right.

LAURA: Oh. He was definitely not a former Jedi, at all.

NICK: Oh, Sentinel? Yeah.

LAURA: Definitely not.

NICK: No, absolutely not. He’s just a guy, right?

LAURA: Mm-hmm. Normal person.

ALYSON: Disappointing.

NICK: With like a brown bath robe.

LAURA: Yeah. He just has like brown robes for no reason.

ALYSON: Boring.

NICK: Yeah.

DREW: You have Ben Kenobi out there on Tatooine.

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: Exactly. Yes.

HUDSON: Yeah. The wind moved that vase. The wind definitely moved that vase.

NICK: (smiling) It was the wind. It was not the Force.

ALYSON: Not the Force.

NICK: Okay. Great. Before we get started we’re gonna do the Destiny Roll. Everybody roll me one of them there white dice.

CAMERON: I got one dark side.

DREW: One dark side.

ALYSON: One dark side.

LAURA: Hudson and I both got two light side, so that’s four!

CAMERON: Heck yes.

NICK: So what does that put our total at?

CAMERON: So that puts us at four light side, three dark side.

NICK: Alright.

LAURA: Eh, okay.

NICK: So, Aly and Drew, like I was saying off-mic, you all being representatives not necessarily from the Afternoon Delight will be using dark side points and the crew will be using light side points, and will be using that effectively I hope. With that, we’re gonna go ahead and jump on in.

We start with the camera aimed into deep space. It’s quiet and still. A small comet lights the sky in the far distance. Then, there’s a swoosh and a bang. The Afternoon Delight stretches and snaps into place, coasting under its own momentum, running lights flashing. This is the first time we’ve gotten a good exterior look at the Afternoon Delight in a while.

The outside of the two side compartments are scored and covered in smoke. The middle section, including the cockpit, seems to be in decent condition, but towards the back of the ship there’s a large crater above one of the engines. One of the emitters is sputtering causing the steady blue glow to cut out periodically. A close look would also reveal a sheet of armor plating working its way free, again, as if it had been slid into place but the recent trauma to the hull had broken it free.

As the ship drifts the camera turns to follow it. Below the Afternoon Delight we see the planet Mustafar. Some listeners may remember it as the crazy lava planet that Obi-Wan and Anakin fight on in Episode 3.

CAMERON: (giggles)

NICK: The planet looks like an angry, glowing eye floating in space. It is crossed with flaming lava, and what little atmosphere it has seems to be mostly smoke; an inhospitable world with the only inhabitants being miners and industrial droids. The ship begins its descent towards the north pole of the planet. We get a shot of the ship’s cockpit. Who’s sitting up front currently?

CAMERON: Probably Karma, as I think I’m the- I bought ranks in both Piloting: Space and Piloting: Planetary last time, as I felt that might come up!

NICK: Yeah. Go figure.

CAMERON: Yeah.

NICK: So, what are you doing, coasting in?

CAMERON: Yup. I’m still sitting in the co-pilot seat.

NICK: Tink, Xianna, what are you all doing on the ship currently?

LAURA: How long has it been since we left?

NICK: It’s about a five hour jump.

LAURA: Oh. Xianna’s definitely still passed out.

NICK: Oh, yeah, that makes sense.

LAURA: Sleeping or passed out. Probably both.

HUDSON: I’m walking around sweating bullets trying not to let everyone know how much the ship is screwed up right now, (laughter) because that was kind of my bad, but no one knows that yet.

CAMERON: It’s still flying. It’s fine!

HUDSON: Yeah! It’s fine.

NICK: I’m sure it’ll never come up.

HUDSON: yeah.

NICK: Yeah. Great. Okay… A yellow light pops on in the dashboard of the ship. When you hit the corresponding button a voice fills the cockpit. “Greetings flight crew of Imperial Transport: Gibbous Moon. We have your reservation in hand. Please proceed to the uploaded coordinates.”

CAMERON: “Thank you?”

NICK: Beep-boop. They just hang up on you.

CAMERON: (laughs) I proceed to the coordinates.

NICK: Yeah. We get a nice shot of the ship swinging in towards the north pole of the planet. It’s a little less smoky over there. The facility you’re directed to is not what you would normally see on Mustafar. The heat on this part of the planet is less than you would expect, only enough to make you sweat profusely, not enough to burn you immediately. The landing pad is a glossy, white platform hanging over a lava-filled chasm. You land easily, and looking up through the view screen of the ship you can see that the smoke and ashes are kept at bay by a low power shield that covers the facility.

The pad is mostly filled with lambda class shuttles, those are the winged ships that fold up, and there are luxury space yachts and civilian ships as well. It’s about what you’d expect except a couple of ships stand out. You see a Z95 Headhunter, it’s like an X-Wing but older and kind of stubbier. It’s painted a non-descript tan color, but has large cargo containers under the wings that could be used to hold additional weapons or supplies. You also see an Imperial ball craft. It looks like the cockpit of a TIE fighter but with one thin wing extending off the back. These are extremely rare, but are sometimes used by important Imperial agents on infiltration missions as they are easy to hide on planets. You also see a Skipray Blastboat, a military surplus vehicle often used by small crews of bounty hunters due to its durability and firepower. (smiling)

CAMERON: (giggles)

NICK: It looks like the Star Wars version of a military equipped minivan. You also see a Star Viper painted red, which is a civilian class fighter ship that looks like an unfolder flower. You know from experience that those can lay down some pretty heavy damage in a dog fight.

You all land. Before you exit the ship you see several Imperial attachés and government officials exiting shiny space yachts. They’re wearing dress uniforms and formal attire. The women you see that aren’t in uniform are wearing fine ball gowns. This appears to be a formal affair. What’s your plan?

CAMERON: I’m sitting in the cockpit, and I’m the only one who can see it at the moment. As I started the descent I turned on the full ship coms and told Xianna to wake up.

LAURA: “(sleepy) Wha— Huh?”

CAMERON: “We’re landing!”

LAURA: “Oh… Oh- Okie…”

CAMERON: “So just START waking up.”

LAURA: “(weakly) No…”

ALYSON: (laughs)

CAMERON: “Alright. Great. Cool. Tink, can you go get Xianna up?”

HUDSON: “Yeah. Yeah. I can do that.”

CAMERON: “Thank you.”

HUDSON: “Just a second. I need to get my formal belt. Just, it looks pretty fancy down there.”

CAMERON: (laughing) “Okay, great, yep. I was just gonna bring that up.”

HUDSON: “(abruptly) Xianna, get up.”

LAURA: “(bitterly) Okay fine.” Yeah, Xianna would get up, actually put clothes on. She found a boot that fits, right?

NICK: Yeah.

LAURA: Yeah, that happened.

NICK: Yeah. We spent way too long describing your footwear situation.

(laughter)

LAURA: Yeah. She puts her boots on, gets dressed, and makes some caf. The bottles of Corellian whiskey are still in the kitchen area, and there’s a pretty good chance that her cup is not completely caf.

NICK: Cool. So, mechanically what I’m seeing here is you have two options with evaluating the situation you’ve been dropped into, because you didn’t have any background knowledge. We can do kind of a sliding scale here. You have that costume closet with a bunch of stuff in it.

CAMERON: That’s where Karma was headed. (laughs)

NICK: Yeah. You can dress as formal and blend in as you want, and go really elegant, but you’re gonna lose your armor bonuses and you’ll be more vulnerable if something goes wrong, or you can slide it all the way to you’re going in full combat-wise, but you’re gonna stand out really intensely. You can try to do something in the middle, you’re just gonna have to explain what that looks like.

CAMERON: Karma climbs down from the cockpit and heads to the closet and takes her cape out, and puts her cape on.

NICK: Okay. you’re wearing your battle armor with your fancy Imperial cape.

CAMERON: It’s not actually an Imperial cape, it’s just a black cape with embroidery on it.

NICK: Okay, so you’re wearing battle armor and a fancy cape.

CAMERON: Yeah.

NICK: Okay.

LAURA: It looks awesome!

CAMERON: It does! And as soon as I put it on and walk out of the costume closet area I start sweeping around all of the corners very dramatically with it.

NICK: Does it still smell like smoke and destruction?

CAMERON: No, because I wasn’t wearing the cloak when the herdship broke up. It was already on the ship.

NICK: Yeah, that’s fair.

CAMERON: So it smells wonderful.

NICK: Tink, you mentioned you were wearing your formal belt. I’m gonna assume that has the same armor bonus.

HUDSON: It does have the same armor bonus.

NICK: Which is zero, from what you were wearing.

CAMERON: (laughs)

HUDSON: Yes, exactly. Actually, “Xianna, do I need to have anything else on to make me stand out as one of your guards, maybe, or something other than a Gigoran?”

LAURA: “Ooh! Let’s look in the closet!” (laughter) And she definitely disappears into the closet and is throwing—

HUDSON: Montage.

LAURA: Yeah.

ALYSON: It’s a really quick montage.

LAURA: Full montage. There’s some scarves, some hats, some brooches, I think we just settle on a cute little newsy style hat.

NICK: Ooh.

HUDSON: “I like this.”

ALYSON: (smiling) Oh my gosh.

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: “You look lovely.”

HUDSON: “Thank you. I feel lovely.”

LAURA: “Yes.”

DREW: And life was never the same again…

(laughter)

NICK: We gotta change all the art.

ALYSON: Upgrade!

(laughter)

LAURA: And then… Xianna’s gonna look to see if there’s a similar cloak to what we had given karma, big enough that it just covers the trench coat, not necessarily- it doesn’t have to have a hood. She’s not trying to completely hide the fact that she’s a Twi’lek, just trying to hide the coat and not have to put on a fancy dress and lose all of her items.

NICK: Okay. Y’all can do the cloaks. That’ll work. It’s not gonna stand up to the most deep look, but it’ll get you in the door, for sure.

CAMERON: So, I’ve been swooshing around with my cloak, and then I see Tink’s hat and I just don’t feel like I’m quite at the level that Tink’s hat takes him to, so I’m gonna go back to the costume closet. I want to do the belt thing with the cloak, like Diana does in Wonder Woman, so that it’s kind of a dress with a cape attached to it, so it looks more form fitting and less like I just threw on a jacket.

NICK: Ooh. Do you put your vibro-sword down the back?

CAMERON: That’s where it is.

NICK: Okay. Okay.

CAMERON: It doesn’t pop up over the cloak, and it’s not nearly as pretty as that sword. It’s just got a boring, black handle. But yes, I’m now in a dress-type garment.

NICK: Well, thank y’all for dressing up and neatly side-stepping the mechanical choice that I gave you. That’s great.

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: Awesome. So, it takes you a while for you to change into your clothes. We get a low angle shot of the boarding ramp of the ship as it drops to the landing pad and the crew exits. Describe y’all’s exit out onto this shiny white platform filled with fancy people.

DREW: (makes the beat to Back in Black by AC/DC)

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA & ALYSON: (join in the song)

ALYSON: It’s like slow-mo.

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: Yes.

LAURA: Xianna is in front being the face, she is definitely in front. Then, Karma is behind her slightly off-set to the right, and then Tink is even another step back slightly off-set to the left.

CAMERON: You need to be able to see all of our costumes in the shot so we can’t be directly behind her.

LAURA: Yeah. The shot is like slightly downward-up, and we’re like backlit a little bit.

ALYSON: Mm, yeah.

CAMERON: Because the lava behind is making the explosion type thing with the slow-mo, but not actually exploding anything.

NICK: Oh yeah. A rock definitely falls off a cliff wall into it so we get the (burst noise), get the spray off of that.

CAMERON: Yeah~!

ALYSON: Perfectly timed.

NICK: Yeah. And then also, the temperatures are different enough that a little bit of ground fog is coming up out of the ship too, so it’s a good look.

DREW: Ooh.

ALYSON: The production values are very high.

NICK: Just on this episode, though.

(laughter)

LAURA: Tink is gonna get so sweaty.

NICK: Oh, it is extremely warm.

CAMERON: (laughs) Ew.

ALYSON: Do you get floofy when it’s this warm?

HUDSON: I more get wet, and it’s kind of gross, like me and body fluids have a really torted history in the past.

(laughter)

LAURA: Yeah.

HUDSON: Yeah.

DREW: So it gets like stringy?

LAURA: Yeah, like matted.

HUDSON: Yeah. That’s actually a word we’ve used to describe it in the past.

NICK: (laughing) It’s not great.

LAURA: In the jungle, we definitely said he smelled like wet dog, and was a little frizzy.

ALYSON: Oh Tink.

NICK: Yeah. Poor Tink. Alright, so you exit with your awesome backlit shot, exploding lava… The main platform condenses down into a walkway, and a shined and cleaned protocol droid is standing at the exit of the landing pad. It gestures at you as you get close. “Welcome to the Imperial Gala. Please continue up the walkway to the festivities.” Do you continue up the walkway? Do you wanna ask the droid anything?

LAURA: Xianna’s gonna keep going. There’s a party.

CAMERON: “Thank you?”

NICK: ‘You’re welcome.” Droids have solid faces. This one looks pleasantly surprised that someone acknowledged it.

CAMERON: (smiling) I figured it might be.

NICK: Yeah. Tink, you doing anything or are you following?

HUDSON: I’m just following.

NICK: Okay. The walkway is a meandering gangplank. It has no handrails, but it is lit from below with periodic spotlights. A red glow from the lava and the harsh spotlights cause the partygoers to look like wandering spirits as they head inside. The doors to the gala are held by two stormtroopers standing at attention. They’re so motionless you’re not sure whether they’re statues or not.

The inside of the ballroom is stunning. The floor is clear transparesteel allowing you to see straight down to the roaring magma below the structure. There are waiters in tight, black cat suits carrying champagne and hors d’oeuvres. There are some stand-up cocktail tables scattered around and large round tables covered in white tablecloths with glowing arrangements of igneous rocks around the edge of the room, although few of the partygoers are sitting.

Most of the men in the crowd are wearing Imperial dress uniforms, although there are a few men in tuxedos scattered about. The women are wearing increasingly elaborate gowns and hairstyles and cluster around each other for a few minutes at a time before scattering away to form new groups, usually leaving one behind looking crushed and overwhelmed. The whole gathering has a predatory air.

There are a surprising number of non-Humans at this party as well. Several of the servers are Twi’leks, you see a Davronian man speaking with some Imperial officers, and a couple of Rodians are leaning against one of the glass walls. There are two other stormtroopers in the room. They are standing at the far side of the ballroom on a small raised stage flanking an empty podium that looks like it’s set up for speeches later.

Now would be a great time for our additional characters to enter the stage, I think. Drew, Aly, what are your characters up to in this shindig?

DREW: I’m fashionably late, so uh, what are you doing?

ALYSON: You’re not there yet? Is that what you’re saying?

DREW: No, I’m not there yet.

(laughter)

ALYSON: (sophisticated) Sila Rowe is moving shark-like throughout the crowd, very, very bored, with a droid floating alongside behind her tailing her as she goes. She doesn’t stop to talk to anyone, but she just watches everything as though she’s seen it a million times before and will see it a million times again. Nothing about this is impressive for her. Nothing about this is interesting, yet, but the night is young.

NICK: I think we definitely get an overhead shot of all these clusters, and every time Sila gets close they scatter like sharks swimming through a reef, and then they come back together, and when they come back together the droid swoops in close because they’re not expecting it and you hear a snapshot noise as it takes pictures of different people, and then they all look really nervous.

ALYSON: So, people are noticing Sila Rowe moving through? They’re very aware of her?

NICK: Yeah!

ALYSON: Cool.

NICK: I think, the impression that I’m getting, and you can correct me if I’m wrong, is that Sila has an aura that freaks people out a little bit.

ALYSON: yeah. It makes them very uncomfortable.

NICK: Yeah~ Most of them look confused at the same time, too. They’re not sure what’s going on, but they know they don’t want to talk to you. (laughs)

ALYSON: Mm-hmm. Yeah. She is not wearing a gown. She is in dress uniform with everything pressed and crisp, utilitarian.

NICK: So, Sila is an Imperial Inspector, which may or may not be an actual EU thing, so what does an Imperial Inspector’s dress uniform look like?

ALYSON: Interesting. She’s got one of the little hats.

NICK: Have to.

ALYSON: Gotta have a hat. Her dark hair is, if she took the hat off, is in a very intricate series of knots and spirals, but it’s all tucked low and close to her head so that with the hat on it looks like a single low bun but it’s definitely not.

NICK: (laughs)

DREW: (mumbling) Make up? Make up?

ALYSON: Okay. Easy. (laughter) She’s wearing regulation stuff. It’s neutral and basic. It’s not important.

DREW: (whispered) Damn.

CAMERON: (laughs)

ALYSON: But she has really long lashes, really long, full, dark lashes. She’s got like tall boots, and… I don’t know how Imperial uniforms look. It’s black and square shouldered, and really well tailored is the thing.

NICK: Yeah!

ALYSON: It’s utilitarian, it’s simple, but it’s very clean, and even though she’s not wearing an intricate gown, as she passes—shark-like—through these women in silk and brocade and whatever, it may as well be for the way she wears it and the way she doesn’t seem to care what anyone else is wearing.

NICK: Ooh.

DREW: Do you mind if I offer something about what distinguishes her as an Inspector?

ALYSON: yeah, go ahead.

DREW: Okay. This is probably not canon at all.

NICK: We really don’t care that much.

(laughter)

DREW: Good! I love it. So, you know the Corellian blood stripe.

ALYSON: yeah, yeah.

DREW: You have one of those, but it also goes up the arm as well, so there’s this red stripe that runs up both sides.

NICK: Ooh.

ALYSON: That’s cool. I like that.

NICK: And then the other thing is, I think it’s a pretty neutral uniform, it’s got that, I think the Inspector uniform probably has a patch. What do you think the patch looks like?

ALYSON: Oh man.

NICK: Is it a ranking logo, is it something that’s imagery?

ALYSON: She’s not just an inspector, she’s an Imperial Inspector. It has the Empire’s insignia, but at strategic points in that logo it’s like a constellation, so there’s silver embroidered stars at certain points in that logo that have been emphasized. The Imperial logo is there, but like you were saying your cloak is black but there’s embroidery in it, so like the Imperial logo is there but the stuff that catches the light are the stars that are poised throughout it. Kind of like, if you know what it is you know what it is.

NICK: Yeah. It looks blank until you get up close, and it may even be just weird stitching, but if you know what that is you can spot it a mile away. I really like that. That’s really cool. Okay, Jorus, do you arrive?

DREW: (cocky southern voice) I do eventually arrive. What happens is as Sila’s moving around taking the look of the room, not the main door, the side door opens… kind of anticlimactically.

(laughter)

ALYSON: I feel like the camera just drifts to the side and this door goes (squeaking noise).

(laughter)

DREW: So, there’s all this commotion going on at the main door, people are coming in and handing people their invitations and coming in, and as the door opens in steps Jorus. Jorus is about six feet tall. He’s in his mid-to-late 30s. he’s got a square beard and a rather thrilling mustache. He’s kind of graying at the temples a little bit from a hard life on the rim, and he’s got this beat up leather hat on, and he is not dressed for such an occasion. He’s wearing his usual jacket that he usually has, it’s a leather jacket that’s got that quintessential Star Wars piping off the side.

NICK: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

CAMERON: Mm-hmm.

ALYSON: Yeah, those pin tucks?

DREW: Yeah. It’s kind of a dark brown jacket that’s got dark blue piping off of the side of it. He’s wearing high boots, tan pants, and like a red shirt. It’s the nicest shirt he owns. (others giggle) He’s wearing a gray vest with that as well. He’s got his blasters on, there’s the bulge of a hulled out blaster under his arm, and he steps in and immediately waiters come up to him, and they’re like ‘I’m terribly sorry sir, this is for a private function.’ “Ah, kriffin’, I got my own invitation.” He reaches in and pulls out this very official looking invitation. He goes, “Here. Why don’t you chew on that for a while,” and kind of puts it at the waiter. As he steps in he reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small little package and takes out what looks like a cigarette and puts it in his mouth. As the guy is sitting there looking at the invitation and goes, ‘Well, Mr. Jorus Kreel.’ “That’s Marshal Jorus Kreel, actually.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

DREW: It’s then that we see that on his shoulder there’s the marshal patch that he’s wearing, and he also opens his jacket and there’s his official badge on the inside.

NICK: Okay. Cool.

DREW: By doing that he also shows his blaster (laughter) to the waiter, and the waiter kind of stiffens a little bit. “Don’t you forget it.” He takes one of the cigarettes and goes, “You want one?” and he puts it in the mouth of the waiter. “Felusian Tebrax bark. You can smoke it, you can chew it, you can snort it too if you like, I don’t recommend it though.” He takes one of those plasma lighters and he lights it, takes a drag. “Now if you’ll excuse me… I got a party to go to.” And he walks in.

(laughter)

NICK: I think the waiter is completely stunned. You get a nice shot of the Felusian bark hanging out of his mouth, not knowing what to do, still holding the invitation, and one of the Twi’lek waitresses with pink, bubbly champagne on a platter walks up and says, “Well, we weren’t expecting anyone like you. Would you like a drink?”

DREW: He looks her up and down and goes, “Sorry, I don’t drink on duty,” and he walks away.

NICK: She pouts, (others giggle) and shrugs and turns off to someone else. That needs the stop shot with Jorus Kreel and the electric guitar under it.

(electric guitar noises)

DREW: There’s like a sepia tone.

ALYSON: And then it keeps going—Yeah! The sepia tone.

NICK: In the distance we see a Zabrak man in fancy clothes waver over and grab a couple and start to drink them. “Wonderful. This is exactly what I was hoping for.”

So, the crew sitting in the room, they see these entrances. In addition, there’s another person you can see by the bar, an Imperial Inspector. Sila, you would probably know them from professional situations, a man named Tarstin Moon, a thin gentleman wearing spectacles, one of the best although he hasn’t collared anyone in quite a long time he’s an Imperial Inspector. When asked what he’s working on he’s often very quiet. He just says he’s been working on something really big. He looks to be the only one not mixing with the guests except for Sila herself. Can I get Perception checks from anyone looking at *Tarstin? So, whoever would be looking at him at the bar and want to look a little bit more closely.

LAURA: A brief physical description again?

NICK: He’s a thin gentleman wearing spectacles with a thin but stylish mustache. Think like Gone With the Wind.

LAURA: Oh. Okay.

NICK: Yeah. Slicked back hair.

LAURA: In my head I was imagining like boring old professor…

NICK: No~

LAURA: …but if we’re talking stylish, pencil-thin mustache, then yeah I’ll do a Perception check.

NICK: You’ll notice that his uniform is very similar to Sila’s and has red pinstripes.

CAMERON: What difficulty?

NICK: This will be hard, I think.

CAMERON: So three purples.

NICK: Three purples. You roll the purples with those at the same time.

ALYSON: Whoa. This is a lot of dice.

CAMERON: Yup.

NICK: Yeah. So you have to algebra them out, so the failures and stuff cancel. Cameron will help.

ALYSON: I feel like I’m casting runes.

CAMERON: That’s gonna be two failures and three advantages for Sila.

NICK: We’ll wait to see what other people’s rolls are, Sila, but those advantages, you can spend—three of them is a bunch. You can do pretty much whatever you want with those. You can add something to the scene, you can give yourself an advantage for later, describe it narratively…

HUDSON: You can give someone else an advantage.

NICK: You could give it to someone else if you wanted to.

ALYSON: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

NICK: You can think about that for a second. How did Xianna do?

LAURA: Xianna has three successes, one threat.

NICK: Okay. Oh boy, we’re starting the threats. I think this is another episode with a threat counter for nameless fear.

CAMERON: (laughs) Great.

LAURA: Yay.

ALYSON: (laughs)

NICK: That’s one. There is a number in my head. If we hit it, something really bad will happen.

DREW: Great.

ALYSON: Cool.

NICK: Yeah. Last time I had this like creeping doom and they never got to it, so…

DREW: That was the most gentle roll.

CAMERON: That’s just one threat.

NICK: Just one threat?

CAMERON: (smiling) Just one threat.

NICK: That’s gonna go in the pile. Y’all are just gonna begin to stand out a little bit.

HUDSON: I didn’t look.

NICK: Jorus, did you wanna look at him or no?

DREW: Oh no, I’m not paying attention to any of this.

ALYSON: You said that Inspector Moon is someone who I would know professionally?

NICK: Mm-hmm.

ALYSON: Is this someone that I am familiar with or I just know who he is?

NICK: I would say you’re familiar with him. You’ve maybe worked a case before. That’s up to you. It would be more fun if you have a relationship, I think.

ALYSON: yeah. Maybe it’s been a while since we ran into each other, but we’ve definitely worked a case or two in the past.

DREW: (musically) Strangers in the night~

ALYSON: Sure.

NICK: Tarstin hasn’t noticed you yet, but you’ve seen him.

ALYSON: Cool.

NICK: So, Xianna I guess would be the only one who noticed that he takes a little packet of powder and mixes it into his drink and the color changes  a little as he’s drinking at the bar.

LAURA: Would I have any idea what that is?

NICK: No. You know it’s not impact.

LAURA: I mean yeah, you don’t put that in a drink.

(laughter)

NICK: But no, it’s in a black bag, you just see a little bit of white powder. From the distance you’re at there’s like no possible way you would.

LAURA: Okay. I’m watching this happen, and I see a waiter walk by with some sort of cigarette in his mouth, and I just pluck that out and go “Oh thank you~” and stuff it into one of my pockets for later.

DREW: Smells like cinnamon.

LAURA: Oh, that’s lovely. And I’m very intrigued by what he put into his drink. I’m gonna go up and talk to him.

NICK: Okay. Before that happens, two things. One, Jorus it’s up to you but would you like to see her very smoothly pluck this Felusian cigarette out of the waiter’s mouth? Is that something you’d like to notice?

DREW: Yeah. Yeah.

NICK: Alright. Can you make me an Underworld check, please?

DREW: Alright. Let’s see here. That’s gonna be…

NICK: I think you have Underworld.

DREW: I do. I do. It’s based off of Intelligence which is two, so two greens and a yellow, I believe.

NICK: Yeah. That’s gonna be an average difficulty.

CAMERON: Just one yellow, one green.

DREW: Oh, sorry.

NICK: No, you’re good. Two purples.

LAURA: Nick, is this to identify me?

NICK: Uh, yes.

LAURA: Okay. The difficulty is upgraded by one.

NICK: Ooh, so make one of those purples into a red.

LAURA: Because I have Indistinguishable.

NICK: Oh boy! I wasn’t gonna give away the whole game, but yeah that’s generally what’s going on.

CAMERON: (laughs) Nothing!

NICK: A total wash. (laughs) That’s always fun. You don’t succeed. Your interest is piqued. That’s somebody who’s slick.

DREW: Interesting. Interesting. Alright. I notice that happened. I noticed her take it. What does your Twi’lek look like?

LAURA: She’s about 5’6” and she is a beautiful shade of medium purple, very long lekku, the head tails, and there’s a—

DREW: Talking like, to knees?

LAURA: Small of the back to hips, and there’s a light gray smoke swirl pattern from the tips going to about half way. Dark purple lips and very blue-violet eyes.

DREW: Interesting.

LAURA: And then, I just probably picked a very basic cloak, nothing special, but nothing boring? I imagine… Ooh, what would look good with purple? It’s probably black—

NICK: I thought mustard yellow. That’s probably not.

ALYSON: (laughs)

LAURA: I was imagining black with a lot of gold on it. No crazy patterns and probably not reflective metallic, just a light dusting of gold. She’s about 25.

NICK: Yeah, great. Cool. You notice that’s an operator. Not one that you necessarily recognize, but yeah, that’s someone who’s good at stuff. You notice that ,and then you see someone approaching the group, someone I don’t think Jorus would know but Sila definitely is aware of them at least tangentially. It’s a Zabrak man. He is bald, he has horns, he’s like the Darth Maul race. He’s got tan skin with darker tan face tattoos, and he’s wearing a governor’s uniform. It looks like an admiral uniform but cut a little different, lots more shiny dooblies on the shoulders. His has been modified. It’s tailored nicer than his regulation and his shoes aren’t the right kind of shoes, they are much shinier, nicer boots. They look to be made out of some weird sharkskin material with a little bit of chiton things hanging off like in a fringe around the top. Call backs.

Sila, you can decide whether or not you’re aware of this. This is Regional Governor Falx. He has a reputation as someone who… He rose pretty far considering he’s a non-Human in the Empire, and something happened that no one has the same story about that got him made a governor of a backwoods system that’s extremely dangerous, and he’s been there a long time. His career just ground to a halt. The fact that he’s here at a bigger social gathering is a little strange. It’s weird that he was invited. He approaches this crew of people who, let’s be honest, don’t exactly blend in. They’re wearing cloaks. There’s a Gigoran, those are really rare, you usually just see them in the background with a flamethrower. (laughter.

But yeah, Falx approaches the crew and says, “My good friends, what a delight to see you. Thanks for coming.”

HUDSON: “Hi Falx.”

NICK: “Hi!”

LAURA: Am I still in the group?

NICK: Yeah. You haven’t had a chance to depart yet. He managed to make his way through the crowd before you split.

LAURA: “Oh. ‘ello.”

NICK: He doesn’t have eyebrows, but he waggles them a little bit.

LAURA: (laughs) yes.

NICK: ‘No greeting for me, karma?”

CAMERON: “Why are we here?”

NICK: “Yeah, funny you should bring that up.” He looks a little awkward for a second and kind of clasps at his hip. He turns to a man next to him who is looking at Falx and the group suspiciously. He’s also wearing a Regional Governor’s outfit but it is a regulation one, standard, nothing fancy. He’s a sort of portly man with black mutton chops, and he is glaring at Xianna pretty strongly until Falx snaps his fingers to get his attention. “Governor Silpin, I think that’ll be all. I’ll speak with you after I get my friends settled.” The man looks like he’s about to say something to Xianna, and then—

LAURA: Xianna’s waving at him, just kinda very awkward smiling, “Oh hi~”

NICK: The man harrumphs to himself and departs for another group. You can hear him grumbling something that sounds surprisingly poetic and existential under his breath.

LAURA: (laughs)

NICK: Falx says, “I am so glad that you came. I actually risked quite a lot to get you here unfortunately, but here’s the thing: I think someone at this party wants to kill me.”

CAMERON: “Why would they want to kill you?”

NICK: “I’m as baffled as you are.”

CAMERON: “Oh, I wasn’t baffled. (laughs)”

NICK: “Oh.” (laughs)

LAURA: “Um… Yes. Is the Mrs. Governor Silpin here too?”

NICK: “You know, it’s funny, I haven’t seen her in quite a while. I don’t know if she even came.”

LAURA: ‘Oh… Uh, never mind, then.”

NICK: “Why? You wanted to do some catching up?”

LAURA: “Uh… No. No reason. (laughs)”

NICK: “Oh. Strange. Yeah, so, really I have you here so that you can make it so I don’t die. That sounds great. I would like to enlist you as bodyguards.”

CAMERON: ‘If you thought someone was gonna kill you here why did you come here? Why not just stay on Unroola Dawn?”

NICK: “Well, I called them here, to lure out the assassin, you see…”

CAMERON: “No…”

NICK: “…so that we could stop them…”

LAURA: “No…”

NICK: “…and I could go back to my meteoric rise to governmental power.”

LAURA: ‘No.”

NICK: “No?”

LAURA: “That is not how you do that.”

CAMERON: (laughing) “This plan does not make sense.”

NICK: “Um… Well, it’s a little late now.”

LAURA: (sighs)

CAMERON: “Yeah. We just need you to be aware of it.”

HUDSON: “That didn’t sound very smart.”

NICK: “Oh—Ooh.”

LAURA: “Tink—“ (laughs)

CAMERON: (laughs)

HUDSON: “I’m sorry. What I meant was it didn’t sound very smart that you waited so long to call us.”

NICK: “Oh. Yeah. Tink, I’ve always liked you.”

HUDSON: “Thank you.”

LAURA: “Do you want to just stand behind Tink for the whole party?”

HUDSON: ‘I cover a lot of area.”

LAURA: ‘He is very large.”

NICK: “We may come to that, but I am actually here to make some deals and arrange some things.” By the way, if either of you would like to overhear this conversation or move towards it at any point…

LAURA: No…

DREW: He’s the governor of the outer rim?

NICK: He’s a regional governor. He’s in charge of a couple of systems. You actually may have heard about the planet Unroola Dawn. It’s an outer rim planet, it’s backwoods, it has some really interesting wildlife and monsters on it.

LAURA: Don’t go there!

NICK: If you want to make me a Knowledge: Outer Rim check…

DREW: I’ll make a Knowledge: Outer Rim check.

NICK: Yeah! You’re probably very interested in those boots. Might give you a little bit more background.

CAMERON: What’s the difficulty?

NICK: The difficulty for you will be… Eh, let’s go with easy.

CAMERON: Okay, so that’s one purple.

NICK: I think that you’re a purveyor of outer rim fashion.

CAMERON: (sharp inhale) No…

LAURA: Oh… (laughs)

DREW: Is that another wash?

CAMERON: No, so it’s one failure, one advantage, because one of the advantages cancels out the threat.

NICK: So, you have an advantage. You can spend that in the next bit to give yourself a boost, to give Aly a boost, to add something to the scene, anything like that.

DREW: Cool.

NICK: Yeah. They continue to talk for a little bit. Falx says, “So, I really need to work my way around the party. I figured you would appreciate if I kept Silpin away from you. To be honest, I did not expect him to be here, but you know what they say, best laid plans of TaunTauns and Rancores.”

LAURA: “Anyways. I would appreciate it if you did not eat or drink, because you know, the poisoning.”

NICK: “Oh. This one’s fine. This one’s from the flask.”

LAURA: “I mean, yes, well because if I was going to kill you I would poison your drink knowing you always drink martinis.”

NICK: “Well, I’ve been nursing this one for a while, gotta keep the wit sharp, and I haven’t dropped yet. So…”

CAMERON: “Cool. Make sure you maintain that in your sight. Don’t set it down anywhere and walk away to go to the refresher or anything. If you do, get a fresh drink.”

NICK: “Oh. Yeah, I never lose sight of a martini.”

CAMERON: “Good.”

LAURA: “Yes. If you do have to get a new one, make sure you watch the bartender make it or the droid make it. Yeah, how about you just don’t eat food, okay?”

NICK: “That’s fine. I’m not hungry anyway.”

ALYSON: I think while this is happening Sila is aware of Regional Governor Falx and his presence in the room. I think she stops her patrol, I guess is a good word for it, and kind of watches this from a distance. She’s not in eavesdropping range but she’s watching, and she kind of tilts her head to one side and the droid comes buzzing over to fill that space next to her, and I think she says under her breath, “Whist, are those known associates of the regional governor?”

NICK: “Calculating. I have no records of any of those beings.”

ALYSON: “With or without the regional governor?”

NICK: “At all.”

ALYSON: “Interesting.”

NICK: “Extremely. I must need my database updated.”

ALYSON: “Go ahead and do a round, would you?”

NICK: “At your command.” He floats up to five meters in the air, so it’s a little distinct but above most people’s normal eyesight, and starts to do a scan.

DREW: While this is happening, I would like to count all the Twi’leks in the room.

ALYSON: (laughs)

SEVERAL: Ooh.

LAURA & ALYSON: (musically) Count the Twi’leks~

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: Alright. So—

DREW: Perception, or…?

NICK: I’ll just give you that. They tend to stand out.

DREW: Mm-hmm.

NICK: There are—

ALYSON: They’re hot!

LAURA: Yeah!

NICK: Yeah they are, especially these ones. There are four, one in each color that I think is fun. So, you see the purple one that is talking to an important government official with the cool boots, you see the one that talked to you earlier which was a red one, there is a yellow one that is actually not dressed as a waitress, she’s wearing a nice gown and is talking with some people and seems to actually be in control of that conversation which is pretty cool, and there is a green one that is a waitress and she has head tails that have Sabacc suits tattooed on them going down the back, she’s pretty short and she seems particularly animated.

ALYSON: So, they’re the Teletubbies colors.

NICK: Oh shit!

(laughter)

CAMERON: Yes!

NICK: I guess so. Oh…

ALYSON: Does that make Tink the baby in the sun?

LAURA: yes!

CAMERON: Xianna is Tinky Winky.

DREW: Would it be a Perception then to guess the heights of all of them?

NICK: Oh yeah, absolutely.

DREW: Alright. I’ll roll that Perception. I have two in Perception, so is that two yellows?

ALYSON: Mm-hmm.

DREW: And then I have three Cunning, so it’s just two dice?

CAMERON: Yeah, so one green.

NICK: Three Cunning, you get a green one with your two yellows, and we’ll say this is an average check, I would say height estimates is something you do in your line of work pretty regularly.

CAMERON: So two purples.

DREW: So two purples. I can use a blue because I had that earlier?

NICK: You can, absolutely.

DREW: Alright. Let’s read these…

CAMERON: This one looks better.

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: Uh, ooh, no, not as better as it could be, though.

NICK: Not as better—

CAMERON: (laughs) Not as—Yeah. It’s three advantages, so all of those cancel out.

DREW: Alright. Ooh. Three advantages.

NICK: So when you get to three that starts getting into like three-pointer territory. You can do something with that that’s pretty cool, but you can’t be successful at the height guessing. That’s a fail.

DREW: Alright. So I can’t guess the height. It’s hard, because they’re spread out around the room, so I’m trying to guess their height but I can’t do that. So instead what I do is, I’m gonna say that I immediately dismiss the waitresses as possible targets, because from what I know of my quarry she would not be doing that.

NICK: So that’s the red one and the green one off the table.

CAMERON: Christmas colors, gone.

DREW: Christmas colors, gone!

LAURA: If I’m not allowed to do this let me know, but I would say with the purple one you specifically have a hard time, because she seems to be shifting her weight from foot to foot…

NICK & CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: …it kind of changes the height so you can’t tell if she’s like on tip-toes a little bit or if she’s purposely kind of slouched down whenever she’s shifting.

NICK: Oh no, 100%.

LAURA: yeah, so you’re just not sure which height is the correct height.

DREW: So, what I know is that she’s masking her height…

LAURA: Eh.

NICK: yeah. It’s totally not that she’s injured horribly or anything like that.

CAMERON: (laughs)

DREW: I’m gonna guess that she’s masking her height…

(laughter)

LAURA: R.I.P. toes.

NICK: (laughs)

DREW: Alright. Thank you so much.

NICK: Okay, so with your three advantages, do you want to sit on that for a bit, do you wanna think about it, or do you wanna use them on something?

DREW: Um… I’m gonna sit on them.

NICK: Okay. That’s fine.

ALYSON: If you don’t use your advantages right away do they go bye-bye?

NICK: No. I mean, maybe by the rules, but if you wanna pocket them for a bit and use them a little later I’m fine with that. It’s more fun.

LAURA: We pocket them.

ALYSON: Cool. Yeah, because I had I think one or two from before, but I haven’t done anything with them.

NICK: Yeah. In my mind you’re still sitting on them. Now like if the scene ends or something really dramatic happens by then they’re probably gonna go away, because we’ll forget about them anyway, but if you wanna sit on them and use them a little later…

ALYSON: That’s cool.

NICK: Yeah, should be fine.

CAMERON: If Nick is allowed to have a threat counter, we’re allowed to hold advantages.

LAURA: Yeah. Yeah.

NICK: That’s fair. No one’s done three threats yet. Disappointing. Yeah, so as all this is going on, I think Falx very subtly cocks his head and sees Whist making a circuit, and it’s difficult to see that he’s acknowledging. He goes, “Well, I think I need to be moving around the crowd otherwise it’s pretty suspicious, so if you could mingle a little bit, maybe look for anyone who could be a threat, there’s quite a few people who seem to be here that I didn’t invite, maybe—“

CAMERON: “Oh, this is your party?”

NICK: “Well, technically it’s Silpin’s party, but the man doesn’t think particularly well, so I may have implanted some ideas.”

LAURA: “Wait! So if it is his party, why did you not think he was going to be here? (huffs)”

NICK: “Yeah. The reason that I didn’t expect him to be here is because I made sure that he had business elsewhere. I really didn’t expect him to sacrifice a colony for this kind of thing.”

LAURA: “But it is his own party.”

NICK: “Well yeah, but the man hates parties. I think he came merely to aggravate me since I hijacked the thing.”

LAURA: “(huffs) Whatever.”

NICK: “Hey, my plans are intricate!”

CAMERON: “I would like to point out a security risk. We were able to just walk in the doors without an invitation, so if anyone is here to kill you they could’ve just walked in even if they weren’t invited to Silpin’s party.”

NICK: ‘Oh no, it was by the ship registry. Did you notice that they called you something else?”

CAMERON: “I did, but then everyone else was still handing in paper invitations as we walked through the doors.”

NICK: “Oh…”

LAURA: “Like, no check at all. I have so many weapons.”

CAMERON: “We are so armed right now.”

NICK: “Well, I’m glad that you’re armed. That was part of the plan.”

HUDSON: “I have a visible vibro-axe.”

(laughter)

LAURA: You just have a vibro-axe on your back!

HUDSON: Just so you all know what I look like.

ALYSON: yeah~

NICK: “You’re the guests of honor, and I may need to have—“

CAMERON: “What?!”

NICK: “You’re… What?!”

CAMERON: (laughing) “We’re the guests of honor?”

NICK: “Well, I mean, like my guests of honor. Anyone who keeps me alive is a guest of honor.”

CAMERON: “But this isn’t even your party.”

NICK: “You’re making me real nervous right now. I would like you to please mingle at the party.”

CAMERON: “Sorry. We’ve had a rough, like, 24 hours.”

NICK: “Oh, really?”

CAMERON: ‘Yeah.”

LAURA: “We will mingle. We will, we will mingle. Okie.”

NICK: ‘Hey, speaking of that, weren’t there four of you before?”

CAMERON: “No.”

NICK: “Oh. Okay.”

LAURA: “Oh… Yes.”

NICK: “Oh? I’m getting some mixed messages.”

LAURA: ‘It’s fine. Do not worry about it.”

NICK: “Tink?”

HUDSON: “(whimpering, failing to form words)”

CAMERON: (laughs)

HUDSON: I’m still broken up about losing a teammate.

CAMERON: (laughing) Karma puts a comforting hand on Tink’s shoulder.

LAURA: Xianna like turns Falx around by the shoulder and just pushes him into the crowd, and once he gets far enough away she looks at Tink and karma. “Okie. So, if he is killed at this party, he cannot blackmail us anymore…”

HUDSON: “Yeah.”

CAMERON: “That’s true.”

LAURA: “So, my vote is that, uh, we let him die.”

NICK: “I am still standing here!”

(laughter)

LAURA: “Oh! You are still here?! Wow!”

CAMERON: “Are you really surprised, though?”

NICK: “No, not really.”

LAURA: “Are you surprised? I mean, you are blackmailing me, so you know what I’m like.”

NICK: “Oh, I’m blackmailing all of you. I’m blackmailing most of the people at this party. … Ooh, I said that out loud.”

ALYSON: Did Whist catch that?

NICK: Oh, 100%.

ALYSON: yes! Perfect.

(laughter)

LAURA: “I mean, I figured, I feel like that is your thing. You blackmail.”

NICK: “Well yeah. Anyway. Now I will leave you alone to plot my demise. I’ve got some people to mingle with.” And he’s gonna go away.

LAURA: Ha!

NICK: I think at this point Whist kind of buzzes Jorus pretty close, and Jorus you hear a lot of computer beeping noises. He is right over you and you can feel a scan, kind of like if you stand too close to a microwave, like you shouldn’t be able to feel microwaves but you kinda get that vibe. You are being actively sonarred by this droid.

DREW: As that is happening, Jorus turns, sees it, flashes the badge, makes eyes, puts it back, takes a long drag of his cigarette… and blows it up into the robot. The smoke is not black smoke, it’s red tinged with yellow.

NICK: Ooh. Very Felusia, I like it.

DREW: Very Felusian.

NICK: Yeah. There’s a synthetic (coughing noises), which is bologna…

DREW: Fake!

NICK: …because he’s a droid, yeah, and there’s a long pause as you see the main iris with a red light in it shutter in, and then you hear the droid say, “It’s an older badge, but it checks out,” and it continues on.

DREW: “Of course it does!”

(laughter)

NICK: One of the well-dressed kind of peacocky ladies who is in a little group turns by and goes, “Oh, there’s a badge!” and makes eyes at you for a second, and then a man in a tuxedo tries to get her attention back. She looks very torn.

DREW: Jorus winks, tips his hat, and goes, “Ma’am, I’m sure you’re… very smart.”

(laughter)

ALYSON: Savage.

NICK: “What do you think he meant by that?”

“Don’t engage with the scary people, dear. Come back to the group.”

And then, Whist makes it back to Sila. “Reporting back for duty, marm.” // 51:48

ALYSON: “What did you find out?”

NICK: So, out of character, what kinds of things does Whist usually scan for?

ALYSON: Notable persons… In a situation like this where it’s a big mixer event, it’s an Imperial hosted event, we’re looking for people who shouldn’t be here, we’re looking for people who have records that I would need to know about…

NICK: Oh boy.

ALYSON: …we’re looking for people who are talking to people who normally they shouldn’t be talking to those people. I’m looking for things that stand out. I’m looking for things that aren’t normal.

NICK: Alright, so… It’s a long list. (laughs) it’s a long enough list that sorting through it is going to be difficult, so Whist gives you the Sparknotes version, the Starnotes maybe even.

ALYSON: Ooh.

CAMERON: Ah-ha-ha.

NICK: So, he gives you a rundown. “Well, marm, I don’t know if you noticed but your fellow inspector Tarstin Moon is here.”

ALYSON: “I did see him.”

NICK: “Yes. His bio signs are a little irregular. He seems much more nervous than usual.”

ALYSON: “Irregular how?”

NICK: “Elevated heart rate and adrenaline, mostly.”

ALYSON: “Hmm.”

NICK: “Some sort of chemical irregularity I can’t identify.”

ALYSON: “That is unusual for him.”

NICK: “Most of the non-Humans here have records. Are there any specifically that you would be interested in?”

ALYSON: Out of character question.

NICK: Sure.

ALYSON: Why am I at this party?

NICK: Good question. You were given an anonymous tip from a very reliable source that heard from someone they claim is reliable that your quarry was going to be at this party, specifically.

ALYSON: So someone I’m looking for?

NICK: Absolutely. Actually, that would be a good thing for the listeners to know. Jorus, you and Sila are both hunting someone specifically, and have heard from a reliable source that’s heard a reliable source that the person you’re hunting is here. Jorus, you’re looking for sort of a heartbreaker, someone who seduces and steals things on a small scale. Sila, you have been tracking this very up-and-coming slicer who’s been hacking Imperial systems. The only thing you know about them that identifies would be StarDestroyer1, it’s this weird signature  they leave in a lot of stuff.

ALYSON: Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

NICK: Yeah!

ALYSON: Cool. So, I’m aware then that it is Regional Governor Falx’s party masquerading as Governor Silpin’s party?

NICK: Mm-hmm.

ALYSON: Great.

NICK: And Whist does say, “It’s quite strange that Silpin is here, because he doesn’t ever attend parties.”

ALYSON: “No, not even his own.”

NICK: “No, especially not his own. One other thing, there are several mercenaries here.”

ALYSON: “Mercenaries?”

NICK: “The Davronian, the Rodian…” For our listeners who don’t go into Star Wars, Davronians look like Halloween store devils—

CAMERON: Deevils!

NICK: –and Rodians look kinda like bugs with sticky-outie snoots. “The Davronian, one of the Twi’leks pretending to be a waitress, and the Rodians are all hired guns.”

ALYSON: “Hired by whom?”

NICK: “That I cannot determine from scanning their bio signs, although someday I do hope for that upgrade.”

ALYSON: “As do I, Whist, as do I.”

NICK: (laughs)

ALYSON: “Interesting.”

NICK: “Is there anything else I can do to serve you further?”

ALYSON: “Not yet. Continue as planned.”

NICK: “Assuming patrol route.” He goes up and starts to hover around the room. Is there anyone in particular that anyone would like to talk to? I defer to Jorus and Sila first.

DREW: I’d like to do two things real quick.

NICK: Okay.

DREW: One, I’d like to hail a waitress over.

NICK: Which one?

DREW: Um, the green one.

NICK: Oh! Great.

DREW: I hail her over, and I take a drink. “Thank you kindly, ma’am,” and I tip her 100 credits.

NICK: She goes, “Oh… What else do you need?”

DREW: “The drink is fine.”

NICK: “Well, I’ll make sure to keep them coming, handsome.”

DREW: “Thank you.” He has his cred-stick and he very, um, noticeably places it in his pocket. He’s doing this in the middle of the room. Then he walks over to the yellow Twi’lek to go talk to her. I’ll defer from that.

NICK: Okay. Okay.

LAURA: So, Xianna’s standing still with Karma and Tink, and look sat the man that’s at the bar, and goes, “You know, I think I’m just going to go get some drinks, just enjoy the party, you know? I do not really care if Falx dies, too much.”

CAMERON: “Okay, but I am curious and interested in knowing the person who kills him, so I’m just gonna go follow Falx.”

LAURA: “Yes.” She’s digging through her pockets while she’s talking. “Oh… It is in here somewhere. Um, hold on…” She pulls out a small little bag, pours it onto her hand, and then snorts and goes, “Mm, it is a party. (upbeat) Tink, you want a drink?” (giggles)

HUDSON: “I’d love a drink.”

LAURA: “Okie. I’m not going to get you one.”

HUDSON: “Fine.”

(laughter)

LAURA: She saunters off to the bar and does the elbow down, chin on the hand, in front of Tarstin. “Ello~”

NICK: ‘Oh, uh, well… Hi there.”

LAURA: “You are?”

NICK: “Not at liberty to say, I’m afraid.”

LAURA: “You can’t even make up a name?”

(quiet giggling)

NICK: ‘Let’s… Let’s go with, uh, Tarstin. Dang it!”

(laughter)

LAURA: “Okie. I am assuming your name is Tarstin, then.”

NICK: “Yes, Tarstin Dangit.”

LAURA: “Okie.”

NICK: “Why are you paying attention to me right now?”

LAURA: “I like your mustache.”

NICK: “Oh, well thank you. I work very hard on it, actually.”

LAURA: “It is very nice.”

NICK: “Well, I think your… head tails are very nice, too.”

LAURA: She gets that like flash across her face of, ugh, that’s not- that’s so offensive… (others giggle) and then it immediately snaps back to the pleasant, like he probably doesn’t even notice. “Oh, heh, thank you. I, uh, grew them myself. (laughs)”

NICK: “Oh, haha, I get it. That’s very clever.”

LAURA: (smiling) “Yes.”

NICK: “I’m actually kind of in the middle of something.”

LAURA: “Yes, so, about that…” She kind of leans in very close and whispers. “So, I saw you pouring something into your drink?”

NICK: “Y-Yeah…”

LAURA: “Yes. What is it?”

NICK: Hmm. I’m gonna need a Charm check.

LAURA: (gasps) Can do! What is my Charm?!

NICK: Also, if anyone else wants to sidle up to the bar at this point they’re more than welcome to listen in.

ALYSON: Sila is definitely watching this. I think she sends Whist back out on patrol, and she looked back over at Tarstin and was going to make her way slowly in that direction and stopped when she saw the Twi’lek approach him first, and now she’s watching that and making her way there very slowly.

NICK: Okay.

HUDSON: I make my way to the bar and stand behind Xianna to get a drink.

NICK: (laughs) Okay.

LAURA: One success.

NICK: “Well, I seem to be having health issues lately. It’s like an immuno-stimulant. It’s of my own making, actually. It keeps me sharp.”

LAURA: “Okie. So, hypothetically, if you were to give it to someone who did not have your, um, illness… what would it do?”

NICK: ‘Ooh. I think it would probably make them extremely energetic, and perceptive, and intelligent, and rakishly handsome…” and he kind of smiles hesitantly, “and then they would have extreme gastric distress.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: “Okie, um, it would not kill them though?”

NICK: “I sure hope not. I’ve been taking this for weeks.”

LAURA: “Okie. It also does not sound fun. I was hoping it would be fun, or very deadly, which is fun in a different way.”

NICK: “Oh… Are you- Would you be insinuating that someone would be taking recreational drugs at this point?”

LAURA: “Oh yes. (giggles)”

NICK: “Ooh… Um… Now might be a great time to tell you that I’m an Imperial Inspector.”

LAURA: “Oh! I do not mean like you, or me, I mean like other people at the party, because it is a party and that often happens. I mean, I’m pretty sure I saw the one Falx doing something.”

NICK: Can I get a Deception check as you try to dig yourself out of this whole.

CAMERON: (chuckles)

ALYSON: Hmm~ Yes.

NICK: Also, at this point I think Tink is very close to Xianna messing up this conversation.

HUDSON: I heard digestive problems and my ears perked up for my previous issues.

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: Your medical book said something about digestive problems.

HUDSON: Yeah, my medical book did say something about digestive problems.

NICK: Yeah. Becoming Medicine… Yeah. Two difficulty. He’s very good at certain parts of being an inspector.

LAURA: (musically) Two failures.

NICK: He looks at the stormtroopers that are by the door and by the podium. They have not moved, statue still, stormtroopers are very good at that. “I’m a little busy right now, but I suggest you don’t leave the party. We may need to be speaking a little bit later.”

LAURA: (nervously) “Okieee.”

NICK: You can just feel the chill coming off of him.

LAURA: “Bye… I will talk to you later…”

NICK: You see he like snaps his fingers above the bar and one of the stormtroopers’ heads turns unperceptively and he does a series of complicated hand signs, and from the distance you hear, “Roger,” and then the head goes back.

LAURA: Oh. When that happens Xianna’s head definitely turns, looks up at the stormtrooper, and is just smiling and waving at him real, real big. (laughs)

NICK: You also see a scout droid with a bulbous head and a lot of arms dangling down. It’s above the stormtroopers. It goes, “(politely) Oh, hello,” and then continues on its circuit around.

(laughter)

ALYSON: One of its little arms wave—

(squeaking/beeping noises, more laughter)

LAURA: And she’s like ‘oh, yes, hi!’ (laughs) “So, Tink.”

HUDSON: “Xianna.”

LAURA: “It is a very good thing that you brought your vibro-axe with you.”

HUDSON: “Why is that?”

(snickering)

LAURA: “Oh, I said some very stupid thing, and we might have to fight our way out of the party.”

HUDSON: “Oh, Xianna… I’ve had a few drinks. I’m…”

LAURA: “I mean, I have not had any drinks yet. How have I not done that…?”

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: Tink’s just been slamming them behind you.

HUDSON: I’ve just been slamming them behind you.

ALYSON: Yeah, just one after the other in the background of the shot.

HUDSON: That’s exactly right.

CAMERON: Karma has just been following Falx, like one social group behind him throughout.

NICK: Okay. I think Falx goes to Jorus actually, like makes a B-line there, which is weird. You see this dashing space cowboy-esque figure that’s actively alienating anyone who tries to interact with him, which is fun. Falx goes straight up and says, “Wow. I didn’t expect the System Marshal to actually make it this far in.”

DREW: “Hello Falx. How ya doin’?”

NICK: “It’s been a long time!”

DREW: “Not long enough, but here we are.”

NICK: “I can’t help but agree. Are those the same boots as ten years ago?”

DREW: “Oh, you know, when something works you stick to it.”

NICK: “And then slowly age into oblivion. I know exactly the feeling.”

DREW: “(laughs) Get bent.”

(laughter)

NICK: “Oh. Aw… Ever eloquent as usual, my friend.”

DREW: “Well, you know, I don’t have much time for fancy words with puffed up puppies like yourself.”

NICK: “Oh yeah. Puffed, up, puppies, the exact kind of custom thing that I would expect from someone of your stature. No one says that.”

DREW: “I know. That’s why I say it.”

NICK: “Ah… Isn’t that nice.” You can see he’s talking to you while thinking about something else. I’m imagining you’re kind of against the wall near the stage and he keeps looking at the stormtroopers and looking somewhere else, and then his com goes off. He pulls it up. It’s one of those ones that looks like a shaving razor.

DREW: yeah, yeah, yeah.

NICK: Yeah. He looks at it, presses a button, and a few lights slide up. “Ah. I need to be doing something, if you’ll excuse me,” and he starts moving a lot faster, like beyond casual. At exactly that moment, the lights cut out.

DREW: Kriff.

ALYSON: People scream!

NICK: yes, exactly, it says it right there.

LAURA: (quietly) Xianna screams.

ALYSON: Ya-ha!

NICK: There’s a scream–

CAMERON: (feigns a scream)

NICK: The room is surprisingly dark with just a dull, ambient, red glow. It’s difficult to see anything, and you hear blaster fire, and the thud of dropping bodies. As quickly as it started, it’s over. The lights flicker back on. There’s another scream. The stormtroopers on the small stage have both been shot. One is on the floor and the other is draped across the podium as if they were turning towards the threat. The stormtroopers by the door have also been blasted. They both fell forward as if they didn’t even get a chance to respond. You see the crowd is pushing away from the middle of the ballroom leaving an empty circle. In the circle, in an expanding pool of blood, is Regional Governor Silpin facedown with a vibro-knife in his back. End of episode.

ALL Ba-naaa~!

NICK: Great.

CAMERON: Oh snap.

NICK: Yeah.

## Outro

CAMERON: Thanks for listening to Tabletop Squadron. If you enjoyed our show please consider logging into iTunes and giving us a five-star review. Five-star reviews will help new listeners to find the show and give the squad warm fuzzies when we read them.

Xianna’fan is played by Laura Penrod. She can be found on Twitter at @cheerio_buffet.

Tink is played by Hudson Jameson and he can be found on Twitter at @hudsonjameson.

Karma Nailo is played by me, Cameron Robertson. You can find me on Twitter at @midnightmusic13.

Our game master is Nick Robertson, and you can find him on Twitter at @alias58.

Our intro song is Space Jam by Pablo Ribot.

Additional music by James Gunter.

Follow the podcast on Twitter and Instagram at @tabletop_squad. For real! We’re real people and we wanna talk to anyone who listens to the show. Reach out! See you next time.

Word document download: Episode 15 Let’s Get Some Answers

PDF download: Episode 15 Let’s Get Some Answers

Read in browser:

Tabletop Squadron Transcript, Season 1 Episode 15:
Let’s Get Some Answers

Transcript by Tyler (Twitter: @Tyler_MoonSage)

## Intro

NICK: Hi everyone, and welcome to Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars: Edge of the Empire actual play podcast. I’m Nick, your game master. Every other Thursday, our story follows a thief, a bounty hunter, and a slicer as they explore the galaxy helping a mysterious benefactor and each other.

Not a lot of announcements this week. I know there’s some new iTunes reviews floating in the internet somewhere, but they haven’t shown up where I can see them yet, so I’ll be sure to thank everyone next time.

You know how I know that? Twitter! Our Twitter drive is going well. We’ve gained 20 more followers. We’ve had several NPC polls, and the NPC will be a blue Gungan that’s a circus acrobat who loves Sabacc and making jewelry. Thank you to everyone who’s voting and helping us make this character. Come follow us and help us decide the final piece. Our next and final Twitter poll will be at 125 followers.

Twitter is a great way to reach out and talk to us or other people who like this podcast and many other great podcasts. Remember, when we hit the next Twitter goal we’ll release a bonus Jedi Adventure on off-weeks and a pretty lengthy blooper reel that I’ve had stashed away since we started. We’re very close, but we  need you!

Anyway. Thanks for listening, and we hope you enjoy the episode.

CAMERON: (distant, giggling) And by the way, our Twitter is @Tabletop_Squad!

NICK: Thank you… Cameron.

CAMERON: (laughs)

##

NICK: Hello! Welcome to Episode 15 of Tabletop Squadron. Happy Thursday, or whatever day you’re listening to this. I’m Nick, your host and game master. We’re gonna go around the table and introduce everybody and their characters, starting with Hudson.

HUDSON: Hi. I’m Hudson, and I play Tink, a Gigoran slicer.

NICK: Great. Next up we’ve got Laura.

LAURA: Hi. I’m Laura. I play Xianna’fan, a Twi’lek smuggler.

NICK: And last but not least we’ve got Cameron.

CAMERON: Hi. I’m Cameron, and I play Karma, a Nautolan bounty hunter.

NICK: Great! When we last left off the team was drifting aimlessly in space dealing with some emotional turmoil and coming to terms with some things, talking about their feelings, drinking quite a bit. We left off with a com call from Sentinel giving them some coordinates on where to meet up. We’re gonna start right about there, but before that let’s get the Destiny Roll.

CAMERON: One dark side.

HUDSON: One dark side.

LAURA: One light side.

CAMERON: Yay Laura.

NICK: Heh. Good work.

CAMERON: So two dark side, one light side.

NICK: Alright. Let’s jump right into it! The com call that you got, Karma quickly flipped the switch to send it through the whole ship. “This is Sentinel. You’ve done… better than I hoped. It’s time for us to meet in person. I’m sending you the coordinates now.” Do you go immediately?

CAMERON: “Hey Tink?!”

HUDSON: “Yeah?”

CAMERON: “Oh wait, I don’t need to yell. Sorry. I have the ship coms on.”

HUDSON: “Uh, yeah?”

CAMERON: (laughs) “Can you come help me astrogate?”

HUDSON: “Sure!”

NICK: Alright. You head up to the cockpit. It’s an easy Astrogation check, you have the coordinates, but there are two black dice on this because it’s not on any hyperspace route that you know.

HUDSON: Ooh. This is a little bit difficult. You said it’s easy?

NICK: Yeah. It’s easy, but two black dice.

CAMERON: Plus a blue die because Karma’s helping.

HUDSON: Oh. That’s so nice of you. Alright, here I go, I put my hand on the astrogater and I pull the lever!

(laughter)

NICK: For our listeners, we do know that’s not how that works.

CAMERON: Do we though?

NICK: Some of us do.

HUDSON: We have three successes and an advantage.

NICK: Great. You’re able to make the calculation. It looks like the jump is gonna be about 12 hours. The location isn’t on any star chart, it’s just at the beginning of the outer rim between the outer and the middle rim, but luckily it’s on the same side of the galaxy that you’re already on, so you’re able to get there in about that much time. You’re able to make the calculation, hit the lever, and jump. That gets you 12 hours to rest, potentially recover strain, repair any equipment that had been damaged, all that good stuff, get some sleep since you haven’t gotten a full night’s sleep in about 48 hours at this point since your last attempt involved getting exploded.

As you drop out of hyperspace with a lurch you see the black of space all around you. There are a few stars, but in front of you, you can’t even see very many of those. The reason quickly becomes clear as a small space station begins to illuminate before you. Running lights appear on the outside showing you the approach vector to land. The space station is not large. It is a simple cylinder about twice the length of your ship with a thin ring around it like a spoked wheel. As you guide your ship into the landing bay it’s a tight fit. One other ship is parked within, a small triangular fighter. The Afternoon Delight takes up the rest of the bay. As you land you hear the (whooshing noises) of lights extinguishing on the exterior. The bay is dimly lit with emergency lighting. Is there anything you want to do before you hop off?

CAMERON: I guess Karma puts her armor back on and just reloads all of her gear.

HUDSON: Yeah. I reload all my gear and my weapons.

NICK: You reload your axe. Okay.

HUDSON: Yeah.

NICK: You have a gun. I’m being mean.

HUDSON: No, I don’t use the gun, though.

(laughter)

CAMERON: Well, the gun’s in your backpack, so-

HUDSON: yeah.

LAURA: Xianna puts all of her stuff back on. She’s still wearing the old left boot, but on the right foot she found a pair of sandals that were a much larger size but they fit over the foot wrappings that she has, so she just strapped the sandal on the right foot so that she’s not walking directly on the bandages.

NICK: Oh, okay. That’s a good look.

LAURA: Yeah.

CAMERON: It’s real classy. “Hey Tink, were you able to fix the ship during our jump?”

HUDSON: “Um… (shiftily) I sure was…”

NICK: So, mechanically you did pretty much what you need to. It’s one more dent in an otherwise decently put together ship. You weren’t able to fix it like new, but it’s operating.

HUDSON: ‘It’s workable!”

CAMERON: “Awesome. I mean, I figured it was since we got here, but-“

LAURA: “Yeah.”

HUDSON: “Oh yeah.”

NICK: Is there anything else you all wanted to do?

HUDSON: Communicate with Sentinel right now to be like are we in the right place, is this a trap…

NICK: You can try and call. You don’t actually have a contact for him. The com that came in was blocked, so you don’t actually have a way to get in touch with him.

HUDSON: Hmm. Alright. “Let’s all huddle up real quick. Get in a huddle. Get in a huddle.”

CAMERON: “Okay. Huddled!”

HUDSON: “Huddle?”

LAURA: “Okay… Huddle.”

HUDSON: “Alright—“

CAMERON: “Alright Tink, you’re gonna have to lean down a little bit. You’re too far up in the huddle.”

LAURA: “Yes. Too tall.”

HUDSON: “Alright. Too tall. Got it. I’m down. What if this is a trap?”

LAURA: “I have a gun.”

CAMERON: “I have a gun, and a sword. You have an axe.”

HUDSON: “I have an axe… Should we have a broader plan than that?”

LAURA: “Um… We shoot them?”

HUDSON: “… Okay.”

CAMERON: “If we get shot at we shoot back. You axe back.”

HUDSON: “I axe back.”

LAURA: “Yes. We stand behind you. You are taller and more resilient, and then we shoot around you.”

HUDSON: “Yeah, and I say some snazzy line like let me axe you a question, and then… hit ‘em.”

LAURA: “Yes. You do that.”

CAMERON: “Yeah. Okay. Anyway. Since we’re huddled, what’s our plan for Sentinel? We’re hearing him out, yes?”

LAURA: “(sighs) Sure.”

CAMERON: “His message said ‘that went more smoothly than he anticipated,’ which concerns me greatly.”

LAURA: “That makes me worried. I mean, how much worse could that have gone?”

HUDSON: “We could ask him.”

LAURA: “”Could it have gone any worse? I mean, besides all of us dying.”

CAMERON: “We could have failed to take out the Vengeance.”

LAURA: “Yes, but then an entire city would not have been destroyed, so…”

CAMERON: “They may have still done the bombardment if we damaged it enough… It’s like it could have gone worse. I feel like he very heavily stressed the loss of life thing though, and then his plan kind of just ignored that and there were no warnings with retaliation and stuff.”

HUDSON: “I’ll defer to you all.”

CAMERON: “Okay. Here. We’ll hear him out, and then we’ll just see, and we’ll make a judgment call on if each of us still wants to be involved in this.”

HUDSON: “We are always, always allowed more huddles. We need to have more huddles to discuss things when there’s hard decisions.”

CAMERON: (laughs) “True.”

HUDSON: “We can just be like hey, pause, pause game… Huddle.”

LAURA: “Okie. If we are having a team huddle, can we huddle around me? I am missing a certain number of toes and is a little hard to walk. I’m still getting used to that. My foot is also bound. I did find a new pair of boots to wear. They are very similar to the old pair of boots, I just cannot wear them yet until the bandages come off of my foot, so I just have them in my room closet… in case you were wondering.”

HUDSON: “Alright. We can huddle around you, Miss Injured Center of Attention. We can huddle around you.”

LAURA: “Yes. Thank you.”

CAMERON: “Alright, let’s go in.”

HUDSON: “And, break!”

CAMERON: (laughing) I hit the button right next to us and the ramp deploys.

NICK: Yeah. You break from your huddle. As you exit the ship a protocol droid enters through the only door. “Ah yes, the master’s latest set of fixers. If you’ll come with me, please.” The red emergency lights in the hanger give the droid a sinister air.

CAMERON: Is this the same droid that we saw on Corellia?

NICK: It looks identical.

CAMERON: Hmm. It sounds identical, too.

NICK: Hmm. Well, I’m not that talented—

CAMERON: Good voice work, Nick.

NICK: Thanks! (laughs) The droid turns to lead you through the halls of the station. The curvature of the floor causes you to feel like you’re constantly walking up a wall and it’s rather disconcerting. Tink, your head grazes the ceiling ever so slightly. This part of the station is dim as well with a single red light every 20 meters or so. The whole station is dim with only the faintest noise of life support. Your steps and the whirring of servers on the protocol droid echo as you walk through.

LAURA: I guess we’re walking…

NICK: Yeah.

LAURA: Xianna would put her scanner goggles on just to see a little bit better.

NICK: Okay. With your scanner goggles on you see that this is a very bare setup. There’s not a lot of stuff. There are some cobwebs and a lot of dust on the hallway. It’s like not a lot of people are here. With that you can actually see the footprints from this droid and a couple of lines in the dust and that’s it, so it doesn’t look like there’s a lot of people here, at all.

So, the droid leads you to a holo room. There’s a table-sized dais for presentations and four rows of auditorium seating in a circle around the edge of the room. Seated behind the dais is Sentinel.

CAMERON: Behind? Or on?

NICK: Behind it. The dais is for presentations like the ones in the movies where they project a bunch of holograms and stuff. He’s seated, like—

CAMERON: Oh. Okay. I was thinking like a stage-type.

NICK: Yeah. It’s not like a stage, it’s like a projector thing.

CAMERON: Okay. the thing that they all huddle around to look at the presentations.

NICK: Yeah.

CAMERON: Okay, cool.

NICK: He’s sitting, it’s between you and him.

CAMERON: Okay, cool.

NICK: This is the first time you’ve seen him in real life that isn’t a distorted hologram. It’s hard to tell how tall he is while he’s sitting behind the table, but he has white hair with streaks of gray, he wears it swept back over his shoulders and it falls to about mid-neck and he has a white goatee. He’s not wearing a shirt, and you can see what looks like metal prosthetics grafted to his shoulder. It’s dim in the room is lit only by the holo-projector that is currently on sleep mode, so you have trouble making out exactly what kind of cybernetic pieces he might have.

He gestures calmly at you to join him at the projector. You can see that his other arm is still well-muscled although it has the distinctive look of someone who hasn’t exercised in a while and is starting to lose their edge. “Thank you for coming. I’m sure you have… a lot of questions.”

CAMERON: “Mm-hmm.”

LAURA: “Yes.”

HUDSON: “We do.”

NICK: “Well, uh… Shoot.”

CAMERON: I go and sit down.

NICK: (laughs) Okay.

LAURA: Yeah. Xianna would plop down into a chair. “So, was the destruction of an entire city of civilians part of your plan?”

NICK: “No. That was rather unfortunate. I didn’t expect them to respond so aggressively. I also didn’t expect the weapons to maintain function as long as they did.”

LAURA: “Yeah… I feel like that whole thing could have gone better if we knew what the weapon we were unleashing was so we could have timed things a bit better.”

CAMERON: “Because it did seem to be kind of a delayed response type thing, so knowing that we could have taken out some of the other systems on the ship just as precautionary measures… Tink’s really good at that. He was at a computer station. If we’d known it wasn’t an immediate flip and was going to take several hours, that’s stuff that we could’ve prepared for.”

HUDSON: “This is less questions but feedback for next time.”

(laughter)

LAURA: “Oh, so just general feedback for next time, do not open the airlocks if we are there, Tink.”

CAMERON: “OH no, Xianna, we’re giving Sentinel feedback.”

LAURA: “I know, but I feel like this is good feedback for everyone. I feel like we should just do a full range of team feedback.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: “I might still have ten toes.”

CAMERON: This is a retrospective on how this mission went.

NICK: Xianna has sweat beading on her temples and is gesturing wildly as she’s talking about these things.

LAURA: “Because I no longer have ten toes, Tink! I have less than ten!”

HUDSON: “You know, we—“

LAURA: “More than six, but less than ten!”

HUDSON: “What’s to say that you wouldn’t have lost the toes anyway, regardless of the airlock incident, you know? Maybe it was just, that’s just the way the world works.”

LAURA: “Anyways. Yes, information about what the weapon was, and that it was going to take a lot of time, or that it was a biological weapon, any of that would have been useful information. yes.”

NICK: “Of course. You’re right when we’re considering the overall operation, but unfortunately my hands were tied as far as sharing the information, as I didn’t know how effective you would be and how much I could trust you. That was the point of this one. This was, like I said before, more of an audition for a much more important setup… which you passed, well three of you passed. If you had turned or had been captured or information about that had gotten out, we have a couple more of those kinds of weapons, if you had been able to give too much information we could’ve really lost an edge that in the long run will help save the galaxy.”

He does look genuinely regretful about the loss of life, but seems pretty determined in his resolve. “But, the good news is that you’ve passed. I know that you’re effective, and I would be willing to answer any questions at this point.”

LAURA: “Yeah, so, what is the overall goal of any of this?”

NICK: “Let me give you a little background. I’m waging a personal war against the Empire.”

LAURA: “Oh… (exhales) Okay.”

NICK: “Yeah. I know. The Order had several stores of funds scattered throughout the galaxy. I’m working to preserve the Republic, a Sentinel for the past as it were. Heh.”

CAMERON: (uneasy) “Heh-heh…”

LAURA: “(groans)”

NICK: “I will of course pay you for the work you’ve done so far, but now that you’ve passed this test, although not in the way I was expecting, if you’re willing I would like to have you participate in a beginning for the end of the Empire. We only have a few months to prepare, but we could strike a pretty significant blow.”

CAMERON: “I have a question.”

NICK: “Sure.”

CAMERON: “How did you expect that to go? Because you said it went better than expected.”

NICK: “I was expecting more of you to die, to be honest.”

CAMERON: “Comforting.”

NICK: “Well karma, I knew you were probably going to be fine, but some of the others were untested. I was expecting maybe one other person to come out of this. What you did avoid, I managed to intercept communication before I sent you on this mission that they were going to glass the planet using the Vengeance, so while a herdship was lost the Ithorians’ mother jungle was protected as well as the other herdships on the planet, so you did do some good, although I am sorry about your friend, colleague… co-worker.”

LAURA: “Person who was also on our ship.”

HUDSON: “Our best friend.”

NICK: “Yes, and I am sorry about that.”

CAMERON: “We had differing levels of relationship amongst the crew.” (laughs)

NICK: “I’m beginning to sense that.”

LAURA: “Yes.”

NICK: “The point would be, if you were interested, I have a mission of some importance that I would like you to participate in. you’re actually sort of the lynch pin. I have one other team I’m getting setup to support. As far as payment for this last set, how does 20,000 credits sound for the group?”

LAURA: “Each.”

NICK: “(noise of surprise and exasperation) That’s—“

LAURA: “I lost toes.”

HUDSON: “We lost a friend.”

LAURA: “I had to find a new pair of boots. I really liked those old boots. (sadly) Okay?”

CAMERON: “My ask was gonna be for 21 so it’s split evenly.”

NICK: “Hmm. What if we do 24,000 for everyone? That’s at least 1,000 for your toes. You can buy some new boots.”

CAMERON: ‘Really nice boots.”

LAURA: ‘yes.”

NICK: “In my mind I’m not necessarily paying you for your work as ensuring that you’ll participate in this next leg, of which the payment would be significantly more, but I would hope you would be motivated by cleansing the galaxy of authoritarian evil.”

CAMERON: “Fair.”

HUDSON: “Yeah, a little left, little right.”

LAURA: “I mean, I don’t know. Like, how positive are you that this will end the Empire? Because, you know, they are kind of everywhere, and powerful, and you know.”

NICK: “The Empire is currently undergoing a very large, very secret project that is using a majority of their military assets. We’re not going to be striking that, but the people who are organizing that particular thing, who don’t know I exist by the way so if you ever run into any of them don’t say anything about that, but there are some parts of the military setup for the military they’re unaware of that I would like for you and some select allies to remove before it becomes an issue.”

LAURA: “So we’re talking the Resistance?”

NICK: “Yeah. The Resistance are launching a pretty big assault in the next few months, but they don’t know everything that’s going to be there. I figure it would be better, and preserve my own personal shadow war, if we just remove some of their obstacles without them knowing.”

HUDSON: “Why do you have this vendetta?”

LAURA: “I mean, is there anyone who does not hate the Empire at this point?”

HUDSON: “Eh. Different people for different reasons.”

NICK: “Hmm…” I need a Perception check.

CAMERON: Ooh boy.

LAURA: Can do!

CAMERON: Guys, we’re rolling!

NICK: We haven’t rolled a check in two sessions! That’s not true, we rolled one earlier.

CAMERON: No, he did a medicine check.

NICK: And an Astrogation.

CAMERON: That’s like two whole checks! What is the difficulty?

NICK: Average, but Xianna can have a blue die because it’s dim in here which is part of the problem.

CAMERON: Karma got two advantages.

LAURA: I got two successes and four advantages.

NICK: Wow.

HUDSON: I have two successes.

NICK: Karma, is there anything particularly you would want your advantages to be used on?

CAMERON: Let me think. (laughs)

NICK: Okay. we’ll come back to you. Xianna and Tink, Xianna be thinking about those advantages, you can use them to add something to the scene that makes it more interesting, you can come up with some sort of advantage that would pass on to if you have to make any other rolls like say negotiation or history or anything like that. What you see with your successes, Tink, you and Xianna both lean around this holo-projector in the middle of the room and get a pretty good look at Sentinel. You see a little bit more the extent of these injuries that he had. His cybernetics actually go from about mid-collar bone down to his hip, and it’s a giant metal piece, so you know there’s at least some synthetic organs in there as if a large part of him was carved away. The metallic pieces look like they are old and have been cared for, but that they weren’t that nice to begin with. They have that look of like a chrome finish on a hubcap where the chrome is rubbed away and it’s just kind of gross metal underneath. He is missing an entire arm, that is robotic, and he is sitting in a wheelchair actually. You can see the wheels poking out. You can’t really see what his lower body situation is, but he has a large, brown cloth over his waist, and with your successes you see that there is a sleeve dangling off of the cloth like it’s some sort of garment.

When you ask why he has a vendetta, he’s going to tell you: “I’m not entirely sure exactly how much background with me you need for me to be relevant, but I do understand that me wanting to play my Sabacc cards close to the chest has resulted in some more difficulties, so let me just say that these injuries were caused by a direct intervention of the Empire and the Emperor himself, and that I have a personal interest in seeing the Republic restored and the Empire removed. Just assume that the Empire killed a lot of my friends and made me lose my arm, a lung, a kidney, and some other things.”

HUDSON: “Checks out for me.”

NICK:  You guys can make me a Lore check if you want based on that information.

LAURA: (laughs) Can I get a blue die for one of my advantages?

NICK: You can have two blue dice, because you had four advantages.

LAURA: (gasps) Yay~

CAMERON: (laughing) Can I have a blue die for my advantages?

NICK: Sure.

CAMERON: It’s not gonna help. I’m not good at Lore.

NICK: Let’s just say that his demeanor and your interactions so far and kind of using some indicators… something is tickling in the back of your minds, y’all are starting to have some suspicions, and it means you’re more likely to figure this part out.

HUDSON: What difficulty?

NICK: This one’s gonna be hard.

CAMERON: Shit. So many of my dice- I rolled six dice, three of them just came blank… but all the ones that weren’t blank, I have three failures and one advantage.

LAURA: Three advantages.

NICK: Bummer.

LAURA: Yes.

HUDSON: I have two successes and two disadvantages.

NICK: Oh good. So, based on kind of what he’s been saying, the look of the cybernetics, you’re sort of an officienato I would say, and the cloth that’s over him which you recognize might be some sort of robe situation, you think this guy might be a Jedi.

HUDSON: Ohhh.

CAMERON: Karma’s just like ‘this dude got fucked up at some point.’

LAURA: Xianna’s just a little tired, probably a little drunk still.

NICK: She’s got things on her mind. Tink, how do you approach that subject with this guy?

HUDSON: Is there like a vase near me, or something on a table that could fall?

CAMERON: I use my most recent advantage to make a vase appear next to Tink.

NICK: So, sitting on this first round of stadium seating there are some small holo-projectors and I guess a vase.

HUDSON: “So, Sentinel, if that vase were to just fall off of there, like there was a bump in the ship and the vase were to fall, would there be some way you could stop it from breaking without actually being by the vase?”

CAMERON: (laughing) Sideways asking about Force powers.

LAURA: “Tink, what are you even asking?”

HUDSON: “Just wait.”

LAURA: ‘Like, is there magnets in the vase that holds it to the podium, or…?”

HUDSON: “Nope. Nope. Nope. That’s not what I’m talking about.”

CAMERON: “Yeah. I don’t understand why you’re asking about a vase.”

NICK: “Um… What an interesting question. What exactly would you be insinuating?”

HUDSON: “Something that rhymes with lorce flowers.”

(laughter)

LAURA: ‘Lorce flowers?’

NICK: He actually laughs, and he rolls his chair, it’s like an electric hovery kind of chair but it still has wheels on it, but it means it’s really easy to spin. He rolls it around the projector a little bit. Can you roll me two force dice, please? Let’s see how good he is.

HUDSON: Two black.

NICK: Heh.

CAMERON: Two dark side.

HUDSON: Two dark.

NICK: He holds his arm out, his still biological arm, and you see a look of intense concentration on his face, and the vase begins to wobble a little bit, then he looks really upset and sad at the same time and tears his arm away. “Ugh. Yeah, I used to be a lot better at that, but… Yes, I would theoretically be able to stop the vase.”

CAMERON: So at this point do Karma and Xianna know what’s going on?

HUDSON: (laughs)

NICK: Yeah. I mean, I would say that you probably do.

CAMERON: “You were a Jedi.”

NICK: “Yes. I was a member of that illustrious order years ago.”

CAMERON: “Cool.”

LAURA: “I saw some Jedi once.”

NICK: “How’d that go?”

LAURA: “Uh, well I mean, they rescued our city from the separatists. I mean, a few years later we were then occupied by the Empire, but you know. For a year or two it was fun.”

NICK: “The disappearance of the Jedi is why I’m waging my own guerilla war here from the outer rim. The Order 66 by the Emperor and the betrayal of the clones resulted in the destruction of my order, and you know, just not a big fan of the whole fascist industrial regime. I’d really like that to be taken down and bring the Republic back. I would hope that knowing a little bit more of my story, and I’d be able to answer any more of your questions, that you would be interested especially with monetary reward in becoming freedom fighters.”

LAURA: “I mean, how much money are you suggesting?”

NICK: “So, those stores that I have scattered around the galaxy, those were Jedi emergency funds hidden anonymously in different banks and planetary economies, and I have access to a pretty solid amount, I’d rather not say exactly, and it’s smaller than it used to be but I could offer you quite a bit of money. How much would it take? I don’t want to buy your loyalty, but I will.”

CAMERON: “You might have to buy hers.”

LAURA: “Yeah. More than what we were paid for this mission.”

NICK: “Oh, well of course.”

LAURA: “At least twice as much.”

NICK: “How about… I’ll do even more than that. With a promise of your, I won’t even say devotion to the cause, but rightfully considering doing the right thing, 75,000 credits.”

LAURA: “Okie. I’m good with that.”

HUDSON: “I just like that we’re working with a Jedi.”

LAURA: “I’ll take your portion then.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

HUDSON: “No, no, it’s okay. I have a question. Do you have a data breaker?”

NICK: ‘Um…”

HUDSON: “Because I kind of want one, or do you know where I can get one?”

NICK: “I don’t have one with me- Well, I do have one with me, but I’m using it.” He looks pointedly at the droid that’s standing really still by the door. Something I don’t think that Star Wars highlights enough but I really like the idea of is that a droid being a non-living being should be able to stand as still as a couch and be easily forgotten. So, this droid, you don’t even know if it’s turned on, it’s just really still. He looks at that. Tink, I would say with your background you would probably recognize that this protocol droid has been modified quite a bit. Karma you might remember that this particular droid tazed Felton Mox when you turned him in as a bounty. Obviously it’s got some things.

CAMERON: Oh yeah.

NICK: That being said, Tink, “Tinkralllkat…”

HUDSON: “Sorry, that’s Rallltinkraatakat.”

NICK: “Rallltinkraatakat.” His pronunciation ain’t bad.

HUDSON: Not bad.

NICK: It’s not bad, but it sounds like someone who’s dealt with Gigorans before, which is weird. Most people do not.

HUDSON: We’ve never addressed that that’s my real name.

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: “I mean, I just assumed Tink was not a real name.”

HUDSON: “No one bothered to ask me what my real name was.”

LAURA: “I mean…”

HUDSON: “Do y’all even care?”

LAURA: “Kind of.”

HUDSON: “Okay. It’s Rallltinkraatakat.”

LAURA: “Okie. Thank you for that information.”

HUDSON: “You’re welcome.”

LAURA: “So, if that is your real name you should not be using Tink when we go to missions. Stop telling people your name is Tink then.”

HUDSON: “No, I mean, it’s—“

NICK: “It’s a very common Gigoran epithet.

HUDSON: “Exactly. He’s got me.”

LAURA: “Oh. Okay.”

NICK: “As far as a data breaker goes, I won’t be able to lend you mine as I’m currently using it, but any black market, any hacker contact, you should be able to purchase one. They are quite expensive, but I did just give you a lot of money.”

CAMERON: “I know a guy.”

HUDSON: “Alright.”

NICK: “You know a guy?”

CAMERON: “I know a guy. I’ve acquired one in the past.”

LAURA: “I could find some people.”

NICK: ‘She has Streetwise.’ (laughs)

LAURA: (smoothly) I have Streetwise.

CAMERON: Hey I do too! (laughs) Also, also I know a guy.

NICK: “So, 75,000 credits for the next job, 24,000 credits… I can give you 12,000 now and have the rest wired to your ship within a couple of days. I don’t have it all sitting in this abandoned space station, unfortunately.”

CAMERON: “That’s fair.”

NICK: “That should give you enough to operate on and gather whatever supplies you need. Is the price enough to ensure that you will help me in my task to destroy the Empire?”

LAURA: “Mmm… Yes. Yes.”

CAMERON: “I mean, I was already onboard.”

HUDSON: “Yeah.”

NICK: “Wonderful. What a momentous occasion.”

CAMERON: “It does feel momentous.”

NICK: “It does to me, or maybe that’s just the rust acting up.” He twists his shoulder a little bit.

CAMERON: It makes a weird grating sound.

NICK: Yeah. (laughs)

HUDSON: Did Sentinel say there’s a second group helping him as well?

NICK: Yes he did.

HUDSON: And that would be like Chairbottom Team, instead of Tabletop Squadron?

NICK: Chairbottom Team.

CAMERON: Gosh.

NICK: Oh no… (groans and laughs)

LAURA: Chairbottom Platoon.

HUDSON: Platoon, I like that better.

NICK: Chairbottom Platoon.

CAMERON: “Yeah, important question: Are we the alpha or the beta group?”

HUDSON: “Yeah?”

NICK: “You are the alpha group.”

CAMERON: “Okay. I just want to know if we’re good, guys.”

NICK: “The beta group is not completely assembled yet. They’re still going through the same sort of initiation / fixing mission that I sent you on, but you’ll be tenuously in contact with them in the future.”

CAMERON: “If they’re doing what we just did you may want to wire them some further instructions, just based on our feedback session earlier.”

LAURA: “Send them some first aid kits.”

NICK: “Theirs is a little bit less sensitive than yours was.”

CAMERON: “Oh, okay.”

NICK: “So, with you being down a member, my plan does involve teams of four, so we will need to replace one of those. I don’t believe we have enough time to recruit another trustworthy mercenary, but I may have a line on another option. I’ll reach out to my contacts and—“ As he’s talking and he turns around to hit something on his chair, a com light starts blinking on the big projector thing. Sentinel stops talking and kind of motions for you all to step away from the table back behind where the projector is. Do you do it?

CAMERON: I back up.

HUDSON: Yeah.

LAURA: I scoot my chair back. (laughs)

NICK: (screeching noises)

LAURA: Oh, it definitely makes a horrible screech.

CAMERON: Oh gross.

NICK: The protocol droid’s eyes aren’t turned on, but its head turns to follow you ever so slowly.

LAURA: Well, because I’m only using one foot to push the chair back- (laughs)

NICK: So it doesn’t go very far. (laughs) He takes his blanket, which you now see is a Jedi robe, and throws it up over his shoulder so it looks more like a toga thing, and he makes a motion for you all to stay quiet, and he answers the call. In the hologram you see from the waist up someone in formal kind of senatorial robes, they’re bald and have a line of horns along the back, they’re tan. You hear the hologram say, “Sentinel! Old friend! What a pleasant surprise.”

Sentinel says, “You are the one who called me.”

“Unimportant! Listen. I helped you out with that last gig and I’m afraid I need a favor in return. You see, I’ve lost some standing in the Empire after a deserter seems to have escaped my grasp. Normally some bribes in the right place would smooth all that over, but one of my more lucrative trading partners seems to have been senselessly murdered during a recent exchange. Tragic stuff.”

Falx – uh, it’s Falx (laughter) – places a hand over his heart and poses sadly. He waits for Sentinel to say something sympathetic but it just turns into a long, awkward pause.

“Anyway! The point is I’m being forced into the political arena in a more active fashion than I’m usually used to and I’d like some protection. How’s that new crew of fixers you sent me doing?”

Sentinel says, “They are busy, and out of contact.” He makes eye contact with you all. “I won’t be able to send them to you.”

“Well, you better figure out a way to get in contact with them quickly if you want them to still be useful, because otherwise I might be forced to tell certain Empire contacts about what they’ve been up to. Of course, I would never mention any connection to you, but it’d be a shame if they were to end up on the most wanted lists.”

“You’re attempting to blackmail me into letting you use my associates?”

“Now you’re getting it!”

Sentinel looks at you all again and says, “Hold please.”

“Wait, I—“ and the hologram freezes.

“As much as I would like to begin the next phase of our mission, it would appear that I need you to deal with this. Will you help me to keep this imbecile quiet? I need him alive. He’s been helpful if treacherous.”

LAURA: “I mean, we did kind of… we were the ones who killed his trading partner, I guess.”

NICK: “Oh.”

LAURA: “Also, in our defense, he did send us with an empty briefcase for trading, so I think he was trying to kill us just in a very roundabout way. I mean, so yes.”

CAMERON: “We may have also been the reason that the deserter escaped. That was us.”

LAURA: “Oh yes. We let them escape.”

HUDSON: “Our fingers in a lot of different pies right now.”

CAMERON: (laughing) “That was an eventful few days there at the start of this.”

LAURA: “Oh. I guess we just let the one escape. Yeah.”

CAMERON: “Apparently he did a terrible job staying hidden like we said he was going to.”

LAURA: “Yeah. I mean, he wanted to leave the Empire, so…”

CAMERON: “Okay.”

LAURA: “Yeah.”

NICK: Sentinel looks equal parts amused and concerned at this. “It seems that you all were quite busy in the original exchange to get the Stone Breaker.”

CAMERON: “Well, Falx wouldn’t give it to us unless we did something for him, and then you probably know since you found everyone else on the crew, but there were a lot of bounties out there for people, so he knew who’d put those bounties up, so then we had to go on that other thing to basically do what you’re trying to do right now, just kind of avoid that whole snafu.”

NICK: “Hmm… Well, he is the best at procuring most of the things I need and is surprisingly insightful into the interior of the Empire, so if you all are willing to do whatever he needs, keep him alive, he doesn’t necessarily have to stay in one piece, just enough to stay useful.”

CAMERON: “We can manage that.”

LAURA: “Probably.”

CAMERON: Karma adjusts her sword strap over her shoulder.

HUDSON: “We got this.”

LAURA: “Most likely.”

NICK: “So we’re in agreement.” He motions for you all to be quiet again.

Falx’s hologram unfreezes. “That’s incredibly rude, my friend.”

“You once had an imperial cruiser crash into my hideout.”

“Fair! So, were you able to make contact with that crew, almost as if some kind of magic?” You can see him wiggling his fingers on either side dramatically.

Sentinel says, “Luckily they’ve made contact. I will send them to your location.”

“Marvelous! Tell them to head to Mustafar, to the mining platform closest to the north pole of the planet, they’ll know it when they see it, and tell them to be ready. This will be challenging.”

The hologram clicks off leaving you in darkness again. You can see Sentinel rest his face in his hands and take a deep breath. As he takes a deep breath you actually hear some mechanical cirvos come from some of his robot parts.

“Well, I guess before we can move onto the next stage we’ll need you to deal with whatever mess is going on there. I’ll continue to research where your fourth mercenary will come from in the meantime.”

LAURA: “Can you get someone who has actual skills in being a scoundrel? Because the last one… I’m not even sure what he was. He did seem like a good politician, but he didn’t seem like any sort of con artist. Basically, maybe a more rigid application.”

CAMERON: Karma kinda like brings her hand up and is trying really hard not to laugh, because Sabos died, but at the same time very much agrees with the sentiments that Xianna’s saying.

NICK: Sentinel gets a really devious smile on his face. “If this lead works out, skillset will not be an issue.”

CAMERON: “Great.”

LAURA: “Okay?”

CAMERON: “So I guess we’re going to Mustafar. Not great safari stuff on Mustafar.”

HUDSON: “(sighs) You know, I can wait. I really want the loth animals.”

CAMERON: “Okay…”

NICK: (laughs) And I guess that’s where we’ll end the episode.

ALL: Ba-naaa~!

NICK: Yay.

## Outro

CAMERON: Thanks for listening to Tabletop Squadron. If you enjoyed our show please consider logging into iTunes and giving us a five-star review. Five-star reviews will help new listeners to find the show and give the squad warm fuzzies when we read them.

Xianna’fan is played by Laura Penrod. She can be found on Twitter at @cheerio_buffet.

Tink is played by Hudson Jameson and he can be found on Twitter at @hudsonjameson.

Karma Nailo is played by me, Cameron Robertson. You can find me on Twitter at @midnightmusic13.

Our game master is Nick Robertson, and you can find him on Twitter at @alias58.

Our intro song is Space Jam by Pablo Ribot.

Additional music by James Gunter.

Follow the podcast on Twitter and Instagram at @tabletop_squad. For real! We’re real people and we wanna talk to anyone who listens to the show. Reach out! See you next time.

Word document download:Episode 14 We Are Gathered Here Today

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Tabletop Squadron Transcript, Season 1 Episode 14:
We Are Gathered Here Today

Transcript by Tyler (Twitter: @Tyler_MoonSage)

Note – Laura’s character Xianna’fan speaks in an accent. Most of her soft I’s sound like “ee,” and most of her TH’s sound like Z’s. Example: “this and that” = “zees and zat”

## Intro

NICK: Hi everyone, and welcome to Tabletop Squadron, a Star Wars: Edge of the Empire actual play podcast. I’m Nick, your game master. Every other Thursday, our story follows a thief, a bounty hunter, and a slicer as they explore the galaxy helping a mysterious benefactor and each other.

Hey… You doing okay? Last episode was kind of rough, huh? Yeah… I’ll give a plot summary when the episode starts so everyone’s on the same page if you decided to skip it, but a couple of real life things… Sabos is really gone. Our friend Steven has had some serious life things come up and he needed to focus on that. We’re still friends, we still hang out, he’s still a super cool dude. We had dinner with him last week. He just can’t commit to the recording schedule we run, and we hope the entire internet will wish him well.

On a happier note, we found a new way to track international reviews. We have one from way back in June that I missed because it’s from outside the US. Marius Konrad, thank you for your kind words and thank you for being a super awesome person. I also want to thank Interrodang for their lovely Sabos-centric review of the show. We talk to her on a pretty regular basis on Twitter and it’s always a blast.

Speaking of Twitter, I have an update on our Twitter drive! We’ve gained 25 followers. We’ve done our first NPC poll, and the NPC will be a Gungan. Also, Gungan ended up tied with Chiss, so it’ll be a blue Gungan. This is already going to be challenging for me as a GM, and I love it. Come follow us and help us decide what the mystery Gungan’s job is. Our next Twitter poll will be at 115 followers. We’re only six away.

If you’re not on Twitter, I joined it specifically to talk to podcasts I love, and we really like to talk to people. Consider it a chatroom with your favorite content creators. It’s worth following just to watch Cameron actively mess with me on Twitter over this stuff. Remember, when we hit our Twitter goal we’ll release a bonus Jedi Adventure on off weeks, and a pretty lengthy blooper reel that I’ve had stashed since we started.

Anyway, thanks for listening, and we hope you enjoy the episode.

##

NICK: Hello! Welcome to Episode 14 of Tabletop Squadron. Good to have you back to this very somber and special episode. I’m your host, Nick. We’ll go around the table real quick, have everybody introduce themselves, and if you spent any experience from the last time we played why don’t you let our listeners know what you spent it on. We’re gonna start with Cameron.

CAMERON: Hello! I’m Cameron. I am playing karma Nailo the Nautolan bounty hunter, and I bought two talents on my Assassin skill tree. I bought Jump Up, so once per round I may stand from seated or prone as an incidental, and I bought Quick Strike, so I can add a blue die per rank of Quick Strike to combat checks against targets that have not acted yet this encounter.

NICK: Great. You’re becoming more ninja-like there.

CAMERON: Yes~

NICK: Let’s move on to Hudson.

HUDSON: Hi. I’m Hudson, and I play Tink the Gigoran slicer. I used 10 experience points to raise my Deception from 0 to 1, so I can start being deceptiver.

(giggling)

LAURA: Guys… Hudson, you have 10 experience points still?

HUDSON: Yes.

LAURA: Buy a rank in Medicine, please.

CAMERON: Ooh, yeah.

HUDSON: Wait, can I do that?

NICK: Yeah.

HUDSON: Alright. I buy a rank in Medicine as well.

NICK: (laughs) Okay. While he’s doing that…

CAMERON: That’s gonna come up. (laughs)

NICK: Finally, we have Laura.

LAURA: Hi. I’m Laura.

NICK: Hi.

LAURA: I play Xianna’fan, and I used my points to purchase Natural Rogue on my talent tree which lets me re-roll one Stealth or Skulduggery check a session.

NICK: Wow. That’s pretty good. Cool.

LAURA: Yes. It’s pretty far down on the tree, so it’s special.

NICK: Nice. Well, that’s everyone, frowny face. So, moving on. (laughter, “womp” noises)

Quick recap from what’s happened most recently: You all were able to board the super star destroyer Vengeance, release some sort of experimental and scary bioweapon, destroyed the ship, but in the process of the ship being destroyed the herdship on Ithor that you were resting on got bombarded and crashed, and in the process of escaping your party member Sabos was obliterated and is no more. You were able to get to the ship, fly away, and jump to hyperspace. You did a blind jump nearby. Let’s roll for destiny. I don’t think we’re gonna use it, but…

LAURA: Two light side.

CAMERON: Two light side!

HUDSON: One dark side.

CAMERON: Aw, Hudson. Four light side, one dark side.

NICK: The lines of hyperspace shrink back to white pinpoints in the view screen of the cockpit of the Afternoon Delight. The camera is over Karma’s shoulder as she pulls the lever that takes the crew out of hyperspace. Her head tails are covered in soot, and you can see deep gouges on the back of her armor. We see Xianna, still strapped into a gunner’s chair, looking out into space. Smoke streaks her face as she looks out at the silent stars. She goes to unhook herself from the chair, and we see her flinch as she stretches her back. Tink is in the engine room. He’s holding a wrench and looking at a length of coolant tubing. His fur is singed and has streaks of blood.

The ship took a short hyperspace hop to the edge of the system. There was little prep and it strained the engines, but it was necessary to get away before the Imperial fleet recovered from the loss of the super star destroyer Vengeance. You’re out of the trade lanes and no one tracked you when you jumped. You have some time. What do you do?

LAURA: Xianna’s gonna completely unbuckle herself from the seat and sort of just flop out of it (laughs) onto the floor, sit there for a little bit, and then yell out, “Tink!”

HUDSON: “Yes?”

LAURA: “Um… I am quite injured. Can you help me to a bed, please?”

HUDSON: “Oh, sure.” I go over and I pick up Xianna.

NICK: One important thing to throw in there is, the ship is pretty large and you’re separated, so you’re using the com system which is great, but there’s definitely gonna be a shot of Tink climbing his way through the ship and out of the engine compartment and up into the gunnery bay, looking strong but hurt.

HUDSON: The pain isn’t just physical.

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: Aw…

HUDSON: “Guys, where’s Sabos?”

CAMERON: Oh fuck. (laughs)

LAURA: “Oh… Oh, I must have had the coms just for the cockpit… Oh yeah, Sabos died.”

HUDSON: “Whaaat?”

LAURA: “He is like so dead. Can you get me to a bed, please?”

CAMERON: “Yeah, he um… We can talk while we walk. Let’s get her to that room that we were using earlier.”

HUDSON: Tears start streaming down my face, and I pick up Xianna, and I get some blood on her, accidentally.

LAURA: You get some blood on you too. I am bleeding quite a bit.

HUDSON: Yeah.

CAMERON: Y’all are just sharing bodily fluids.

HUDSON: Exactly.

NICK: Yuck.

LAURA: Yay.

CAMERON: Yeah~ … Sorry. (giggles)

HUDSON: So, I carry you to the bed. “You don’t want to stop off in the shower or anything? Get all this blood off?”

LAURA: “Um… I’ll just sit here for a moment.”

HUDSON: “Alright.”

LAURA: “Can you hand me the bottle of whiskey, please? I’m just going to take that right now.”

HUDSON: I hand her the bottle of whiskey.

LAURA: I pop it open and I do start taking swigs of it.

HUDSON: “So, uh, I’ve been reading this book called Becoming Medicine written by someone who really shouldn’t be writing medical books, but I’m learning a lot and I think I can actually help fix you up a bit.”

LAURA: “I mean, at this point, go for it.”

CAMERON: “Okay, so, walk me through your initial plan. What do you think needs to be done?”

HUDSON: “First of all, basically, I don’t have the right outfit which is really one of the more important parts, so I get a pizza cutter…”

CAMERON: “Uh…”

HUDSON: “…and I detach it from the pizza cutter tool, and I put a strap on it, and I put it around my head…”

CAMERON: “Okay. Yup.”

HUDSON: “…like old school medical, and then I get some cloths and I kind of blow on them if there’s any dust, so you know, there’s not any contamination, from you know, germs. Get some straps, get some rubbing alcohol, and some Q-tips… and some eye drops just in case their eyes are dry, and then I kind of put them all into this box I have because I don’t have a handle bag yet that looks cool…”

CAMERON: “Oh, okay…”

HUDSON: “…and I bring it over to Xianna.”

CAMERON: “Alright-“

LAURA: “Wow.”

(laughter)

CAMERON: “So, the rubbing alcohol and the Q-tips, those look good. Cloths will be useful for wiping up some of the blood. You look like you have a fair amount of glass sticking out of you… We’ll probably remove that first.”

LAURA: “Oh yes.”

HUDSON: “So if you actually press down on the skin it pops out.”

CAMERON: “Nope. Doesn’t. Here, um—“

LAURA: “Oh- No…”

CAMERON: “I found some tweezers earlier.”

HUDSON: “Oh. That’s actually probably a little better.”

CAMERON: “Here. You can have a set, too. Let’s…”

HUDSON: “Oh. This reminds me of Operation as a kid. Sabos loved operation. (sobs)”

LAURA: “Um… Okay.”

CAMERON: “Y’all must’ve had a lot of conversations while me and Xianna weren’t there.”

LAURA: “Yeah.”

HUDSON: “We started to get kinda close. You know?”

CAMERON: “Yeah. Um… Kinda weird that we only knew him like a week-ish, right?”

LAURA: “Yeah, so anyways, do you want to get the glass out of me, please?”

(laughter)

HUDSON: With the tweezers, I start picking the glass out.

CAMERON: I hold two Q-tips and I use them as tweezers to pull glass out of Xianna. (laughs)

LAURA: Well, I mean, that’s how you use Q-tips, right?

CAMERON: Yeah, yeah.

HUDSON: No. They’re for your ears.

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: Except they’re not.

HUDSON: yeah, they’re not.

CAMERON: Okay. Anyway. So, do we need to make a Medicine check to…?

NICK: Yes you do!

CAMERON: Okay. Hudson, make the check, because Tink’s smarter. Can he have a blue die because I’m assisting with my own set of tweezers?

NICK: Yes you can. It’s going to be a hard check, because the Agonizing Wound critical injury is on the hard part of the chart.

HUDSON: One success.

NICK: Great. You fix the Agonizing Wound.

LAURA & CAMERON: Yay~

HUDSON: I did it.

NICK: You’re able to get the glass out without doing much more damage. There’s a worrying amount of blood, but in your book Becoming Medicine it reiterates repeatedly: “There’s going to be a lot of blood, but that’s not a big deal. Don’t worry about it.”

HUDSON: There’s actually this whole part that’s really supposed to raise your self-esteem where you keep your own little notebook of your medical journeys, so it’s called Tink’s Medical Journeys. I open it, and on the first line, my very first time, it’s gonna say: “Fixed up Xianna’s glass problem.” Smiley face on the right column. (laughter) So, if it’s bad then it’s kinda like frowny face or neutral “meh” face.

CAMERON: (grinning): Do they have like the range of smiley faces and you have to circle which one was the result, or is it just freeform? You just decided to do smiley faces?

HUDSON: I decide which smiley face to put down.

CAMERON: OH, okay.

HUDSON: Like, if I’m stressed about it I might put a little drop of sweat or something on the smiley face. It’s very freeform. They kind of push for that.

CAMERON: Oh, okay. Cool.

LAURA: Yeah.

NICK: (laughs)

LAURA: It’s based on your own emotions.

HUDSON: Yeah.

CAMERON: It’s your own medical journey. You need to get there however you get there.

HUDSON: Yeah.

NICK: Tink’s character arc is now just about him going to med school apparently.

(laughter)

LAURA: Making your parents proud.

HUDSON: So I start crying again.

NICK: Aw.

CAMERON: Karma’s gonna finish wiping Xianna up, use the rubbing alcohol.

LAURA: “Can you stop crying please?”

HUDSON: “You just let someone into your life, even if it’s just for a week or something, and then their gooone! (sobs)”

CAMERON: “Yeah…”

LAURA: “Yeah… Whatever. Can we decide what we are doing now?”

HUDSON: “(sobs)”

CAMERON: “Tink, have you ever lost a crew member before?”

HUDSON: “Uh… No.”

LAURA: “Well, it is best to just shove those emotions down, move on, forget about them…”

CAMERON: (laughing) Oh, that is not what I was going to say.

LAURA: “Can we have some bandages? I’m still bleeding a bit.”

CAMERON: “Oh sure.” I go and get the box of Band-Aids, and hand them to Xianna, and then turn back to Tink.

LAURA: I start putting Band-Aids, just slapping them on here and there, like, ‘eh, oh look, there’s a wound.’ Slap! Band-Aid!

NICK: They’re like the big hand-sized adhesive ones, so- A big stack of those.

LAURA: yeah. I’m just throwing them on wherever I feel like I need them, taking sips of whiskey in between. Yeah.

HUDSON: “(sobbing) Can we at least make a memorial or something?”

LAURA: “No.”

CAMERON: “Yeah… Yeah, so—“

LAURA: “What? No.” (laughs)

CAMERON: “Xianna, you don’t have to participate if you don’t feel the need to. You can stay here and finish patching yourself up. Tink, why don’t we go to Sabos’s room and see if he has anything in there that we could use in the memorial?”

LAURA: “Oh, yes!” Xianna leans over to Tink. “Tink… If he has any good stuff, give it to me~”

HUDSON: “Donate it to the memorial? You got it!”

LAURA: “No, like—“

HUDSON: We walk to the room.

LAURA: “Loot his room, please.”

(laughter)

CAMERON: It’ll be a memorial on the ship. I’m sure it’ll be fine. Things can be accessed at a later point if necessary.

HUDSON: So, we enter the room of Sabos.

CAMERON: Yup.

NICK: Okay. Sabos’s room is a pretty standard birth. It’s got a couple of bunk beds on it. It is covered in that red shag carpeting on the ceiling, floors and walls. His has a particularly large and ornate mirror on one side. There’s a little bathroom suite with the sink and a refresher kind of tucked away. It seems fairly standard. There are some of his articles. Y’all have lived on the ship for almost two weeks at this point, so it’s the kind of stuff that gets scattered around a hotel room when you’ve been there for a while. None of his expeditionary gear, because that was all on him at the time, but these would be small personal effects. So, everybody tell me one thing of Sabos’s that might be scattered around his quarters now that he’s gone.

HUDSON: There’s the weirdest looking night cap for his head tails that I guess he wears at night.

CAMERON: Oh, nice! (giggles)

LAURA: (giggles) Oh, they’re like knit, and there’s four little knitted head tails coming off of it.

HUDSON: yeah.

LAURA: Ew…

NICK: What color is it?

HUDSON: It’s like patterned.

NICK: (laughs)

LAURA: Oh. I was imagining that like speckled oatmeal color that you see in old knitted sweaters.

HUDSON: We can make that happen. Yeah. Let’s have it be that.

NICK: Okay. There’s that. It’s bigger than you would expect. You instantly recognize what it is even though you never saw him wear it, or touch it, or talk about it, but you realize how much volume goes into a head tail… and it’s off-putting and nostalgic at the same time.

CAMERON: I think it works like he pulls it up the head tails and then it hooks onto the montrals on top so it stays up. That’s how it actually hooks onto his head. So, it has the four, but also has two smaller ones on top.

NICK: Mm-hmm. Yup. So, you’ve got that. What else is in this room?

CAMERON: He’s got a bag in the corner that’s just full of nice, fresh, never been worn shirts.

NICK: Oh. Nice. Yeah. There are some shirts that look like they’re for a safari situation, some dress shirts, towards the bottom you even see some formal wear that you would wear for things… and they’re all still wrapped.

CAMERON: He just got real attached to just the vest look, but he’d packed for all weather gear, just thought the vest looked cool so he decided to keep wearing that.

HUDSON: I start crying again and talk about how we talked about going on safaris.

CAMERON: Oh-

HUDSON: There was actually safari gear?

NICK: Yeah.

HUDSON: “Aw, he was real, he was talking about real plans.”

NICK: (laughs) yeah. So, Tink crouches over the bag and is a blubbering, white, hairy mess. It’s very sad. You can see him shuttering from where you’re at. What else is in this room?

HUDSON: Are you in there with us, Xianna?

LAURA: No.

CAMERON: No, but Laura gets to add something.

NICK: No, but Laura gets to add a thing to the room.

LAURA: I can still add a thing…

HUDSON: Oh, okay.

LAURA: …I just can’t figure out what I wanna add.

NICK: Xianna doesn’t give a shit, but Laura cares about the story.

(laughter)

LAURA: Yes. I kind of imagine that Sabos just doesn’t exist until he’s in there. He’s only there when other people can see him.

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: He has no personal life. He doesn’t exist.

NICK: We can work with that. There could be, like, besides these couple of things the room is actually very empty and doesn’t look lived in at all.

CAMERON: There’s just a ton of IDs and they all have different names on them, but it’s all his picture. (laughs)

HUDSON: I was just thinking about that.

LAURA: Oh! Yeah. So, there’s not much else in the room, but on a little table in the corner he had stuff to make fake IDs, but it’s all the cheapest equipment he could get and a lot of it looks repurposed from other crafting hobbies. He’s pretty much just coloring in with crayons and then laminating with just large pieces of tape. (laughs) That level.

NICK: It’s like he got a scrapbooking kit, and then went: ‘Now I can forge things.’

LAURA: Yeah. I think one of them literally says Scrapbooking for Beginners, and there’s a bunch of different IDs and everything’s spelled wrong, like his own planet name is spelled differently on every single one. We’re still not sure which is the correct way to spell Osaron.

NICK: Great.

CAMERON: All of the names are something like Sabos, but the Bs are changed to other letters, so it’s like super not clear.

LAURA: There’s a Savos.

CAMERON: There’s a Sados.

LAURA: A Safos.

CAMERON: yeah. It’s just real strange. A Sagos.

LAURA: A Tabos. The B is there, but the S is different.

CAMERON: Yeah. So he may have had a Sako one as well at some point. Who knows? (laughs)

NICK: Maybe~ So, that’s the room. Like Laura said, besides those few items scattered around this room looks very sparse, like very not lived in. the bed is made immaculately, but you know Sabos probably wouldn’t be someone to do that. It’s like he never really used it. This is what is left of your friend, compatriot, co-worker, depending on what you think your relationship is with them. so, now what?

CAMERON: Alright.

HUDSON: “What do we do about the memorial?”

CAMERON: “Well, so we have this head tail thing… I think if we can find something to kind of just set this on, that could kind of be the centerpiece of the memorial. Um… Have you seen any like Styrofoam heads anywhere on the ship? (laughing) I don’t think I’ve seen any. Oh! There’s some empty alcohol bottles. We could use one of those to just kind of hold it up.”

HUDSON: “One for each head tail.”

CAMERON: “Yup. We need six actually, because we need one for each head tail and then one for each montral to actually hold it up.” So I grab some—

HUDSON: Oh, we have six empties.

CAMERON: Yeah. Well, it’s mostly empty at this point. Xianna’s gotten to most of it, and they weren’t super full to begin with. She’s finished quite a few bottles. We grab that and come back in, and we kind of set it up so where the head tail thing is upright and they’re kind of draped across. We’re just setting up a little alcove in this bedroom. (laughs) “We can scatter the cards around?”

HUDSON: “Yeah. That feels right.”

CAMERON: “I don’t know if we need to include the shirts. There’s kind of a lot of them. we can just add them to our costume closet and then it’s like Sabos is always with us.”

HUDSON: “Yeah, or if we ever somehow come across a new companion who needs a safari outfit.”

CAMERON: (laughing) “That’s true. That’s very true.”

HUDSON: “I’m really stuck on the safari thing. I was real excited about that. Just…”

CAMERON: “Yup. Well… Do you know where you were gonna go on safari? Did you have a planet picked out?”

HUDSON: “Yeah… We had plans to go to Lothal to go on some exciting adventures and explorations and see some loth animals.”

CAMERON: “Aww. Well, I don’t know exactly what our travel itinerary is, but we can try and make sure a safari happens? I know it won’t be quite the same, but I think Sabos would want you to go.”

HUDSON: “Yeah. That sounds nice.”

CAMERON: ‘Have you been to many other planets before? Because you sounded real excited about that, and Lothal’s cool, but I don’t know…”

HUDSON: “You’re saying there’s a better planet than Lothal to go on a safari on?”

CAMERON: “I mean, I’m sure we could come up with one, but…”

HUDSON: ‘No…”

CAMERON: “If you want to see loth animals, Lothal is the place to go.”

HUDSON: “I wanna see loth animals.”

CAMERON: “Okay, then yeah, Lothal is the best place to go to safari.”

HUDSON: “I’m about that. Alright.”

CAMERON: “It was just you seemed very excited about this adventuring in particular, so…”

HUDSON: “He just really talked it up. I don’t know. Just the way his head tails would just stiffen when he would talk about it, it just really brought excitement to everyone around.”

CAMERON: (snickers, laughing) Karma’s trying real hard to be supportive mom, and is just struggling more and more as we keep talking about head tails.

LAURA: Right about now, Xianna walks in, kinda leans against the door, and is holding a different bottle of alcohol in one hand and a package of instant noodles. “Is anyone hungry? I’m going to make noodles.”

HUDSON: “Oh no. she’s out of it. You can’t make noodles with alcohol as the liquid that boils.”

LAURA: “I mean… You can…”

CAMERON: “I think technically-“

LAURA: “…it just doesn’t work well. I’m going to use water.”

HUDSON: “Oh. You were holding both, so I just assumed.”

LAURA: “No. I’m just going to consume both.”

HUDSON: “Oh. Okay. I’d like some noodles.”

LAURA: “Okay. Tink’s getting noodles. Karma, you want noodles?”

CAMERON: “Yes please.”

LAURA: “I think there is some sort of spicy one. You want spicy or regular?”

HUDSON: “Spicy. I’m no wimp.”

LAURA: “Okay. Two spicy. What about you?”

CAMERON: “I’ll take regular.”

LAURA: “Okay. Two spicy, one regular.”

CAMERON: “I am a wimp. (laughs)”

LAURA: She turns around. There’s like a little bit of blood still on the door from where she leaned.

CAMERON: (smiling) She’s doing a lot better.

LAURA: You hear the microwave start beeping.

CAMERON: (laughs)

NICK: Real quick, Tink, what does your Becoming Medicine book say about people drinking with massive blood loss?

HUDSON: Well, conventionally you’re not supposed to, but in reality if it makes you feel good that’s what really gets the blood flowing.

NICK: (smiling) That’s… Okay. This is a good medical textbook.

HUDSON: (laughs)

LAURA: Yup.

NICK: I am so glad this has become a part of the ship. This is great.

HUDSON: This is banned on six planets!

NICK: (laughs)

LAURA: Who was it written by?!

HUDSON: The books were written by Dr. Evazan, but on the first page they say something about how the word doctor has to be in quotes due to a law suit, so it says “Doctor,” quote-quote, Dr. Evazan.

NICK: (laughing) This is good. I like this a lot. Okay. Noodles are getting made. You all have made a small shrine to Sabos.

CAMERON: I find some candles.

NICK: Find some candles.

CAMERON: They’re the electronic ones though, so I can just flip a switch and they’re there, so we don’t have to worry about it burning up all the oxygen in the ship.

NICK: Alright. You put some votives under, get them running… What else?

CAMERON: I’m gonna take the bag of shirts and go and add them to our cosplay closet.

NICK: Okay. I’ll make a note that there are more shirts in the closet of costume change.

CAMERON: I lovingly stroke the Imperial cloak as I close the door. (laughs)

NICK: That one was a favorite, and it somehow avoided getting damaged at all, because it was on the ship during the whole escape, so you didn’t have to deal with not getting that anymore.

HUDSON: “Guys, were we Sabos’s emergency contact for anyone, like his family? Are we gonna get a call from Mr. and Ms. Sabos, like, the parents?”

CAMERON: “I think it would probably be Mr. and Mrs. Niks. That was his last name.”

HUDSON: “Oh. Yeah.”

CAMERON: “Yeah. Uh… Honestly, I have no idea. I think what we have to go on is that he was from a colony called Osaron. It sounded like he may have gotten kicked off of Shili and made to go to the colony, so I don’t know if it was a full family thing or if that happened once he was an adult. So, it’s a very good question, but I honestly have no clue.”

HUDSON: “Hmm.”

LAURA: “Karma!”

CAMERON: “Yes?”

LAURA: “Your noodles are ready~”

CAMERON: “Oh thank you!”

LAURA: “Tink! Yours will be ready in a moment. The spicy ones take longer to cook for some reason.”

HUDSON: “I have patience.”

CAMERON: ‘Okay. let’s head into the dining room, (laughs) and we can keep talking while we eat.”

NICK: Ooh. We haven’t described the dining room for your overly nice ship yet.

LAURA: Oh, are we in a separate dining room? I imagined I was in the little kitchenette area at the table.

CAMERON: Well yeah, but then you have to take your microwaved noodles to the dining room to eat.

NICK: There’s definitely a durasteel table with a finish on it that makes it look like nice wood, and it just comes out of the ground. It’s not bolted to the ground, the hull of the ship is formed into this nice table. There’s high back chairs. It sits about ten people in this. All of it is tucked into a doorway that looks like it goes into part of the freight storage area, like there’s a niche there, but it’s this small door that you haven’t really looked at before and then when you walk in there’s paintings on the wall and it’s very nice and it’s lit by a hanging candelabra type thing with electronic candles in it.

LAURA: Xianna’s there at one of the seats and has three things of noodles in front of her, and no longer a bottle of alcohol but a very large coffee mug. There’s probably some coffee in it…

HUDSON: (laughs)

LAURA: A pot of coffee was made—or a pot of caf…

NICK: Ooh.

LAURA: …was made in the little kitchenette area, so yeah.

CAMERON: Karma’s gonna pour herself some caf on her way in. it’s been a long day already.

NICK: Yeah.

LAURA: There’s probably a bottle of alcohol next to the caf. (laughs)

CAMERON: I leave that there, and I just take the caf.

HUDSON: Is Kenobi’s Irish Cream a thing?

NICK: It is now. (laughs)

LAURA: Oh yeah. It’s definitely like a Corellian coffee.

HUDSON: Oh, I getcha.

LAURA: Just like coffee, whiskey, and maybe… yeah, space Bailey’s.

NICK: Yeah. Space Bailey’s is now officially called Kenobi’s Irish Cream.

(laughter)

LAURA: Kenobi’s Irish Cream.

NICK: Nobody knows what the Irish part means.

HUDSON: (laughs) Yeah. What is that?

NICK: (smiling) Doesn’t matter. Yeah. So, you all are seated around the table with your space ramen and coffee, and other beverages.

LAURA: “So, any plans for where we go after this?”

HUDSON: “I’m grieving too much. Someone else make a decision.”

CAMERON: ‘I was kind of figuring that Sentinel would reach back out to us. That last part of the job didn’t go… well, I would say.”

LAURA: “Yeah. You think?”

CAMERON: “Yeah, you know the whole getting the herdship destroyed anyway kind of seems like it was probably not the plan, and we probably should have been given some more information about what we were dealing with.”

HUDSON: “So it’s really not our fault.”

LAURA: “No. it is not our fault. So, yeah, are we going to keep working for Sentinel? Because my vote for that is no.”

HUDSON: “Mmm… Let’s see what he has to say.”

CAMERON: (contemplative) “Yeah… I’m—Hmm.”

LAURA: “Hmm…”

CAMERON: “I’m heavily leaning in the ‘no longer trusting of this person’ camp, but they also haven’t paid us yet.”

HUDSON: “We gotta get that far.”

CAMERON: “Yup.”

LAURA: “So, we get him to pay us, then we shoot him, and then we go work for someone else. Yeah.”

HUDSON: “That won’t have any repercussions.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: “No. None at all.”

HUDSON: “That was sarcasm I am not good at doing. That will have repercussions.”

NICK: (laughs)

LAURA: “I mean, maybe, but we just go to a different planet, change our names, go from there.”

HUDSON: “Ah, I need to think of a new name… This is where it gets fun, so I mean I guess I’m okay with this plan right now.”

LAURA: “Yeah.”

CAMERON: “I’m really against the whole having to change my name thing.”

HUDSON: “Really?”

CAMERON: “Yeah.”

LAURA: “It’s pretty easy.”

HUDSON: “You have all these nametags to choose between from when Sabos had different identities. You can pick one of those.”

CAMERON: “Yeah, but none of them are good.” (laughs)

LAURA: “Oh no. do not use Sabos’s fake ID cards. I can get us much better ones.”

HUDSON: “You got it.”

CAMERON: “Yeah, see, as a bounty hunter reputation is kind of a big thing, so if I just change my name I kind of lose all of that.”

LAURA: “Oh, well yeah, you would have to stop being a bounty hunter. Just become a smuggler or something.”

CAMERON: “Yeah, but I’m really good at that.”

HUDSON: “What if I am a male Gigoran model named Ricky Smooth, and that’s my new identity?”

CAMERON: (grinning) “I support you, Tink, whatever you want.”

LAURA: “I mean, I’m not sure there is a huge market for Gigoran models, but…”

HUDSON: “That’s the thing. It would blend in so seamlessly because it’s kind of rare.”

LAURA: “No. No, you want the opposite. You want generic so that no one notices you, so you can just walk away and no one has to remember your name or anything like that.”

HUDSON: “But, I thought I was unforgettable… but you know, only when I’m having a really good hair day.”

CAMERON: “I mean, you will have, probably, if we were trying to disappear you probably would have a more difficult time than Xianna or I because you are a Gigoran and there tend to be a lot more Nautolans and Twi’leks wandering around the galaxy in general.”

HUDSON: “True.”

LAURA: “We can dye your hair. Pretend you are a Wookie.”

HUDSON: “I can’t do the noise.”

CAMERON: (snickers)

NICK: (laughs)

HUDSON: “I can’t speak their language.”

CAMERON: (laughs) “Oh. You don’t speak Wookie? Okay.”

HUDSON: “Yeah. Either one.”

CAMERON: “I know it sounds like a noise, but they are actually words. It is a language. It’s not just noises.”

HUDSON: “It’s all noise to me.”

CAMERON: “Oh, okay—“

HUDSON: “But I understand that it’s there language. It’s like (slobbery growling noises).”

LAURA: “Is Gigoran really dissimilar from Shyriiwook? I would assume they are similar.”

HUDSON: “Okay. Just because it sounds similar, I don’t really appreciate the fact that you’re kind of grouping us together there. They’re very, very different cultures.”

LAURA: “I mean…”

CAMERON: “How does Gigoran sound, actually? I have no idea. You always wear the translator.”

HUDSON: ‘It’s kind of become a part of me now, so I don’t know if I can take it off.”

CAMERON: (laughs)

LAURA: “Well, I mean, you can, I have seen you do it.”

HUDSON: ‘Yeah, but only when I really- I don’t like how Gigorans sound. I’m a little ashamed of my people.”

CAMERON: “Aww.”

HUDSON: “I kind of wish I wasn’t Gigoran sometimes.”

CAMERON: “Well, why?”

HUDSON: “Because no one understands me, and I’m just a big, hairy mess.”

LAURA: “I mean, yes, but…”

CAMERON: “You’re a mess right now, but you also just escaped an exploding herdship. So like… We all need showers at this point, but-“

HUDSON: “We do.”

CAMERON: “Yeah. I’m gonna be finishing my noodles first, but that’s high on my priority list at the moment, is a shower.”

HUDSON: “Yeah. I guess my self-esteem is just kind of low.”

CAMERON: “Okay. So, I know you were super drunk when we went to the casino and were playing Sabacc with Kettle, but do you remember how impressed she was with your slicing skills?”

HUDSON: “I guess that was kind of impressive, but I kind of thought there were some people after me at the time so I was real focused on that.”

CAMERON: “Okay. well yeah, so she was very impressed and said you did a fantastic job on the security cylinder, so you have a lot to be proud of. Don’t be too hard on yourself. You’re pretty great.”

HUDSON: “Aw, thanks. I think a good shower would wash some of this shame away for me.”

LAURA: “Do you think some drugs would help?”

HUDSON: “Uh…”

LAURA: “I have some glitterstim if you want that.”

CAMERON: “Ooh. No…”

HUDSON: “You know…? I don’t know. I’m really not into that kind of treatment, but thank you.”

LAURA: “Okie. More for me.”

HUDSON: “More for you.”

LAURA: “Yes.”

CAMERON: “Back to an earlier conversation topic… Tink, do you have any emergency contact people?”

HUDSON: “Oh man. I would just make up numbers when I’d fill out those forms.”

LAURA: “I thought you had loving parents who live on Mandalor.”

CAMERON: “Yeah. We’re not filling out forms right now. This is for if something happens to you and Xianna and I need to get in touch with your friends or family, anyone for you to tell us, so we’re not dealing with… the awkwardness of not really knowing for Sabos.”

LAURA: “Because I actually like you, so if you were to die I would probably care.”

HUDSON: “Aw. Thanks. Actually, yeah, I have my folks’ contact info. I’ll leave it out with you guys.”

CAMERON: “Cool. Just ping it to us just so that we have it, and we’ll save it as like Tink’s Parents.”

HUDSON: “Okay. Just, I mean…”

LAURA: “They are still on Mandalor, right?”

HUDSON: “yeah, they are.”

LAURA: “Okie.”

NICK: So, you all kind of disperse—

CAMERON: Shower.

NICK: –to the refreshers, get cleaned off, get patched together. Xianna takes a shower. Her Band-Aids fall off and she needs to put new ones on. While everyone’s cleaning up… What happens next?

CAMERON: Okay. Karma finishes her shower, doesn’t put her armor back on, just like leaves on… I guess her armor pants and her tank top that she was wearing previously, and goes into the cockpit and sits in the co-pilot seat again. She takes out her data pad and starts flipping through HuntersOnly.com…

NICK & LAURA: Yeah.

CAMERON: (laughs) Yeah. She logs into her HuntersOnly account which she doesn’t do very frequently, and opens up her friends list and starts scrolling through and stopping on people occasionally who have died on past missions with her.

NICK: Okay. So like, what are some of those?

CAMERON: The first one she stops on is a blue Duros male. The name is Arisi Starkos. She thinks back to the bar fight that he got in where he got shot and she had to leave him there. That was kind of sad. The next one is a Rodian female named Kayda Bayonate, and her mark had exotic pets. Karma wasn’t on that one, but still a friend who died. The next one’s a male Falleen, Hestramiel, who was chasing a bounty and fell into a chasm because there were no handrails on the catwalk, because that’s how you die in Star Wars.

(very quiet giggling)

The last one she stops at is Braun Brecht, the Davronian female, who got food poisoning.

NICK: So, is Karma sad about this? Nostalgic? What does looking through these dead compatriots do for her?

CAMERON: Combo of the sad and nostalgic?

NICK: Okay.

CAMERON: A lot of them happened a long time ago back when she was first bounty hunting before she started taking Jet and Juke out with her, because she started taking less dangerous bounties once the boys started going with her, so that there was less of a chance of something happening to them.

She wasn’t super close with Sabos but she was starting to like him, and kind of get over some of the initial issues they had with him not actually being the person who was supposed to be on the mission, and some of his weird personality traits, and is genuinely sad? That they couldn’t save him. She’s feeling slightly more depressed now that Tink brought up that we don’t have any emergency contact information, so we can’t even let people know besides just going to Osaron, if we know where that is even, and just going to the town square and announcing that Sabos is dead.

So, she starts thinking about the emergency contacts and then flips over and starts looking at Jet and Juke’s Facebook pages.

NICK: Okay. What kind of statuses do you think they may have going on?

CAMERON: (laughs) Like status updates?

NICK: Yeah.

(laughter)

CAMERON: Uh… Juke probably has a lot of selfies of him flexing, like drinking protein shakes.

NICK: ‘You mean THIS situation?’

CAMERON: Yeah. There’s probably a fair number of selfies that he’s taken of him and Jet where he’s got Jet in a headlock, but they’re both smiling and laughing, and it’s cute. Then Jet’s is mostly like, not pictures of them but pictures of new technologies he’s been working on, and short videos of upgrading shock gloves and stuff, and there’s videos of Juke punching something and it just shoots across the room. It’s a lot of technical nerdy stuff.

NICK: Cool. Yeah. One thing you see from their statuses is neither of them have been online in probably three weeks. They went dark. You know they do that for missions sometimes, that’s not a super worrying thing, but you haven’t seen anything from them recently.

CAMERON: Yeah. I go through and I Like all of the posts that I missed, because that’s what moms do when they get on Facebook.

(laughter)

NICK: ‘Mooom!’

LAURA: Every single one is Liked, and then if you can leave comments you leave like a little smiley face or a little heart emoji.

CAMERON: ‘Love you guys~!’

LAURA: Nothing else, just ‘so cute!’ Smiley face! (laughs)

CAMERON: There’s probably a couple on Jet’s, on some of his invention ones, where she leaves an actual comment that gets technical and is asking about a specific function of this technology.

HUDSON: And ends it with ‘my boy is so smart!’

CAMERON: (giggles) ‘You’re so smart!’

LAURA: ‘I love my boys!’

NICK: heart, heart, kissy face.

CAMERON: yeah.

LAURA: Smooches!

NICK: There’s definitely one picture of Juke in a bar wearing a different outfit than you’re used to seeing, and he’s really close in the physical space of a Falleen woman, and Karma puts a comment like: ‘Hey, who’s that?!’

CAMERON: (grinning) Mm-hmm. Yup. Just all of the mom Facebookings.

NICK: Yup. Is there anything else you wanted to take care of?

CAMERON: And then Karma’s going to call them.

NICK: Ohh.

CAMERON: HuntersOnly didn’t remind her, but she got on it, as she was going through notifications and stuff it says that the twins’ birthday is today.

NICK: Ooh.

CAMERON: And like, she knew that, but a lot of stuff has happened and it kind of slipped her mind, so she’s gonna call them.

NICK: Okay. So, you com their ship?

CAMERON: Yeah. I just com the Gemini, probably from the Afternoon Delight.

NICK: Yeah. Well, you have to use ship-to-ship communication.

CAMERON: Yup, because that’s how that works.

NICK: If you’re sitting in the middle of space you can’t just use your cellphone.

CAMERON: Yup.

NICK: Star Wars, the 70s.

LAURA: Star Wars tech!

CAMERON: I just do voice, though. I don’t do a holo.

NICK: Okay. The com rings for a while, and they don’t answer, and you get a voicemail.

(begin segment recorded by others)

{JET}: Hello! You’ve reached the Nailo Brothers, Bounty Hunters Extraordinaire. If you’d like to leave a message, please press 1—

{JUKE}: Hey. Hey! Are you recording the new message? … Hey, you said I could be in this one.

{JET}: Juke, we’re trying to get this done professionally, so I thought—

{JUKE}: No, but… but mom said you have to let me be part of the marketing.

{JET}: Look, how about you just keep punching the heavy bag? … Okay. Fine, Juke. Come over here.

{JUKE}: Oh—Okay… Tell me when to start.

{JET}: No. It started already.

(beep)

(end recorded segment)

CAMERON: Alright, so it beeps and she goes, “Oh, hey boys! (giggling) Wow, that was a very professional voicemail message. (laughs) Um… Y’all sound so adult. Happy birthday! It looks like y’all are real busy right now, but hopefully you have a chance to listen to this soon so I’m not late. I’m very proud of all y’all have accomplished in the past year. Y’all are taking over all of my old stomping grounds. That’s pretty cool.

Um… Here’s an update on my life, I guess. I got recruited for a job. I’m not really sure why yet. It’s kind of a huge mess. The crew I’m working with is… interesting, and smaller than we were this morning. It’s been a rough day already. You know, just helplessly watching people die. I really hope y’all don’t have to experience that. Anyway! There’s a brilliant slicer that you’d love, Jet, and there’s a smuggler who you’d find… interesting? Juke. Actually, come to think of it, I think I’d rather y’all didn’t meet. Anyway. Keep each other safe, boys, and I love you. Bye.”

NICK: Beep! Let’s cut over to Tink and Xianna. What are you two up to?

LAURA: Okay. Xianna is sitting on the floor in front of the costume closet, as we have now dubbed it, and I’m sure Tink’s there and has put Sabos’s extra unworn shirts on a shelf in there, but Xianna is on the floor with a pile of shoes around her and she’s looking at all of them and holding them up to a boot that is half smooshed and demolished and has a hole in the front and is all sorts of bloodied up. She’s like comparing shoes from the closet to the old boot to see if any of them are the same size or how similar they are, because she needs new shoes. (laughs)

NICK: That boot at one point on the third comparison, a drop of blood drips off of it. It’s soaked.

CAMERON: Ew.

LAURA: Yeah.

HUDSON: I walk over and I say, “Oh. Are you comparing shoes to see which is superior to other shoes?”

LAURA: “I mean… I’m just looking for a new pair of shoes, seeing which ones will fit me, which ones are similar to my old shoes, because as you can see my old boot will no longer work.”

HUDSON: “I mean, it would work—Well, not really, I guess.”

LAURA: “Yeah.”

HUDSON: “Well… Good luck with that!”

LAURA: “Thank you?”

HUDSON: “So on a scale of like Sniffle to Sob, how sad are you that Sabos is gone?”

LAURA: “Uh, none?”

HUDSON: “Don’t you have a heart…?”

LAURA: “I mean, I guess, but like I knew him for like a week? That is not really enough time to… care.”

HUDSON: “We’ve had some adventures together, though. It’s been a very action-packed week.”

LAURA: “It has been a week.”

HUDSON: “Time is just a construct.”

LAURA: “I mean, but is it though?”

HUDSON: “Gah. My head hurts now.”

LAURA: “I mean, I really do not have the energy to care for someone who I’ve only known a week who I did not really even like that much to begin with.”

HUDSON: “But… but… all the fun times together…”

LAURA: “Yeah… SO you see, I do not even remember my father, I was three years old when he was taken and captured and enslaved, never saw him again. When I was 15 my sister and I hid in the cabinets at our house as stormtroopers busted into the kitchen and took my mother away, never saw her again. Most of the other people I knew growing up on Ryloth were at some point killed, enslaved, or arrested. So, sorry if I do not have the energy to care for someone I knew for a week and a half.”

HUDSON: “I mean, this was different though, because he was blown to bits, not taken or arrested or none of those things.”

LAURA: “I mean, yeah, he was pretty much blown to bits, but I don’t think you understand. I grew up seeing people shot in the streets in front of me as a child. You kind of get used to that after a certain point, so one Togruta that I did not like dies… Eh.”

HUDSON: “I still believe there’s a heart in there.”

LAURA: “I mean, technically yes. There is one, but I only have so much time and emotional capacity, so I’m just going to drink and find a new pair of boots.”

HUDSON: “Let’s see if we can just, you know, increase that emotional capacity just a little by little over time.”

LAURA: “No…”

NICK: (laughs)

CAMERON: “What does your medical textbook say about increasing emotional capacity?”

HUDSON: “Well, so they actually want you to buy this other book called Becoming Emotions for the emotional track of the medicine, so like that’s a whole other thing I need to save up money for, but the sneak preview kind of says that emotions are just a construct and that’s all it says. That’s how I had that line from earlier.”

CAMERON: (laughs) “Great.”

LAURA: “Got it… Oh, so yeah, while we are speaking on emergency contacts, I do have a sister, somewhere on Ryloth, I think. I don’t really talk directly to her. I have a family friend that I send money to to give to her, but I do not actually speak to her. So I guess you would want to contact Jerr. He will then contact my sister, wherever she is.”

HUDSON: “Cher?”

LAURA: “Jerr.”

HUDSON: “Chair?”

LAURA: “Jerr, with a J. J-E-R-R.”

HUDSON: “Oh… Jeer.”

LAURA: “… Jerr.

HUDSON: “Jerr.”

LAURA: “Yeah!”

HUDSON: “Jeh… JEHR~!”

LAURA: “That is close enough. Yes.”

HUDSON: “Alright. I can contact that person.”

NICK: Tink’s translator is like smoking a little bit.

(laughter)

HUDSON: Yeah.

NICK: Okay. Around this point the camera zooms in to the cockpit of the Afternoon Delight and onto a little vid screen that’s embedded in the dashboard, and you get a com with no video. It says Incoming Message, and you hear: “This is Sentinel. You’ve done… better than I hoped. It’s time for us to meet in person. I’m sending you the coordinates now.”

CAMERON: As soon as I saw it I flipped the full coms on so that everyone on the ship heard it.

NICK: Yeah. That voice rattles through the ship, and that’s where we’re gonna end the episode.

ALL: Ba-naaa~!

CAMERON: (hums funeral march)

NICK: (groaning) Aww…

CAMERON: (laughs triumphantly)

NICK: Oh no…

## Outro

CAMERON: Thanks for listening to Tabletop Squadron. If you enjoyed our show please consider logging into iTunes and giving us a five-star review. Five-star reviews will help new listeners to find the show and give the squad warm fuzzies when we read them.

Xianna’fan is played by Laura Penrod. She can be found on Twitter at @cheerio_buffet.

Tink is played by Hudson Jameson and he can be found on Twitter at @hudsonjameson.

Karma Nailo is played by me, Cameron Robertson. You can find me on Twitter at @midnightmusic13.

Our game master is Nick Robertson, and you can find him on Twitter at @alias58.

Our intro song is Space Jam by Pablo Ribot.

Additional music by James Gunter.

Follow the podcast on Twitter and Instagram at @tabletop_squad. For real! We’re real people and we wanna talk to anyone who listens to the show. Reach out! See you next time.

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