A few weeks ago I managed to secure myself a group of players who have previously played my pamphlet adventure, and asked me to run Mothership for them. I was overjoyed, though, admittedly, I had no clue what to run. Mothership is a favorite of mine for when I need a quick oneshot, but I am lacking in zines suited for longer play. Except for Owe My Soul to the Company Store, of course, which has been staring down at me from my shelf of shame for years now. I gave in, reread it, made 2k words of notes, reread it at least 4 more times, and then scheduled the damn game.
For context, the station the adventure is set on is split into 2 halves, Flower and Bucket, each of which can be run pretty independently of the other one. Our group settled on the Bucket, “where the crabs live”, but one of the players was late to the session by 30 minutes. Once it dawned on me she’s not coming, not wishing to waste a timeslot, I proposed: do the 2 of you want to play a Flower game tonight instead?
What follows is a report of the first session for both the Flower and the Bucket, made half because I want a record I can self-reference when the political situation on Isotelus grows too complex to hold in my head, and half because I want Archon specifically to know what’s going on.
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| Loch I adore your art so |
Session 1A - Flower
Our cast:
Harding Harper, a dockworker. Was Forked some time ago, still dealing with regrets over dooming a copy of himself to the labor body life.
Agnes Leroy, an IT Technician. Memories of a different life spent in battle - she carries a flamethrower the Concern wouldn’t be all too happy about.
Both clients of Oskar, of course. Agnes needs to somehow drown out the screams of the dying, while Harding has a few personal engineering projects on the side that don’t exactly fit colony regulations. It’s all too bad, then, when a scheduled meeting with their dealer turns into front row seats to a ComSec execution. They dip, just barely glimpsing another witness, and hide within a side tunnel to have a good look at the main arteries of the station.
Quick debrief follows. What the fuck happened, why Oskar, what are we going to do now, etc. Options are thrown around, but the hour’s late, so the duo splits to get some sleep, promising each other to reconvene in the morn.
Day 1
The whole sleeping thing didn’t work out. The memories of Oskar’s face in his last moments, as well as the dull sound of a closing airlock, keep both Harding and Agnes all night long. Nevertheless, they meet up, and decide to make an unannounced visit to Olivia Adkins - Harding’s supervisor.
A lot of words are said, but not much information is conveyed. Harding implies they could’ve seen something last night, but they’re apprehensive about telling ComSec about it. Olivia implies that, if she was, hypothetically, to see something last night, and a ComSec officer was involved, she would also avoid ComSec. They bother her for a while, asking a whole lot of favors she cannot provide, while she repeatedly tries to make them go bother someone else with their legal trouble. Agnes steals a bowl full of benzodiazepines, which Olivia just barely registers. Eventually, they leave.
They split up when their shifts start, since they want to abuse Agnes’ access to Concern’s IT infrastructure. The ComSecs wouldn’t have murdered a guy right in the view of cameras, of course, but surely at least one of them registered the other witness leaving, so they can ID and bother her. Just barely escaping detection, Agnes copies the recording onto a personal drive, and goes to a previously agreed upon meeting place, so she can hide for 30 minutes awaiting Harding’s arrival, and attempt to give him a heart attack by jumping from the ceiling. She fails the roll, and instead falls on her ass.
They scan the recording, get a good shot of Msia’s face, and ID her by having Agnes browse the employee database 1 by 1, until a match among the office workers in Admin Offices turns up. They go loiter around the place until the woman leaves, and then, one of Harding’s muscular arms pushing her along, remind her they were supposed to go grab beer tonight, and lead her away from the crowd.
A conversation in a side tunnel follows. Lacking better options, Msia tells the gang both about herself, and then about her escape plan on Day 5. Promising them a seat on the freighter Tulsa if she’s still alive ‘til then, Agnes and Harding promise to try to keep her safe. Just a tad paranoid of ComSec coming after them at night, they decide to all move into Herding’s room to sleep, and organize the world’s worst sleepover (1 mattress, 1 blanket, 2 pillows, and 3 beers). With that, Day 1 ends.
Session 1B - Bucket
Our cast:
“Galena” Harper, a labor body, and fork of Harding Harper. Dreams of a beautiful Abandonist future, inspired by an idealistic zine he carries. Has a marker-drawn smiley face on his head.
Eva Leroy, the freshly out of university student forced into Dr Althaus’ hands. Not very good at her job, but without her there’d only be one [1] person staffing the infirmary.
Nan Sòng, a bootlicking ComSec officer, and confidant of Benson Hale, who sees her friendship with a Body as potential source of intel.
Each tasked with their own goal in their opening scenes: Benson Hale wants the names of the Abandonist Cell, and rants about it to the entire ComSec squad. Dr Althaus doesn’t want to bother with Eva, so it’d be good if she made herself useful and went to ask “Pages” Morrison for some money - word on the street has it the forebody’s hiding a vein of rhenium all to herself. And, of course, “Galena”, who gets a suspicious package pushed into his hands during the shift change by one “Jacket” Morse.
Day 1
The Bodies, “Galena” among them, all head to the Amenities Chamber to get some food, talk, and play dice (the modified Isotelus variant - this derailed the session for solid 10 minutes, so it has to be mentioned, although I’ll save going into detail as to all the intricacies of the game). Both Eva and Nan arrive shortly after, each on their own business. The former beelines for “Pages” Morrison, who happens to be locked in conversation with “Galena” at the moment. Immediately distracted, she attempts to scribble on the Body’s face, considering his smiley face to be “sad” and “lonely”. Predictably, she is stopped before any vandalism can take place. Nan just sort of loiters around, engaging someone else she knows for small talk, while consciously registering only the far more interesting conversation taking place at the table over.
Eva, questioned over why the hell she’s there, tells “Pages” about Althaus’ request. The forebody replies she’s willing to play ball, and make a small donation to the Doctor, but she needs some work done herself - some guy’s snooping around looking for her private stash, which absolutely doesn’t exist, and someone ought to keep him away from it. Eva immediately agrees, and “Galena”, forced by circumstance to be part of the conversation, does as well. “Pages” then reveals their “target” is someone by the name of “Jacket” Morse. This “Galena” excuse himself from the table, head for the nearest toilet, and open the mysterious package he received. It’s a gun! Without a biometrics lock! What the fuck!
The duo make plans to meet up once “Jacket”’s shift in the tunnels is done, to give him a little scare. While Eva heads to the infirmary to notify Althaus on her progress, Nan intercepts “Galana” and talks with him about Abandonists. The Body quickly turns it into a lecture on Isotelus Sign Language, and all its intricacies.. Nan, frankly, does not give a fuck. The ComSec goes to report to her supervisor, who proposes he’s willing to turn the other way, and overlook minor crimes, if somebody gives him any names to follow up on.
The hour of the meeting nears, and when “Galena” and Eva head to the scheduled location, they’re greeted by Nan, already waiting for them. She’s in whether they want it or not, and has her own business with poor ol’ “Jacket”. Eva protests a bit, but in the end the officer joins the scheme anyway. Notably, no plans are discussed, so when Morse leaves the tunnels, it's pure improv. Eva says he missed his annual checkup, the Body informs her he had no checkup planned. “Galena” cuts in, saying he also wasn’t notified beforehands either, but that’s because the local medical care is understaffed all the time. Nan stands ominously to the side. Eventually, “Jacket” is convinced following them to the infirmary is probably a wise move.
With Eva leading the pack, and Nan in the back, “Galena” notices his manipulator arms wouldn’t be seen by anyone but “Jacket”, so they establish contact. Quick question about the gun: why do I have it. A very delayed response: shit, wait, you’re not “Branch” Walker? Realizing the package was shipped to the wrong address, “Galena” kindly informs the smuggler: I am going to give it back to you tomorrow, I don’t want anyone to see me with it. Response: what, no, I don’t want it either. They arrive at the infirmary. Eva drags everyone into the surgery room, away from the curious eyes and ears of her supervisor.
Continuing their sign language conversation while getting “checked up” by Eva, “Jacket” eventually puts 2 and 2 together and realizes the group was sent after him by “Pages” Morrison. Excuses are made: why is she supposed to be the only one with all the extra rhenium? You know the stash’s big enough to pay off one’s debt? I just want to see my wife again, even if she won’t recognize me.
2 conversations happen in parallel: Nan questions “Jacket” with words, and, whenever she’s not looking, “Galena” exchanges messages with him in sign language. For some reason that’s beyond my understanding, the ComSec becomes CONVINCED the Body had something to do with Abandonists. Eventually, he breaks. Nan promises his name won’t be mentioned in any report, so he reveals he’s with a group known as Ten Feathers, and works directly for Olivia Adkins in the Flower. Out of useful intel, and spooked enough he definitely won’t get anywhere near Morrison’s stash for a long while, the group lets him go.
Nan heads to report to her boss, and Eva and “Galena” exchange a few words about what happened. Ten Feathers is useful insofar that they provide supplies to the hospital the Concern regularly ignores to cut costs, so they worry that what they did might impact the situation negatively. “Galena” decides to run after “Jacket” to check up on him, gives him the gun he desperately doesn't want, shares a few sips of “gin” with the guy, and then they ways on good-ish terms.
Benson Hale, meanwhile, gets a report about Olivia Adkins’ involvement in providing weapons to the Abandonists, and he’s pissed about it. When asked about the source of this intel, Nan provides it without hesitation - “Jacket” Morose of Ten Feathers. Hale writes the name down. He trusts that “Judicous” Gogol, the bucketside smuggler leader, has enough brains to not escalate the situation, and to recognize that whatever Adkins is doing through “Jacket” is antithetical to good business. So he’ll simply pass all the information on, and let Gogol deal out justice however he sees fit. Nan nods obediently, before being told to leave.
Some thoughts
Damn, this is hype.
I’m really happy with how these sessions went, although I can claim little credit, I think. While the zine requires a lot of reading to fully Get, once it’s all in your head, it basically runs itself. The way the NPCs are written and drawn makes stepping into their shoes easy [and, more importantly, fun!]. The way various factions interact always feels intuitive in the moment. Archon also very clearly put a lot of thought into how Isotelus works from the technical perspective, which was expected from him specifically, but still feels like the most wonderful gift a Warden could ask for. I don’t need to make tough calls on how the docks work - this guy figured it out for me! Overall, despite choosing a bizarre way to run the game - I don’t think this zine was designed for 2 games running parallel to each other at once - the actual moment to moment running of the game is so smooth.
Some notes for myself:
If I already crafted this scenario where the players in the Bucket come from very varied backgrounds and factions, some of which are at odds, I ought to put more work into actually giving them a reason to work together. Nan’s player, for her part, did an excellent job inserting herself into the other players’ plot, but I almost feel like she has to actively work to be included in the adventure. I should’ve thought about that before allowing her to be ComSec, and I didn’t, so now I have to work to make her more included.
I don’t do well translating english room descriptions to polish, in which I run the game, so I should probably at least write keyword notes for every location as a description shorthand. The amount of times I froze because I forgot a very basic word is, frankly, embarrassing.
There is a part of me that also feels I should give them a more concrete understanding of how certain spaces look, because I feel like sometimes me revealing a fact about the colony’s architecture a bit too late changed how some plans played out.
All of that being said, I’m still incredibly happy with how the sessions went, and can’t wait for more.
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