Session 24, 5/14

Of course we started with everything going to shit.  Want and Yarb were in the Railyard with some of the brainer kids, doing a fabulous job of infiltrating and planting spores, but when Want ripped the life force from the other patients in the infirmary and destroyed a robot nurse, things took a turn.  The medical staff tried to quarantine Want and Yarb, but Yarb pulled them both into a pocket dimension before teleporting them beyond the wall.  Yarb left the kids behind.

Piss, Duke, and the Harlots were waiting out at the treeline to start the attack on the Railyard whenever Want gave a signal (there are disagreements on whether this was actually the plan or not), but took the initiative to try and attack earlier with the harlots.  He had to fight with Legs, but he got them moving.  Just before he entered a culvert that would lead them to the city, his spidey sense went off, because Cupid was near, with friends.  

Cupid had baited a trap for Piss, but saw the number under his command and the maniacs following Duke to his aid and decided he had lost the element of surprise and aborted the attack, disolving once again into the overgrowth.

Want and Yarb magically pop into existence with the rest of the party and they all decide to head back to the Piss Pot since there is now an alarm also going off at the Railyard (either from Want’s overgrowth infection or for Piss’ flare he shot to signal Duke)

The party was surrounded by troops in power armor from the Railyard, but they massacred them in short order.  They chased down the few that survived to flee, and put one named Kettle to the question.  

Kettle lets the group know that the Railyard knows of the oil at the Piss Pot and he also gives intel on how to attack the railyard after some coersion from Piss and Want.  Then he makes the wise decision to join the maniacs instead of dying and gets renamed “Pot”.

The group made it to the piss pot, scavenged up some pet food for the complaining populace and gathered intel of an impending attack by the Railyard.

[WANT]

Back at the Piss Pot (Session 23, 4/30/17)

The gang(s) had finally all reconvened at the Piss Pot after clearing out a group of invaders from the Railyard. Lithium met with the Harlots and warned them that she'd had a vision of further conflict with the high-tech city. They put the refugees from Live Oak to work setting up more defenses; Lithium gave the title of quartermaster to a refugee named Peekaboo and gave them a pigoon to eat. A battery from the White Castle Zone was used to finally get the oil rig working again.

Duke met with Carlos and requested that he train Quinn to drive the new truck they'd acquired. During this training one of the Live Oak refugees, a squirrelly man named Smallbone, approached Carlos with a business proposal to open a speakeasy with a cache of booze that he'd smuggled from town. Carlos agreed to open the bar, but his suspicions were raised when Smallbone also requested passage to the Railyard.

With tensions mounting over the Railyard, a "council" meeting was called. Want hatched a plan to take the children into the Railyard - they would use the main entrance with its awful decontamination procedures, but once inside they would summon Overgrowth spores from the Psychic Maelstrom to infiltrate and overtake the Railyard from within. Duke and Lithium would stand watch with an assault team and be ready to attack the gate if anything went wrong. With these plans in place, everyone went to the speakeasy, followed by a lot of sex back in Want and Lithium's respective quarters.

The next day the group set off for the Railyard. Lithium and Duke stayed back with Want's summoned Featherex and Tree People to keep an eye out for trouble. Duke noticed some footprints in the woods that Lithium recognized as belonging to Cultists, and he had another ominous vision in which he encountered the Two-Headed Deer King. Lithium prepared to have the group attack the Railyard regardless of whether Want's plan succeeded.

Meanwhile Carlos drove Want and the children to the Railyard entrance. They passed through the decontamination chambers with the usual fuss, though Carlos managed to bribe his way through to avoid the more invasive measures.

Want decided to head to the nearest infirmary, with the thought that the spores he summoned could latch onto a virus for quicker dispersal. The guard robot at the infirmary, Andy the Android, gave them a cheerful but ominous horoscope about how an object that was lost would have new meaning. The android sensed that Carlos had not been properly decontaminated and started to apprehend him and Want, but Want zapped it out of commission with his orb powers.

With time now running short before alarms were sounded, Want and the children began their ritual to summon the Overgrowth spores, which began to quickly take hold on the sick patients. Carlos, Want and children began to hightail it back to their vehicle and safety, not realizing that one of the children had been snatched away...

TO BE CONTINUED

SD4Q (Session 22)

When last we left our heroes...

Piss, Lithium, and Yarb had exited stage left and were headed to the Piss Pot. Somehow, they encountered an alien and were doing battle.

Want took the children and headed to the Piss Pot as well. Carlos had no interest in any of this shit, and also made way towards our stalwart (maybe?) home. We see a cut scene of Duke, back at Live Oak, making his way out of the forest. After he approaches Trish, and gets the cold shoulder, the noir block zooms in on his face, we see his new emerald green eyes, and or first hint that things aren't what they seem anymore.

As Yarb, Piss, and Lithium (and Want who eventually found the trio) are fighting the alien, Duke pulls up and they defeat him together. Perky Dan and two other kids were pulled into the vortex; Want tried to lay the blame on Lithium.  After the pleasentries are exchanged, and Piss prances his victory over the alien to the surroundings crowd, the group makes their way back to the PP.

On arrival, the shit moat is examined to ensure its viscosity. Maple sure has been gone a long time reinforcing our shit-oriented defenses. Carlos had already arrived and had started to give orders to the Harlots.

My mind is having trouble filling in the gaps. I remember Want actualizing a Feather-Rex, and creating a divide in the Mossmen in the 10,000 Maniacs between loyalists to Piss and those who were only there to serve the cause. Also, Want and Duke had some tension as Duke was beginning to see through Want's charade.

Carlos went ahead to the Piss Pot and found the surrounding forest crawling with scouts from the Railyard in containment suits (since they're always scared of infection).  He snuck into the Piss Pot, chatted with Legs and Trunkman, and then met up with the group on their way back.  The party was able to take out the guys in the woods without too much trouble and captured a guy to interrogate.

Lithium's Notes from the Future... or Maybe the Past... Who Can Remember? (Session 21, 4/1617)

Lithium and her boon companion Piss finished mopping the remains of Ratbutter's men. They began searching the bodies for any un-demolished valuables when they spotted a small feral child wielding a giant club. The child basically just said "Yarb" which they took to be it's name. Later Yarb proved to be quite eloquent, if foul-mouthed, with a remarkable grasp of grammar (sans ability to use the first person).

Upon meeting Yarb, Lithium fell to her knees and began worshipping the young girl. It turns out Lithium recognized her from the future. Lithium claims that Yarb will grown up to become The Colorless Queen, who rules White Castle as a utopia. She is also the ones who brought in an injured, aimless Lithium, and trained her to be the badass she is now. Lithium declared that they must protect the young child-thing. Piss found it amusing so he was cool with it.

Piss decided to recruit the remnants for the folks of Live Oak and get them to come be the new residents of the Piss Pot, including a few tough guys to serve as a permanent town guard. While the Maniacs got everyone geared up and ready to leave, Yarb took Piss and Lithium back to her hovel. It was a cave, lined with bones. She found that someone had stolen her radio and her chair (which is actually an old artillery shell).

A cave in trapped them inside so they had to crawl out the back way, through an underground facility-type room. They climbed a ladder up to hatch in the woods. While walking back to Live Oak they happened upon a strange robed figure, mutated from the zone. This person appeared to be an assassin from the future, sent back to kill a young Yarb. Time travel shenanigans! The assassin was dealt with quickly enough though.

The caravan finally was underway, heading back to the Piss Pot when they found a telepad in the overgrowth, attached to one of those giant polyhedron batteries. Lithium recognized the device as one capable of time travel (or something, maybe, it's all fuzzy to her). Piss decided to test it out, so he grabbed a "volunteer" from the crowd (which nearly caused a riot), flipped some switches, and shoved the young fellow onto the telepad. He promptly disappeared. Then a portal opened to a strange, alien dimension and giant fucking monster came through.

Things could've gone better.

Ratbutter [Session 20, 4/17]

Cupid's Entry #213

"Dear Diary,

I feel like the group is really coming together!  We've pulled off our complicated "Make Ratbutter paranoid" plan surprisingly well, and all we have to do is wait it out.  In fact, I'm sitting next to Duke, hiding from some of his men, and we're having a great night in Live Oak.  I feel like everything's turning around!"

Cupid Entry #214

...

...Well, Diary, that didn't work out.

We last left off with Piss hiding under downtown's bed as he couldn't escape without making any noise.  He tried to steal some of her things, but couldn't risk getting noticed and stayed under the bed.  Cupid found his way back to Duke, and explained that Piss was trapped.  As the two made their way back to Trish's house, they encountered a large patrol of Ratbutter's men and had to spend the night hiding out behind one of the lift systems they had set-up in the tree-top village.

Back at Trish's place, Lithium tried to communicate with the Moss Men, but ended up making some awkward gestures instead.  In order to salvage the situation, Want turned lithium into a moss-like person herself, and somewhere along the way she figured out that the moss people wanted revenge on cupid still for the featherex dino.

The next morning, Duke and Cupid make their way back to Trish's, but duke soon leaves with Want to find one of his followers.  Lithium, left in the room with the moss men and Cupid, decides it's best for them to leave the confined area.  Want finds one of their followers preaching, and gets up on stage to give a sermon of their own.  Want encourages the people to try mushrooms, and get in touch with their inner self.  Ratbutter, with his thin figure and slicked back black hair, hears the commotion of people on shrooms and having an orgy.  He comes out to see what all the commotion is about, and Want tries to convince him to take some shrooms himself.  The sword speaks to Ratbutter, and tells him it's poison, and so to prove their good intentions Want eats some of his own medicine.  The asparagus doesn't sit well with Want though, and he begins violently expelling fluid out through their nostrils and needs to lay down.  

Lithium tries to get closer, but is stopped by one of Ratbutter's guards.  Lithium says she has a present for Ratbutter, and gives the guard one of her guns/the whip as security.

Piss meanwhile has positioned himself on top of the canopy, and calls the lithe ratbutter a fatass before launching a grenade at him and the crowd of people.  Body parts go flying, and lithium tries to cover Want and the children as they dive for cover.  The sword goes flying through the air, and while Lithium and Want are able to dodge it, Want stays a safe distance away while watching 3 of his child brainers get chopped in half.  

Cupid lunges and grabs the sword out of the air as it flies by, and piss jumps down onto the catwalk in front of Cupid.  He says that since once Cupid took issue with Piss trying to take his kill, if he hands over the sword Piss will consider it even.  A group of Ratbutter's men attack, and Piss turns around to fight them.  The sword screams to Cupid to stab Piss now, but Cupid instead leaps down to the forest below.  Duke sees Cupid running with the sword, and gives chase through the overgrowth.

Once the carnage starts, Lithium is determined to get her gun back.  She slams on the door and commands the guard that it will be much worse if he doesn't give it back, but the guard tells lithium to fuck off.  Lithium then smashes through the wall, taking him completely by surprise and retrieving her weapons.  She begins fighting off the rest of Ratbutter's men, and in the carnage ends up next to Piss.  Piss tells her that they need to take care of Cupid - permanently this time, to which Lithium responds she doesn't have her whip anymore.

Duke loses track of Cupid, but Cupid comes into a clearing to speak with Duke.  Duke says that Cupid has something that doesn't belong to him, and the sword belongs to Piss.  Cupid tries to reason with Duke, saying that Piss is a madman who shouldn't have a dangerous weapon like Ratbutter's, but Duke stands firm and says at least Want should be the one to decide.  Cupid agrees, and says he doesn't know which direction Live Oak is.  Duke looks around to get his bearings, but while he's distracted Cupid stabs him with the sword.  While Duke writhes on the ground in pain, Cupid tells Duke Archie says hello and thanks for trying to help him while he was stuck in Cupid.  He told Cupid to give Duke this, and holds up his first aid bag.  Cupid tosses it to the side of the clearing, and walks off into the overgrowth.  The last thing Duke sees in the session is Cupid raising his Angel-summoning horn in the moonlight and blowing on it.

Live Oak (Session 19, 4/2/2017)

Live Oak (4/2/2017)

• we're checkin' out Hermit Larry's hut outside live oak
• Rat Butter is currently in Live Oak -- seized control of the town
• Piss asks for a power test -- Want turns tree inside out, but he lose control and the tree starts Akira-ing. We drive frantically to safety.
• Then Want tries to conjure a weird creature from the maelstrom. Creates a weird rhombus creature that shoots a laser beam at Piss. Cupid shoots it, and it explodes viscera everywhere. Cupid tastes the viscera -- it looks like raspberry jam but does not taste like it.
• Larry recognizes Cupid as "Archie" (his old name). Larry trades Cupid an assault rifle for some barter. Larry talks about the trouble in Live Oak and Rat Butter, who takes some sort of counsel (the sword, we think) that has made him aggressive and vicious
• Live Oak is like a wookiee city in the trees -- we're trying to figure out how to infiltrate. and Rat Butter's dudes are guarding the city
• Want animates some vines to reverse-zip-line ourselves up to the platforms
• Jennifer says he's paranoid, especially after losing a gang. Doesn't really trust even his most trusted lieutenants. Also has a sweet tooth.
• We take the animated vines up toward Live Oak but encounter guards. All of us drop down but Cupid, who continues fighting and successfully kills them all.
• We retrieve the bodies (I forget how) so they don't raise any alarms and then loot them.
• One of the dead guys is Stringy, a former 10K Maniac who stayed loyal to Rat Butter. He is wearing his trademark lizard-skin mantel around his shoulders. We hatch a plan: to exploit Rat Butter's paranoia by making it seem like his second-in-command, Downtown, turned against him and killed Stringy. We'd dump the body somewrrhere it would be found and then stash the mantel in Downtown's quarters so it looked like she did it.
• We wait for the rest of the 10K maniacs to show up.
• Eventually they do.
• In the town of Witches' Jelly, Margolius heard that my old man is dead and my sister is running New Flamperton
• In the dead of night, the moss men merge with the overgrowth to climb up to Live Oak then lower a rope ladder.
  • (To accomplish this, I had to threaten Dick Flower. I then buttered him up and gave him a corpse as a reward.)
• We gather information (I forget how). When is downtown likely to be out? Rat Butter meets with his generals after breakfast and after dinner. Best way to get to Downtown's place? Through the overgrowth over the market.
• Split up -- Carlos and Duke go to stash the body above the marketplace (on the way to Downtown's place), Piss and Cupid go to stash the late Stringy's mantel in Downtown's
• While Duke is stashing the body above the market, preparing to open a vein, and Carlos is keeping watch, someone wanders through the market. Carlos successfully distracts and scares the guy off
• Back to Piss and Cupid, they notice that Downtown is on her way back from the post-dinner meeting, leaving Piss enough time to get in but not enough to get out. Piss signals to Cupid to get out of there, then he ducks into Downtown's quarters. He stashes the mantel, his signet ring, and a branding iron (Stringy sexually enjoyed burning his nipples) under the bed, then hides under the bed all night.

White Castle [Session 18, 3/19/2017]

WANT:
The group started off in Gut Town, everyone reeling from the battle.  Mutant and android bodies littered the ground, with the shell shocked compatriots milling around.  Cupid and Lithium investigate the town more and realize it resembles an outpost like the Facility, but is completely run down.  Lithium is plagued with memories of her past, so she takes stimulants from Cupid to keep herself awake, leading to her assault of a local villager.  Duke barely talks her out of the murder and brings the villager to Cupid to heal.  The injured mutant, Germander, tells them that he can safely lead them through the local zone to the white castle.

Lithium kills someone else instead.  Conveniently Piss found himself in need of a body to feed to Dick Flower and the other moss men, so Lithium did a little haggling and handed over her prize.  

Anyone who was actually sleeping the next morning was awoken by a nauseating sound coming from the white castle, signalling a tear in reality.  The group convened before embarking on their journey, with their new guide.  Want convinced Germander to bring along his own wife and child after suspicions arose that he would betray the group.  

Along the way Germander diffused traps and found a safe passage.  The environment changed as they got closer to the white castle.  Among the pillars of a large aquaduct, giant misty fish creatures swam through the air.  The mossmen set upon one of the large creatures and left only a mummified corpse, similar to the body they had devoured in town, tipping Germander off that he was not with good people.

Lithium looked into G’s soul and saw that he intended to sacrifice the party so that he could get the orb himself, so naturally she attempted to kill him for the 2nd time in 24 hrs.  Want and Duke dove to stop Lithium, she knocked out Duke, while Piss and Cupid hold the family close, with guns to their heads.  They convince G not to betray them and head out.  

The group entered the white castle and Duke inexplicably found a brand new truck parked in one of the hallways.  As they proceeded they heard the sound of rain coming from within the halls.  Lithium peaked around a corner and saw Mecha Grandma (ol maple) and her cronies examining a raining room that stood between them and a room containing the orb.  Piss miraculously pulled a giant grenade launcher out of his saddle bags, just as Lithium tossed a flashbang around the corner.  The onslaught from Piss killed everyone but Grandma, who stumbled back into the rain room.  The rain stopped and she was pulled into the air and wrenched apart by some unseen force.  Want gathers that this was the trap that G was laying for them and runs into the now safe room to grab the orb.  The orb dissintigrates and flows into Want, filling them with a vision of a safe piss pot, but only following the rescue of live oak and the defeat of the railyard.  A glowing Want, delivered this message to the group before absent mindedly tearing a hole in reality and proclaiming “away to live oak!” before stepping inside

LITHIUM:
I would just add that Duke also laid down a barrage of bullets into Grandma's men and then Lithium actually knocked Grandma back into the rain room with her barbed wire bar. Oh then Lithium finally murdered Germander right before they escaped.

DUKE:

Also, I went back and grabbed the truck, driving it through the portal. It is now our only method of transportation...