Steve's Session Notes

[Uthoroc]

September 16th 2025

Leaving the base of the cargo lifts at Fort Bump in the morning and heading towards Tin City, the group encounters a trader who swaps with One Shot a Electrocutioner for the Houndscatcher. This summons lightning and doesn't need a full moon to recharge. The trader tells them about Onyx who they meet a bit further on. He's a guide for hire, his price being a stick of chalk and a human corpse per week. One Shot finds this a bit ghoulish but a deal is struck as he seems to have knowledge of many places, and even inside Bravo City. On their way to Tin City, an ambush by some Scraplings is spotted. They are hidden in the ashes off the side of the track under their shells but retreat as soon as it's clear that the heavily armed travellers have seen them.

A night is spent in Tin City. Onyx and Sven enjoy the hospitality of Silver, head of the city (really more of a village). General Lin and One Shot spend the night at Smiffy's, the other pub where the General discovers the pleasures of a rather potent ale (Headkick?). Urged by One Shot to have one more pint so he won't remember the taste in the morning, does so and it works, but he has a nasty hangover. Between them they find out that most people seem to know about the secret tunnel, that there is unrest in Bravo City between the wardens as Deputy Slate plans to kill the currents chief warden's daughter, Fightless Mentzi, and claim her inheritance. Also, The Twig Witches do their endless dance, cowering near strange statues in great numbers. One Shot gets in with the cook and learns how to butcher soot shrimp for the barbie in exchange for helping in the kitchen and repairing the chef's apron.

The next day, it's snowing black flakes and they pass an upturned church covered in crosses. According to Onyx, it's where Rhinestone lives and he thinks that crosses will repel the bloodsucking soot shrimp. Next is The Memorial of Immaculate Revenge. A graveyard of ash statues looking up towards the clouded sky. Two Twig Twitches are scolding a hapless Scrapling who has stolen 18 ash noses. He is torn apart by moving statues. The group are hiding behind the low wall around the graveyard and find a traveller there, a young mage called Stellmer who has been drawn to this place by dreams of an Angel under the crashed city. They are from Gamma City and have somehow made it this far. They agree to voyage together. Onyx suggests they go rest up in the fuselage of a crashed sky barge.

The next day (I may have got the timing wrong here but it doesn't matter) Lord Sven spots someone in hiding in the graveyard. It's the Cloud Empress. She has a nasty wound. They take her to the safe haven and One Shot does a great job of fixing her up. However during the discussion, One Shot and General Lin between them mention that she's the Cloud Empress and that she can grant wishes. Which would have been fine except that Onyx and Stellmer were there. Onyx is fine but Stellmer is in shock about this. They leave the two strangers and discuss things more privately. Cloud, to whom One Shot gives the name Mia, is worried about what will happen now as Skull is stalking her, having stabbed her while trying to persuade her to grant him a wish. And one of the rumours they heard in Fort Bump is that Skull was wandering the crater. But Mia believes she is probably safest staying with the group. However at this point Onyx comes in to say that Stellmer has disappeared. Lord Sven finds her footprints. She must have turned invisible and ran off. She had given a list of spells she knows but hadn't mentioned this one, just Levitation and Stomach Portal. They follow the footprints to the tunnel but daren't go in as they don't know if it's safe until the afternoon. They hide in the graveyard until it's time to go, however, shortly after a group of scraplings emerge from the tunnel and put a little blue flag up. A couple of them decide to loot the graveyard for noses but One Shot takes a strong dislike to this and with General Lin and some big guns, urges them to move on.

The session finishes with One Shot and Lord Sven discussing the terms of the former's contract with the latter but the matter is still not resolved.

September 23rd 2025

The group goes through the tunnel into Bravo City which looks like it has been shattered by several earthquakes. They encounter two men struggling to carry a recalcitrant wardrobe. It turns out to be a piece of sentient furniture named Goose that the two antiquarians are returning to the Palace for when the emperor returns. They discuss the situation of the city Wardens who run their city and the Fightless, who are their underclass. They are taking the group to the Palace when some Fightless are spotted but they soon retreat. However they are shortly followed by three wardens wearing power suits and armed with Electrocutioners and a Heat Cutter. One Shot and Mia (Cloud's cover name) take cover while Lord Sven shows them his warrant which they poo poo. He and General Lin surrender their weapons and are marched off to the west.

As it gets dark they come to an arena. General Lin notices that the Heat Cutter doesn't have any power so Lord Sven uses the cover of darkness to use a Crest of Sudden Sorrow on one of the armed guards, while One Shot, who has been stalking them fires his heat cutter on the other, destroying his groin, he falls unconscious to the ground. General Lin dodges a blow from the Warden using the heat cutter as a club and cuts open the sack containing weapons. Lord Sven grabs the electrocutioner on the ground and fries the sorrowful Warden, not enough to drop him but the runs off into the night. The Warden with the unloaded guns flees too but Lord Sven uses the other electrocutioner and explodes him before he can get very far.

In the meantime, a woman, Bugtra, has approached One Shot and Mia and asks if they might help her deal with the Permastorm. They agree and she leads them into the arena, past three tame imagos to her quarters. She explains that she has a plan that requires at least four powerful magicians and a quantity of chalk. She has a list of likely candidates so the group set off to find the first one, Praten the Poisoner who tends to the Twig Witches of the Coven of the Restful Dead. The plan is that the mages together will activate some machinery which will give access to a memory of Bravo City as it was before its fall which the group will explore and find the instructions of how to turn off the Permastorm before they were destroyed. This memory is that of the Angel, a sentient starship in a cavern under Bravo City. This is the Angel that calls to magicians to free it from its prison. Bugtra also feels the call and would like also to free the Angel, but only after the Permastorm has been stopped.

[Uthoroc]

October 9th, 2025

Talk to Twig Witches, Spoon turns up, having learnt from Trazu the failed Twig Witch Animate Goliath. Prater the Poisoner, it turns out, is the only male Twig Witch in the Coven of the Restful Dead but he is keen to meet the Angel and so accompanies the group. Spoon is surprised at how old Prater looks. Usually old people cannot do magic (or magicians have died before they get that old). He is called Prater the Poisoner because he believes that running the fine line between life and death is how witches access the Slip and perform magick.

On the way back to the secret tunnel, you encounter Lady Darby running away from an ash goliath, a fearsome lumbering beast as big as five with great hulking fists. Prater immobilises the goliath with a spell and Lady Darby's servants are freed from the graves into which they had fallen. She is looking for the burial place of her grandmother and Praten suggests the graveyard south of Tin City, as long as she doesn't disturb the statues. Spoon learns from her servants that she is looking for a Major Crest of Day into Night which she thinks was buried with her relative.

Back into Bravo City you meet up with Bugtra who is accompanied by a Farmerling carrying a strange metal staff. This is actually Illuciden the magician from the stars. He wishes to use the Angel to return to his homeland and has made a deal with Norg to carry him around.

There is some discussion about the plan to access the Angel's memory to get the information to turn off the Permastorm. It seems that this might also give some clues as to how the Angel could be set free. But they are still short a few magician so they decide to recruit Geldine as she's actually in Bravo City, in the same place as the Angel. This is a great cavern with dunes of chalk on which grow pine trees. The Angel stands here, in the ruins of an enormous ancient hourglass filled with chalk that has spilled out. The Angel's thoughts are so loud here that it messes with people's minds. Spoon manages to mostly resist it. He prepares some food dosed with sleeping pills and plants it for Geldine to find. She is very disturbed so when she is asleep and enters her kaleidoscope mind, he can't affect a cure but he does manage to calm her down and implant a suggestion that she visits the amphitheatre - where Bugtra has set up. And they pick her up when she wanders out.

With only one more magician needed, it is decided to rescue Stellmer from the Wardens who picked her up a few days ago as she sought audience with the Angel. She's being held in the Bone Hub, the Warden HQ. It's quite busy with Fightless so there's opportunity to get in, and Illuciden will create a diversion to make it easier to get her out - he'll summon an asteroid.

[Uthoroc]

Ocotber 13th 2025

Spoon mislearns Portal and creates a Sleepy Clone of Lord Sven.

There is much discussions about how to rescue Stellmer from the Wardens. Praten mentions he knows Mentzia and that she looks after her ailing father in the Medical centre at the Bone Hub. Bugtra explains the layout of the hub, three giant snake skeletons arranged as a medical centre, market and mess hall around a glowing central core. The group set out with One Shot and General Lin disguised as Wardens, pushing a cart full of rubbish covering their weapons and holding Spoon and Lord Sven as prisoners to get past the Wardens.

Lord Sven and Spoon enter the medical centre, a long ward with a line of beds up each wall and two doors at the far end. There are two wardens being treated by a doctor for burns. One is recognised as the one who ran away from Lord Sven after being electrocutioned. Spoon gets some soup from the orderly and takes it over to the Wardens to thank them for saving him and medicines the one who might recognise Lord Sven. He is soon climbing the walls and has to be restrained. They make it to the door at the back and Lord Sven goes in to talk to Mentzi. Her father is lying close to death in a bed.

They have a useful exchange of information. Mentzi is a bit reticent to tell all but is thankful to learn of the Vice Warden's plot to kill her. Some plans are entertained for how to get Stellmer out. She's being held by the Wardens in the tunnels under the Hub so Mentzi forges an order from her father bringing Stellmer here and another handing her over to General Lin and One Shot in their guise as Wardens. They hide her, still hooded and manacled, in the back of the cart and casually make their escape. There's a short exchange with two other Wardens but they get away.

Then it's back to Bugtra who explains the plan again, to find out how to turn off the Permastorm, and also, if there's time, to save the Angel. Stellmer is overjoyed to hear that she's going to see the Angel and help it escape. The group makes its way to the Control Room. Stellmer, Praten, Geldine and Illuciden take their places in the chairs around the pool of the memory machine. Cloud stays on watch and everyone else gets into the pool and is transported to 36 years previously.

They meet Geldine in all her finery who asks them what they are doing and isn't too upset to find out she's a memory. Bugtra works out it's the day that Bravo City crashed. Geldine agrees to help them. There are some quakes and they make there way to the Angel Research Tower. They meet a woman on the steps who has found an Imperial Warrant and is off to free Papon, who later becomes the commander of Fort Snek and poisons his men in a bid to kill the Imago.

Inside a strange fellow is looking for something but the four books are more important and are quickly found and trawled through. Fortunately Geldine has made copious notes in the margins as none but her read Torturer script. The following information is found:
- Removing the system orbs in the Machine Room dissolves the Permastorm.
- Deactivating the Permastorm defense barrier and placing the Marriage Band on the Angel’s left-hand ring finger frees the Angel.
- The system orbs must be removed in this order: 1. mahogany 2. ebony 3. alabaster.
- Instructions on how to cast Rejuvenate. Information that casting Rejuvenate while the Angel wears the Marriage Band should replenish the being’s life force.

Spoon gets the last piece of information and just about manages to learn the spell.

[Uthoroc]

October 27th

The frantic chap who was searching for a writ finally gives up, says "What does it matter now?" and casts a spell setting fire to a pile of books. Lord Sven trips him up and he declares that it doesn't matter what they do, Bravo City is doomed and death to the Emperor.

They leave and go back to the angel. They get some sense out of it and notice the Marriage Band on his finger, a dinner plate sized ring with a single gem. Spoon tries to get more information out of the angel but it only causes her to panic.

They return to real world and go back to the amphitheatre. Bugtra recognises the ring as being on a chain around her father's neck. It's time to rest and there's a lot of banter.

The next day they travel to the Bug Tower, the old library - only visible to mages, and meet the Prince who is happy to hand over the ring, and wishes them luck with their endeavour. He's the son of the current emperor and an imago transformed into a woman. Bugtra and her sister are his adopted children and Cloud his step-mother. She reconciles with him and decides to stay. He's only 37 but looks much older as transforming into an imago at random times has aged him.

In the meantime One Shot helps Brass the cook, is gifted some spices and refashions Brass's clothes. He is also given a cook book by Jaffrey and, having learned the password to open the books, gets a couple more, one a history of the last 5,000 years and the other containing three spells, Asteroid Impact, Doom Star and Shockwave of Sound.

Considering the threat to Bravo City from one of the covens and Fort Bump when the storm dissipates, a plan is formulated to deal with the Warden second in command.

One Shot, Lord Sven and General Lin hide in the hospital trash room, Spoon hangs out with the patients and Stellmer turns herself invisible. Spoon casts lightning on his and General Lin's weapons. Mentzi summons the deputy warden Slate and Stellmer uses a spell to put two grenades in his stomach. They explode turning him to a pulpy mush which oozes through his cracked armour. His bagman is shot through by One Shot with his heat gun. Mentzi makes a broadcast to the Wardens but fails to convince them. The other guards rush in from outside and Spoon clobbers the first one into stupefaction and there's a bit of a pile up. Lord Sven tries in turn to persuade the wardens but doesn't sway anyone. One Shot downs another of the piled up guards and Lord Sven takes out the other two with one blast from his electrocutioner. Finally General Lin makes the remaining wardens see sense and Head Warden Mentzi takes charge, ordering people underground to prepare for the Permastorm coming down. There's a bit of a feast with the group.

November 3rd

General Lin goes off with Head Warden Mintzi to organise the defence against the possible Ash Imago attack. Spoon, One Shot and Lord Sven go with Bugtra and Geldine down to the Machine Control Room, collect several bags of chalk powder and turn off the machinery pumping chalk round the three system orbs which are removed in the correct order. They all come back outside to find that the Permastorm has disappeared.

There's some radio chatter that Ash Imago have been spotted to the South East. The defences are in place and General Lin has a plan for dealing with the aggressors, and another which doesn't just involve everyone standing in a line a slowly moving forwards. One Shot calls up Waffle, his packsquab, and all return below to free the angel. One Shot places the Wedding Band on the angel's finger, where he finds some aroma spores growing which he collects. Spoon gives Illuciden the one remaining seed so he can plant it among the stars and the staff-mage is attached to the angel's leg. Everyone stands back and Spoon performs the ritual.

The angel breaks its bonds, spreads its wings and starts to dismantle the ceiling causing flying debris and a massive cloud of chalk dust, everyone rushes to the exit, One Shot drags Spoon up on to Waffle's back and they all make it out safely, even though the chalk has started to burn in places. The angel soars up into the sky and away as a dust storm comes in. This prevents the Ash Imago from attacking so General Lin sets up a pile of chalk in the arena to attract them. Spoon stays down near the chalk and some piles of ash, One Shot is off on Waffle to use the aroma spores to attract the Imago and Lord Sven is secreted up among the seating, with the Warden snipers, with a clear view of the lure.

It soon starts to rain and the Imago appear in the sky grouped together. From among the pack a giant undead Imago appears, four times the size of any others. One Shot attempts to calm it with his Imago song but just gets buffeted for his efforts. Four Imago land by the chalk and Spoon summons up an Ash Goliath which beats them around a bit. Then one of the Imago hits the other and it falls over. Lord Sven gets a good shot in and the snipers hit them with heat cutters and they burst into flame, three of them dead.

In the air One Shot hits the leader with an enormous lightning strike but it shrugs it off. One Shot and Lord Sven both get hits on it and all the Imago disappear. One swoops in to buffet Spoon and Waffle takes another nasty blow, forcing One Shot to Land. Lord Sven works out where the invisible leader is and hits it again, so it charges him, wounding him and knocking his weapon away. Spoon then casts Detonate Limb, the undead Imago explodes showering bony debris around and its remaining squadron go up in puffs of ash. Spoon's left arm has gone, neatly removed just below the shoulder and he is unconscious. But Bravo City has prevailed and the wounded are taken to the infirmary. One Shot takes off his badge and dubs Spoon "One Shot" and decides to go by his birth name Garfax. Lord Sven reveals that his true name is Amethyst, Sven just means second born, and he is known by some other houses as Lord Smirk.

It is clear that Spoon is not going to wake up and when a delegation from Delta City arrives, the mage says that his soul is adrift in the slip. If they want to find him, they'll need to get to a place where the veil is thin. Spoon is recommended for a decoration and receives the Order of the Purple Imago. Lord Amethyst's house receives more glory and everyone is rewarded. A peace is ordered by the Imperial envoy between Fort Bump and Bravo City as both had been eyeing each other as possible conquests.

In the meantime, Spoon's ghostly dog is whining and pointing to the East and it is noticed that Prince Emelius has taken Imago form and flown off with a woman on his back.