As we pick back up on Station 472, the crew has a few things to take care of during shore leave.
Shore Leave
Billy Ray gets smashed in Hotel Artemis to make it through his, uh, social engagement with Audrina, the massively powerful and intimidating medical supplies vendor. The Hotel is pretty low-rent (literally, as they have an hourly rate). He also moonlights briefly for Dave, heading out to the abandoned strip mines to escort a passenger being dropped off there. On the way back, a couple of snipers ambush them. Billy Ray manages to protect his principal although he isn’t able to determine the identity of the attackers. Once he delivers the new arrival, he gets the sense that they resemble José Baker (the missing artist from Session 1).
Dr. Wilson completes his analysis of the special delivery they completed from Bicycle Day Corporation to Dave’s Ol’ Timey Meat Emporium. The cargo consisted of “bricks” of human tissues with unusually high-consistency DNA. He runs to the bathroom and pukes, certain he will never eat on the station again. He speculates a bit about what the flesh is for, thinking it may be artificially grown human meat for consumption on the station.
BR3ND4 visits the local chop shop, which is staffed by mysterious clones (all of whom share the same fantastic musculature and facial scar). The clinic itself is located in an especially shady-looking area deep within the station, but inside the light is glaringly bright with lots of sea green walls with white accents. She decides not to get any expensive enhancements, but does choose to get the broken portions of her chassis replaced with transparent material. ((No wonder everybody has disadvantage on Fear saves around this creepy android!)) She also provides a copy of her video and audio recordings to Dave for 4k credits.
Looking Ahead
Dave offers them a contract: information on a derelict ship. He just wants one specific piece of cargo, a specialized medical scanner. Everything else on the ship can go to them, and according to his information there’s enough salvage there to make a significant dent in their debts.
The crew also met Nina, an aging, once-beautiful entertainer who runs a shabby nightclub. She claimed her club was once the hottest spot in the outer rim, “where the beautiful people came to see and be seen”. The crew asks her about rumors that she runs a smuggling operation (because they’re interested in weapons); she offers to hire them as security for a social gathering coming up soon. Proving their trustworthiness for this would lead to additional work in the future.
Once the crew regroups on the ship, they take off – having not accepted any work and saying they never want to come back to this icky place. They set course back to ALCOR Station to look for new contracts – or perhaps try to track down some salvage jobs, which could turn into their bread and butter.
We also talked a bit about remote monitoring of the crew’s vital signs. For BR3ND4, this is straightforward as long as both are in nearby range. And for Billy Ray, at least when he’s wearing his Advanced Battle Dress, telemetry should also flow back to the ship. For the ship’s pilot and general engineer, Aeris, we don’t have an answer yet. This is something to consider in the future.
Technoskald's Forge 